What about video?

Should I put videos on my website?

The simple answer is that it depends. Video can allow you to connect with your audience more effectively than just words and images. Video gives you the chance to entertain and inform your audience. It can reach out to people, it can make them laugh, be moved or just be better informed about what it is that you do.

It is an old cliché, but people do business with people they meet, like, know and trust. Video gives you the opportunity for people to know what you like and what you sound like before they get in touch with you, and it is just another way that builds confidence.

I can remember turning up to meeting someone for a business meeting in a coffee bar some years ago and not having a clue what the person I was meeting looked like. I asked a few people if they were the person I was due to meet and I got more and more embarrassed as they kept saying no! That is, of course, far less likely to happen these days, as you can usually find out what someone looks like through their LinkedIn profile or via their website, however, video allows everyone to hear you talk and feel even more comfortable before making contact.

How should I go about it?

Before the advent of smartphones and YouTube, the only way would be to hire a video production company to create a video for you. The advantage of this is that the finished product will be professional, it will be scripted, edited and give you a polish that you would be unlikely to achieve on your own. There is the additional cost but if you see this cost as an investment in your business, it is certainly money well spent.

There are many fine video production companies around and it is worth talking to some of them and get a feel for the kind of videos they produce, before deciding which one is suitable for you.

The alternative, of course, is to do it yourself. Today's smartphones can shoot in 4K resolution and achieve some quite remarkable results. I would recommend that you also invest in some lighting so that your video does not look dull and perhaps a lapel microphone to get better sound quality.

There is a whole array of inexpensive accessories available that should make the technical side of the process easier and I would also recommend do this anyway, even if you plan to use a professional video company. The reason for this is simple: the more time you spend practising, the better you will get at this and is it not better to spend your spare time getting over the fear of being on camera than waiting until the day of filming with a professional company? Time, after all, is money and you will get better results if you are confident about being in front of a camera in the first place!

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