This is a guest post from Ryan Critchett from RMC Tech.

Editor’s note: I usually don’t do this but in this case I thought it was important to point out that, the intention behind this type of content is to showcase real entrepreneurs and their stories of successful use of social media marketing, rather than presenting the usual suspects nobody can relate to, like Redbull or Starbucks. These are real examples you can put into action. The story is told by Ryan and, if you have something similar going on, share it with me. Here goes…

It’s no secret, video blogging is a great tool that anyone can benefit from by adding it to their arsenal of business marketing weapons.

Some take advantage of it, some don’t know its power exists and some, don’t understand the force impact you can make by showing people the “face and feeling” of the company.

I’m in the former category. I started video blogging on a blog some of you may remember called Imarketinghacked. Long gone and taken down, Imark (as it was called in the street) was a blog mainly about the awesomeness of new marketing and social media. That’s where it all started for me.

Video Blogging Has This Much Power?

I was blown away. Months after launching the blog, I had actually (contrary to collective expectation) built a pretty solid readership.

Was my content awesome? Well, I think so! But it wasn’t the quality or practicality that brought in such quality readers, it was the fact that they saw my face, felt my feelings and were bonded to me emotionally that got that blog traffic.

That was well before I decided to start a full blown business. I was just dabbling around, learning the landscape, testing things out. But, as it turns out, it was not only the perfect primer, but the most powerful social marketing training I ever could have gotten.

Taking It Into Business, iPhone Style

My company, RMC Tech, is a technical service company that goes where the market needs us. Right now, we’re needed in, and are attacking the iPhone screen repair market.

We replace screens on broken iPhones nationwide, and locally here in Pennsylvania. But, with just the technical skill to replace a screen, could I really make any money?

Could my business get traction, press, awareness and leads just because I’m a hardware geek? I think not! And I certainly didn’t for the first month I offered the service.

I knew, I had to do something big, something contagious, something that spread. The video blogging begun.

I started thinking about how I could use the power of storytelling to reach the local market in the Lehigh Valley, expanding out to the rest of the US. The answer? The iGraveyard.

iPhones break, and when they do, we normally keep the parts. With the parts, comes a story. The story of how the phone met its demise.

Here’s a clip of one of our latest:

My friends started telling me they were drawn in by the iGraveyard videos, that each new one that came out, they were excited to watch and it’s at that point that I knew I was onto something.

Tweeting the videos out to people in my local market, it started to spread the awareness for me. Even if the video gets retweeted 5 times, 5 more people see it, the idea that I repair iPhones gets pressed into their brains, and I’ve effectively just indirectly marketed to them.

But wait, there’s more. It isn’t just the Ryan Critchett theory, I’m getting leads from this. People are not just calling for the service, they now ask me if I’m going to showcase their iPhone on the iGraveyard videos.

I’m now getting a steady flow of leads saying things like “I stumbled across one of your iGraveyard videos on Youtube, and I have a broken iPhone..” not just locally but also from states like like Massuchusetts, New York, and Texas. The main sources for this lead generation, as I ask each one of my customers, are YouTube, Google and Twitter.

I’ve also been able to get some interesting press coverage, land meetings with executives from worldwide brands about technical services within the enterprise, and attract a nationwide franchise technical service company. We’re now in negotiations to do some major partnership stuff.

The videos helped my company get the exposure we were not able to get by building backlinks to our website or attending local networking events. The formula is simple, I use video as a digital emotion vehicle to reach people in a more personal format, through storytelling and showing my face to spread something entertaining and get a message across, which is much more effective than interrupting people.

We’re moving into a new age. In fact, it’s arrived. We’re here. Internet technology and the social web makes it possible to reach customers, and generate leads, in a whole new way. Video blogging transfers emotion. It gives you the ability to show the company’s personality. The human being behind it.

How are you approaching your target?

Let’s take the bull by the horns. Find creative ways to built trust through video with your target market. Reach your potential customers before your competitors do.

Take advantage of the fact that this makes huge budgets in advertising obsolete, because you’re getting to the consumer first by being with them in the trenches and entertaining them.

Crank out some awesome videos, not just about the service you provide but about something entertaining around that service, without trying to sell all the time. People want to do business with people, they want an emotional connection and there is an enormous opportunity to build real trust points through video marketing.

Your R.O.I. is more likely to show up.

Photo Credit: Rego – d4u.hu

Videos are everywhere lately, specially interviews. I mean bloggers are really taking it to the next level and why not, it’s a great way to engage your visitor and make them stay a little longer. Are you asking yourself if this is hard to put together?

