UNDERSTANDING the Stages of the Marketing Funnel
In today’s competitive market, understanding the stages of the marketing funnel is essential for crafting effective marketing strategies. The funnel, often broken down into three key stages—TOFU (Top of the Funnel), MOFU (Middle of the Funnel), and BOFU (Bottom of the Funnel)—guides potential customers from awareness to decision-making. It is important for companies to understand these stages in order to know how to best reach their ideal customers with the right content. For us, this can help in determining the best kinds of videos to make based on where the target audience of that video is within the marketing funnel.
WHAT ARE THE STAGES?
TOFU:
The TOFU stage is all about brand awareness…
GOSPEL MISSION:
There is no question that the most fulfilling videos for us to make are for Christian non-profits. Jesus Christ is my ultimate joy and I want Shelley Video to bring Him glory and to make his goodness and gospel known. We love working with individuals and organizations that care about loving their neighbors with the love of Jesus.
5-20% DISCOUNT:
Because we want to be a part of helping these organizations produce quality content that fits within their budgets, we offer a 5-20% discount on our services upon request, based on need and project scope, particularly for nonprofits…
AstroWatt, a “local electrician serving Apex, NC, and the surrounding areas”, claims to provide “Stellar Service From Start To Finish!”
We recently spent a day shooting multiple videos and taking team photos for AstroWatt. They will be posting the videos periodically and have posted one so far, which you can watch below.
Dwell Ministry offers psychologically informed and biblically grounded counseling resources to churches and individuals out of Greensboro and Cary, NC. We recently created three videos for them: one about therapy, one that explains reasons for partnering with them, and one about their marriage advocacy program.
Co-owners Lauren and Kalie did a great job preparing for and recording these videos. Check the video out below and see if you should consider partnering with them.
DIVERSITY INITIATIVES
Campus Outreach (also known as CO) is a campus ministry currently on 122 campuses in the US and around the world. The campuses in our area have several diversity initiatives to help reach staff and students of color. These initiatives are extremely important, as you can see in the video, and I was so thankful to be asked to make this video for them.
B-CAM SLIDER
This is the first interview I have ever shot using a slider for the second camera. As you can see in the image below, one camera is on a tripod and is shooting a wide angle and the second camera has a telephoto lens and is on a slider. As each person talked, I moved the camera back and forth and used it to create a subtle parallax effect…
HISTORY OF HORIZONTAL VIDEOS
From the beginning of motion pictures (1878 or 1888, depending on how you look at it) until a little over a decade ago, pretty much all video has been shot and viewed horizontally. This means that the aspect ratio, which is the “proportional relationship between an image's width and height,” would be something like 4:3 or 16:9, with the screen being wider than it is tall.
HERE COMES VERTICAL
With the advent of the smartphone and social media, the market for vertical video exploded out of nowhere. When posting videos on social media, clients now have to consider whether they want their videos to be shot and posted horizontally, shot horizontally but cropped vertically, or shot and posted vertically. This can be a difficult decision because usually you want to be able to use a video across multiple platforms…
The Fireplace Problem
We just finished a series of three videos for Stewards Advisory Services, a company based in Dubuque, Iowa.
One of the challenges with this project was the fireplace. The best location in the room reserved for our shoot was in front of the fireplace. However, the reflection of the cameras and interviewer was clearly visible in the frame of the video. The second problem is that the fireplace fan was extremely loud. The solution we chose was to shoot the interview with the fireplace off, then get shots of the fireplace on and edit them together. You can see the before and after of both angles below.
It is important to solve as many potential problems as possible when planning and shooting, but there are times when it is necessary to know how to fix things during the post-production process.
DENTISTS NEED GOOD TESTIMONIAL VIDEOS
As a personal consumer, I can’t think of any type of company that needs good testimonial videos more than dental offices. Sitting in a dentist's chair can be incredibly stressful, even terrifying, so whenever I do have to sit in one, I want to make sure I’m in good hands. Hearing stories of actual patients who can say why they trust a particular dentist’s office can absolutely make the difference between me booking an appointment there or not.
HIGH POINT DENTAL PARTNERS
The staff at High Point Dental Partners is incredibly kind, patient, professional, and capable. I was very impressed with their use of cutting-edge technology as well as their rapport with their patients…
BENEFITS OF USING MONITORS
External monitors provide a larger viewing screen than camera monitors
Monitors can be moved without moving the camera, allowing even the subjects to see the frame
There are several useful features that monitors have included in their software (false colors, focus peaking, zebras, LUT overlays, etc.)
Who Is Your Target Audience?
When creating video content for your brand, it is very important to identify your target audience. Ask yourself, who is our ideal client? Creating content with your ideal client in mind will help you get a higher rate of engagement because you reaching those who will actually care about your product instead of casting an overly wide net.
Many people think that getting a video to go viral is the best-case scenario for a video. However, a high view count does not necessarily equal success. Having a video go viral can be helpful in many situations, though it’s also possible for a viral video to gain a large batch of new subscribers who ignore the rest of your content, which ultimately can hurt engagement. Also, focusing on trends that are making some content go viral can harm your brand’s image in the eyes of your current followers if they are not into those trends. If your customers are serious business people but your marketing is based on what teenagers think is cool, then your content will not be successful...