Welcome to Nate's Take! Today I'm gonna show you how to make a promotional video. I'm gonna
show you how to make your promotional videos better, way better.
Now I'm gonna share a magic formula with three ingredients. It's real simple, but if you
follow this magic formula, it'll definitely make your videos a LOT better.
Number 1, A-roll. Number 2, B-roll. And Number 3, music.
Now last year, I put on an even to help my clients create promotional videos and so in
the promo video for THAT event, I explained the difference between A-roll and B-roll and
music very, very well. So let me show you a clip from that video.
When creating a video, we usually have two or more video tracks. The main track that
has the audio is the A-track or the A-roll and the video track that we see here above
is the B-roll. Let me show you an example.
In this video, we used two tracks. The interview is the A-roll and the footage of her speaking
on stage is the B-roll.
"So my purpose really is to inspire learning and leadership development in other people.
I find that it's really important for someone to be able to identify what their own purpose
in life is. It's really more than just setting goals. It's really about trying to identify
why you're here, you know. What is it that you wanna do? What legacy do you wanna leave
behind? And that really needs to be identified in one's own purpose, vision and mission statement.
See how it switches back and forth? This makes the video much better!
"The value that I bring to my clients is that they're able to communicate more effectively
with each other. They're able to have more engagement with each other while they're..."
Now that you know the difference between A-roll and B-roll, why they're both important, let's
talk about what is good to use as A-roll or as that main content for your video. You can
write up a presentation. I mean, you can give a presentation on camera. You typically do
that in a, in a promotional video. Some type of presentation.
But there's some other things that you can do as well. I found that interview works really, really well.
Now, in interview, you do not look at the camera! When someone is interviewing you,
you know, you're looking off to the side. You're looking in their eyes. So it's really
hard to do this if you're not really looking at somebody. In fact, I recommend always having
somebody that you're talking to, so that when you think naturally, you're just gonna always
go back to their eyes, okay?
So, interview can work really, really well. Do NOT have your interview scripted! If you,
if you sound scripted in an interview, it just comes off the wrong way. Interviews are
conversational and so you have to have a conversation. You know, I recommend filming for 15 minutes
of an interview so that you can wiggle that down to a 2 or 3-minute A-roll for your marketing
video, your promo video, okay?
Something that works REALLY well for A-rolls is testimonials. If you have an event that
you're putting on, and you've got a lot of your clients there, get testimonials from
them towards the end of that event so that they can talk about the transformation that
they experienced. I got a whole other video that I've made about how to get good testimonials.
Testimonials are one of my favorite forms of A-roll.
So now let's talk about why B-roll. Why is B-roll so important to put in your promotional
videos? Well, there's a whole bunch of reasons.
One is credibility. It adds a whole bunch of credibility to your videos. So if you've
got A-roll testimonials or you're being interviewed or there's some type of presentation, having
it switched over so they're still listening to you, but now they're looking at you speaking
on the stage, they're seeing you in action, it just adds a whole other level of credibility
even if you're not typically giving them keynotes speaking presentations.
Let's say you're a coach, okay? You're a coach, you work one on one with people or you work
over the phone, but they're watching a video of you and they see you speaking on the stage
as they're learning about your coaching business, it... they just think 'Wow, this person is
an expert!'. Does that make sense? So it adds a whole 'nother, another level of credibility.
The other thing that B-roll does is it keeps people's attention. Instead of having them
watch the same type of shot the whole time, you know, whether it's... testimonials mix
it up because you got a lot of different people, but instead of just looking at that person
the whole time, it allows their, their eyes to look at something else.
Switching back and forth from A-roll to B-roll to A-roll to B-roll to a different B-roll,
back to A-roll... it really keeps people's attention. Next time you're watching a television
show or a movie, see how often the camera shifts around. It's always jumping around.
It will spend here 1, 2 seconds then it'll shift 1, 2, 3 seconds then it'll shift.
We've got... our brains have gotten accustomed to that. We need to have things change to
keep our attention in these videos. And B-roll footage really does that.
Okay, another great aspect of B-roll is it can really increase the comprehension of the
things that you're saying. So you're talking about something in the video or somebody said
something in a testimonial, and then they see it, does that make sense? It adds a whole
'nother level of comprehension.
If you just say it, people will, will remember it and understand it to a certain extent,
but if you say it AND they see it, and then they make that connection, it... it takes
them to that whole new level.
I'm gonna wrap up this part by just talking about the professionalism of the video again
and what B-roll does to a video. I mean, just think about a video that you've seen that
doesn't have B-roll, and then a video that you've seen that does switch it back and forth
between A-roll and B-roll. It's just night and day how much better it is and yet, if
you do it right, it doesn't have to be that much more work. But it will be leaps and bounds
better than, than otherwise.
Okay, you probably trust me that music is important in a promotional video, but let's
just talk about the reasons why. We want to connect with people EMOTIONALLY, you know,
especially when we're in sales or promotional type situation. We want them to not just make
decisions logically by giving them the facts, but we want to pull their heartstrings so
that they can connect and make that decision emotionally as well. They may need it but
they won't buy it unless they really want it. Does that make sense?
So, music can really help them connect emotionally much quicker! And, and have it be felt a lot
stronger, okay?
So, I always pick my A-roll. Now the content and I have that filmed and usually my B-roll
will have all of that filmed first before I select the music... because I wanna find
something that matches... that matches the tone of the message. I wanna hear it together
and I'll, I'll explain how I select that music. I'll show that in a bit.
One other thing to mention though is we're not talking about SONGS, you know, where there's
lyrics because the, the words to, you know, those songs are gonna distract from the words
that you're saying or, or there's testimonials or whatever type of presentation, right? It's
gonna distract from the message. And that's not what we're going for.
We don't want cool music that somebody's gonna recognize the song and start singing along
and not pay attention to you. We want subtle background music that's really going to enhance
the message and it's gonna pull people into help them focus on that message even more.
Does that make sense?
Alright, I wanna conclude this video with one more example. And this example uses testimonials
as the A-roll and pay attention to the music, to the B-roll that we're using there, and how it all mixes together.
"I think wherever you are in your business, to come hear what Entrepreneur Simplified
is all about is a good choice. Something that will at least get the wheels turning in your
brain of how you can be better and improve, and will hopefully take your business further."
"I will continue to come back and I wanna recommend this to anyone who's interested
in increasing their business."
"Whether you're building your own or you're building a team or hiring people, it's awesome
awesome experience."
So now you have the secret formula... it's not so secret, but the MAGIC formula for making
promo videos that are a LOT better! So I would LOVE to see YOUR promo videos. In the comments
below, share them and I'll let you know what I think!
I'm also gonna give you one more tip. My favorite resource for royalty-free background music
for these videos is Pond5.com. I'll put a link under the screen here and I'll also share
them in the description.
But the reason I like Pond5.com, one, it's real simple. It's really affordable. There's
thousands of options and one it's, also it's fully functional. So, what I usually do is
I'll have the audio playing from my A-roll, you know, whatever the message is, I'll just
have that playing so I can hear it. And then when I'm on the Pond5 website, it will display
all the different options in a grid on the screen and I can just hover over one with
my mouse. It instantly plays. So as I'm listening to the A-roll, i'll just hear 'Ooh, how does
that one sound with it? How does that one sound? How does that one sound? How does that
one sound?'. And I can just go through because I wanna find something that matches the tone
of the message and it matches the emotion that I really want to convey in the video.
So that's why I love it. Hope you find that, that resource helpful!