OMNI-BLOG

The BIG Difference: Branding VS. Production Companies

2011-08-02T09:52:00.001-07:00

Tunnel vision can be incredibly limiting. I had a client offer why they would :"never even consider using another company" - based on items I think of from time to time, but never focus on.

The largest reason omni clients are devoted customers is largely due to the fact omni is far more than a "production company," but a "branding agency" using many creative tools together in creating high end appeal.

The difference means that when many production companies and producers create a project, they bring the video/editing/producing component ONLY to the table - leaving many holes in a campaign's needs.

Omni features full service creative, not stopping at only video production - but include the following:

• Delivery methods to TV stations, viral and social media outlets. Already having many outlets and relationships with local and national news groups, publications and tv networks, as well as Home and Lifestyle TV, allows omni clients existing paths for their projects.

• Still photography while on set, which creates a "seamless" campaign whereas the video assets match the still images and print/web messages exactly. It is great to deliver HD video and photography to clients and watch them grin from ear to ear when the reality hits them: "My hard work will look amazing because it all fits cohesively together."

• Graphic Design professionalism is added to every project TV, web, or print, where most video producers know little or nothing about layout, design within a project. Omni is well armed with motion graphics, animation and other design-heavy talents when producing.

• Flexibility is another valuable asset omni offers its clients, using multi-platform trained creatives to accomplish high end goals. Omni believes strongly in training everyone ALL SIDES to creative skill sets. Not "compartmentalizing" everything helps they wheels turn smoothly.

Conclusion:

I have to admit, I am truly glad that while refining my creative skills in college - I didn't listen to the instructors when they recommended "stay with one skill set only, and market that." If that were the case, I guess I would be head of a department somewhere, rather than owning a successful business. I am equally appreciative that our clients recognize these differences enough to explain them back to me.

Great News in July 2011: "Client Sales Up 31%"

2011-07-10T08:40:00.000-07:00

In the week of July 4th 2011, I did a very personalized and unscientific poll among many of my retail and service-providing clients. Being that we host many business and service types on our Home and Lifestyle TV show, we work with a great deal.

After calling and polling over 25 omni clients, the question was simple and answers clear. The average percentage that our current advertising clients stated regarding profit margin at July, 2011 versus July 2010 was a very happy 31% increase in sales.

In fact, the majority of increase weighed heavy on the retail side, slightly higher than the service providing side. Both very healthy gains made over a one year period - bringing smiles back to both sides of the marketing world.

This information reflects national and regional clients in the Dallas-Fort Worth Market only in the week of July 4, 2011.

Question: are other non-omni businesses experiencing similar increases? Or is it our effective tactics that have made the difference? Or both perhaps? I would venture to guess a bit of both.

Shoot, then Ask Questions

2011-02-20T20:59:00.000-08:00

Omni produces a weekend magazine type of tv program called "Home and Lifestyle tv." I would say about 80% of our featured guests of the show turn around after a successful airing, and ask the question, "can we use that footage to edit a commercial?" Or "can we use the footage for a video press package or b-roll usage?" well the answer is Abso-freaking-lutely! When we shoot a featured guest segment on our show, we often take the footage and build MANY video pieces such as Video On Demand to air on cable networks, tv commercials for cable and network tv, and customized long form videos used for in house use, business to business sales tools, as well as popular web streaming on YouTube, vimeo and facebook.

We use the saying often at omni: "shoot once, use everywhere." in fact, many of client referrals approach us saying we had them at "shoot once" because they have experienced the sticker shock of production companies or ad agencies charging full price for each and every little campaign element. And being that omni is a bit of an unusual animal to begin with - being a production company with enormous branding experience, seems to make the decision process easy for them.

An example scenario would be the fine city of Grapevine, Texas. We love wine, we love entertainment, we love shooting interesting topics in our DFW backyard. Therefore we feature upcoming events in grapevine, such as the nationally popular GrapeFest, Main street Days, Vintage Wine Trail, and the now trademarked "Christmas Capital of Texas" holiday attractions all over the city. We then take this acquired HD footage, and produce a VOD (video on demand) to be found on Time Warner Cable, commercials for directing viewers to the VOD, b-roll packages for new station editing and use, in-room viewing as well as attraction and event tv ads for ad efforts.

