Affordable Atlanta Video Production Studio Green Screen Videography Editing Online Marketing Online Video Commercials Training Videos Production House <meta name="google-site-verification" content="kAijge8Fx-DYlLUP79xpRKxRitzzkc3Fph5Aibjz-pQ" />

If you area speaker, trainer or actor and need your demo reel edited — because you want to get hired for more acting work? –Read on.

The vast majority trying to book jobs don't "get it." And that's why they're not booking jobs. They're still under the assumption that all you need is agood looking headshot and a résumé (never mind the fact that everybody knowspeople tend to stretch the truth on their acting résumés just a bit...)

The fact of the matter is this: multimedia is here to stay.And it's never been easier to use. You can cut together your demo reel, post iton the web, and email it - so that casting directors and agents can be lookingat your footage in mere moments. With just about everybody (my grandmotherincluded) utilizing fast internet connections, demo reels via the internet arefast - and as important as headshots.

"Not having [acurrent demo reel] absolutely decreases an actor's chances of getting hired. It lookslike you've never worked in film or television. And what better way to see howan actor looks on film than to see their reel?"

- Casting director

A huge number of actors don't even have a demo reel. And many of the actors thatdo have demo reels use footage from back in the day when Dallas, the Love Boat,and Knight Rider were on prime time.

A bad video editor can ruin your demo and hurt your chance of getting work. My job is to sit with you and spend some time with all ofyour footage, crafting it into a short piece of video that shows that you're castable. That's it. And that's my focus with my clients. It's time for us to start marketing you

in a way that will get you hired for more speaking, training and acting jobs. 

We are Atlanta Business Video and we specialize increating marketing materials for professional public speakers, trainers and actors that get them hired. This means that if you edit with us, you'll not only gettechnical excellence in your video, but you'll be collaborating with somebody that understands the craft and speaks in the "language" of what you do.

 If you're not getting paid to present or act, then it might be time to get a good demo reel. 

There are some really cheap demo reel editors out there. Like a hundredbucks cheap. Are you willing to risk your career to somebody that doesn'treally do this for a living? And think about this: how fast would you run awayfrom somebody that offered you an entire headshot package, with yoursitting, makeup, and printing included, for less than a hundred bucks? You might as well get your headshots done at Sears. For me(and you), this is serious business. We can get you booking jobs ... or you can go to one of those kids that cut together actor's reels in his mom's garagewhile he's paying off his film school debt - and wind up with a lousy reel that doesn't get you hired.

Our editing is beyond fast. We can get your reel done in a day and your copies will be done the next morning in most cases.

There are editors in town that will take a week or two to do your reel. I am not one of them.

My clients know that I'm worth it. Why? Because the reels I produce for my clients get them hired. And when you get hired for a job that pays you the bucks, you'll realize that investing in yourdemo reel was the smartest money you could have ever spent.

And if you're not happy, you don't pay.

I'm serious. I'll make it really easy on you. I'm the only guyin town that offers his clients this: a no-holds-barred, 100% satisfaction guarantee. If, for any reason, you're not satisfied with your reel when we've finished producing it, then you don't spend a dime. No B.S., no weasel clause, nothing. If you're not happy, then when we're done editing, you can walk away without having spent one penny. Do you want to get speaking or acting jobs, or do you want to be like everybody else?

Want a demo reel? Get a free consultation. When you call and make an appointment for a free consultation at (404) 353-3540, we can get the process started so that you'll have an amazing marketing tool. Just getting hired for ONE job will pay for your reel.

To answer one other question: Yes, we can edit your reel for you if you don't live in Atlanta. We can make arrangements for you to ship your materials to me, and we'll be in contact over the phone and via email until the job is completed. I will email you links to your video files for your approval, and the reel won't be finished until you say that it is.

Successful performers are always successful marketers - so it’s time that you used these tools – and my expertise – to your advantage.

Call me at (404) 343-3540 to schedule an appointment to talk aboutputting together your demo reel. I look forward to hearing from you.

- Roger Stix

The consumer funnel takes users along a journey—awareness, favorability, consideration, intent to purchase and purchase.

Display advertising works at all stages of the funnel, bringing new prospective customers but is expensive and does not stimulate short term revenue.

Search advertising and SEO works on the lower funnel targeting those that already show interest.

Part of their attraction is the ads generate immediate revenue.

Some industries such as travel focus on Web users already in the market, meaning they lean heavily on search to target the lower funnel. On the opposite side of the spectrum, verticals such as consumer packaged goods aim to bring as many users into the purchase funnel as possible through banner advertising.

Roger Stix, Producer

Atlanta Business Video

Google drives nonbranded queries.

