The Video Commerce Consortium has just released a new whitepaper, “Creating E-Commerce Videos That Sell,” downloadable here. Included in the whitepaper:

- Conceptual Framework for Creating Videos that Sell
- Understanding Motivation, Simplicity, and Triggers
- Producing E-Commerce Videos that Get Results
- Conceptual Storyboarding Approaches
- Benefits and Drawbacks of Various Video Production Methods in E-Commerce
- Product Video ROI Calculator
- Selecting the Right Video Production Equipment
- Filming and Post-Production for E-Commerce Video
- Common Video Production Questions Asked and Answered
- Placing Videos on Product Detail Pages for Maximum Results
- Product Detail Page Implementation Results…

I’ve noticed more people asking me about the relative merits of Flash vs. Silverlight for e-commerce video, especially since the release of Silverlight 3.0 in July.  I am not a technical expert on the differences between Flash and Silverlight, so I won’t expose my ignorance here by pretending otherwise.  Besides, a simple Google search reveals no shortage of Flash v. Silverlight comparison reports for the curious.  Smashing Magazine’s writeup is one of the better ones.  Read it here if you’re so inclined.

For most executives in e-commerce, my general read is still that the battle between Flash versus Silverlight comes …

Last week, I co-presented a webinar on the State of Video Email Marketing in 2009 for my non-VCC gig with Liveclicker (see embed below).  Here’s the webinar in its entirety, in case you’d like to pull any charts/stats/graphs/takeaways:

We spent a large portion of the time in the webinar discussing video .GIFs. What’s a video .GIF, you might ask?  Well, it’s basically an animated .GIF file that looks like video in the end user’s email client.  You can see an example here, here, and here. There are some important elements of video .GIFs that make them different from standard animated …

You may have heard late last month YouTube announced it would allow content owners to include their own customizable overlay links on their YouTube videos for the first time.  Note this is different than the overlays which content owners could previously opt to place on their videos that allowed YouTube to target which links appeared.  The big disadvantage of that program for online retailers was that e-commerce companies don’t benefit by allowing 3rd parties to advertise in their videos – the last thing anyone wants is to use a video that consumed precious resources to produce or acquire to …

We’re pleased to announce the launch of CommerceVideos.com, a new blog dedicated to profiling the video shopping experiences of leading online retailers.  The blog launched without much fanfare on May 27, 2009.  As opposed to the Video Commerce Consortium blog here at www.video-commerce.org, which is dedicated to video commerce thought leadership, inquiry, and video commerce best practices, or VideoRetailer.org, which is concerned primarily with video commerce industry developments and insights, CommerceVideos.com is concerned only with reviewing and critiquing how different online retailers are implementing video.  Already, three different online retailers have been profiled: JC Penney, B&H Photo/Video and …

Thanks to Jeff Molander, CEO of Molander & Associates for publishing this video interview earlier today with Gordon Magee, Internet Marketing & Analysis Manager at Drs. Foster & Smith.  The section regarding Drs. Foster & Smith’s use of video is 10 minutes, 45 seconds into the video, so you might want to fast forward to view the video commerce section.  Also, thanks to Kristi Treder, Affiliate Marketing Specialist at 4imprint.com for pointing out this video to us.

Happy Selling!…

How many times have you heard someone say “The internet is not like television” or, conversely, “Television is not like the internet”? The line between the two is starting to blur, but I think it is much too soon to really know what the final fusion will be like. In the meantime, we have to decide how to stylize our ecommerce videos for use on the internet using what we know from producing for television.

We all grew up watching television and are therefore used to seeing commercials. We all have also seen, at some time or another, an infomercial …

Last Friday, Alan Talanoa, Director of Web Operations for GolfDiscount.com sat down with us for the second interview in the ongoing VCC Radio Interview series.  Among the topics we discussed:

- The role of the product page in the company’s video commerce strategy

- The blend of manufacturer v. self-produced video used at GolfDiscount.com

- The biggest opportunities for video syndication and growth from the product page

- The amount of investment needed to create video content

- How GolfDiscount.com’s customers have reacted to the video on the site

I hope you enjoy listening to the interview as much …

This morning I read a MarketingVOX article highlighting how YouTube just surpassed 100MM viewers in January.  That’s great news for video commerce, right?  It’s all fine and good that YouTube has such a vast audience, but the more pertinent question for video commerce professionals is: should you care, and if so, why?

Unfortunately, I think this is one question that hasn’t really been adequately examined by many video commerce professionals, and like many questions worthy of examination, the answer isn’t always clear cut.  So let’s take a critical look at YouTube’s role in the video commerce ecosystem and outline the …

By John Weaver, FansEdge.com

Creating video content is a time consuming process, and time is money.  I imagine that when the idea was first floated at your company, someone asked about the ROI of incorporating video into your strategy.  Obviously, the longer it takes to produce content, the lower your ROI gets.  Sooooooo…

“How do you efficiently create video content for your website?”

It Starts With a Plan
As with any large project, planning is the most crucial step.  My philosophy with video production is to do all the real work before getting to the shoot so that, once the …