If your planning on being a guest on Home and Lifestyle TV, let the producers of the show know ahead of time so that omni can produce video content suitable for both entertainment and news-worthy styles. The value of a package such as this is at least 4 times the investment.

Related topics coming up: how to shoot an entertaining featured guest segment, and shooting still photography while shooting a tv segment for consistency.

Has the World Gone Viral?

2011-02-19T06:51:00.000-08:00

Buzzwords like "Viral Marketing" and "Social Networking" have found themselves taking up an enormous amount of time in our simple conversations, production meetings and strategic media plan sessions with omni clients. Quickly, they call social networking "Viral Media" because it is a message hopefully found interesting enough to spread from friend to friend through social outlets like facebook and twitter. For instance, I see an amazing video produced in New Zealand uploaded to youtube, and I want my videographer friends to view it. So with a few clicks (if not one) it is embedded into my facebook profile and all my facebook friends can choose to view it.

Here is why the "face" of advertising has changed completely. I simply can not tell you how many times I have left a client meeting unable to answer the question, "Well... how do we know EXACTLY how many viewers REALLY watched our video or READ our print ads?" With the advent of social/viral media, a backbone to these features are statistic tracking. For instance, omni visual produced a destination video package for the city of Southlake, Texas. Over a single year's time, we were able to view important data such as: it had been downloaded and viewed a) 80,000+ times, that out of these viewers, b) they had been watched in 34 different countries around the world, b) and also at what point in the video they lost interest or not by clicking away from the video. Now I employ you, bring me another method to track target specifics like that based on factually gathered information rather than assumptions using a math formula.

Yes, technology has again quickened the heartbeat of society - and advertising departments of companies large and small are able to now find "true" answers for their effort. Its a fabulous thing by the way - receiving recognition justified numerically in fore-mentioned media planning meetings.

Omni created a television segment for Gaylord Texan Resort for our popular Home and Lifestyle TV show in Dallas airing on NBC5. We took this entertaining 5 minutes featuring one of their main events each year called "SummerFest," and sponsored it alongside many other summer attractions found on youtube and facebook. For mere cents on the dollar - we were popping up next to everything people pulled up for summer entertainment in Dallas from amusement parks, local water parks and even travel discount offers. Due to these techniques being of proprietary nature, I can not expand further, but the campaign proved an overwhelming increase over years prior.

One last thing, being that viral and social networking outlets are generally inexpensive to FREE, this new fabulous trend has opened the door for smaller companies with little to no advertising, and has re-leveled the playing field somewhat against companies spending millions. But most importantly, as mentioned before, the message being a video, a photo, an offer, a recommendation – need to be fun or interesting enough to have people share it with their friends. And large companies are actually spending millions of their budget in creating content people will, well..."enjoy." All with the intention of eventually creating a relationship with the consumer in exchange for a chuckle or a wow.

This blog is another example of social media, and while I quickly told these stories in a few paragraphs - you accidentally learned about Southlake Texas, NBC5, Home and Lifestyle TV, Gaylord Texan Resort and their annual "SummerFest" event.

Related topics coming up: what to tweet and why? and how to sponsor an ad message on social networking sites.

Why This? Why Now?

2011-02-11T19:40:00.000-08:00

Omni visual was creating ad campaigns and environmental graphics before the internet was the web, before "interactive" required a mouse to do so, and even before "brand recognition" was largely recognized.

Looking back I would say, we have painstakingly designed and re-crafted our website at least 8 times. So "Why This? Why Now?" does Omni bring about such a simple design? For that reason... simplicity. I should probably call it "duplicity" as the site looks simple to the eyes, but is actually quite dynamic. Often times we explain to our clients the iceberg theory. The one that explains a website is much like one, having a small portion actually being seen, but a much more profound portion beneath the surface.

These days, building a great looking web site is only the beginning. All of the external links pointing back to a site have replaced simple techniques such as making sure a site has the right keywords and alt tags.

Just as the internet breaths, changes and adapts - so do the designers, developers and clients. And at a lightning speed it seems. So the all new Omni site contains never before seen elements such as this blog, for discussing industry trends and advice, as well as ever-changing content based on current and upcoming projects.

If your a current client of Omni, or simply a wanderer - please feel free to ask questions, post your own opinions, but most importantly create dialogue with us and others in topics of creativity and content creation. Thanks for helping us kick off the new Omni-Blog! To see the site we are discussing, go to www.omnivisualmedia.com