MBA1302 How to Make Video Creation Easier + Free Ride Friday!

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Making business just a bit easier every day with our daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of the Hundred Dollar mba, a complete business training and community online. And in today's episode you will learn how to make video creation easier. I know many of us, I for one love video content. We know it's effective, we know it's great, we know we can repurpose it and videos get shared and they're a fantastic asset for content marketing. But videos are tedious, they're hard to make. There's a lot of setup there's editing, there's pre production, there's post production. Let's face it, it's a hassle to shoot a high quality video. So what happens is, is that creating videos sounds like a great idea that never actually gets implemented. So in today's episode, we're gonna make things a little bit easier. We're gonna focus on what really matters most when it comes to creating great videos. And that's creating videos consistently. Anybody who's successful with video, if you look at somebody like Casey Neistat, a huge vlogger on YouTube, if you look at the team at Wistia who uses video as content marketing for their software company or SaaS business or another example is like Profitwell, their regular show on pricing, pricing, page teardowns. The number one ingredient is consistency. So we gotta create a formula, a setup to make it easier and consistent so that we are successful. There's no point in putting all this work in if you're not going to see results. So today it's all about making video creation easier and consistent. Let's get into it. Let's get down to business. Listen, I am the first to say that I love video content. But I'm also the first to say that I have dropped off the map when it comes to creating great videos. I'm talking scripted videos, videos that are made for content for the blog for this last year. One of the reasons why is that we really got ambitious and we really wanted to do it right. We created a great home studio. We had three point lighting, great equipment, amazing camera, great lighting, boom mic, everything right. Separate recorder, we were editing, it looked great. The problem was that creating a video was a lot of work. It took us a week or something of hard work just to create one video. It wasn't something I could just pop in the fly. The setup of a video, just putting up the equipment and lights and the camera and the tripods and everything, that was a disturbance. I couldn't just shoot a video on the fly. It was, you know, set up, shoot, breakdown, make sure we get all the shots before we break down, you know, the editing, all that stuff was just a headache. So I said to myself, this is not working. You know, if it's a hassle, if it's hard, if it's not easy to create video content, I'm not going to do it consistently. I knew this when it came to webinars because we created a webinar software called Webinar Ninja Shameless Plug, where its whole mission is to make it easy and it takes 10 seconds to create a webinar, and that encourages people to do more and more webinars because it's so easy to create and run. So I wanted to do the same thing, but for video content, whether I wanted to teach a topic or explain a new feature or whatever it is. So what do I have to do and what do you have to do to make this easy on you? Well, you gotta cut out the hassles. You gotta see what is stopping you from being consistent. And for most people, it's the setup. It's the video setup. Most of us can't have a dedicated room where they could just have everything set up and they don't touch the setup ever. And they go in and they shoot super hard to do. You're asking a lot from somebody to just have an empty office space to do that all the time. You know, I had to set up lights, like I mentioned, all that kind of stuff. And it's just a lot of work. So I asked myself what would make me consistent. I said if I could just step in to an area of my office, ideally my desk, and shoot videos quickly on the fly. So one of the first things I like to do is I like to list the things that are holding me back. So setup was one of them. So one of them is like, I don't want to have to set up. I just want to, you know, step up to my computer and shoot a video, and it's going to look brilliant. I don't want to sacrifice quality either. What was another hindrance? Another hindrance was after I shot, I had to take all this data from the camera from the sound recording and, you know, take those memory cards and import it to a computer or hard drive. And it was a little bit of a hassle, you know, making sure, you know, I saved the content and all that stuff and making sure I hit record on the video and the audio recorder. All that stuff was, you know, a bit of a headache. So I said to myself, hmm, it'd be great if I didn't have to do that if everything got recorded straight to my computer and the files are just on the computer or a hard drive that's connected to my computer. So that saved me hassles. What else is a hassle? Editing. That's a hassle. Editing the actual video. So you gotta think about, hey, is there an easy way for me to do this? Don't worry about the solution right now. Just list the hindrances, the problems, the obstacles. I thought to myself, anything else I Said, well, scripting, that's pretty easy for me. Just jotting down some notes. The shooting is easy, and then the transport of the information is easy and other files and the editing is taken care of or simple. I guess what's left is just to upload the file to my video host or YouTube and that's it. So now I know what my challenges are. I know what I have to kind of solve so I can make my life