At Clips That Sell we make lots of videos featuring the business owner, directors or key staff. These are the very people who need to build relationships with viewers, eg prospective customers.
However, the challenge of working with people who are not professional actors is of course whether they present well on camera. Sometimes they can. Sometimes it simply requires a few extra takes, and sometimes they can’t do it well. Often clients don’t realise how hard it is to remember what they want to say. And it’s easy look a bit wooden using a teleprompter.
In other words, not using an actor is a bit more risky. It might be fine, but most likely it might take longer, and the video may not be as good. It’s a trade-off of risk, quality, your purpose and budget.
What Actors Can Do That The Rest Of Us Can’t
Actors train to do what they do. Just as you can’t expect to wake up and be a great plumber, so it is with presenting to camera. What does this mean in practical terms for making a business video. An actor knows how to:
- remember dialogue
- use a teleprompter and not look like they’re reading, or stilted
- have great facial expression and body language
- present the image you want, for the example video below, being corporate, professional and warm
- get it right first or second time which really does save production time and money. This partly off-sets the extra cost of the actor. It saves time editing as well as during filming. If you’re using your own staff or yourself, this also costs money and most likely more time.
Most of all, you get to pick exactly the right person for the job. Using actor recruitment websites like Starnow, you can post a specification and get dozens of relevant applicants who look, sound and act the part that you want.
We recently used an actor to make videos for Options Consulting Group, a human resources business. I worked with the client to prepare scripts, identify an appropriate actor, film him in our studio on green screen and edit. Here’s one of the videos:
I hope you’ll agree the actor (Luke) looks professional and presents well. His vocal expression and body language are spot on. Using Luke ensures a high quality video, and it was quick to make. What you’re seeing was Luke’s second second take. He is reading from a teleprompter.
We can easily recruit actors using websites like Starnow, or even certain Facebook groups and they don’t necessarily add a lot to the cost of a video.
So, are you thinking of making videos, how to do it, and whether to engage an actor? I can help you work through those questions, and source the right person. Give me a call.
Keith Rhodes, Chief Videographer
