Joint Venture Lightning

My 16 year old son Scott just completed his science project for the Roanoke Valley Governor’s School project forum that will be held tomorrow at the Patrick Henry High School.

Scott conducted an experiment demonstrating how to increase methane production for power generation by adding readily available organic waste materials like leaves, wood chips, saw dust, and old newspaper to the sludge at the Western Virginia Water Authority.

How To Increase Methane Production For Power Generation from Brian Duvall on Vimeo.

I’m conducting a short seven question survey of non-profits, chambers of commerce and associations to see if and how they are using video and how effective it is for them.

Click Here to take survey

The reason for the survey is to gauge how quickly these organizations are adopting this medium to achieve core missions. With the advent of web video, global syndication is now a reality… for FREE. It has been my experience that smaller organizations with limited resources tend to fall far behind in the adoption of new tools like social networking, bookmarking, RSS, SEO, web video, and syndication.

If you are a staff member, board member or volunteer for a non-profit, association or chamber of commerce then please take this short 2 minute survey. I’ll be happy to share the results when the project is completed.

Thanks.

As I have mentioned in earlier posts, web video is POWERFUL.

If you aren’t using it then you are missing out on one of the most powerful forms of media available. Imagine having your own global broadcast network. That is the power of web video. And best of all it’s free.

I have been working on an interesting project with a prolific writer named Geoffrey Zimmerman. He pours out his emotions with the written word in the form of novels, poetry, short stories, and screen plays. The challenge is how do you promote a text medium with video?

Can It Be So by Geoffrey Zimmerman from JointVentureLightning on Vimeo.

Here are several tactics that we are currently using on his site www.GeoffreyZimmerman.com:

• Interviews with the author revealing the background that inspired his work.
• Video chats where the author invites readers to comment and join in collaboration or contests.
• Behind the scenes videos on his creative process
• Converting some of his old films into video for web distribution

There are other tactics in the plans for later on when we kick promotion into high gear with press releases and begin offering interviews with the media.

A key component of the video strategy is to get each video well titled and tagged then distributed to the major video hosting providers to help drive targeted traffic to the site where readers are given the opportunity to subscribe to his romantic adventure novel “Love Never Dies.”

Getting subscribers is the primary purpose of the website. The secondary purpose is the showcase his work and third is to establish his online presence and brand. This will help him build credibility with publishers and the media so that one day he can get a major publishing contract.

Here is a secret marketing tip that you might not have thought of recently… try adding a beautiful photo gallery and slide show to your website.

TrainingMyHorse.com

How does this help you close more sales?

FitClub4.com

Simple. It helps the customer or prospect believe in you as a professional.

If your site is heavy on text then you really need actual photos depicting the work you do. Don’t be shy, either. Go ahead and show yourself actually working with your clients and doing your job.

This helps the prospect to imagine themselves working with you on their own projects. It also gives you the chance to visually SELL your services in a subtle but convincing way where text only sales messages or messages that use clip art or stock photos scream SALES BROCHURE or ADVERTISEMENT.

The human mind has a way of filtering this type of hype-filled “salesy” content from your prospects conscious thought.

Actual photos seem more “real” and therefore are more believable. Be sure to add captions to give your prospects a clearer understanding of what they are seeing in each photo.

You can see several examples of this at work in my client Photo Gallery section of this website.

Here’s another tip… be sure to use a high-end camera that will give you plenty of resolution. I recommend having a professional spend a day with you and some of your best clients to get really good images that can be used in print materials as well as on the web. This will help you maintain consistency in your marketing materials and brand identity.

Trust me. You do NOT want to skimp on the photography. It’s worth it get the good stuff.

We include professional level photography in our joint venture / strategic alliance work. The photos you see in these galleries were all taken with a Nikon D40-X digital camera with 10.6 megapixel resolution.

