Online-Video Workshop for Marketers

Warning: Blog post contains blatant self promotion. 🙂

I’ve been frustrated by the lack of understanding among marketers and advertising agencies about how to capitalize on online/viral video. Most viral-video marketing campaigns are born to fail — with heavy production costs, overtly promotional content, and view counts that are embarrassing. Rather than stew and rant, I’ve decided to offer a solution.

Although it won’t make WifeofNalts very happy, I’m conducting private half-day workshops for marketers on how to harness the power of online video. I’m a Product Director (by day) and have done my fair share of public speaking and have conducted countless training programs and workshops. More importantly, I think I’m one of very few career marketers that actively participate in online video on a daily basis (as a creator, blogger, and media spokesperson).

Topics covered:

1. Why should your brand focus on online video? Most interactive agencies have built you a great site, and have invested in paid search and display ads. But that’s missing a huge opportunity in the rapidly expanding online video arena.
2. What are the best and worst practices? There are so many examples of success and failures in online video. We’ll pick case studies that best address your company. These include produced viral advertisements, partnerships with creators, video contests, and other promotions.
3. Online Video Myths. If I make a killer video, it will find an audience. Contests work for brands, so I’d better try one. People will watch my brand videos, and click to my site and buy. These are some examples of various myths we’ll dispel.
4. Where do we start? The key to this workshop is not education, but identification of specific pilots and tactics that can be deployed immediately. Opportunities will be reviewed based on three criteria: a) Impact, b) Ease of implementation, c) Appropriateness for your brand.
5. Questions and Answers. Here’s where we roll up our sleeves and dig into specific programs you’ve tried (successfully or not) and are considering. This is more consultative in nature and works better in smaller groups. Attendees will be asked to bring example of past attempts and future plans for online video, and we’ll assess them constructively and hone future ones.

For details on my qualifications and cost, please select “more” below.

My qualifications are listed in the “about Nalts” section, but here are the key points.

• I am authoring “The Profit of Online Video,” a book that shows marketers and creators how to leverage online video to advance their brands and careers. I have been featured on numerous television stations such as CBS, Fox, ABC, CNN and The Wall Street Journal Online.
• I am a career marketer with an MBA and 5 years experience at Johnson & Johnson, where I focused on “new media.” In that capacity I identified emerging digital opportunities and worked with brands to harnass them.
• As a Product Director of a major brand, my intended audience is peers. So I understand your limitations (corporate “taste and tone” police, budget, time) and how to overcome them. I also believe there’s a happy middle ground between promotion and entertainment, and have created numerous videos that achieve that balance.  Examples: Mentos, GPSManiac, XLNTads, DoMyStuff.
• I am one of the more prolific creators of online-video content (man that sounded pompous) with more than 400 comedic shorts (okay some aren’t exactly funny). A handful of these have “gone viral” with views ranging from 100K to nearly 4 million per video. My collection of online videos have been viewed in aggregate by more than 10 million individuals. So this workshop isn’t theoretical BS, and it won’t be boring.
• As a former KPMG Consultant and Strategist at a Digital Agency, I have led countless workshops and have spoken at numerous conferences. Your audience will be engaged.

The private workshop cost $5,000. There is no variable cost based on attendees, and this fee includes two conference-call preparation sessions. These are one hour each: The first call is to understand your goals, challenges (organizationally) and desired scope. The second is to review a proposed agenda and slide decks. If your speaking engagement is in NYC or a public event (conference), I can reduce the fee.

This isn’t a one-hour “dump and run” presentation. It’s a training workshop that will leave marketers with the ability to judge, conceive and launch better (and often less expensive) online-video campaigns with their agencies and video creators.

• More knowledgeable marketers (many of whom spend hundreds of grand on viral video doing it poorly, so if this workshop can make their efforts just 10 percent more effective, it’s a worthwhile investment.
• Insights on past pilots and improving those in consideration.
• Methods to improve the viral potential of a video at far less of a cost to the brand.
• Actionable strategies and tactics to launch better content, get it viewed more broadly, and have it embraced as entertainment not perverse self promotion.

Note: I’m a full-time marketer in the pharmaceutical industry, so I cannot speak to pharmaceutical brands or agencies that represent them (as this would be an obvious conflict of interest). I also cannot speak to proprietary experiences I’ve had in my day jobs. I do need advance notice to arrange to take vacation time.

To contact me, please use kevinnalts @ gmail com with the subject header “SPEAKING.” If I do not reply with 24 hours please don’t hesitate to send a second message (as my e-mail is packed with junk)!

Cheers, Nalts