Tired of boring corporate videos? Sick of talking heads droning at the camera? These days exponents of online video are pushing the envelope: Taking a lead from slick consumer-facing content, they’re exploring the boundaries of video as a corporate communications tool. Caroline Parry reports 

As the Apple iPad reaches a cool 1 million in sales after just 28 days on the market and despite a delayed UK launch, it has become clear that online video content has secured itself a crucial place in the new digital world order.

Just ten years ago, many had written off video, then limited to screens, as a dead medium but the combination of broadband, Web 2.0 and the rapid development of production equipment have not only revitalised the medium but have also given it new purpose. For corporate communicators looking to engage staff and stakeholders with key corporate messages; it has become a central tool in their armoury. However, a quick sweep of YouTube will still throw up too many examples of hastily-produced, ill-thought out corporate content that has the potential to do as much harm as good. In an age when “sharing” has became a global past time, people have come to expect high standards and will swiftly disseminate and criticise if it does not come up to scratch.

“Internal communicators are able to use a wide range of media now,” says Stuart Maister, founder of corporate media agency BroadView. “But now they now have to do this to the same standard people expect in their ‘real’ life.”

IBM, the technology company and consultancy, has worked to meet this standard through its Smarter Cities film series. Part of the company’s Smarter Planet initiative, the short films aim to raise awareness of the economic and infrastructure challenges facing UK cities as urbanisation puts pressure on vital resources. Launched on 15 April at the British Film Institute, the films feature staff, key stakeholders, including The Carbon Trust and the NHS, and the general public talking about how technology can make UK cities better for citizens and businesses and how IBM’s skills can help the UK to meet that challenge.

The six videos were filmed in high definition with the final installment, City of Dreams, made in 3D, and have since been made available on a variety of platforms such as YouTube, blogging site Tumblr and sharing sites StumbledUpon and Pitchengine. People – stakeholders, staff and the consumers - can leave comments or link the films to their blogs, which IBM says it hopes will initiate multiple discussions across a wider range of interested groups.

Caroline Taylor, vice-president of marketing, communications and citizenship at IBM UK & Ireland, said: “The advantage of film is both its vibrancy and adaptability as a medium. It enabled us to attract companies to share their personal views on camera and engage with media and other audiences at the British Film Institute launch event as well as via YouTube. Film as a communications technique is well used in B2C but less often used for impact in B2B. I am delighted to say we are already getting very positive feedback on the series.”

Maister, who works with clients including the National Grid, says that companies using video content must be not view it as a one-off tactic but as a way of developing corporate assets. “Video should be considered in a planned and a strategic way, it needs to be targeted and well-made.”

Tullow Oil, the European oil and gas company, is currently working with CTN Communication to do exactly that. Gary Mitchell, chief creative director of CTN, explains: “We are creating a suite of video assets that will take everyone from investors and the City through to employees and local communities on a virtual journey on what the company is about. Few people know Tullow right now so video is a really important part of its comms strategy.”

The agency has already started filming the company’s work in countries such as Ghana, Uganda and Singapore and this will be used in internal and external communications over the next couple of years. The content is being made into a documentary, set to be broadcast this autumn, that aims to demonstrate their partnership with local governments and environment agencies; but it will also be developed into online video content to engage local communities, investors and, of course, for staff.

“We will also respond to issues and messages as they crop and develop specific work if needed, but once we have the collateral built up, Tullow can use it to push out a variety of messages.”

For Mitchell, the power of video lies in its personal feel yet its ability to take people outside of their normal experience. He points to the agency’s work with the Royal Navy for its annual report. “We have created video packages, introducing the people or about life onboard the ships, behind the still images, to create an interactive experience.”

But that said he stressed that the renewed interest in video is driven by the changes to distribution. “The principals of what makes a good video have not changed. You have to get to the story and make sure you tell it targeted to the right audience.”

