My 14 year old thinks Sears is cool. So does my 82 year old father. Go figure.
Sears launched a major marketing initiative this summer called Arrival Lounge to highlight to it’s younger target audience that you shouldn’t just go back to school – you should ‘arrive’ back to school- suitably attired in Sears back-to-school fashions. Sears hired Disney Channel celebrity Selina Gomez to lead the marketing program which is centered around it’s arrivelounge.com website. The site includes music, celebrities, dancing, backstage passes, coupons, behind-the-scenes features, air-band contests and high quality video production. Sears has done all of the requisite cross-promotions with social media sites like YouTube and Facebook and has also developed tie-in programs with MTV. The program has been a huge success for the company.
What makes this campaign particularly interesting is the company’s use of web-based video. Sears has comfortably broken a couple of web-video barriers (launching music on the site without asking and also playing full screen – albeit lower res - video) and seem to be employing a video first and ‘text as support’ approach which until now has been the other way around. Video has traditionally been used as support for the text that appears on a website.
While it certainly makes sense that retail establishments targeting younger demographics would lead the integration of video marketing into websites this isn’t the beginning of the end, it’s the simply the end of the beginning (it made more sense when Churchill said it…). What we are seeing with sites like this is a glimpse beyond the ‘text web’ – the integration of broadcast media and rich media programming into what until now has been a static content delivery environment. Sears isn’t the first company to take this approach but given their history and positioning in the marketplace it is a significant departure from it’s traditional marketing activities.
The short term consequence will be a surge in rich media web video production – a lot of it quite awful (remember the first websites) and unfortunately will favor those with traditionally larger marketing budgets. That said, the clever use of social media channels could turn out to be the great equalizer between large and smaller companies.
When you own a premium brand you have to spend premium dollars to support it.
Channel has just released their newest commercial / mini-movie and as before, have done a wonderful job. Last time it was Nicole Kidman in a three minute short film (or a three minute long commercial). This time around Audrey Tautou – one of France’s national treasures – graces the screen for Channel. North Americans might remember her as ‘Amelie’ in one of the few French films to get theatre time back in 2001. The Director of that film – Jean-Pierre Jeunet directs this commercial and was given a free hand in creating Channel’s newest filmette. Naturally he cast his favourite actress (it didn’t hurt that Tautou is also playing Coco Channel in the recently released film ’Coco Avant Channel’ in France) in the lead role.
The story (not that it matters a whit) centres around a chance encounter on a train to Istanbul. Tautou spends the remaining two minutes waiting and hoping to hook up with the handsome stranger. A sudden romance on a night train to an exotic destination – ya, it`s cliche. Romance and mystery and the promise of adventure – that`s what you buy when you drop $100 or more for a little bottle of purfume – the promise of something exciting. That`s exactly what Channel is selling, and they are quite good at it.
You have to give Jeunet top marks for his direction. He spared no expense (watch `the making of` to see what kind of coin they dropped on this little video) at creating some asbolutely stunning sequences. He`s come a long way since his last big North American film - he directed the last Alien film (I think it was called Alien Abomination). Like the perfume Jeunet is selling, this video won`t be for everyone but for those who it targets, he hits the mark perfectly.
There are many different cameras and many video formats at the disposal of video production companies: DV, Digital Betacam, DVCAM, DVCPRO, HD, P2, XDCAM, Red and even film (16 or 35mm if the budget allows).
Full HD (1920×1080p) is becoming the new high-end standard for corporate video production. Cameras like Panasonic’s P2 series or Sony’s EX1 series are capable of shooting at the highest resolutions and outputting directly to disc – which allows for much more efficient workflow. These cameras rival or surpass the quality of broadcast ENG cameras. Fully tricked-out with proper mikes and lens you’re probably looking at an outlay of $12,000 or more. But if you are looking for high quality input (and output) and want to make sure your video will still be usable tomorrow, using a camera that shoots full HD is your best option.
I shoot almost exclusively with the Sony EX1 for many reasons:
1. Quality. Attaining high quality footage is the best and most obvious reason to shoot in full HD. Whether you are shooting for a 480×270 web video or for a large HD plasma display at an event, there is no substitute for the quality that a high-end camera produces. In IT circles the expression ‘garbage in, garbage out” relates to the quality of output being determined by the quality of the input. The same holds true for video. Even if you are compressing your full HD footage down to a small web video format the final quality is still determined by the starting quality. Keying out backgrounds, colour correction, zooming in edit mode and many other post production activities are directly affected by the quality of the original video.
2. Flexibility. HD is ‘future proof’ (today). You can repurpose and re-use your full HD footage for a variety of uses such as trade shows, broadcast, and the web and still plan on incorporating it into future productions and formats. Video formats change quickly so having the highest quality footage allows you the most flexibility and re-use options in the future.
3. Standards. Full HD is becoming the standard (16×9 aspect ratio full 1920×1080p) for Corporate Video. Large companies are starting to specifically ask for this format and mid-sized and smaller companies will follow suit. Ericsson even claims that its mobile phone cameras will shoot in HD video in 2012!
4. Ecosystems – A corollary of the quality and standard argument is that ecosystems evolve to support the standards and the higher quality formats because of the larger scale associated with the standard and the higher profits associated with the higher quality. Camera equipment, editing software, storage devices and a host of other support products and services will evolve around the high end HD standards like Sony’s EX1 and the Panasonic P2.