easier and make video content easier and just be a lot more consistent. So my solution, I need a simple setup. Yes, it's great to have all this professional stuff, but I want to get as close as possible to the same quality with having a simple setup. So I'm gonna revamp my office and what I'm gonna do is I'm just gonna have a new desk setup with my lights set up on my desk. One easy fix to have good lighting for you if you have talking head videos where you're looking at the camera, is to have a ring light. A ring light is fantastic, especially if you're just doing short videos. If you're doing longer videos, 20, 30 minute videos, I don't recommend it. Cause ring lights can be very, very painful in your eyes. You can. You'll be seeing rings for days. Well, not for days, but you know, for the rest of the day. But if you're shooting a quick video, five, ten minutes, you should be okay. Ring lights will light your face and really create a nice soft, balanced light on your face with very little setup. And you can actually just mount it right behind your monitor. Now, I want great quality audio. Well, I can hook up a boom arm that clips to my desk and hook up my USB mic that's plugged right into my computer. So the audio file is recorded directly to my computer. Now, some people don't like the look of a mic in the shot. Totally get it. Another option is to have a very subtle lapel mic or a lavalier mic that's usb. Again, you can plug it in and then when you record your video using QuickTime, if you're using Apple or any kind of video recording software, you're just gonna use the input of that mic as your input. No separate video recording. Now, if you want, and you want to go slightly pro, you can do what I'm going to do. Where is. I'm going to have a boom arm set up in the corner of my desk. I'm not going to move it. It's going to be there permanently. It's going to be kind of out of the way. And it's just going to be on top of my camera, so that way it's not in shot. And I'll have my audio recording recording on a separate zoom device. It's called Zoom, the Zoom recorder that we use. And that's it. And that gets recorded on a simple SD drive. And you can then export the SD drive. Simple step. It's not totally convenient, but you're gonna get some pretty cool audio. And we have the equipment, so we might as well just make it a permanent thing. Camera. Now, my advice is to get something simple that you can just keep on your desk all the time on top of your monitor. You have a couple options here, a very high quality USB Webcam, something that's 4K or Full HD at least that can plug right into whatever you're using. QuickTime to record your video straight from your compute. Any video camera that is high quality that can be plugged in via usb. In fact, I know people that actually use their smartphone cameras. Their smartphone cameras are actually quite, quite good. They use a gorillapod, a tripod to prop up their camera and they use their video or their video camera from their phone as their source via USB. If using iPhone, lightning cable to USB that type of thing. The point here is that you want to set everything up right on your desk. So at any time during your day you can just open up QuickTime, open up video, movie player, Camtasia, whatever you use to shoot video, and shoot a video on the fly. This also means setting up your background. You know, make sure that your desk has something in the background so it shows some depth, it shows a little bit of character, maybe some pictures, a bookshelf, a plant, whatever it is. But set yourself up to make it so easy to shoot a video. So you just have to, you know, have a simple script, get in front of the camera, hit record, and everything's on your computer, all the files, all that stuff. Now let's get into post production. How can we make post production easier? Well, in my opinion, there are two options. Number one, you can outsource editing. You could take the files and you can give it to an editor. Nicole and I are lucky enough to have a fantastic audio and video editor on our team, Carl, who edits this podcast, award winning podcast. So shout out to you, Carl, so that makes things easier for us to be able to take the files, send them to Carl. Hey, Carl, we need this video edited. And you know, after the first couple of videos, you know, your editor will know the style, the titles, all the Things you're looking for, your intro, your outro, all that kind of stuff in your videos. And that can't get any simpler. Your editor will send back a file and then you upload it to your video host, whether it's YouTube or Wistia or Vimeo, and you're done. We're talking about minutes here. This is what makes things consistent, makes things easier when you remove the obstacles. Now, if an editor is not available, I highly recommend you check out a software called Camtasia. Camtasia is one of the best softwares I've seen in terms of ease of use and having all the tools you need to edit amazing video. Whether it's on camera video or you're using your screen to do on screen tutorials, like a video tutorial with slides, or if you're doing a walkthrough of your software, things like that. It's fantastic in terms of animations and transitions. And it's easy to do, it's easy to use. I've used Camtasia for some years now and in fact, before I used Camtasia, I used a app called screenflow, which was more about screen recordings and editing those with the Mac because it was like the best one for the Mac. But then Camtasia came out with a Mac version because they were primarily PC. That was just amazing. Now, Camtasia is not super cheap, it's $250, but it's a great investment. I edit all our videos when I have to edit videos myself with it. It's fast, it's easy, you