I’m going to show you how to produce your own video interview guerilla style… I mean, without losing an arm and a leg and without hiring anybody. First let’s review the ingredients:

The Ingredients

• Webcam
• Screen capture software
• Skype
• Basic video editing software
• Video sharing website

Record A Little Intro

With just a simple webcam, record yourself doing a short introduction for your guest, tell people what they are about to see. Make it short because your viewer will not stick forever to see you hook it up.

When you are done save it, you will need it later to edit the final piece.

Screen Capture

When doing an interview you will face two possible scenarios, is the person you are interviewing physically reachable or on the other side of the planet. In this case we’ll talk about a long distance interview and since this is going to happen over the internet, what we need to record is what’s happening on the screen, this is called Screen Capturing. This software will also take care of the audio part.

I personally like iShowU from ShinyWhiteBox, but there are plenty of options out there. Depending of your choice, you should expect to pay up to $100, don’t pay more than that (iShowU is about $30).

Skype

Oh, the beautiful and FREE Skype… If you don’t have an account you should probably make the time to get one, today. In my opinion, the only thing Skype doesn’t do is record, that’s why you need to use screen capture software. Other than that, it makes everything much more simple. Setup your appointment, make sure you have a good connection for the call, make a couple of tests and you are ready.

Consider that your interview should probably not exceed the 10 minutes but try to record more material to play with at the editing stage.

Editing Your Video

The term “Video Editing” is probably the one that scares everybody, but don’t complicate things. Remember that you are producing something for the Internet, not for TV. While there are many options in this field, I recommend you stay in the lower end, the basics. I’m using iMovie but if you are on the PC side, Windows Movie Maker should be the equivalent.

These programs are very easy to learn because they are meant to help beginners like you and me. If you take a couple of tutorials, you’ll be on your way pretty fast (These links are for tutorials on both iMovie and Movie Maker).

During the editing stage, you want to play with adding different elements like pictures, text, effects and music. You will also be able to chop the raw video in pieces and paste them together.

Video Sharing Service

Now that you have your video edited and saved on your computer (usually on a MP4 format), you need to share it with the world and for this you will need to create an account with a service like Vimeo or YouTube if you don’t already have one. I prefer Vimeo but that’s just me, there are plenty options out there for you to find a good fit.

Once you have your account setup you just need to upload your file, be patient, it’ll take a while. Set up a title, a description, tags and whatever you can do to make it a little more friendly. Publish your video and make sure everything is looking good.

Embed To Your Post

The last step is to bring it to your blog, where you want to place it on your next post. Wherever your video lives now (Vimeo, YouTube or other…), copy the “Embed Code” (read my post: “Mini-Tutorial: How To Embed A You-Tube Video On Your Blog“) and insert it into your post. Preview and test everything before hitting the “Publish” button.

It’s A Wrap!

It’s not rocket science, anybody can do a video interview and while the technical part is very important and entertaining at the same time, make sure the main focus is on delivering good quality in the content. People will forgive a technical difficulty if the content is of value.

(2 mentions before I go: Sorry Andrea for using you as an example… and thanks Glenn Sakamoto for the idea for the post).

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Embeding video into your site or blog is easier than you think and provides your visitor with a much richer experience. Here is the screencast and the step-by-step action on how to do it in a few minutes…

These instructions are based on YouTube because is the most popular site, but you can use video from any source that provides you with the embed code.

Step 1: Go To YouTube And Find Your Video

Step 2: Get Your Code

Look for box that includes the URL and Embed, usually to the right side of the video player. Do not get the URL, instead place your cursor inside the Embed box to select it. Copy (Cmd+C on Mac or Ctr-C on PC).

Step 3: Back To Your WordPress Dashboard

Go back to your WordPress dashboard where you are editing your post. You have 2 tabs on your body window, “Visual” and “HTML”, select the HTML tab.

Step 4: Paste Your Code

Once you are on the HTML view of your post, locate the cursor exactly where you want to place the video and paste the code (Cmd+V on Mac or Ctr-V on PC).

When you go back to the “Visual” tab, you will only see a yellow box. You will not be able to see the video from the editor.

Step 5: Preview, Test And Publish

Before you publish your new post you need to test the video and look at the size on preview mode, make sure everything is right and you’re happy with the results.

Hope you like it and if you have any ideas for future tutorials, let us know in the comments of this post…

Also, you can see all the Mini-Tutorials in one place on my Screenr page. Visit, comment and share the love.