Tom Laidlaw is CEO of Videojug, a producer and distributor of branded video for clients including Citroën, DVLA, Microsoft, Sony and Unilever. He agrees that the dynamic growth of online video consumption has created a major opportunity for businesses to communicate. “Online video pairs the communication power of video with distribution opportunities across the web to reach the consumer on their terms, where they are,” he says. “Companies are liberating themselves from the traditional microsite model, which has steadily proven to be less effective and more expensive to promote.”

Knowing that a high proportion of its staff had the latest mobile devices, Qualcomm, the wireless telecoms research and development company, was keen to use video content to speak to its dispersed European staff but wanted to go beyond the traditional talking-head interview. Their solution has been to develop animated avatars for key staff, including European president Andrew Gilbert, to turn key staff messages into a series of two-minute “vignettes”.

Not only does the content use the technology that the company is involved in, explains Qualcomm marketing director Richard Tinkler, but it avoids forcing reluctant directors in front of the camera. “Often people get very tense about being on video but with this they only have to provide the audio. It is fun, a bit tongue-in-cheek but it is also a way for us to address our international audience in an easily manageable way.”

“Companies are liberating themselves from the traditional microsite model, which has steadily proven to be less effective and more expensive to promote”

Since the being launched 18 months ago, Qualcomm has used the avatars to announce everything from its partnership with the Prince’s Trust to reporting about its presence at the Mobile Trade Congress, using a specially created newsreader character, Chip Setter. Tinkler adds: “Not all of the staff can get out there so Chip Setter was used to help show other divisions what we do there.”

While Mitchell says few companies need to be convinced of the benefit of using video or of the case for using it creatively; it is less clear at this point what lessons corporate video are drawing from leadingedge consumer campaigns. “User-generated content, when it is used properly, can be very motivational for staff,” he explains. “But companies should not assume that because it is UGC that is it the right message. There is no harm in encouraging staff to get involved but they shouldn’t do it off their own back.”

Russ Lidstone, chief executive of advertising agency Euro RSCG, is currently working with AkzoNobel-owned paint brand Dulux on a campaign that, like Tullow’s, is creating video content that can be directed both internally and externally. Working from a film made by Dulux marketing director Kerris Bright that was used to galvanise the company’s board behind the Dulux brand, it has developed a strategy around the strapline ‘Let’s Colour’.

While a consumer TV ad using the line is rolling out now, the corporate campaign has been running for several months and revolves around the idea that paint and colour can regenerate areas. To demonstrate this, Dulux developed an international outreach project in the UK, Brazil, Paris and India that saw it transform dreary parts of local communities by using paint while chatting to the locals about the effects of colour on their lives. Through the Let’s Colour Project blog, the films, alongside a ‘Making Of ’ film has been pushed out on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Flickr.

“We want to use these films to excite our internal audience behind out brand. Our brand isn’t new but we still need to bring it live for our staff,” says Bright. Lidstone adds: “Video content means we can demonstrate the merits of a product or point of view by entertaining and engaging in different ways. It is blurring the lines for people between “my world” and the “corporate world”.

But with people consuming so much media from so many sources now, they have become very savvy, says Mitchell. “You can’t tell an internal audience something that they don’t experience on the ground. It has to chime with people’s experiences of a company otherwise it will just be detrimental.”

Animated expression

Andrew Gilbert, the executive vice president and president of Qualcomm Internet Services (QIS) and Qualcomm Europe, had probably not considered how he would look as a cartoon character before he was transformed into an avatar for a new internal communications strategy.

“We laugh about it with our senior team,” says Richard Tinkler, the Qualcomm marketing director. “But we think we have found a way to make out corporate messages more compelling.”

An email is sent out with each message to explaining what it is (reassuring staff it is safe to download) and it is then accessed through a text link after which staff are asked to enter a code to see the content. According to Qualcomm, one of its messages, sent out during a major industry event in February, received 800 views over the internet and more than 300 on mobile devices.