[youtube]https://youtu.be/7xX_KaStFT8[/youtube]
No matter your opinion about Donald Trump and the controversies surrounding him, business leaders can learn the following eight video production lessons from the short video he released about his transition into The White House.
- Use video. Video is one of the most personal forms of communication. Unlike an email full of text, video relays a person’s personality, allowing business leaders to more effectively relay their key messages to target audiences. Caution: This approach will generally backfire if business leaders display poor or distracting body language or struggle to read a teleprompter.
- Speak with passion. President-elect Trump spoke with passion. Communicating through video often will fail if business leaders speak as if they missed their afternoon naps. Executives who excel at making money sometimes struggle with appearing natural on camera. If this is the case, find someone else to deliver the messages.
- Provide simple headlines. Generally, Trump focused on some of the same messages he hammered away at during his campaign. The political analysts and Americans at their dining room tables will debate if he avoided his most contentious positions. This is an important debate because business leaders who avoid their audiences’ most glaring questions risk losing credibility. However, Trump kept things simple, which also has its advantages. Videos are more for providing headlines than sharing an encyclopedia worth of words.
- Include more visuals. Keeping someone on camera during an entire video normally risks lulling an audience to sleep. If business leaders are compelling and fascinating figures, you might be able to get away with keeping the key figure on camera the entire time. However, it’s usually best to include visuals to support what someone is saying to help keep everyone’s attention.
- Include graphics. The video includes simple graphics to reinforce his messages. Caution: Wordsmiths too often try to bloat graphics with a flood of words, crowding a screen. Graphics should reinforce the message, not include the entire message.
- Include a link. The description under Trump’s YouTube video does not include a link where viewers can receive additional information about his messages. Because videos often deliver only headlines, adding a link in the description helps viewers try to ascertain additional details.
- Keep it short. Unlike many others, we don’t believe all effective videos must be short. Check out YouTube and you’ll realize trending videos are frequently very long. However, because Trump’s target audience for this video is so vast, keeping it short makes sense.
- Offer updates. The president-elect offered future updates. More businesses should view a video as more than an isolated, one-time project. They should view video as the first installment in a series of important messages. One of the best ways to build a loyal audience is to create the expectation that more is to come. So stay tuned!