Short Takes 03 on the 22nd of September: Make a first impression that lasts

September 07 · Blog

In today’s media saturated world, it’s more important then ever to cut through. The problem is that we are all approached from so many angles that we commit every shorter bits of time to everything just to keep up! This is why getting the first impression right is more important then ever. This Short Takes will look at first impressions from a variety of perspectives. We’d like to thank business coach and guru extraordinaire Hugh Todd for coming up with the brilliant title ‘First Impressions That Last’. Gold.

Emma Mc Dermott: You Are The Brand: how Personal Brand and Reputation Management can transform your business.

“Personal Brand” is a term that has become widely used with the rise of social media, but it is often misunderstood. Your physical appearance is just one aspect of your personal brand, but it is critical to your reputation and the scope of your influence. Understanding the non-verbal messages your appearance is sending to your clients and prospects allows you to present yourself appropriately and authentically for any situation – work or play. Stylist and Personal Brand Adviser, Emma McDermott will give us some tips and techniques for becoming memorable for the right reasons.     Emma has a background in marketing and brand management in the corporate sector and now runs her own business My Personal Stylist, helping professionals and small business owners make a lasting impression. http://mypersonalstylist.com.au

Lis Faenza: The human element of business

When we meet someone who is authentic at every level we are drawn to them and open to what they have to offer. In any business everyone involved needs believe and literally digest the company’s mission and vision, or the mismatch will be picked up, and your business will come across as a business that has no focus or integrity. Lis will share some key principles you can use to get clarity about your own values and principles, and align your actions to those – and then work to find alignment with the mission and vision of your business.       Lis is a keynote speaker and mentor. She has designed her current suite of presentations to address the void that exists in evidence based approaches to managing performance and productivity. http://thebucketrevolution.com

 

Nigel Collin: First impressions on camera; having the right state of mind and starting smoothly.

One camera presenting guru Nigel Collin will share share some more practical tips on how to make that great first impression when presenting to camera.     Nigel Collin is a creative facilitator, speaker and mentor who has worked with and hung out with creative people, innovative thinkers and thought leaders most of his life. He understands the importance of inspiring people to be more creative and giving them the skills, confidence and resources to do so. http://presentingoncamera.com/  

Mandi Bateson: make a first impression or social media will make it for you.

“Is the Google search the sworn enemy of the first impression? Is bad Facebook etiquette the new social faux pas? Before you get a chance to make an impression your social media presence may be making it for you. Find out how social media can help – rather than hinder – your personal and professional reputation right from the start”.     Mandi Bateson is Digital Director at Hill & Knowlton, and a keynote speaker and expert on social media, Community management; Social CRM; Content seeding and Influencer outreach among others! http://blogs.hillandknowlton.com/mandibateson/   So what is Short Takes like? Here’s a video of our previous Short Takes: http://www.vimeo.com/25950043/

Let’s connect!

The next Short Takes will take place on the 22nd of September 2011 at the Hunting With Pixels HQ on level 1, 270 King Street in Newtown. Doors open at 18.00, we start at 19.00! It’s only $ 60,- early birds rate for four awesome speakers, free quality food and drinks, great networking and simply a cheekiest way to combine business with pleasure. We’d love to see you there! Book your place here:

Openness in business; Trends in video and user generated content.

September 02 · Blog

Earlier this year, Hunting With Pixels caught up with Shay David from Kaltura on the New York leg of our epic interviewing spree. Kaltura are a leading open-source video platform, helping business and educational clients deliver top quality video solutions. In this video, Shay David goes into the benefits and drawbacks of businesses employing consumer engagement and feedback in their online marketing strategies. Generally speaking, having your online marketing videos open to consumer feedback and engagement is a great thing, and can really help build your brand. This is increasingly becoming a part of many marketing strategies in several ways. First, as video production costs have gone down, businesses can now be more generous with content. Not only can marketers afford to show more, they can show a product from all angles, show people using it, and show it being used on-location. This leads to greater engagement and association with the audience. Also, with the proliferation of the internet and consumer video options, it is increasingly possible for customers to create user generated content, such as crowdsourcing. Businesses such as Amazon have found that user reviews are the best sales tools ever. Often the fact that a business is willing to be open to consumer feedback shows that they are confident about their product, which like user reviews are a great selling point. However the flip-side of that is that if the product sucks, people are going to know, and they will tell others. To counter the possible negative side effects, consumer interaction needs to be carefully managed. Businesses that keep control of their content, and moderate any user feedback, have a far better chance of managing any damage to their brand. You want to encourage frank conversation, but also keep the lid on hate speech or degrading of your brand. It is a fine line to tread. In a controlled environment, like Amazon’s user reviews, customer engagement can be a powerful part of a complete marketing strategy, especially if you are confident in your brand/product. It can occasionally be risky, but the reward is increased engagement with the customer. [vimeo http://www.vimeo.com/25698600 width=”100%”]

Why Not Have A Cuppa?

