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Brand Positioning Using Web-Video
By Jerry Bader (c) 2007

As Web-video presentations increase in popularity as a means of
delivering marketing messages over the Internet, there will be
the inevitable major successes and unfortunate failures. It is
only a matter of time before Web-video becomes the dominating
vehicle for businesses that are serious about marketing
communication.

The businesses that will be successful will learn how to use the
medium beyond its technical implementation, focusing instead on
the psychological elements that communicate beyond mere surface
meaning.

Multimedia Modeling and Vicarious Observation

Albert Bandura, distinguished psychologist and expert in the
field of social learning theory, points to television commercials
as an important influence on social learning through multimedia
modeling and vicarious observation.

We often forget that like all creatures human beings are subject
to our hardwired instinct for survival, one of the most important
being our ability to learn through vicarious experiences rather
than just direct encounters. We may learn not to touch a hot
stove by putting our hand on a hot heating element, but it is
far less dangerous to learn the same lesson by watching someone
else do it, even if that observation is simulated as in a
commercial.

Marketing Campaigns Are Learning Experiences

All marketing campaigns are learning experiences for the target
audience in that advertisers are attempting to manipulate viewers'
behavior by vicarious demonstration of brand benefits resulting
from product or service use.

Cost has limited the use of broadcast television commercials to
all but the most deep-pocketed of advertisers, but the broadband
Web and digital technology has changed all that. The means to
produce reasonable-cost Web-video is at hand, witness the
explosion of numerous video sites like YouTube and Google Video,
plus the advent of Web-commercial venues like Google Video Ads.
Unfortunately many businesses cannot see past the proliferation
of uneven quality viral videos that lack any serious commercial
purpose to see the real opportunity that exists.

It is inevitable that a period of DIY (do it yourselfers) will
ensue, as businesses that don't understand the medium will try
to implement video campaigns without taking the time to learn
that mastering the technical use of software and hardware is not
what makes vicarious-experience video-observation work.

The Four Communication Elements of Web-Commercials

If businesses are to be successful in getting people to do
what they want them to do through the implementation of
Web-commercials, they will need to learn that success ultimately
depends on an understanding of the psychological influences
behind the four communication elements that constitute effective
Web-presentations: scenario, sight, sound, and score.

Scenario: The Brand Story

Every business has a brand story to tell, but often that story
gets lost in the minutiae of product specifications, service
details, and self-congratulating biz-speak. There is no point in
spending time telling your audience that you have the highest
quality, lowest price and best staff. Nobody cares, and if they
do care, few will believe you, and if they do believe you, your
competitor is saying the same thing. Have you presented anything
that defines you, makes you different, or provides something
memorable?

People remember stories, linear narratives that are constructed
with a beginning, middle and end. This enables an audience to
process the information and retain the essence of the message
for future reference. In developing your brand story, less is
always more. It's your brand story that creates the position you
will hold in your audience's mind.

Sight: Visual Context and Reference

A moving picture conveys a depth of information that cannot
be delivered with text, no matter how clever, or with a still
image, no matter how skillfully composed: the nod of the head,
the folding of the arms, the look in the eye, in fact, every
subtle movement of the presenter communicates something. These
subliminal subtleties make it vital to have a professional
presenter who understands how to act in front of a camera.
Business executives familiar with face to face selling, or even
speaking in front of a large audience may think performing for
the camera is easy, but it is not.

Audiences are experts at decoding video presentations; we have
all learned from years of watching television how to detect
deception and fear in a performance. Acting for a camera
requires what Marshal McLuhan called a 'cool' personality.
Howard Dean's bid for the Democratic Party's Presidential
nomination was disastrously stalled when a speech he gave in
front of a large boisterous audience was captured by television
cameras and broadcast on the small screen. When transferred to
television, his attempt to speak above a thunderous crowd of
supporters made him sound like a wild man, an unfortunate
situation that would make one wonder about the integrity of
network broadcasters who understand the medium and decided to
misrepresent the circumstances for effect. In delivering a
commercial message, it is imperative to have professionals who
understand the psychology of small screen presentation.

Sound: Sonic Familiarity and Personality

If what people see on screen is important than what they hear is
profound. The audio portion of a Web-presentation can be broken
down into three separate elements: the on-screen actor's voice,
the voice-over announcer's voice, and the music and sound
effects.

The sound of the human voice provides focus, emphasis,
familiarity and personality, all of which are necessary in the
creation of a meaningful, memorable experience: the ultimate
goal of any Web-commercial or presentation.

As much as the business focus of advertising is to motivate
people to act immediately to buy, you are bound to have more
people view your presentation than will respond to it. If your
message is constructed only for immediacy, you are losing the
vast majority of potential customers. The more memorable you
make your presentation the more likely people will ultimately
contact you when they are in need of your product or service.

It is the sound of the human voice with its quality of tone,
cadence and delivery, combined with a finely crafted script that
emphasizes rhythm, rhyme, and repetition that gets embedded in
people's minds.

Score: Music, Emotion and Focus

One of the most important, but perpetually misused elements in
Web-video is music. Often music is just slapped onto a finished
video as an after-thought without any real meaningful purpose or
design.

A musical score creates an appropriate emotional atmosphere
providing audio cues that direct attention and re-enforce memory
recall. When we watch a television show, movie or commercial we
are rarely cognizant of the music, but the musical score has an
enormous impact on the viewing experience: it not only creates
the mood and sets the emotional context, it tells the audience
what to pay attention to and how to react.

An Example of How it Works

The best way to understand how scenario, sight, sound, and score
affect an audience's experience, memory and reaction to a
Web-video is with an example. To illustrate the importance of
these elements we've taken a video and presented it in three
ways: video only (no sound), video with voice-over (no musical
score), and video with voice-over and musical score. This
example can be viewed at:

http://www.mrpwebmedia.com/SonicPersonality/demowebvideo.html

Watching the three versions illustrates just how important each
element is and how each contributes to the memorable experience
you as an advertiser want to create.
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Jerry Bader is Senior Partner at MRPwebmedia, a website design
firm that specializes in Web-audio and Web-video. Visit
http://www.mrpwebmedia.com/ads, http://www.136words.com, and
http://www.sonicpersonality.com. Contact at info@mrpwebmedia.com
or telephone (905) 764-1246.
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