How to Create a Profile Video for Your Personal Brand
As you build your personal brand, creating a video content for your profile is a must. There is a growing trend in filming personal profile videos to draw the eyeballs of recruiters, employers, investors and customers.
Video marketing is no longer limited to corporate branding for business owners or professional marketers, but also for personal brands.
The power of video marketing for marketers
“The average internet user spends 88% more time on a website with video than without.” — Brainshark.com
“Nearly 75% of all Internet traffic in 2017 will be video.” — BrainShark.com
Now, more than ever, marketers are recognizing that content should be at the core of their marketing campaigns, and the videos should be the center of that. Based on a social media marketing industry report, on the over 5,000 marketers surveyed, “60% of marketers use video in their marketing and 73% plan on increasing their use of video” (Stelzner 2017). In the Animoto survey more than 2,000 subjects composed of professional marketers and small and medium-sized business owners reported that more than 75% of the subjects who have used video marketing said that “it has had a direct impact on their business” (O’Neil 2017). Currently, there is not yet a wide-spread use of video marketing for personal brands, which means you can reap more benefits as the first ones utilizing this tool.
What is a profile video for personal branding?
A profile video is a short video with a duration of 1 to 2 minutes that gives an overview of your personal brand. It introduces who you are, what you do, the audience you’re targeting, and how you can add value to their organization. Your objective is to be able to create a profile for your brand within this brief time. It is typically the first video your audience sees on your website, so create a quality video to have the best first impression. The most important thing to remember is that the content that you give out and how you put it out — the medium, the language, etc. — must be relevant to the target audience.
Here are 7 steps on how to create a video profile for your personal brand:
1. Clarify your personal brand and target audience.
Remember you are introducing yourself and your brand. Hence, clarity is key. Avoid any confusion and make sure to communicate your brand positioning clearly. Identifying your core audience is equally important; it helps you streamline the message that you will deliver in your video. Compared to the mass media marketing wherein marketers tend to target as many as they possibly could, this time, you aim what you communicate to the people who matter to your brand. Know your audience — what language do they use? How do they communicate? This way you can develop your video, or any communication material relevant and engaging to your target market.
2. Write what you want to say.
It will help you organize your thoughts and what you need or want to say in your video if you write it down. Develop a script. Writing it down will also help you identify the talking points that you need to emphasize in your video and ensures that you don’t miss anything important. Try to also picture how you can bring home the message to your target audience. The best way to reach your audience emotionally is to tell a powerful story. Tell a story complete with a hero, a beginning, a problem, a solution, a climax and an ending. If you can, develop a story board. This way, you can direct the flow of the content and will efficiently help manage the production.
3. Pick 3 filming locations to start.
Changing locations is a great way to show your story, instead of telling it, and keep the visuals interesting. To start, find three locations to choose from and divide your script so you can shoot parts of it in different areas. You can plot this down when you do your storyboard (refer to previous point). Do you need an indoor or outdoor venue? Keep in mind that the lighting in vital. Make sure your selected venues are well lighted. You don’t want to look like a silhouette in your video. If you are very organized, and the 3 locations are close by, then the filming could be done in half a day.
4. Be creative with Powerpoint and animation.
Some people are uncomfortable being on camera. There are others way to tell your story without your face being in the video. The simplest form of video is a Powerpoint presentation with voice over. You can use free programs such as Quicktime to record your screen and talk over your Powerpoint. Alternatively, you can hire an animator to draw your story and voice actors to read the script. So even if you are shy, you can still create a kickass video.
5. Hire video production professionals.
You do not need a full production team for the shoot if you don’t have the budget, you can opt to just get the key people. The videographer is one. Hire someone who can help you record and capture your video. You do not want to distract your audience with a poorly recorded video. A competent videographer will plan ahead to ensure the lighting and audio needs are met to create the best quality footage.
6. Editing is essential.
A video editor is also one of the key people you would want to hire. The editor can also add effects to your video should you need it. Most probably the first draft of the video would probably be over the two minutes target. Your editor can trim it down to help make your video brief and straightforward. Make sure to ask them to produce the final video in different formats suitable for Youtube, Facebook, Instagram etc. If you prefer to do it yourself, then you can learn to use a simple program such as IMovie or Windows Movie Maker to edit basic footage, however I recommend enlisting the help from professionals so you can free up your time to focus on where you best deliver value.
7. Upload your video to a variety of platforms online.
The whole point of this is to spread the word about you and your brand. Publish your video profile on your website. Video profiles are usually found on the “Home” page and/or on the “About” page. Utilize social media channels to ensure that you spread the word out there. With your video profile uploaded on all your social media platforms, you can now direct all the traffic to your website. In addition, I recommend uploading your video to various video platforms such as Youtube, Vimeo, Dailymotion, Metacafe etc. Make sure you fill out your profile, social media links and the video description section on each of these platforms.
Are you ready to get started with your profile video? Do you already have a video for your personal brand? Let us know in the comments below.
Sources
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Originally published at kaitlinzhang.com on August 1, 2017.
Kaitlin Zhang an award-winning personal branding consultant, helping entrepreneurs, executives and celebrities manage their online reputation. Kaitlin founded Oval Branding in 2016 serving corporate and personal clients in the USA, UK, Canada and China. Follow her blog to learn more about personal branding, corporate branding, digital marketing and reputation management.
