Movidiam’s how-to guide to getting that video brief right

What is the purpose of the video?

Ask yourself why are you creating the video. If you can’t answer this in a couple of sentences then you probably shouldn’t be making it. Make sure that the person leading the project understands this and is going to be the point of contact throughout the entire project to maintain continuity and ownership. You’d be surprised at the number of times someone changes jobs or leaves the business during the process and projects get sidelined.

What problems will it solve?

Think about how your product or service is different from the competition. What are the USP’s and make sure to bring these to the forefront and communicate them in the simplest way?

Who is your target market?

With the amount of data available today it’s easier than ever to segment who your customer is. Build a persona around who these key customers are. For example, Steve, 35 lives in London, works as a sales director, supports West Ham football club, buys two TVs a year and likes Betfair and Ladbrokes on Facebook.

If you are a betting company and creating a commercial, base your brief with this persona in mind. With the cost of video production considerably lower than it was six years ago, consider the possibility of creating multiple versions of the advert for multiple personas. Companies like KFC do this extremely well where they shoot the same commercial ‘shot for shot’ with ten different families and then distribute the content directly to these audiences.

What is your message?

Attention spans are shorter than ever and with a saturation of digital content people can only take in one or two messages. If they only take one thing from the video make sure that it is both memorable and important.

What style of video do you want to create?

There are a thousand ways of telling a story and the same is true of video styles and creative directions. Starting with a couple of reference videos is often a good place to start and can be used as a basis for initial conversation about what you think works well. It’s important to decide early on if you want to create an animation, live action, 3D character based animation, live action with motion graphics etc. This will determine the cost and align the expectations as to what is achievable between the client and production partner.

What is the creative concept?

There is no point in creating anything if the creative is not correct. You can spot this type of work right away. It might look good but the audience is left thinking what was that and what were they trying to say. Before going anywhere near the cameras or the animation station make sure that this is locked down and tested. We always recommend creating a storyboard or animation with voice over and music to produce a feel. This can be really simple or to get a really good understanding before investing further use a company like Animatic Media. Make sure that you test the creative paths with a number of your target market to make sure it’s working.

What is your budget?

How much does a commercial, video or animation cost? It’s the number one question asked by the client side of Movidiam. It’s also one of the most difficult to answer. There are so many factors involved in creating a video that determines how much they cost. These can be based on the complexity of the project to the experience and quality of the team, the number of people involved, the expectations of the client, the amount of spend behind distribution, the number of actors involved in the number of 3D characters created and the amount of rendering required.

What is the timeframe?

We live in an immediate world where everyone wants things done quickly. We once took a brief from Costa Coffee and completed a commercial within 48 hours of receiving the brief but aim for something that is realistic; too short and quality is comprised. Too long and there is often not enough focus or momentum, things typically drag and people loose interest.

How long do you want the video?

Less is more unless you are creating an HBO Game of Thrones style epic. If you are making a commercial or animation keep it short. The tendency is to want to create more and longer, but based on analytical viewing metrics, most videos have a high drop-off rate post 15 seconds.

Where is this going to be distributed and what you want your audience to do after viewing?

Focusing back on the purpose of creating the video, you’ll want to maximize your return on investment. Are you wanting views to increase brand awareness, downloads of an app, click through to view products, share, call or purchase directly from your site? Also about where this will be seen and also what devices and languages.

Alex Vero is the co-founder of Movidiam, a professional global network, marketplace and project management platform for the creative industries.