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Comedy videos can rally your audience and draw the public’s attention to your brand. Laughter is the best medicine when it comes to viral videos, and it’s a good way to show the humanity behind your company. They’re an opportunity to play with your organization’s characters, develop your inside jokes and stories, and establish a familiarity with the public that a more serious video may miss. Most importantly when we make a comedy video for you we make sure that it is funny for your target audience, and gives you a giggle whenever you think of it.
The following seven elements have proven to be successful in ensuring some laughs and diminishing—even banishing—every marketer’s deeply ingrained fear of ‘cheese.’
This applies to any video production or communication effort, comedic or not. Yet what is hilariously funny to some elicits crickets from others. Who is the audience? How old are they? What do they care about?
What makes them laugh on YouTube, network TV and Comedy Central?Make sure that what you are creating lives in a similar genre, in both tone and style.
Once you know who it is you are talking to, get in their heads. When creating an internal company video, for example, talk to multiple employees to find out what’s funny team-wide and company-wide.
Case in point: we recently created a safety training video for a large beauty company with an internal tendency to overuse acronyms. Our team played with that and created a few ridiculously long acronyms that had team members giggling while learning important safety lessons at the same time.
Casting is the most important aspect of the video production process. It will make or break your marketing video (which is why we tend to jump up and down when we talk about this). This is no place to skimp—make sure you have the budget and the time to find the correct cast.
We tell clients to not rush this phase, even if it means pushing back their deadlines. It’s that important. Also, share audition tapes with trusted team members and friends.
Make sure you’re not the only one enchanted by this person. Your cast needs to be universally charming—did we mention funny, too? Hollywood stars earn ridiculous amounts of money because the success of shows and movies rides on their backs. Believe it or not, the same goes for a marketing video production.
‘Brevity is the soul of wit’ or so says Billy, and boy is he right. Grab their attention, make them laugh, and leave them laughing. When producing a comedy video there’s no faster way to kill a joke than to beat it into the ground. Like I’m doing here. Just stop, seriously. There is nothing funny about long windedness.
Funny people make funny comedy videos (most of the time, anyway. But un-funny people never do.) The person directing your video should have the same taste in humor as you and your team. If your meetings are filled with laughter and mirth, you’re on the right path. That synergy is the first sign that you’re about to make something great…or at least funny.
A good performer can breathe some life into a flat script, but he or she can’t be expected to lift it out of the basement of despair. Hire an experienced production company or recruit the office comedian to take on this phase. Then, take the time to ensure that you’ve actually got something funny on your hands. Read it out loud with co-workers. If they’re not laughing, it’s not ready. Studio B hires the best, brightest, and funniest comedy script writers so we can guide you through the process or take the lead.
There are plenty of ways to have fun with your message, whether you are spoofing something in popular culture or making fun of yourself. Just step up with these seven fancy tips and you’ll get the laughs while steering clear of the gouda, cheddar, mansueta and goat.