August 30 · Blog

It’s all good and well to Tweet and Link And Face, but at Hunting With Pixels we still like having cups of coffee with our clients. Pop by and meet the people behind brand, or fill in your details below and the Magic Pixel Pigeons will deliver it to our inbox. It’s amazing.

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Next Short Takes Event: A workshop around creating a story around what you do to connect to your audience.

August 03 · Blog

Our first Short Takes was such a success we decided to make this a monthly event! This Short Takes is about Clarity; how to create a compelling story around what your business does, so you can really connect to our target audience. Here’s the video for our next short takes, which is planned for the 18th of August: http://vimeo.com/26901322

Short takes is an evening where you can learn some, meet some and try some.

By that we mean this is not just another evening seminar or networking event but rather a place where you can enjoy yourself and network, but also walk away with some practical learning and experiences about business communication and video.

Clarity and communication in business

This time we’re focussing on creating a clear message around your brand. How are you different from the rest, and are you making that clear to your target audience?

Just being good at what you do isn’t enough the be successful anymore.

Here’s why: your target audience can instantly find all your competitors online; there will always be someone who can undercut, outperform or outmarket you because they have lower overheads, they’re bigger or they’ve been around longer.

You need to create a connection.

Being good at what you do is expected now. People don’t hire you just for being competent; they hire you because:

• You’ve built a relationship and/or
• They connect to your brand story.

We need to get good at creating a story around our brands, and then do a great job communicating that story. So this Short Takes is about finding answers to questions like:

• How do you make sure that you get the results your business needs?
• How do you measure whether your communication is effective?
• How do you really engage your audience and come across well?
• What’s my story? An how do I communicate that story?

Meet The Speakers

This time Short Takes will feature three speakers that will give you three perspectives on clarity in communication. First up is the amazing Justin Cooper, the man behind the Brand Factory.

  Justin Cooper has spent over 20 years in marketing – creating and telling stories about brands like Pledge, Finesse, Warner Brothers, and Penfolds – and being amazed that his customers actually believe him. Next up is Hunting With Pixels’ creative director Robert Moorman.Robert has created highly effective business video campaigns for almost 20 years now, working for brands like MTV, Diesel, Time Out, Ted.com and Westpac. Robert specialises in helping business to create a narrative around their brand and translating that into highly effective online video campaigns. Last but not least we have the grandmaster of ‘on camera’ presenting, author and creativity guru Nigel Collin who will share some invaluable tips on how to make sure your story really connects to your target audience through authentic but professional on camera presenting.    

So What’s on the agenda?

Learn Some

The main focus of the presentations is about creating a story around your brand that your target audience can relate to. Just having a list of features and benefits isn’t enough to cut through in our media saturated world. You need to define what it is that makes you different, and then communicate that in a clear, confident and concise way. Once the message is clear, Nigel Collin will give you another great tip on how to present well.

Try Some

It’s nice to talk about theory, but how does that translate to real life? At Short Takes we’ll pick case studies from companies that are present and our panel of experts will look into the finer detail of what the brand can do to create a compelling narrative. Here’s a video of our previous Short Takes: http://www.vimeo.com/25950043/

Meet Some

Of course Short Takes isn’t all work; we’ll have drinks, catering and business networking going on too! We want to keep the group small so everyone gets the time they need, so we’re going to cap it at 25 seats. Don’t miss out.

Let’s start connecting!

