So your team has decided to make video content part of your upcoming marketing push. You have established your target group, scoped the budget and are ready to contact a
pr-firm/production company and commission a video. But where do you go from here?
In this blog post I will guide you through the essentials of commissioning a video and how to start on the right foot.
3 IMPORTANT QUESTIONS

The How
First and foremost making video content is a time consuming and elaborate process. In this day and age where consuming high definition videos is part of day-to-day life on social media, most people think creating video content is a walk in the park.
But in reality, creating video on a professional level involves a wide array of actors, from the pre-production creatives to the on set crew and post production team.
For reference, a fully decked out production team could involve up to 30 people and that's only referring to the people behind the camera on set.
So keeping this in mind when making a content marketing budget is essential to create the right conditions for a successful marketing campaign. As high end content isn't necessarily what suits your brand's marketing needs or your budget constraints.
Being ambitious is great, but the scale of ambition has to be backed by the resources and knowledge necessary to match it. Luckily everything in video content creation is scalable and the production costs can be tailor made to fit the project. Therefore it's always a good first step to discuss your budget with the video producer.
Involving the producer as early in the creative marketing process as possible is crucial to create the conditions for great visual content. As the producer can contribute their expertise in making the marketing vision as cost effective as possible, and at the same time guide you to making the right type of content for the purpose of the campaign.
Once you are in sync with your video producer, you have the right conditions to create video content in which expectations meet reality.

The Why
A common mistake brands often make when commissioning video content is that they don´t narrow down the purpose of the video. The look and feel frequently overshadow use value when envisioning the visual content in a marketing campaign.
And don't get me wrong, an impactful commercial is perfect as a coup de grace to any ambitious marketing strategy. As such it is obviously expensive, and works best as a finisher that has been accompanied by well placed snippets of video content accumulating to the commercial as the grande finale.
The key phrase when commissioning video content should always be strategy of purpose.
As all the visual content creating your brand's identity always should be part of a larger whole. You should view your video marketing strategy as a well crafted story, which at its core contains a neat and enchanting premise: your product or service.
Building on the premise, the story as a whole should have a clear start, midpoint and finish. And when your audience has viewed all of the content in your well crafted plot they should be engaged and committed to not only buy your product, but be left longing to see what the next chapter contains.
Leaving the cheesy corporate-speak story metaphor, what I want to get across is that the flexibility of video content is that it's a blank slate with which you basically could create anything you would imagine. Which in itself is a double edged sword, as the hard part is to utilize such a costly but efficient tool in your marketing.
Having the goal of increasing sales is too vague and often the incorrect way to measure a visual content marketing campaign's success. When it comes to commissioning a video,
you therefore have to know what you want it to achieve.
Is it to educate your audience to instill trust in your service/product? Is it to create a spectacular launch for your premium product, drive sales and outshine your competitors?
Is it to tease something amazing coming in the near future?

The What
Knowing your strategy of purpose means that you are armed with the knowledge to measure the success of your visual content, as you know what you want to achieve with the video.
Congrats now you can get down to the nitty gritty & creative part of the process!
On this page we have listed the most common visual content concepts, and how to use them. They are useful as they are a good starting point when conceptualizing your visual marketing strategy. You should of course always aim for something that is unique, but keep in mind that we are standing on the shoulders of giants and every visual marketing campaign doesn't need to reinvent the wheel.
In our previous blog post we examined the “triangle of visualization” which is a great and simple model we apply when working on visual marketing strategies.
So if you found this useful you should definitely check it out.
OUR GOAL
We at On Nox are starting to promote visual marketing strategies because of our experience working in the industry, as we often get requests without a well thought out plans of action. By providing this resource, we are hoping to entice our partners, customers and new prospects to create more cost effective and sustainable visual marketing strategies.
Read more about how we work with visualization or reach out for a introduction meeting
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