EP 5 – Using Videos in Virtual Selling Scenarios – Collin Mitchell

Hi Gabriel, thanks so much for having me on this show. I know that we’re going to have a ton of fun.

It’s a pleasure really. The subject we want to discuss today is about how do you use video during a sales meeting and during the sales process. At which stage first you use video?

Yeah. So I’m a big component of using video in the sales process. But often what happens is you find a lot of people use video early on just in prospecting and then for whatever reason, they stop using video throughout the entire sales process.
And so you see folks sending video in email or even video in like LinkedIn connection requests. And the reason that one thing that’s really important to think about is your prospects in order to gain trust and rapport with your prospects and to hopefully your prospect then becomes your customer. You want to be, you want to have some consistency. And what I mean by that is you want to show up the same way, the same way you’re showing up on social, the same person that showed up in the beginning with a creative video to catch their attention and then if you just start using template emails and become very boring and stale there’s not a lot of consistency with who they’re dealing with and that’s not the person that they signed up, you know, to go down this buyer’s journey with. So there’s a lot of benefits of using video throughout the whole sales process. That’s one of them. But the other thing is, think about it, I mean, would you rather read a, I don’t know, fairly long email or would you rather watch a 19 seconds video? Well, most people would rather watch a 19 seconds video. So you can, you know, use video to review a proposal when you send that over, package it up with a video. You can send a video as a recap after your discovery call, rather than giving them a bunch of reading material. The main benefit there too, is it also makes it easier for that person that you may be the influencer or the person that you’re meeting with to also share the information with other stakeholders as well, because sometimes in the early stages of the sales process, you might only be in one meeting with one or two people in the buying committee and there could be, you know, five, ten people, depending on what you’re selling and the complexity of it and things like that and the size of the companies. Sending information over via video, makes it a lot easier for them to share it with other people and for them to actually consume it and hear it directly from you as well.

Great. So you use video for outreach, but not only outreach also as a follow-up at every stage of the sales process.

Yeah. And so, you know, after discovery, after your demo, maybe with the proposal after the proposal, every stage of the sales process, and even sometimes, you know, if your prospect is, I dunno, maybe gone darker, ghosting you, videos is a nice way to, you know, reach out to them rather than a really boring, Hey, I’m just following up email.

And how do you produce this video? Do you use simple tools, like lLoom or use more complex way to produce this video?

Yeah, I just use simple tools. You don’t need to have like a highly produced video. I don’t recommend that you, you know, edit those videos and do things like that. So you can use tools like Vidyard or BombBomb, or even the one you mentioned Gabriel, Loom. It’s a great one as well. These are very easy tools to use. If the process is too complicated, you know, then it’s going to be a little bit harder for you to do it consistently. So using some of those tools will definitely make it a lot easier. Now here’s a couple pro tips. You know, if you have a lot of information to sharen, maybe like after a discovery call, you may want to type that information out as if you were going to send it in an email and then that becomes your script for the video, because you don’t want to hit record and then be sort of thinking about what you’re going to say, because you’re going to be 52 takes later and you still haven’t sent your video because you have to keep restarting, right? So I highly suggest if you have a lot of information to cover that you at least write that out, even if it’s just like bullet points or things like that, make sure that you actually look at the camera. There’s some, a couple other pro tips, like depending on what tool you’re using sometimes the play button is in the center of the frame. So you may want to go out of frame a little bit and smile so the video is a little bit more inviting. With BombBomb, that’s not the case. The one thing that I really love about BombBomb is at the bottom frame of the video, that’s where the play button is, and it also tells them how long the video is. So if it’s a 57 second video, it’s going to say 57 seconds because the first thing people are thinking is like, how long is this thing, right? And so it makes it, it really helps with converting people to actually watch the video.

And when you send a video, you don’t send the text on the email plus the video? It’s either one or the other one?

Yeah, that’s a great question. So, you know, I’ve kind of experimented with different things. Like, you know, I’ve sent the text and the video and just said, Hey, this is a lot of information. If you prefer to consume it, you know, here’s a short video with everything contained in the email. Sometimes I will just send the video and sometimes I’ve sent it with both, but the best thing that you can do is you can actually ask your prospects. And you know, throughout this process, we’re going to, I’m going to be sharing a lot of information with you. How do you prefer to receive that? Would you like me to send you an email with all of the information, or just a video or email and a video breaking down what’s in there. So you could actually just ask them and see what their preference is because. The key is, not everybody is visual. Some people do want to have it to be able to read too. And others would prefer to just watch the video and they won’t even read the email. I mean, I don’t know Gabriel, how many time, I mean, how often do people just skim their emails? Right. They get an email and they’re just looking for the important points because they don’t want to read it all.

