They say a picture tells a thousand words. On a website where you only have a matter of moments to engage the visitor it is even more important to use multimedia that engages, conveys a clear message and grabs the emotions.

We all know that around 95% of new business comes from referrals but did you know around half the people who are referred to your firm don’t contact you after visiting your website. Your website is, therefore, a critical piece to land the fish nibbling on your line.

What question is that visitor asking about you and your firm: Are they competent? Can I trust them? Are they nice people? Would I feel comfortable having them work on my business and personal affairs?

You can attempt to satisfy these questions with some blogs and written testimonials but these only go so far. Videos are much more powerful. The visitor gets to see you, experience you. In the late 60s, Albert Mehrabian conducted several experiments to find out just how important gestures and intonation are for conveying a message. So what were his results? Only 7% of communication is verbal, 38% is considered paraverbal (meaning tone and intonation) and 55% is non-verbal! Gestures, facial expression, body movements, posture, intonation all convey a message – a blog seems very weak by comparison.

For example, this short video probably conveys more about me and how I can help firms than I could convey in any blog.

The challenge, of course, is that you have to record the video. Many people are not very comfortable presenting to a camera. I remember the first time I did it. It felt quite weird as the camera gives you no feedback and in the back of your mind you’re aware that what you’re saying will be recorded for posterity. Like everything, it takes practice. The more you do it the more comfortable you become. The more you look down the barrel of the camera you’ll be able to change your perception so that you will think you’re talking to a person. When you’ve achieved that feeling you’ll find your videos will be significantly more engaging.

One way of overcoming concerns about presenting to a camera is to structure the video as an interview. People find it easier to respond to questions being put to them than just presenting without any human interaction.

Videos need to be short – just a couple of minutes. You could have a few covering a variety of topics; how you can help your clients, important issues for people in business or covering specific topics such as estate planning or superannuation.

Write out what you’d like to say – go through it a few times but don’t memorise it. Have the main points in your head and then let it come out in a conversational manner. It will be far more engaging. The odd stumble doesn’t matter – just shows you’re human.

The quality of the video itself will also say something about you and your firm. Recording from a webcam in poor lighting and poor sound really doesn’t cut it if you’re trying to convey a professional image. You need a high definition video with good lighting and high fidelity sound using a quality microphone.

Firms have been regularly asking us where to go to get these videos done. For this reason, we have teamed up with Branding Attraction to deliver a cost-effective service to professionals wishing to create videos for their website. Have a look at this video and if you’re interested contact Matt at Branding Attraction. The regular price is $3000 per video but if you mention Smithink you’ll get the special price of $1990. 

Your stardom is just around the corner. It’s time to take your website to the next level of engagement.