Put Emotion at the Center of Video Marketing

Emotional connection is at the very core of who we are. As humans, we value that connection not only in our personal relationships but also when we’re being communicated to by brands. While advertisers have desperately been avoiding “direct sell” ads for some time now, the amount of video content designed to elicit an emotional response continues to grow. As the world’s collective attention span has gotten shorter over time, strong content with a great emotional story has remained king.

In the past 20 years, ambitious brands have turned to fictional documentary narrative films to help build their brand story. While not completely abandoning a direct-to-consumer marketing strategy with their video marketing efforts, many brands have found enormous success by showing genuine stories of customers who regularly engage with the brand and the people behind it.

These films have an average length of 5-10 minutes and cater to the brand’s most loyal followers, yet they can also be great introductions to new audiences because they showcase brand pillars and connect via true heart-centered emotion. Yeti and Land Rover are two major brands that accomplish this in their video marketing.

The real art behind these films is that they typically do not visually force any branding or specific products or services on their audience. That’s not the goal. The mission is to tell a great story about a person (or people) that their audience can deeply connect with so they will remember the brand and be inspired to adopt it.

Here’s a video we created for one of our clients, Tyson Fresh Meats and their Open Prairie^® Natural Meats brand. We spent two days on Chain Ranch with owner Newley Hutchison and his family and learned the rich history of their cattle operation.

The people highlighted in these films and their personal outlooks on life don’t always mirror the brand pillars exactly, but the spirit of who they are and how they resonate with the brand are at the core of the messaging. Audiences get an authentic, engaging story of someone they can relate to as opposed to a commercial that oversells a solution to a problem.

Without a direct logo or product placement in these types of films, audiences can connect with what’s most important behind the brand: the people. Audiences get to see people struggle with challenges as well as feel true joy — all the things we humans experience every day. In time, the brand starts to mean something much more than just a simple product or service. When people are introduced to a brand in this kind of emotional and meaningful way, they are more likely to trust it.

While I believe your video marketing efforts should include everything from live video, paid media, short-form social content and more, there’s no doubt you can find success in telling authentic stories through narrative brand films.

Click below to get Will’s quick tips for creating strong narrative videos.

In a world that’s full of crowded messaging, there are unique advantages for a brand that is connecting with its audience on the deepest emotional level.

See you on the big and small screen.