Visual Post, LLC

This weeks co-host is Nick Brown, Community Manager at Astonish Results.

Connect with Nick on Twitter: @InsuranceMHQ

Visit Nick’s blog: http://www.insurancemarketinghq.com/

Nick’s Picks

• @AstonishResults
• @astonish_alicia
• Check out We Follow’s Insurance Directory http://wefollow.com/twitter/insurance

Pat’s Picks

• @Wistia – Love this company and their online video plateform
• @TheModernCPA – Mike has been sharing a ton of great content. A must follow for anyone looking for tax tips, accounting advice, and money management.
• Southern New England Media Makers #snemm Come by this months meeting of the Southern New England Media Makers on August 15th at 10am hosted by @BruceKGarber and @MediaDisconnect

I’m starting a new Web Video Tips Newsletter. It’s a bi-monthly newsletter filled with web video tips, articles, and strategies. I’m sharing all of my secrets! I’ll be sending out my first newsletter soon so be sure to subscribe now.

• Click here to subscribe to my Web Video Tips Newsletter

Above is s TV commercial Visual Post produced for the Brederson Law Center. It was then translated in Spanish for use on Telemundo.

Interested in producing a TV commercial for your business? Give Patrick Hughes, Production Director at Visual Post a call today. 401-312-3409

For small businesses having a video produced can be a expensive and nerve racking experience. It’s important that you work with a company that you are comfortable with. Do your homework and research the companies you might want to work with. Here are a few tips when researching companies.

Call up your potential video production company and ask them questions.
Here are a list of starter questions to ask:

• How many years have you been in the video production business?
• What types of video productions do you produce?
• Are you insured?

From my personal experience I love it when potential clients contact me about working together. I want to make them comfortable and reassure them. So come up with your own questions and ask away!

The next step is to setup a meeting with the video production companies. This is a great way to get to know who you’ll be dealing with.

By the way if your interested to know how I would answer the questions above here are my answers.

• How many years have you been in the video production business?
Visual Post has been in the video production business for three years.

• What types of video productions do you produce?
At Visual Post we produce videos for all different types of mediums – web, television, presentations and other formats. Specific types of productions we have produced in the past are TV commercials, sales video, corporate video productions for conferences, introductory web video, and many more.

• Are you insured?
Visual Post is fully insured by EMC Insurance.

Do you have more questions for me? Feel free to give me a call 401-312-3409. I would be happy to answer all your questions.

Patrick Hughes
Co-Founder & Production Director at Visual Post, LLC

P.S. Are you interested in learning more about the TV commercial production process? Check out my TV Commercial Guide, it’s filled with great tips on how to produce your first TV commercial.

Co-host this week: Suzanne McDonald

Connect with Suzanne on Twitter @Sue_DesigEditor

Check out her website:  http://www.designatededitor.com

Suzanne’s Picks

• @americascupNPT
• @regattadesigns
• @12MeterCharters
• @USSailing
• @carloverkat
• @iheartrhody

Check these events Suzanne is hosting:

Providence Wordpress Meetup July 27th 6pm at McFaddens

For more information visit http://wordpressprovidence.com/

Newport Interactive Marketers Event July 29th at 6pm at Pop on Broadway  (Newport RI)

For more information visit http://newportinteractivemarketers3.eventbrite.com/

Patrick’s Picks

• @oldspice
• @mktingmo
• @snemm

Southern New England Media Makers #snemm Come by this months meeting of the Southern New England Media Makers on July 18th at 10am hosted by @BruceKGarber and @MediaDisconnect

Co-host this week: Lou Perseghin

Connect with Lou on Twitter @louperseghin

Check out Lou’s Yelp Profile http://loup.yelp.com

Lou’s Picks

Victoria K.
@missionfood
Great homemade recipes with photos to document the process. Conversational style. She graduated from Johnson and Wales recently and is interning at the Food Network.

Mc Slim Jb
@mcslimjb
Mysterious Boston area Yelper and food critic. Great reviews and links, for a lot of high brow places, but he also writes the On The Cheap column for the Boston Phoenix.

Yelp Boston
@yelpboston
Lots of Boston area news and events. Run by the Boston Community Manager Leighann, who’s always out at new places.

Drew Lazor
@drewlazor
Food editor for the Philadelphia Citypaper. Great style, lots of pop culture and sports references, and photos. Also runs the @mealticket blog for the CP.

Patrick’s Picks

Andy Ihnatko

@ihnatko – Andy Ihnatko is a “Chicago Sun-Times’ tech columnist, a host of the MacBreak Weekly podcast, Macworld back-page columnist, occasional TV guy” visit his web site http://ihnatko.com and be sure to read his epic iPhone 4 review here

Landing Strip Web Show

What is it? A web show dedicated to reviewing awesome and awful landing pages on the internet!

Who host’s the Landing Strip Web Show? The beautiful and talented Amanda MacArthur (@amaaanda) and Patrick Hughes(@eastofprov)!

Where can I watch the show? I’m glad you asked, visit http://landingstripshow.com.

Can I submit a landing page to be reviewed? Oh course! Submit a page to the Landing Strip here!

Co-Host this week: Matt StottConnect with Matt on Twitter @totalsilence
Check out his website GrowthArt.com
View Matt’s photographs and design projects on his Flickr account

Matt’s Picks

• @rocknwrap - Rock and Wrap It Up! is a national think tank working to reduce poverty. Check out their website http://www.rockandwrapitup.org/

• @ashleyhillis - Check out Ashley’s Tattoo Documentary she got funded on Kickstarter

• @rcrdlbl - new music daily http://rcrdlbl.com/

• @ICAinBOSTON -  http://www.icaboston.org/

• @shaycarl – Matt’s doppelganger http://www.youtube.com/shaycarl

Patrick’s Picks

• @podcampboston For more information visit http://podcampboston.org/

• Suzanne McDonald @sue_DesigEditor – She is hosting the Newport Interactive Marketers tweetup and networking event on July 29 at Pop on Broadway. Check out the event page for more details. She is also lending a social media hand to the America’s Cup Newport Rhode Island events so check out @AmericasCupNPT for more details.

