The Power of Video - get on board or be left at the train station

Now here's a story that we'd probably never even have heard about if the folks at the University of Chicago hadn't created a video.

The reality is that trying to communicate this story using just a press release would be difficult. It could be done, but the media would have a hard time understanding why 'fingerless' gripper mattered or why it was a story.

But toss in a video, just a very basic, no-frills video demonstrating the product, and suddenly people become fascinated.

In addition, more outlets are running videos in conjunction with their stories as a way of increasing ad revenue. The video link above is to YouTube (because I can embed YouTube in blogger), but if you were to view it on CBC's Web-site you'd notice a short advertisement before the video started.

PR folks need to start seeing video as not a special 'one-off' element of their job, but rather, a tactic that they utilize regularly. I can envision in just a few years every news release being accompanied by a video.

Now, creating videos is not rocket science and PR folks can easily learn to make videos themselves. All you need is a camera and a video editing software - heck, not much more than you'd use to edit home videos.

But for PR folks that are intimidated by learning how to make videos themselves, they should start budgeting for videos now. Toss in an extra budget line for video in your annual budget - because even if your organization doesn't see the value in it today, you can bet in a year or two your CEO will be knocking on your door asking 'Why aren't we doing videos?'

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