Most video is made to impress someone who isn’t the audience.

A manager signs off a budget, the team loves the storyboard and something wonderful gets made. Cue Linkedin praise and another piece of on-brand content that makes everyone feel good. But then it goes out into the world and not a lot happens, because the person it was actually made for, the buyer, the candidate, the would-be tenant, had a key question that wasn’t answered.

Production values can result in wonderful content but they usually have no relationship as to whether the person watching makes the decision the client wants.

Decisions require something different. They require the right person saying the right thing in a way that feels real. Not a polished spokesperson or a scripted testimonial. The actual human being whose credibility, honesty, and specificity does the work that a beautiful shot never could.

The question that should really start every video brief is: what would this video need to do for the person watching to actually decide?

Sometimes the answer is cinematic. Usually it isn’t. That’s not a slant against production companies making amazing stuff in the b2b world, the problem is rarely the execution. It’s the question nobody asked at the start.

Nick
Director/Bouche