Where: Hunting with Pixels HQ – 270 King St, Newtown When: Thur 18th August 2011, doors open at 18.00, we start at 19.00. How much: $85 or $60 Early Bird if purchased before Tuesday 7th August. Book Here: [linkedin_share style=”none”]

Get better business and learning outcomes with quality content

August 02 · Blog

Earlier this year, Hunting With Pixels caught up with Shay David from Kaltura on the New York leg of our epic interviewing spree. Kaltura are a leading open-source video platform, helping business and educational clients deliver top quality video solutions. In this video, Shay David examines how we define ‘good’ content in the realm of online video. In the broadest sense, good content is something that engages with an audience. However, we can only measure the effectiveness of video content if we define what aims we are hoping to achieve, and who our audience are. It could be that our online video is as simple as entertainment, in which case the obvious measure of quality is ratings: Does the watcher stay and view the entire video? Shay draws a distinction between “lean forward” and “lean back” entertainment, with the latter being passive entertainment such as television, and the former exemplified by user-selected short form content, such as YouTube. In the example of YouTube, the definition of quality goes beyond mere ratings and becomes: Does the watcher click on to watch more of the content? If the format of the online video is educational, then the desired outcome should be good learning results. For example, online video can be used as a learning object for students to get hands on experience, in the context of homework or distance learning. So then, our definition of quality is related to our measurement of learning results, generally grades. Finally, with Business-to-Business video or enterprise video, the business outcomes depend on the manner of business. If the video is a selling tool, then effective content would be measured in increased sales. If it is a customer support video, then the measure of quality would be customer satisfaction. In short, if you want to measure the effectiveness of online video content, you must carefully define what constitutes a success. To do this, you must ask: – what are the results that matter? – are these results occurring in the right places? http://www.vimeo.com/25697885

Robert and Beth speaking at fastBREAK

July 12 · Blog

At Hunting With Pixels we’re big fans of fastBREAK; it’s a monthly breakfast event at the powerhouse museum where a number of speakers do five minute presentations on the same subject. So what turns you on? Last month Annie from Vibewire managed to get us to do one; the title was ‘What Turns You On’. The subject couldn’t have been more apt, since we just returned from the US doing shoots for our new video blog ‘Whatever Trips Your Trigger’ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyChjr5dpYE

Business MasterMinds

July 12 · Blog

Here at Hunting With Pixels we are proud members of Business MasterMinds; a community of business people who share ideas, experiences and knowledge. Sharing your clients’ or members’ experiences and impressions in a client testimonial video can create powerful and authentic content. Business Master Minds is a great example of a business that generates real advocacy and video is the tool to share that advocacy with a wider audience Have a look at a video that we created for them that tells the story of the Business Mastermind experience, through the reflections of current members. http://vimeo.com/26301450

That was fun! First Short Takes business video event was a success.

July 04 · Blog

The inaugural Short Takes event held at Hunting With Pixels in Newtown was a great success. Video as a business communication tool was the focus and a workshop from business coach Hugh Todd kicked off the evenings program. Hugh tackled the subject of pitching your business effectively and was followed by Business Master Minds founder Angelique Milojevic who presented on the power of authenticity in your communication. Next up was Hunting With Pixels creative director Robert Moorman who talked about how to get the best results from your business video. The last speaker was presenting coach Nigel Collin who shared some simple yet very effective tools for tackling the sometimes daunting notion of presenting to camera. Short Takers were then given the opportunity to get some hands on experience and to practice what they had learned from the presentations. Willing participants were given the opportunity to deliver their pitches to camera in the studio and received some more personalised coaching from Nigel. This jam packed program was punctuated by plenty of great food and drinks and the opportunity to network with each other and the speakers. Check out this video for a brief look inside Short Takes and if you would like more information on the next Short Takes event then please check out http://businessvideomasters.com/ http://vimeo.com/25950043

Whatever Trips Your Trigger: about doing what you love and loving what you do.

June 22 · Blog

At Hunting With Pixels we’re very passionate about people’s stories; why do they do what they do? What makes them different from others? How did they find what they love, and then managed to build a life and a career around it? Doing what you love means living a life that’s in line with your values; a very important part of being happy and essential for success in business. We just came back from the US shooting a series of online videos around the subject for a new website called Whatever Trips Your Trigger. It’s a video blog about people who love what they do. The website is going live in the next weeks, but we thought we’d show you the trailer already: http://www.vimeo.com/25438973/ We’re doing a presentation for the wonderful people from Fastbreak this Friday on the subject of ‘What Turns You On’, where we’ll be talking about the project; we’d love to see you there! http://vibewire.org/2011/06/fastbreak-june-what-turns-you-on/