Yeah, then video would be the same problem. It takes time to see all the video, but you can go on it faster also. And when do you ask the permission of your prospect? During the customer meeting? So at another stage or through email also?

To send video during the process you mean? Yeah, I don’t think it’s necessarily asking permission. It’s just like kind of getting what their preference is, right, and knowing that. And it’s going to stand out because most people aren’t doing it, and then there’s all these other benefits as well is like the more as a seller that you get comfortable using video, the better you’re going to get at it. So then using video throughout the entire sales process with your prospects is going to make your prospecting videos better because you’re going to be more comfortable. You’re going to make more, you know, better eye contact with the camera. You might be more engaging. So just really as a seller today, like getting comfortable on camera is important for a lot of reasons, maybe in, and maybe just once you get comfortable using video in your sales process, in like a one-to-one, then maybe you work your way up to using video to create original content for social. I mean, sellers really kind of need to be marketers these days and you need to create original content as well, if you’re going to be prospecting. So especially if you’re using social channels, so the more you get comfortable using video, then it kind of opens up a door to like, oh, I can start creating, maybe just recording videos and posting them on social and doing that in a regular, you know, in a regular period of time as well, rather than just never, or sort of random.

And what do you think a video being taken by your phone?

Yeah, that’s interesting. So, you know, LinkedIn has a nice feature where if somebody sends you a direct message, then you can record a video right in the DMS and send it. So many people don’t do that. It’s a great way to connect with people and build a little bit of trust and rapport, you know, immediately after connecting. And so using your phone is totally fine especially like on LinkedIn or social and stuff like that. Cause sometimes it’s easier to just do it on mobile than on desktop and, you know, hit a button and stuff like that.

Three years ago, I used to do a daily blog on LinkedIn and the malls video was a bit crappy being done by the phone with moving a little bit, the more success I get with the video and the more it was produced, with the insertion of Gif, the less success I had. Can you explain that?

Yeah. So people want to see people, want authenticity, right? They want, you know, they don’t want the edited, highly produced, buttoned up, you know, edited version of Gabriel, right? They want the real just, Hey I’m just a regular guy like you, you know, maybe we have some things in common that people are hungry for just authentic connection with other humans in business, right? And so by just sending a video, you don’t know what the perfect video is, the video that’s not perfect. Like maybe you messed up. Like I don’t send, I really don’t. I mean, I’ve been using video for years, so I’m very comfortable on video, through lots and lots of practice. I was like power user of Vidyard when they rolled out their LinkedIn integration. They like sent me gifts and stuff like that because I just use the platform so much. And I don’t do tape. I don’t do tape. One take and send it like, even if I mess your name up, I’d be like, Hey, if I said that wrong, I’m really sorry, but doing the best I can here. Like people, you know, people don’t want the perfect buttoned up version of you. They just want the real version of you.

That’s great. I agree with you. And that makes you comfortable on video. Even me with my accents, I have to train it. Then I will train it by interviewing you, but you have to go there and I agree totally with you. Video is easy to use and you should use it at any time. You can do it. Do you use it still as much on LinkedIn? Because the reach of video I’ve been falling.

Yeah. Yeah. It’s a great question. So, I think video is sort of a, it’s a necessary evil, like yes, video is not performing as well on LinkedIn as it used to, it used to get over indexed and like videos would get insane reach. Then LinkedIn rolled out polls and then so polls were getting priority and like, oh my God, if I see another poll, I’m going to shoot myself.

Because I stopped my daily blog when the reach went down because it was frustrating to have less audience going so tiny after one time.

Here’s the interesting thing though. Because I think you still need a content mix, right? So I wouldn’t say, stop doing video because the reach is not what it used to be on LinkedIn or other, even other, maybe other social platforms. I primarily play on LinkedIn because I’m in the B2B space. I think most of your listeners probably know B2B space as well. I’d imagine.
But don’t not do video because videos aren’t performing well because when you connect with a prospect and you’re trying to build a relationship with them on social, in an authentic way, before they decide whether they maybe accept your connection request or beside, or, you know, if they decide if they want to meet with you.
They’re going to check out your feed. And if all there is, is these highly produced graphics or company blogs that you’ve reshared or very long text posts. It’s going to be a little bit harder for them to connect with you. And so if you’re, I think there’s a lot of benefits of still doing video, even though you’re not going to get the sort of engagement that you used to get.