A good position in natural search results is critical to a brand’s strategy on the Web—and that means appearing on page one.

Making it onto the first page of results from Google, Yahoo! or Bing has always been a major goal, with marketers aware that consumers will give up after relatively few hits. Data from iCrossing analyzing natural-search referrals shows that only a tiny number come from results after the first page.

That was true across the big three search engines, with at least 95% of traffic from each originating from the first page of results after a nonbranded search. Less than 2% of search-referred traffic came from clickers persistent enough to look for results after the second page.

Marketers recognize the importance of investment in search optimization so they will appear in those results and benefit from the huge portion of clicks that go to the top hits. The Society of Digital Agencies (SoDA) found that search optimization was the third priority of senior marketers worldwide, after social networking and improving digital infrastructure.

A report from Econsultancy and ExactTarget indicated natural search would see a rise in spending by online marketers worldwide, nearly two-thirds of whom planned to increase outlays in the channel.

iCrossing also found that, in terms of referrals rather than queries, Google is doing even better than reported by researchers such ascomScore, which found that 65.7% of US search queries in December 2009 were conducted on Google.

Counting referrals for nonbranded search terms, Google’s share rose to nearly three-quarters.

An EMarketer article

What if I told you that there was a surefire way to make your website standout and POP. .. would that be of interest to you? And what if I further told you that this method is inexpensive, easily accomplished, and has a 50 times greater chance of landing you on Page 1 of a search result?

I thought that would grab your attention.

What is the secret ingredient, that magic potion, you ask? The answer is, not surprisingly — video.

It turns out that of all the things you can do on your website to engage viewers, create more page views and get higher search engine rankings, adding video just may be the best.

Forrester Research did a test and found that when search results are blended (that is, they include text, video and images) videos that are search engine optimized give you a 50 times greater chance of ending up on the all-important first page of a search result.

But here's the catch: You can't just add a video to your site and expect a great search engine result for that page. The video must be search engine optimized, that is, it must contain key words in the file names, captions, and so on. That same Forrester blog indicated that less than 20% of all online marketers search engine optimize their video.

If you want your video to be picked up and analyzed properly by Google and the other search engines, you must not only add SEO keywords to it, but you must actually "submit the video to Google using XML tools.

Putting your video on YouTube and embedding the YouTube player and URL into your site is insufficient. "The traffic and the rankings will be applied to YouTube and not your site.

Obviously properly SEOing a video offers a tremendous opportunity.

1. It helps attract new customers by virtue of the SEO factor

2. It engages them, reducing the "bounce rate" and

3. It can help increase your conversion rate – that is, the number of people who visit and then end up buying something or calling for more information

ABV produces professional videos that are affordable for a company as small as one person and distributes them, properly titled and tagged for SEO purposes to all the major video sharing sites.

Roger Stix, Producer

Atlanta Business Video

By Roger Stix

Being a Professional speaker or trainer is a performing art. Speaker marketing has always been about creditability, message, stage presence and the ability to communicate clearly.

In the old days speakers used written testimonials in their marketing materials. Filming or video taping performances was unusual and costly and getting a copy of the tape (remember Beta?) was something you needed to negotiate in advance. And the uses were limited.

The most professional speakers would combine presentations into a video tape demonstration, “demo reel”, have it copied and give it to their agent for distribution to prospective clients. The process was expensive and time-consuming. Oh, and those tapes your agent sent out were rarely returned. I’ve heard stories of agents sending out an average of more than 20 tapes to get one booking.

To be successful today, speakers need to adopt their marketing efforts to the new reality – video and the internet. You need to have several of your presentations video taped. If you are presenting before a big audience you should consider having 2 cameras at the event, one to capture you from the back of the room and the second to capture audience reaction and get alternative angles of you from the audience perspective. Tell the videographers where you have injected humor in the presentation so camera 2 can be in a good position and ready to capture the audience reaction. The more professional your video looks, the more professional you look, and, visa-versa. Beware; poor video quality will not make a positive impression.

The Demo Reel

Today’s demo reels are not really reels but flash files that can be played over the internet. Think of a demo reel as “the best of me”. They usually are a combination of several speeches, organized to showcase you stage presence, strength of presentation and your topics. Professionally edited demo reels do not have an elaborate introduction or background music or self-aggrandizing introductions. If you have several topics which you speak on, include them but don’t mix it with a TV interview, which is material for a separate reel. Total running time should be about 5 minutes and include nothing but your best, even if that means it will run for only 3 minutes.