The camcorder you see me holding in some of the photos is a Sony DVD cam that shoots direct to mini DVD’s. The resolution for video on the web doesn’t need to be nearly as high quality as the photography because the video is being compressed for faster download speeds.

If you plan on doing broadcasting of your video work then you will need to use professional level video equipment as well.

Enjoy.

Have you ever noticed the logo in the corner of every single video on YouTube?

It’s called a watermark and is used to brand the content of the video. We’re seeing this more and more as businesses catch on to the power of using video in their online marketing.

We have started using custom watermarks on ALL of our clients’ videos to help build their brands. How do you put a watermark on a video?

Good question. You need a cool piece of software called Camtasia Studio. At the moment they are offering an older version as a FREE download. Keep in mind that this powerful software package retails for over $300, so go grab it quick before it’s gone. You’ll also need a key code to open the full version… this is not a 30 day demo but the whole deal of version 3.0. Here is the link to get your key code.

You can either create your videos in Camtasia or import your existing video files. Then on the left side of the screen under Tasks… scroll down to Produce and click the link that says Produce Video as… A window will pop-up giving you file formats to choose. I like to convert my video to Flash so that it’s streaming and not a download that others can take and then reproduce.

Once you choose the file format, there will be several steps along the way and one of them gives you the option to insert a watermark logo. Select this feature and upload your logo graphic. Set opacity to about 40%, adjust the size, choose which corner you want your logo to appear in, etc. You can even have it embossed or flat. Once you like your watermark, click next. Camtasia does the rest… converting the file to Flash and adding the watermark logo throughout. Then all you need to do is upload the files to your website where it can be viewed.

Geoffrey Zimmerman has been busy working on his trilogy called Love Never Dies.

The challenge is to get readers interested in his first book so that we can build a market interested in buying books II and III. The approach that we are going with first is to offer the first few chapters online to draw the readers into the story.

Then we offer the reader the chance to subscribe to the novel in a twice per week e-mail where they continue getting the next 29 chapters as downloadable PDF files.

That’s nearly half of the book.

The first few paragraphs of each chapter are included in the body of each e-mail as a short teaser to draw the reader into the story. Then they can choose to download the entire chapter to finish reading until they get the next installment.

Geoffrey is currently working on gathering photos to include with each chapter as a visual element to enhance the reader’s experience. One photo is to be included at the beginning of each chapter to help set the mood or tone.

A word of caution here. Do NOT include photos in the actual e-mail as this will bog down servers and wreck your deliverability. We are including the photos in the PDF download file and simply e-mailing the link to the download.

The rain was pouring down and had been for two solid days after three months of severe drought.

George called to reschedule the video shoot. We met this past Monday at a beautiful horse ranch in Forest, Virginia to spend the entire day shooting videos for his new web site www.TrainingMyHorse.com.

We managed to get plenty of video for his free “Horsemanship Tip of the Week” subscription content. I have been spending the week editing, formatting and uploading the videos as well as posting his content to the new site. Check out his free samples posted on the front page to get an idea of the type of tips he’s offering for FREE in order to build his subscription list.

Once we get a list going, we’ll poll the subscribers about their most burning questions and work to create a great product for sale.

You might be wondering how we settled on “Training My Horse” as a domain name instead of something like “Natural Horsemanship.” The answer is RESEARCH.

I spent hours looking for available domains that use top searched keywords. Here are the results:

• Natural Horsemanship - 1,328 searches per day… not bad.
• Horse Training - 23,458 searches per day… Much BETTER.

The competition is also much bigger with these two words which means that the most likely combinations are already registered to other owners. We managed to acquire Training My Horse dot com. It’s short, easy to remember, straight to the point, focuses on the mind of the customer, and uses to the two biggest key words. Perfect.

Here is a handy free keyword suggestion tool that I use to help develop my marketing strategy for each joint venture I work on. Feel free to use it or visit the web site where it originated at Digital Point Solutions. Simply enter the word or phrase and hit the enter button on your keyboard. The Digital Point Solutions web page will open with the list of suggestions and the number of daily searches on each variation.

