I hate these sales letters
I got a sales email the other day. It basically said “We have a great new product. Click the link below to see the video about it”. That was it — no description, not idea about the market, no cost info. Nothing! I was supposed to click on a link to watch a video of who-knows-what-length. Right. I have lots of time for that, just to see what they might be selling. It might even be that legendary bridge.
I didn’t click the link in that email because I have done it before, when I knew the niche and the sender. And it pointed to a video alright. Sometimes the video works and sometimes not. I’m not sure why it doesn’t sometimes, but that’s the case. Anyway, it is a page of text with a video. The text is black on white with a logo or banner of the seller.
The video is black text (usually) on white so it looks like text on the page keeps changing. There is sometimes an image on a few of the “slides” but it is generally mostly text. Yep, slides of text: PowerPoint-style. And to top it off, there is a voice (always male in my experience) that basically reads the slides. This is “death by PowerPoint” as a marketing tool. To be fair, there is sometimes background music, but not always. I find it tedious. And I cannot even fast forward to the offer, because the player does not seem to have that feature. It must work, though, as I keep seeing more and more pages with these videos.
This format would be massively more interesting if the text went by at an angle Star Wars-style. Or if there were some other visual interest beyond text. Maybe it is because I read reasonably quickly and since the reader is reading slowly I get bored after one or two slides. Do you feel that way, too?
I’d love to see some stats comparing the conversion rate of this style to more interesting uses of video. Couldn’t we see the face of the presenter (or does he have a “face made for radio”)? How about interesting visuals? Yes, the text format is less expensive to produce. But is it enough less expensive and successful enough to justify it? I honestly have no idea. Is there a reason to use this format (it generally uses Flash) instead of just text? If it were just a cost issue, I would expect to see it primarily from novices. But even experienced marketers are using this format.
My final question today is, “when is it best to use video and when is it best to use plain text?”
Friedman And North on Vouchers
The link below is to an “old” article by Gary North. The article is from 1993, but the point is interesting and quite timely. Milton Friedman argues for school vouchers as a way for parents to retain control of their children’s education, while North argues that he who pays the piper still calls the tune. I have always agreed with Friedman when it comes to vouchers, but North’s point is well thought-out and well articulated.
Today there is debate about Federal funding of education and even some corporate training programs. The US government is spending way more than it takes in and many people, both politicians and members of the voting public, are arguing for cuts. Government programs always have strings. Some strings are reasonably neutral and some have wide impact. Many are in-between.
Currently, the US education is a separation between the those who are wealthy enough to afford private education for their children and those who are not. As long as the government is not funding or contributing to the funding of private schools, it cannot exert control (aside from making schooling mandatory, as Friedman points out, and that is a different matter). So those who attend government schools are educated to government standards; non-government schools are free to exceed those standards (what parent would send a child to a school that had lower standards than the government schools?). Even the US President sends his children to private schools — he clearly sees the value in a school that exceeds the government standards.
I attended a government school and my mother taught in government schools for most of her life. My parents even chose the house I grew up in because of the local school. There are good government schools. I have served on the board of a nationally-ranked (government) charter school. My parents exercised school choice through which house they bought. A charter school allows any parents to choose that school over their “assigned” school. Good schools are important to our society and parents need to be able to choose their child’s school, at least amongst government schools if they cannot afford private schools. Sadly, many do not have a great school to choose. So how do we raise the standards of government schools, or at least create an environment where every parent can choose a great school for his or her child?
So, back to training. What impact does government funding have on corporate training? Interestingly there are multiple providers for corporate training and companies or government agencies can choose virtually any provider (considering purchasing rules). Does government funding have impact on training in private companies receiving grants that fund that training? I’d love to hear what people think. Comment below.
The article from The Freeman Friedman And North on Vouchers.
Free learning 2 (for everyone)
This is a TED video of Salman Khan. He is promoting using video for learning. He also put his money where his mouth is and created the Khan Academy. The academy has a zillon free videos on all sorts of topics. I wish this were around when I was in school. One benefit he talks about in the TED talk is the ability for a student to watch a video over and over and when necessary, in order to understand a topic. This is great! No need to feel dumb saying “I still don’t get it” over and over. If I’d had these videos I might have passed Differential Equations by more than the skin of my teeth.
Check it out. Learn something.
Free learning (for trainers and instructional designers)
“The best things in life are free” or “you get what you pay for”? Each is true sometimes and in this case it is the first one. Here are two sources of free eLearning through live (and recorded) webinars: Training Magazine Network and Training Games Network. The former has been around a few years and the latter is new this year. Both offer webinars from people who are well-known in the training industry: Thiagi, Tracy Tagliati, Matthew Richter and others.
Today, for example, on the Training Magazine Network, Thiagi and Tracy did a session on “Instructional Facilitation”. In it they discussed issues with the conventional training model and alternatives to increase the value of the training. If you are a trainer or instructional designer, you might check the replays. As this is number ten in a series of Thiagi and Tracy webinars, why not check out all ten? Great stuff. The webinars on Training Games Network are archived, too.
Here we go…
I decided a couple of months ago that video was a great way to 1) get people’s attention, and 2) communicate ideas — especially for training. So I thought I should learn more about making videos.
The first online materials I got were from Lorraine Grula. These are more about production and videography and I will talk more about them later.
Then I started playing with Xtranormal. I made a few videos that turned into promos to get a client to act. They worked well! The first was before Xtranormal started charging, the second after. (Both are company confidential, so I will make another one and post it to this blog shortly.) I used the on-line MovieMaker, but I need to upgrade my PC to use their more sophisticated tool.
That was fun, but I wanted to learn more. I had signed up for Jim Kukral’s free program some time ago and found it informative. Then he came out with a new version and I ordered that. You can order it too at Online Video Toolkit 2.0 (yes, it is an affiliate link). I’m still going through the videos, but so far I have been learning valuable new stuff. [No, I did not get a free copy, and no, he is not paying me to say any of this.] My copy came with a copy of his book Attention! which is a wonderful book that I will talk about later.
So, what are the steps I will take next? First I will watch the videos in the Toolkit and take notes. I want to have a simple intro for videos I make, so I may go to Fiverr as Kukral suggests and get one made for $5. (You might be surprised what people will do for only five dollars!) Finally, I will play with some of the other tools he talks about until I can find an affordable computer to edit Xtranormal videos and to edit one’s I’ve “filmed”.
Til next time.
Welcome back!
I’m starting this over.
I am embarking on a journey to learn more about video creation. Video for learning, video for marketing and video for fun. I will chronicle the learning here.
I am also thinking about how ideas and concepts from other disciplines can help in the training profession. I will also be sharing those thoughts here.
Hopefully I can be more consistent than in the past…