The reel is about performance and message. A professional reel starts with a simple short slide containing your name and contact information. Then immediately proceeds to your best, most forceful presentation and important message followed by the second, third etc. Meeting mangers can read about your book, prior engagements, and your TV appearances in your resume.

An effective demo reel will lead visitors deeper into your website. Your reel is your most important tool. For more information on demo reels read Demo Reel Secrets for Actors: How to supercharge your reel by Derrick Boelter.

Organizing a Sophisticated Internet Marketing Campaign

Now let’s examine how a sophisticated, multifaceted the internet marketing campaign should be organized. Your second-first most important marketing tool is a professional looking website with appropriate meta-tags and a sign-up form to collect the email addresses of visitors.

Another critical ingredient is an email newsletter. This requires that you collect business cards form as many people as you can. Your audiences are good targets for subsequent engagements and to sell additional online educational programs.

Remember, your marketing campaign will evolve and grow as you do as a speaker. New speaking topics will need to be added as will clips from presentations before large audiences. Always, always try to get a copy of any video of your presentations or interviewes.

All the video’s we will be discussing can be used in many ways; on your website, in email marketing, in blogs and social networking. Then there’s posting on video sharing websites like YouTube and Metacafe.

SEO and Video Distribution

About 6 months ago, Google started placing a lot of weight on web video in SEO rankings. Virally distributed video, properly meta-tagged often come up at the top of Google organic search results with a thumbnail. Additionally, properly tagged, these videos can be linked to your website and increase your sites organic search ranking. We offer a service that distributes to about 25 of the leading video sharing and social networking sites.

Website Walk-on Videos

A“WalkOn” video starts to play immediately when a visitor lands on the site. It gives you the opportunity to speak directly with them and gives visitors an immediate opportunity to assess you (think Wink) and your delivery. Statistics show viewership of involuntary video plays drops off precipitously at 45 seconds, so you want to keep this short.

Embedded website videos

Showcase your reel on the first page of your website. This video should be embedded, require a voluntary click and be visible without having to scroll down. When visitors voluntarily click to view a video they are more likely to watch for a longer time because the act of clicking indicates an interest in the message, so a 5 minute reel will not be too long.

Video blogs

For one speaker I’ve made video blogs, an inexpensive video shot against a green screen with a background added. These videos can run as long as necessary to discuss new topics, relevant current events and as video versions of articles.

Video excerpts

Another excellent use of video presentations is to extract 1 to 5 minute video snippets from previous presentations and repurpose them for your website and elsewhere.

Monetize your existing material

Many speakers have programs on DVD they sell after a speech. These programs can be converted to flash and sold from your website too, complete with workbooks. No new program creation, no postage, no duplication and no left over inventory. The best practice is to distribute through a website that controls the number of views allowed, limits the computers they can be viewed on and can not be copied. To find these sites Google “digital rights director”.

Closing

Being a Professional speaker or trainer is a performing art. Written accolades are no longer effective. Your computer has a display and speakers, use them. We’re in the show me era and video is the most effective way to showcase your skills. There are costs involved but they eliminate printing, duplication and will keep you competitive and profitable in the 21st century.

Roger Stix is the Founder and Producer at Atlanta Business Video, ABV produces affordable, professional HD video captured on location, at speaking engagements and in our green screen studio. Our collaborative, post-production editing process ensures client satisfaction and compresses completion of projects that might take weeks elsewhere, into days, reducing cost. Now, anyone can take full advantage web video without budget-busting prices.

Hello and welcome, My name is Roger Stix and I'm the producer here at Atlanta Business Video. The internet is now the most ubiquitous source of information in the world. 

We created ABV to help small to mid-sized businesses compete and win on the internet by producing professional video at affordable prices.

Among the innovative ways we’ve reduced costs is right-sizing our studio and by creating a process that speeds-up the process so that we can complete in days or a week, what takes weeks or months at most production companies.

We have our own permanent studio in Buckhead, own all the necessary equipment which is NEW and High Definition and we employ a full time staff of 2 editors.

Our faster process, lower overhead, and small staff is producing professional video at affordable prices for small to mid-sized companies that have never been able to afford video before.

It used to be having a website was enough to compete on the internet, but not anymore. It’s gotten too big. Google does such a good job indexing information that people have stopped reading, and are now only glancing at sites as they search for information they’re looking for.

Google’s own statistics show that when searching, men will spend only 3 seconds on a site before reaching their “limit of frustration.” For women, it’s 10 seconds.

Video has been proven to hold people on sites long enough to communicate messages. Here are some statistics:

80% of people landing on a site with video play it.

52% of those people will search the site for more information.

20% of those people will buy or call.

Static websites can’t compete.

Now you can afford video.

