Effective and Economical Business Promotion Video

Have you ever wanted to get your own video shot for a website or for your own use? For some projects you should seriously consider using stock footage instead.

If you don’t have to show a specific product, you may be able to skip shooting video altogether. Instead you can just hire a good video editing service. They can find and use stock footage that’s already been created instead of getting professional pictures and footage shot from scratch.

Or you can consider having the entire video made using animation.

First, we’ll discuss the use of stock footage. Before you shoot your next video, you should consider these 3 reasons why you should use stock footage instead of using the more expensive alternative of shooting your own video.

1. First and foremost you will save yourself money when you utilize stock footage.

Professional videos can cost thousands of dollars to shoot. For some budgets, this can be too big an investment. Generally speaking, stock footage will cost you a lot less than if you hired a production company to shoot a professional video for you.

When having your own video shot from scratch, you’ll be paying for a full crew, all the equipment, actors, locations and more. If you are looking for a particular look and style, then this can add expense. Unless you need extremely specialized stock footage, it can save you thousands to skip the shoot and go for the pre-made stock footage.

2. Saving time with stock footage.

On top of the added expense, it’s likely to take longer to complete your video. You’ll have to wait for the video shoot to be organized and completed. Actors must be auditioned and hired, locations found and secured, and a shoot date where the entire crew and equipment is available must be set.

Sometimes this can all take weeks to accomplish. Then the shoot itself can take a day, or multiple days. When you’re using stock footage for your video, all of this can be skipped. All you need to do is to find the shots you intend to use.

Then you go right to the editing. This means editing can usually begin within a couple days of starting a project.

3. You can integrate a wide variety of effects into your show using stock footage.

This can add a great deal of quality and interest to your video. For example, you can find time lapse videos, or even videos with graphics that would cost thousands to produce. You can access visual elements that you wouldn’t be able to easily get yourself.

With stock footage you can find footage that captures weather patterns that you couldn’t easily get such as a tornado or hurricane. You can find visual elements of a particular season or region.

Animated videos can also be a great alternative to shooting a video.

Animated business videos are another great way to get your message across to a variety of prospects. This process also allows you to skip the costs and time needed to shoot a video. It can be extremely affordable, usually costing less than a full production. Though some customization can be added to animated videos without incurring additional expenses, some customization can add costs. It depends on your artist’s animation library.

One of the benefits to animation is that it affords a certain levity and lightness which other forms of video fail to provide. It enables you to easily simplify complicated topics in an entertaining manner. You can show activities that might be difficult to show in real life.

Whether it's with a chalkboard animation style, comic book style or moving graphics approach, explainer video production companies can use animated business videos to keep you talking about any subject in a light and enjoyable way. It still connects with your target audience without necessarily talking down to them.

Instead of simply regurgitating your sales pitch as you would in a normal pitch, animated business videos allow you to talk to them in an animated way that still makes sense and gets your point across. This all helps your prospects remember who you are and what you do, while also making them more interested in learning more about the opportunity you have presented them with.

Conclusion

While it is often tempting to create new footage and custom shots to create your business videos, marketing always comes down to return on investment. And the cold hard fact is that using stock footage or animation can often yield similar marketing results at a fraction of the cost.

So these are two ways to bypass video shooting, with all its expenses and issues. It’s something to explore before you make a decision to hire a company to handle your project.

To read more about these options and to see video samples of these techniques, check out this article calledThe Secret to Creating A Powerful Business Video Without Shooting any Footage.