It's possible to make a video now faster than the time it takes to watch one. Here's how.

Hello and welcome to this episode of Speak PR. My name is Jim James, and I wanted to let you know that you could be making a 45-second video in less than 6 seconds for free.

That's right.

Now I'm going to share with you how I've just done that with using a tool called Lumen5. Now my purpose on the Speak PR podcast and also on the mastermind that I run which is at speakpr.co, is to help all those business owners or people that have got an organization where you've got something to share, but you don't have the budget to have an agency. So you could use technology to accomplish content creation and amplification for your business. And so I look at all sorts of tools like AI writers for your content, for Instagram, but also for infographic creation, for newsletters, and so on. And today, I wanted to share about making a video, because as we all know, videos are the hero content when it comes to social media. And we know because we've covered this in Speak PR that this is due to the picture superiority effect and how the brain will operate with what we call dual coding, a theory which is explained by a chap called Alan Pavey here in the UK that I've also done blog posts and podcasts about. So the idea is basically that our brain will process images and audio separately, but with video it actually connects the two together, which makes it doubly impactful.

So that's the theory behind why videos are so impactful. We all just know that it's— we like to watch the TV.

Now the challenge, of course, with creating video content is that for your average company it's very difficult to do because it's very expensive to create content But also it requires some skill sets of the kind that writing does not. And then audio has another set of skills. And but video is altogether harder, both in terms of storyboarding and editing and getting the dissolves right and then getting all the music right. So it's been beyond the reach of the average small company. And you can go to a small production company And it may cost you up to £500 to £1,000 just to get a minute to 3 minutes of content. And even then, you may have found that your need for it has, has passed by the time that it's ready, because the production times for video can take quite a long time. So in the past, I personally haven't created video other than trying to create the odd YouTube, which is on a handheld device and all just looks a little bit rinky-dink, to be honest, a little bit cheap. So I've been on a mission to find another way, and through the Speak PR, I've been looking at lots of different AI-led technologies for creating content. We've looked at content creators for music, for example. We've looked at content creators for, uh, writing, and this was the turn of video.

So I found one called Lumen5. That's L-U-M-E-N-5, the number 5. Now, Lumen5 is a company that obviously I'm late to the game because over 700,000 businesses are already using the platform.

And the platform is free to sign up, so that's what I've done today.

And you can make with this what they call community plan, you can make 5 videos per billing cycle, you can access millions of photos and videos and music tracks, and there is a marketplace for media, and you can output your video to 720 or 1080 HD. So having signed up, what I did was I then entered the URL for one of my blog posts, because you have that option to enter content that you've already written online, or you can enter content directly into their text dialog area. And within 6 seconds, I kid you not, Lumen5 had auto-compiled a 45-second video with music, with nice dissolves. And unlike other services that I've seen where the video images were not really relevant to the text, I could not have chosen better images myself. So when I put in the word, for example, writing and the challenges that people have with writing, which is one of the elements of this particular article I've written, the Lumen5 has gone off and found video clips of people typing.

And then when it comes to using the word AI, because I have in the article using AI to create content, either original content or edited content for repurposing, It has found a very nice image of a, of a head with lots and lots of lights going on inside.

Doesn't look as bad as I'm making it sound.

So, but it actually showed context-relevant images both as stills and as videos and edited them together and made the dissolves between them nice.

And also then what it did was it added music.

What I was able to do then— this is all within the free version—

was I was able to add my logo as a JPEG file or a PNG file. But I've also used a platform called Videos to animate my logo for Speak PR, and I was able to upload my MP4 file. It's just a short 6-second sting, and I was then able to have as the penultimate frame an animated, an animated clip of my logo for Speak PR. And then on the final frame, I was able to add my PNG file of my East West PR logo and write text in underneath. So you're able to change and add more scenes by adding in more text, adding in your own images, adding in your own video. And if you want to change the music, then you need to upgrade the program And I'll share that with you in a moment, how much that costs. But I have now some royalty music that I've paid for, for the Speak PR program, and that I use on the podcast and also on some other videos on the Speak PR training course. So I would be able to upload that music. And we've talked before on the Speak PR podcast about sonic branding. And so with Lumen5, I'd be able to even stay clean and clear with my sonic branding. And you can of course also change things like the templates, the colorways, just as you can with other platforms like Vimeo and Canva in order to retain your corporate branding. So Lumen5 then created this image, uh, this video for me. And after I'd added my own clips, I got to 51 seconds. I was then able to download that video, but I was also able to resize that for a vertical 9:16 or a horizontal, and also a square for Instagram, which is, which is really very helpful. I did find that when I went from the horizontal to the vertical that the sting didn't quite work, but the rest of it all reconfigured beautifully. So you can actually then create the content and repurpose it for multiple platforms pretty much instantly and download these. Or what you can do is you can share them, so you can link the Lumen5 to your Facebook account, for example. Now what I did was I downloaded the horizontal format and I then uploaded it to LinkedIn. Now it's a nice small file, only 13 megabytes, and so The LinkedIn had no problem at all in taking that video, and I was able to then post that to a group. So in less than half an hour and for free, I was able to create a 51-second video which was branded with music and text and great images. And frankly, I don't think anyone would have thought that it had been made in the way that it's been made because it really looks very professional indeed. The resolution is great, the music is good, the sound quality is Awesome. So I'm thinking about now, if this is 5 videos per cycle, um, that's fantastic. I could upgrade. So for the reason of maybe adding my Sonic branding, I may increase the cost of my monthly operations to $19 a month. Uh, and if you— that's if you pay annually, you save 35%. Uh, then you can get 10 videos per month, and it also removes the Lumen5 branding, which would be nice. And they have 24/7 live chat support.

Having used the system, it looks, to be honest, pretty simple, pretty straightforward so far. Uh, the workflow is very nice and didn't seem very buggy at all. Now, for brands focused on reach and growth, as they say, for $149 per month billed annually, you can have 20 videos, 200 million stock photos and videos. You can upload your own watermark and you can have multiple brand profiles.

So if you're an agency, that's absolutely fantastic for you.

So there we are.

Lumen5 has introduced for me, um, a way of creating video from existing text. Remember, I just cut and paste the blog post URL from my website and within 6 seconds, I had a video. It's pretty amazing, really, and all of that for free. So as you know, on this, uh, podcast, I like to share tools and tips that I think business owners and entrepreneurs and anyone who's running a small organization may find useful.

Now, I then share this as a weekly newsletter, so if you'd like to subscribe to get all this information to your mailbox once a week, it is at eastwestpr.com/newsletter.

And if you're interested in signing up for a mastermind and having time with me and running through the Storify, Personalize, Engage, Amplify, and Know 5-stage methodology, which helps you to understand the strategy and then to be introduced to all these tools and how to integrate them into your PR program, then come to speakpr.co and sign up because we're going to have the next intake for the Speak PR program. The week commencing the 1st of February.

So my name is Jim James. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Speak PR.

I hope you found this of value, and certainly go and check out Lumen5. I will be trialing this in earnest but also looking for comparisons, and if you have any, then do please share those with me. And if you have any other ideas, please write to me at jim@eastwestpr.com.

With any topics that you would like me to cover on this podcast.

So until we meet again, I wish you the best of health, a profitable business, and a restful Christmas vacation.