Some Cool Viral Videos

Check out some of the latest viral videos from CompareNetworks Production Group, part of Biocompare, Medcompare, Dentalcompare and OphthalmologyWeb. These guys specialize in making some cool videos about technical products. Anything from a PCR machines for life scientists, to workstations for dental offices the videos are fun to watch and get your product message across.

Some Examples of the Latest Virals:

Transformers - Roche LightCycler 480 Real-Time PCR System

Frankenstein - DentalEZ Freedom Workstation

Promote Your Own Advertising

One thing that I continually try to tell clients of ours is, if you want your products, videos, articles viewed more, why not promote it through your own website as well. Here are reasons for linking to certain types of advertising....

Editorial & Product Reviews: Biocompare, Medcompare, OphthalmologyWeb, and Dentalcompare have all become trusted sources for product information for their industries. By linking to an article from our site, you lend credibility to the benefits and features of your products you are promoting.

Product Listings: If your own website doesn't have all your product specifications in one easy layout, link to your product listing. The CompareNetworks product listings give full specifications, description, and have your contact information at the bottom. Not to mention, you can generate even more leads.

Videos: If you just paid a lot of money to have a testimonial video done at a tradeshow, why not link to it from your website. Everyone loves to watch videos on products, it lets the user experience your product almost- first hand. Linking to your video gives people more information and you get more views....better ROI!

Media Kits - Who Reads 'Em?

Just wondering if i'm totally wasting my time on creating a media kit. Aside from an editorial calendar and some print specs that are sometimes useful for print advertising, does anyone out there still read a media kit?

The current arguments I get from sales for having a Media Kit is "everyone has one, we need one." As a marketer, who is spending thousands of dollars on printing and calculates ROI that reasoning doesn't fly anymore. I want to know how many people open it...or how many dollars we would lose if we did not have one?

Take Control of Your ROI

I recently read "Web Marketing's Darwinian Secrets" article by Jeff Stibel from Harvard Business Publishing, and while at first I was annoyed, since it completely discredited my marketing degree, there is some truth to what he is saying.


Online advertising has completely changed the way a marketer makes decisions. Rather than spending money to work with creative agency to develop the one campaign that will be the theme of your print advertising, with online you can create thousands of campaigns. Swapping out ad text, and imagery is easy as a flip of a switch. Not to mention, you can collect data in real time, and make adjustments when you see something isn't working.

With this kind of feedback mechanism, marketers now have control over their ROI. It's no wonder more and more advertisers are moving away from print to online advertising.

If a picture is worth a thousand words...

...then what is video worth? In the marketing world, $775 million a year and growing. Now, I'm not talking about commercial videos on TV which you purposely use the TiVO to avoid, I'm talking about internet video. Internet Videos have become THE new way of interacting and educating potential clients, and spreading a marketing message especially when you are trying to reach a targeted audience.

Here are a few reasons why so many marketers are putting more and more funds towards internet video.

1. Effective - video ads say more than a static or flash ad in a small amount of space, not to mention they catch your eye and make you jump if your speakers are turned up too loud. In a nutshell, they draw more attention and therefore make the end-user click.

2. On-Demand - internet videos are always there at the perfect time. Users can watch when they want to watch, and at the pace they want. Some videos even allow for jumping around to different subject material.

3. Viral - people are much more likely to pass around a cool video than a boring article. A couple perfect examples of this are the Mac vs PC videos and now the new Office 07 videos.

If you are interested in jumping on the bandwagon, the CompareNetworks production group currently offers several forms of online videos: Demo Videos, Audio/Video Slideshows, and Viral Videos. Just shoot me an email if you would like more information.

Interesting article on videos from BtoB, "Picture this: Online video generating excitement".

Pay per signup!

Google recently announced their new "pay-per-action" ads. A cross between Google's Adwords and Analytics programs, with these ads you only pay when a user follows through with an action you specify, for example, signing up for an email newsletter. These new ads ensure people clicking on your adwords are actually your targeted audience, AND you know exactly how much money you spent to acquire that new customer. Currently, Google is slowly rolling out the new ads over the next few months. To signup to receive an invitation and learn more about the program click here. Check back in the next couple months, I'll be sure to post on how the program is working for us.