Recently an associate of mine and a fellow member of the Communications Media Management Association, Cynthia Holt of Medtronic, Inc started a conversation about creating “YouTube/home video” style programs in the corporate setting. There were a lot of contributions and opinions on this subject. The members of CMMA are managers of corporate, educational and government internal media departments. Many of them are responsible for internal communications and many more are responsible for external communications and hence the “look” and “message” of their organizations.
It seems that there are three reasons given to engage in “YouTube/home video” style productions.
1. YouTube is getting a lot of buzz so shouldn’t we be doing that too?
2. We should engage our employees and customers in generating our message.
3. This is cheap; we don’t need to pay for video production.
The reaction ranged from enthusiastic acceptance to beating the evil amateurs away with a stick. Some saw this as a threat on quality and professionalism. Others saw this as the latest in a long line of fads like camcorders and super-8 film (for those of us who were around when these were fads). They contend that the amateurs would soon fade away when it became evident that skill was needed to craft a coherent message. Still others reacted to the continual onslaught of those who wanted something for nothing and devised strategies for coping with the cheapskates. Others thought it was great and have already started distributing flip cameras.
Well, I’m taking a firm stand on the side of, well… it just depends. Meaning that the message and the media just depend upon what you are trying to accomplish. But first let’s step back and look at what we mean by professional, YouTube, User Generated Content and all this other stuff.
YouTube is the newest incarnation of the democratization of media distribution. My “25 cent words” for saying that every few years there is a decrease in the cost of the tools to produce film and video and a group previously prevented from producing content now can. When 16mm cameras became available in the 1960s there was an upsurge in independent documentary film producers. When public access television became widespread every suburban teenager had a talk show, aka the “Wayne’s World Affect.” When camcorders became available in the 1980s everyone started making their own videos. Now YouTube has made it possible for anyone to distribute video for nothing and that’s pretty cheap.
Now just because someone can make and distribute a video doesn’t make it good and that is the point made by my professional friends. There are millions of examples of bad video on the internet. But it does give talented people an outlet they never had before and those few individuals are the ones creating the buzz.
So, does professional video have a place? Yes of course. Whenever the message is important, the story is critical and the audience needs to be engaged I would pay and depend upon a professional. The video should be distributed where it will engage the audience. If that is on YouTube, NBC or the corporate web site then that is where the video should be distributed.
How about amateur video? If the purpose is to save costs then it is a Pyrrhic savings. It is like the old production saying: I can make the video cheap, fast and good: please pick two. You can save money but you may not achieve your goals. The idea of getting someone to produce your content for free is ultimately bad. You cannot control the message, you have no control on quality and you cannot control the distribution. If you want control you need to pay for it. But what about User Generated Content (UGC) you ask. Coke and Mentos got a huge amount of publicity from YouTube videos. That is true but Coke and Mentos do not let amateurs control their corporate image and message. A business can work with their fans and customers in promoting their goals if they don’t abdicate that role to the amateurs. The dark side of course is exemplified by The Sons of Maxwell’s “United Breaks Guitars.”
A couple of places are doing some cool things with User Generated Content. Robert Halper, the Director of Video Communications at Johnson & Johnson is in charge of their YouTube Channel. One of their cool projects and a great example of effectively harnessing UGC without it being exploitive is the Real Mom Series. This is one of my favorites:
An example from a university is the University of Washington’s Pocket Media contest. The idea was staff, faculty, students and alumni could compete if the shot their video on a camera that fit into their pocket. They got some very good results.
Neither the University of Washington nor Johnson & Johnson are using UGC in place of professionally produced content or to save money on production costs. They are using it to engage their customers, build community and enhance their message. Let me know what you think about user generated content and YouTube quality videos.