can save a template so you can just plug right in and put the videos in and it's just super intuitive. You know, I have imovies and I have Final Cut Pro on my laptop, but I don't use it because Camtasia does everything I need and it's super simple. And no, this podcast is not sponsored by Camtasia. But I'm happy with the software and I recommend it to the point where I'm repeating myself how much I love it. So those are the two options. Outsource editing or use an editing software that's simple to use. I like Camtasia. I know Carl Editor uses Sony Vegas and he quite likes this, so you may want to check that out as well. So the end result is you can step up to your workstation, shoot a video that looks amazing Pro, Great lighting, great video, great audio, have it edited quickly and ready for your audience immediately with no time lag, with no suffering, with no weeks of work and this allows you to be consistent. I highly recommend you also batch. You're going to be in the mood to shoot. You're going to have everything going. So still batch. Even though it's an easy setup, record two or three or four videos in a row. No one says you have to release them all at once. Release them once a week, but then you don't have to record again for another few weeks. Want to buy a car your way? Of course you do. That's why CarMax offers an experience designed just for you. Want to start online, then visit the lot, then go back online? Sure. Want to talk to a real person or chat online? Either works. Want to take your time and compare all the makes and models? No problem. Then make up some time by filling out the paperwork at home and schedule express pickup or home delivery. Done. When it comes to how you buy, CarMax puts you in the driver's seat. Want to drive? CarMax delivery restrictions apply. See CarMax.com for details.

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To wrap up today's lesson, to make video creation easier for you, you gotta remove the obstacles. Make sure getting to the task, getting to the me, shooting the actual video and making it happen, having it edited, having it ready for your audience is a simple process. Most of us overcomplicate things and having that whole pro setup that I wanted and we had is going to produce a very similar result to what I'm going to do right at my desk. No need for, you know, putting up all the lights and all the equipment and the expensive camera and the tripod and making sure everybody's on their mark and all that stuff and slating and all that stuff. It can be all done away and then breaking it all down. No worries. Let's make it simple for ourselves so we can be consistent. Thank you so much for listening to the $100 MBA show. If you have a topic you want us to cover on the show, we want to hear about it. Email me@omar mba net I want to know if you're struggling with something. If you want me to answer a question you have. If there's an area of business you want me to cover? We get lots of suggestions from our thousands of listeners and we want to hear from you. We want to make sure that we're building the best podcast for you that were fulfilling your needs and helping your business. And hey, if you want to support the show, there are two things you can do. Number one, you can just hit the subscribe button. That's as simple as that. By hitting subscribe, you're letting the world know, hey, I love the show and it helps us get some awareness. Number two, support our sponsors that support the show. If you hear a sponsor that you're interested in, use our unique link and get the deal that we secured for you. We vet all our sponsors to make sure they're a great fit for our audience and make sure they're also good people to take care of you. Thanks again for listening to our Rash show. But hey, this episode's not over yet. It's Free Ride Friday. I gotta announce a Free Ride Friday winner. Let's see who won this week's Free Ride. And the winner is Charisse Theory. Cherise Theory says a forever fan. 5 stars. I've been listening to this podcast for quite some time now. The most recent procrastination episode has far been my favorite. I really appreciate all the invaluable help that you provide. Thanks for supporting people like me. Well, thank you Charice Theory. Thanks for the review. Thanks for being a listener. We're happy to help. Your mission is to email me at omar00mba net so we can hook you up with the lifetime membership to EZcourse, our 30 day course on how to build your own online course. If you want to win access to ezcourse, all you got to do is leave us an iTunes rating and review. It's that simple to get access to a $500 course that we sell for over at EasyCourse co. It's our way to say thanks for showing us love on itunes. Just listen on Friday to see if you won. That simple. All right, before I go, I want to leave you with this. The most important thing when it comes to content marketing, whether you're blogging, shooting videos, having a podcast like this one that has over 1300 episodes is consistency. You got to be consistent. The thing about consistency is that it allows you enough reps to get better and better at your craft. You get better at shooting videos, you get better at writing blog posts. You get better at being a podcaster. You get better at being a content creator. Communicator and it allows you some momentum to allow your audience to learn from you and start building a relationship with you and building trust with you. Without consistency, you don't give yourself a fair chance. So whatever you choose to do when it comes to content creation, be consistent. Thank you so much for listening and I'll check you in Monday's episode. I'll see you then. Take care.

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