Check out some of our other videos to learn about all the ways video can be used including viral distribution and for SEO.

You know you need video to be competitive and now you know where to get it. Call me now and we’ll get started.

Very.

In October 2009, Eyeblaster reported that creative was the key to more engaging rich media ads. Based on the research firm’s “Online Video Advertising: Doubles Engagement, Boosts ROI” bulletin, video grabs attention and has a lasting impact.

Rich media ads with video had a higher dwell rate than those without, and almost double the dwell time.

This translates to fewer impressions needed for the same results. For example, Eyeblaster found that two exposures to a video ad campaign produced the same dwell rate as three exposures to nonvideo rich media ads.

Unsurprisingly, in-stream banners were most likely to be fully played. They far outpaced the start rate and fully played rate of all other video ad formats.

Other creative decisions also influenced effectiveness. Video ads initiated on rollover performed best, followed by auto-initiated ads. Ads that only began playing when a user clicked did worst.

The performance of video ads also varies according to the content it appears with. Video ads did best when placed next to e-mail, news, finance, sports and music, but fell behind in social network and gaming environments.

An E-Marketer Article

Roger Stix

Tweeting while driving

Despite the slowing growth of Twitter after its explosion earlier in 2009, many users still cannot get enough. Crowd Science reports that in August 2009, although only 27% of Twitter users posted daily, 46% checked for updates every day. Almost one in five social media users reported using Twitter in the past week.

Although 60% of Twitter users reported using only their computer to access the service, microbloggers are highly mobile, accessing social media from the washroom, the car, the theater and even during a religious service.

Twitter users were more likely than other social media users to feed their addiction from every location but school, including hotels, libraries, public transportation and restaurants.

A September 2009 study from Retrevo found that among those under age 35, 39% of Twitter users and 27% of Facebook users checked the sites at least 10 times every day.

The under-35 crowd dramatically outpaced older users in usage from different locations. Younger users were more than twice as likely to check Facebook or Twitter at work, and more than four times as likely to do so while driving—not to mention their propensity to “kiss and tweet.”

An Emarketer Article

Roger Stix

Atlanta Business Video

Extracted from a recent posting by Roxio.com

Digital video quality has been improving rapidly, thanks to ever better and more efficient compression algorithms. But the consequent alphabet soup of acronyms (MPEG-1, 2, 4, DV, HDV, AVCHD, H.264, DivX, Flash etc.) out there just seems to grow with every technology advance. However, thanks to Roxio video burning and editing software's ability to convert to and from most formats there are really only a few you need to worry about.

Here's a guide to the most common formats you'll see around the Web:

H.264/MPEG-4 AVC (advanced video codec) -- This is the highly efficient format used by most new portable players, including the iPhone, iPod Touch, Apple TV and Sony PSP. It's also used by a lot of web video chat and conferencing programs, and is popular for streaming video due to its compact size.

AVCHD -- A high-def video format based on H.264 video that has taken the camcorder market by storm. Most flash and hard-disk-based camcorders record in AVCHD. Discs, including DVDs, authored as AVCHD are playable in most Blu-ray players.

DV/HDV -- DV is the original consumer digital camcorder format. All MiniDV tape camcorders are either DV or HDV, the new high-def version. DV is a special high-quality standard definition video format that is very space-consuming. By contrast, HDV uses the MPEG-2 compression scheme, the same used by DVDs (although in a higher resolution), so it can fit a decent amount of high-def video onto the same size tapes. Both are excellent quality, but are being displaced by AVCHD due to AVCHD's even smaller file sizes and easier handling.

DivX -- DivX is both a brand name for products from DivX Inc., and a compression format noted for its extreme encoding efficiency. Movies encoded in DivX format maintain surprising quality, even in high-definition. Both Roxio Creator for Windows and Toast for Mac can convert video to DivX format.

Flash -- The format used by YouTube and much other web-based video. Requires Flash Player to decode, as well as special authoring tools. Best avoided by consumers except for playback.

WMV9 -- Windows Media Video 9 is the Microsoft implementation of the VC-1 SMPTE HD video standard. VC-1 is an efficient codec that can be played back in set-top Blu-ray players, and WMV9 can support both unprotected and DRM (copy-protected) material.

QuickTime or MOV -- QuickTime files (usually with the .MOV extension), can contain almost any type of video format within them. QuickTime is basically a wrapper that tells the QuickTime Player how to decode whatever is contained inside. Since QuickTime is a system-level architecture, many applications can play QuickTime files in addition to Apple's player. You will need to have the QuickTime framework installed on your PC or Mac, however.

Roger Stix, Producer

Atlanta Business Video