• Please follow and support the Providence Improv Fest June 23-27 Website: http://providenceimprovfest.com/ Follow them on twitter @PVDImprovFest

Production Notes

Shot on a Canon 5D MKII

35mm Nikkor lens

On-board camera audio  (really quick setup)

NOTE! You might want to watch this video in full screen mode.
Here are three takeaways from the Quick & Dirty Video SEO Tips video.

1. Use the keywords your targeting within the title of your video. In the example video the target keywords were web video services. For the title I used “Visual Post’s Web Video Services“.

2. Make sure you add a link to your web site in the description in the video. I put my link first and then add a short description to the video. Remember, keep your descriptions simple and short, don’t go over 160 characters.

3. Use your target keywords as the first tag within your video.

Let me know if you enjoyed this video and feel free to ask any questions about video seo.

My co-host this week is Mel DuPont.
Connect with her on twitter @mgdupont
Visit her website http://meldupont.com.

Mel’s Picks

• @BatchBlue – if you’re in Rhode Island check out BatchBlue’s co-working days.
• @Bagelzri - with three locations in South County Rhode Island, open seven days a week, and free wifi! Bagelz an awesome place to co-work. Did I also mention they have bagels?

Patrick’s Picks

• @LouPerseghin – Come by his Unofficial Yelp Event on Saturday June 19th 6pm at McCoy Stadium. For more information visit the official event page here. UYE: Pawsox Baseball and Beer!

• Southern New England Media Makers #snemm Come by this months meeting of the Southern New England Media Makers on June 20th at 10am hosted by @BruceKGarber and @MediaDisconnect

• Please follow and support the Providence Improv Fest June 23-27 Website: http://providenceimprovfest.com/ Follow them on twitter @PVDImprovFest
• Check out Patrick’s blog http://eastofprov.com

Production Notes

Shot on a Canon 5D MKII

35mm Nikkor lens

On-board camera audio  (really quick setup)

Now that you’ve got your businesses web site up, its time to get creative and start posting some web site video content for your visitors.

Like your web pages, your videos need to be hosted. You could host your video files like you do your other web pages—on your own server—however videos use a lot of bandwidth and could put a strain on your server.

A better alternative would be to use one of the popular video-sharing services like YouTube to host the video and then embed the files on your web page. Some video-sharing providers charge for the service but there are quite a few free ones to choose from. Below are four of the ones that companies are using to host web site videos successfully.

1. YouTube

Since they are the site that has become a household name, it’s only fitting that YouTube should at the top of our list. In order to use YouTube, you have to register for an account, and once registered you can upload as many videos as you want. The nice thing about the service is that the interface is very easy to use and upload videos.

YouTube’s video file size is limited to 2 GB and 10 minutes length of time. Youtube also offers great SEO for your video. Google has started placing videos in prime positions on search results so be sure to get your keywords into the title and description.

Here is an example of YouTube’s video player.

2.Yahoo

If you already have a Yahoo account for email or RSS feeds you can automatically start using Yahoo Video, their video hosting service. Yahoo video hosting capacity is minimal with an upload limit of 100 MB.
Here is an example of Yahoo’s video player.

3.Vimeo

If you are a filmmaker or in the video production world, Vimeo is a very popular and professional choice for hosting your web site video. They have an active community that loves to share videos and talk about the equipment they used to get the shot.

Vimeo also supports full 1080p video and has a slicking video player. They offer a Vimeo Plus plan that gets you even higher video quality video, 5GB of uploads per week, faster uploading and advanced video statistics.

Here is an example of Vimeo’s video player.

4.Wistia

Do you want video hosted on your website professionally? Do you want a no-ad, non-branded video player? Do you want advanced analytics and video heatmaps? If you answered yes then you need Wistia. Wistia offers a professional video hosting platform that is perfect for collaborating, marketing and sharing your videos. Full Disclosure – we use Wistia to host all our videos in our portfolio and use Wistia for client approvals. No, we’re not getting paid to recommend them.

Here is an example of Wistia’s video player.

There are other free & paid video hosts for you to choose from but this list will at least get you started. If you find that your business is using more video promotions, you may want to experiment with some of the other video-sharing sites—maybe even the premium ones—to find the one that works best for your business.

* Totally Forgot to mention @joecascio during the video, sorry Joe! Be sure to follow him!

Co-host this week: David Flanagan

Website: http://david-f.net

Follow David on twitter: @davef85

David’s Pick’s

• @MillaJovovich
• @Allanhyde
• @scissorsisters
• @OliviaPinupArt

Patrick Picks’s

• @srdill
• @sophiathink
• @joecascio
• @loumazzucchelli
• @vanhoosear
• @amaaanda

Special Mention

Please follow and support the Providence Improv Fest June 23-27

Website: http://providenceimprovfest.com/

Follow them on twitter @PVDImprovFest

Production Notes

Shot on a Canon 5D MKII

35mm nikkor

On-Camera Audio  (really quick setup)

First time I’ve edited a Follow Friday Video on Adobe Premiere CS5, it lets me edit H.264 natively! This is great for shooting quick clips like the Follow Friday Video and getting them up on the web fast.