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Using Production as Part of a Brand Strategy
By Amy Colbourn, Managing Director, Business Strategist at MONOGRAM
As the saying goes, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” It’s a simple suggestion that a single image can convey complex ideas, emotions, and messages more effectively than a lengthy explanation. It’s an idea that highlights the power of visual communication in capturing attention, evolving emotions, and conveying meaning succinctly.
When it comes to branding luxury hospitality, a truth like this one couldn’t be more meaningful.
Visual aesthetics can make all the difference when engaging a guest. Not only can they deliver on a place’s overall appeal, but they can also evoke a sense of an experience and capture emotion.
When it comes to destination marketing, a beautiful piece of video content can be so intimate that it can even communicate the scent or the temperature of a setting. That’s powerful. That’s why production is not merely a means to an end, it’s not just a service offering, and it’s definitely not a commodity where all things are created equal—quite the contrary.
Here are four reasons your content production should be part of your visual communications and brand marketing strategies.
#1. The Emulation of Satisfaction
A brand promise creates a sense of satisfaction about what to expect.
Satisfaction creates a better sense of perceived value.
Perceived value leads to loyalty, which is a bridge to brand affinity—the apex of brand admiration, where cult-like brand fans are born.
A brand promise is more than an idea and must be expressed emotionally and relevantly. Here, our job is to bring the vision to life through content production. There is no better way to bring an experience to life than through sight and sound perfectly orchestrated to deliver a story and suspend a moment in time.
#2. Disruption-Less Production
Productions of any kind can seem daunting and overwhelming. They often come with large teams of people hauling heavy equipment and wielding bright lights. The vision of the production team encroaching on a serene beachfront setting to capture the property’s allure becomes an intrusive, unwelcome task.
Meanwhile, shutting down the resort or part of the resort is impossible.
That’s all the more reason to have a production team aligned with the brand team—it will help all parties understand the need to minimize business disruption and be considerate of guests.
#3. Working Within Defined Parameters
Most campaigns come with two things: a budget and a timeline.
Most budgets and timelines are never enough, so the teams do their best to balance needs. Unfortunately, operating under these restrictions leads to tight deadlines and rushed outputs, and budget constraints require balancing high-quality campaigns with limited resources. Having a strategic production partner can maximize the balance between timing and outputs so you can make the most of what you have to work with.
A production partner may also help to maintain creative integrity in a few ways:
- Balancing creative client expectations with the marketing team’s direction
- Accommodating other last-minute tactical requests for needs outside of the overall marketing plan or vision
- Capturing unexpected events as part of the story when the events are not scheduled on the production timeline
- Determining how to effectively measure ROI
#4. Quality Above All Else
A quality aspirational offering cannot and will not settle for anything short of perfection. This goal and the proper aesthetic and expectation are essential to quality production. A production partner who is at the table at inception can go a long way to ensure crucial aspects are considered.
- Content quality: producing content that aligns with the brand identity
- Content relevance: ensuring content is relevant to the target audience
- Consistency: maintaining brand consistency across all produced assets
- Communication: effectively communicating the vision and goals
Beyond the Shoot
A brand team that considers production as part of the strategy has a better success rate of anticipating client needs beyond the shoot. The longevity of assets is a crucial consideration for any production, which means negotiating usage to utilize content and assets well beyond the initial campaign period. Somehow, this scenario is more common than not, and the client ends up running assets longer than they anticipated.
Considering everything, a production and brand agency partnership model can potentially alleviate many client pain points. It can add value to both the process and the outcome. Next time you embark on a new campaign, consider making video production part of the upstream strategic planning process. You will be glad you did.
If your business is in need of a brand campaign strategy that includes quality assets, contact MONOGRAM today to schedule a complimentary brand consultation with our team.