Did you know that video marketing remains a key priority for businesses? Many business owners cited reduced production costs, shorter production times and easier in-house creation as reasons they decided to jump on board. Deciding to start creating your own videos can be daunting, but with a little planning, you can create effective marketing videos for your funeral home.
If you want to produce professional marketing videos, you are going to need to spend a little bit of money. But that doesn’t mean you can’t be selective about where you place those dollars. Here are a few suggestions for getting started without breaking the bank.
Video Marketing EQUIPMENT
The most important investment in your funeral home marketing videos is your equipment. The better the camera, lighting and sound, the more professional your final videos will look.
If your firm offers in-house video recordings for memorial services, you may already have some high-quality equipment that will work well for marketing videos. If not, you may want to consider investing in some additional equipment.
Camera Equipment
If you’re not ready to invest in a high-powered video camera, today’s smartphones and tablets feature great cameras that take high-quality videos. One downside to using a mobile device is that you can be limited by the amount of space available on your device. This issue could be eliminated by using a form of cloud-based storage. Purchasing a small tripod will greatly increase the production value by helping you stabilize your video. Small smartphone tripods are inexpensive and readily available.
Lighting Equipment
The next consideration is lighting. For most of your lighting needs, you can position your video subjects in natural light or a well-lit interior space and achieve a sufficient quality. If you find that your shooting location doesn’t have enough light to produce professional-level videos, you might want to consider spending some additional money on video lights.
Even lighting is essential to creating an eye catching, professional video. A well-lit room on a sunny day is a free way to create great video lighting. Low light will make your video grainy, which in turn will make the production value appear poor. To take advantage of sunlight, always make sure your subject is facing toward the light, not standing in front of it. If you’re filming a video up-close with one person, utilizing a selfie light could instantly add additional light to someone’s face. For casual videos, we use the QIAYA Selfie Light with good results.
If you need to light a darker room, consider investing in a two-system light setup. More intense lighting works better for videos that include multiple people. My personal favorite light set up is a softbox LED lighting kit with a diffuser. These kits are fairly compact and also portable if you decide to film videos in multiple locations. Another type of light system that works well for video is an umbrella light kit, although these lights are a little more harsh than the softbox LED lighting kits.
Audio Equipment
Good quality sound is another hallmark of a great marketing video. The easiest type of microphone to use in a video is a wired lavalier mic. These are the same type of microphones you see used on TV news stations and talk shows. They easily clip to the on-camera talent’s jacket or shirt and pick up their voice.
Other Equipment
To keep your speaker on track, consider downloading a free teleprompter app for your smartphone or tablet. A teleprompter can reduce the stress of the individual who is speaking, and also help establish his or her credibility.
Once you have your raw video, it’s time for production! For Mac users, Apple has a built-in production feature called iMovie, which is easy to use and produces great videos. For those who don’t have Macs, Adobe has a fairly inexpensive program called Premier Rush CC, which currently costs around $10 per month to use.
If you’re looking to create a full video studio atmosphere, Amazon and B & H Photo and Video can provide all of the technology you need. B & H even offers on-hand experts who will listen to your needs and recommend which technology will work best for your funeral home business.
Video Marketing Tips
On-Camera Talent
Your funeral home business is sensitive and personal, and any video you produce will not be successful if it seems inauthentic. Key stakeholders — owners, staff members, customers and community partners — are much better choices for your on-camera talent. In addition to having genuine experiences with and a vested interest in your business, these individuals don’t require additional compensation and often don’t need to be scripted. Here are a few tips to help you select the right on-camera talent for your funeral home's video marketing efforts:
- Think about your personnel. Who on your staff would serve as a good spokesperson for your services? Give them a few bullet points, and let them expand on your value offering.
- Consider your client families. Are there individuals who were especially well served by you and your staff? Invite these individuals to share their stories by asking them open-ended questions about their experience.
- Look at your relationships in the community. Which individuals (florists, caterers, pastors, counselors, etc.) have partnered with your business? Ask them to reflect on why they enjoy working with you.
You often don’t need to look far to find compelling (and inexpensive) brand ambassadors who can promote the value of your services.
VIDEO B-ROLL
If you want to adopt a more sophisticated approach to funeral home marketing videos, you may want to consider capturing extra video to illustrate key points. This additional footage — often referred to as b-roll — can enrich your videos by adding more visual interest and giving you greater flexibility in editing and post-production.
Few of our funeral home partners have a backlog of video they can incorporate into effective and professional marketing videos. Stock photography is much more common. Most funeral home owners have professional photos of their facilities and staff already on-hand, either for their print advertisements or website. These photos can be useful when creating videos — especially when you use them to illustrate your unique value offering.
If you want to create an archive of video footage to use as b-roll, start by making a list of the type of content you want to produce (customer testimonials, staff introductions, facility tours, event announcements, etc.). Then, think about what b-roll would complement the subject matter in many of these videos, and focus the majority of your time and money on those things.
There are a lot of ways to save money on marketing videos through investing strategically in content and equipment that can be used for a variety of videos and incorporating the resources you already have on-hand — local on-camera “talent,” free software platforms and/or still photography.
Deciding what products to use is a very individual process and depends on the skill level and patience of your team. It takes a lot of time and equipment to produce a high-quality video, which is why many of our funeral home customers work with one of Homesteaders’ more than 40 top preneed marketing agency partners. Do you have any favorite marketing video production tools and techniques? Let us know in the comments.