Video, video and more video.

I spent Wednesday morning shooting quick tips videos for the FitClub4.com web site with Pam Turman. Then I spent the afternoon editing and uploading the videos to her web site.

Today, I spent editing and uploading content for the Geoffrey Zimmerman web site to promote his new romantic adventure novel “Love Never Dies.” His auto-responder is set-up with chapter one ready to download when you subscribe. Then you’ll get a new chapter or two each week.

Once that was taken care of, I started editing my own testimonial video from Pam Turman of FitClub4.com about why she chose to work with Joint Venture Lightning instead of some other company. It turned out pretty well if I do say so myself. I love doing testimonial videos and capturing why people love the companies they use. You can see the finished video here:

JVL Testimonial: Pam Turman of FitClub4.com from JointVentureLightning on Vimeo.

Then to finish off the business day I met with the owner of Downtown Music to discuss a joint venture deal with him to promote his line of custom-built banjos and electric guitars. I’ll keep you posted on that case if we decide to work together.

And then just to prove that I really do like to have fun, I met with Ian Piefer of Windsor, Ontario to go ride our Dirtsurfer inline boards on Callaway Road. Man, I love that sport. What a RUSH!

I’m always pushing to get to product creation and launch within the first 30 days. That’s why it’s called Joint Venture LIGHTNING. If you want to talk to me about possibly working with you on your project then you need to make your best pitch ASAP because my schedule is filling up fast for the year and I am becoming increasingly selective.

Stay tuned for the latest on these real businesses. You can see step by step exactly how I do it and what the real results are… good or bad… I hold nothing back.

Cheers,
Brian

Have you ever seen or heard of the movie “The Horse Whisperer”?

It’s inspired by a real life horse trainer who uses a gentle and natural technique called Natural Horsemanship. So instead of forcing a horse to comply with your wishes, it requires you to understand the horse’s natural tendencies and communicate with the animal in a way that has the horse wanting to do what you want.

The first time you see it in action, you might be inclined to believe that it’s some sort of magic or that the horse is specially trained to respond to secret hand signals. But it really does work.

How do I know? Because my wife and I had natural horsemanship expert George Schaefer come to our home to conduct a training clinic for us and a few of our friends who own horses, too.

That’s how I met George and saw first-hand how good of an instructor he really is. That’s also what got me thinking about doing a joint venture with him to help him create and launch his own downloadable video programs and e-course.

So, I called George last week to schedule an appointment to discuss the details with him and his wife at their horse ranch over in Gretna, Virginia. We met last night around his dinner table where he explained that he had been thinking of doing something like this for years but never really knew how to get it all started. Friends had told him he should write a book. He knew that all of the big-shot famous horse trainers each had web sites and had written books but it was all a bit overwhelming.

I just smiled and listened.

Then it was my turn to share what I was doing with other entrepreneurs just like him and how we could team up in a joint venture to make all of his goals a reality. We asked each other questions, I showed him some examples of my clients’ web sites, then I gave him his first homework assignment… to clearly define who his best customer is… their age, income level, experience level, and so on. This will help us target the right audience.

Then he has to come up with 26 topic points that we can cover in 1 to 2 minutes of video to give away to subscribers through his auto-responder campaign.

And finally, he has to set-up a time when I can video record some client testimonials. By the time our meeting was over, he was already listing satisfied clients who would be willing to do testimonials for him… including my wife. His only up-front expense to start the project was $10.61 for me to register his new web site domain with GoDaddy.com.

He’s conducting a training clinic in Lovingston, Virginia this Friday so I might be able to get some good footage of his class and shoot some Quick Tips content right away.

Remember, my goal here at Joint Venture Lightning is to launch a new site and begin product creation within the first thirty days. I’ll continue to post updates on George’s horse training joint venture as we progress.

Cheers,
Brian