And I post a video every day and it doesn’t get the engagement that it used to, but I do get people that reach out in the DMS and they’re like, Hey, I’ve really been consuming your content. I really appreciate it. Thanks. I really enjoyed this video. So I get feedback from people, um, that enjoy the videos. And I also know that the way that my network has grown, you can build a lot of trust and rapport and connection with people through them consuming your videos when they’re deciding whether they want to connect with you or not.

Great. Thank you. And so you use video on social, you use video for outreach, you do use video for follow-up. Do you use video during customer meetings, a virtual customer meeting in-person customer meetings?

Yeah, everything that we do as a company and even in my previous company that I recently exited, it was all virtual. So, I mean, before, when everybody was trying to figure it out, Oh, my gosh, how do we sell virtually? How do we meet with prospects virtually? How do we keep them engaged? How do we do all these things? We’d already been doing it for a long time. So it was like, it was, it was no, it was nothing new for us, you know? And so we’ve always used video conferencing. We’ve always met that way. We’ve always used video in prospecting and created content. And so like a lot of these things that people were trying to figure out when, you know, everything was a bit crazy, me and my team had already been working that way for a fairly long time.

And then do you use video during a virtual meeting with your customer on zoom or at this time you don’t choose video because you already are on video?

No. Yeah. I wouldn’t use video already on video. But there’s some good etiquette about like being on zoom, right? Like don’t, so many people don’t look at the camera and they’re like looking away or it looks like they’re looking at another screen, and this is a really hard one. Like Gabriel, even if right now, like we’re on zoom, right? And if I’m looking at you, then it doesn’t really look like I’m making eye contact, right? You’ve got to look at the camera.

Yeah it’s very different. I am expecting a screen with a camera in the middle of the screen.

Yeah. And the thing is people still can read energy and tone and body language. And a lot of these things that we kind of rely on more in person can still, some of those cues can still be picked up on virtually. But if you’re just having a conversation and you also gotta be careful, right? Like, you know, maybe get a little frustrated with the conversation, you don’t want to like put your hand on your head. You don’t want to show people that you’re frustrated. I think sometimes at least early on, there was a lot of people that weren’t used to doing a lot of virtual meetings and doing zoom or Google meets or whatever they were using. And they kind of just would forget that, Hey, you’re on camera.

True. So during zoom meeting, no external video, but you take care of how you are being seen by your audience.

Yeah. There is one exception to that. And it’s mainly just because of the type of work that we do. You know, sometimes we will show people content, right? Because content is part of what we do at Salescast, we create content for podcasts and micro content for social and all that sort of stuff. So yeah, we may show them videos, you know, we may share a screen and share audio and show them some content samples that maybe we made for them, or some examples of something similar that we think might work for them. So we do sometimes show videos well, on a video meeting.

Like a use case.

Yeah. Yeah. Not all the time, but in certain situations we do.

Great. Other usages of video during the sales process? Did we miss something?

No. I mean, pretty much the big takeaway is if you’re thinking, when should I use, I mean, we talked about a lot, when should I be using video in the sales process? And it’s all the time, every chance that you can get every chance that you get to send a video, rather than sending in a long email or something like that, you should be using video.
But make sure it’s something worth watching. Gabriel don’t send, don’t have, you know, bad messaging and then take that messaging and then put it into a video and think like, Hey, I’m using video, so it should work. So what you say still really matters, your messaging still really matters. And there’s another thing that even matters as well, which is how you say it.
So your messaging matters, but also how you say what you’re saying on video matters too. If I’m reading it, like I’m reading it from a screen, it’s not going to perform well. It’s not going to be very engaging. They’re probably not going to complete that video, but if I’m, you know, bringing good energy, I personally use a standing desk. I stand all day. That’s what works best for me. I think that when you’re recording video, you know, if you’re not standing and you know, you don’t want to be slouched over and not having good energy. So there’s, you know how you say what you say in those videos really make, a big impact on how successful with, you know, using video for prospecting or using videos to close deals or using videos to recap a discovery or a demo.

Great. Thanks a lot Collin. It was very interesting. I’m sorry. I will have to read because my English is not so good, but I will read my screen for a little bit for the outro. I will make it better each time. This episode of the virtual selling podcast is over. Thanks for sticking around. We’ll meet twice a week for a new episode with new challenges of giants in the field. If you enjoyed today’s episode, we are always listening for your feedback, share the show and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform so you don’t miss any episodes. This episode was brought to you by Sales deck.io, the virtual selling platforms that increase your sales team CVR and sales readiness and that enables remote management and sales operational excellence. Book your Sales Deck.io demo today to discover how you can close more deals with engaging and better prep customer meetings. Thanks a lot, Collin.

Thank you.