Who we are videos are a vital first step in any company’s customer journey and is often a visitor's first impression of the website and of the company. Here’s my top five who we are videos:

#5 Lockheed Martin

It must be stated that Lockheed Martin has a distinct advantage as they create cutting edge technology for the most advanced military in the world. They have some of the most impressive products to show off. But they take this video past the unbelievable products they create. They also show the future possibilities of product use in everyday life. One aspect that I found especially compelling with this piece was the lack of stock footage. Lockheed Martin clearly put forth considerable effort to have all original footage in their piece as well as some incredible special effects to have a very cohesive look.

#4 Verily

One of my favorite aspects of this piece is its use of stop motion, something not as commonly used in these videos. This combined with some fantastic transitions makes for a visually compelling piece. Their overall story of seeking to discover personal, human illnesses before they happen is an emotively compelling one as well. They also did some intriguing extreme close up angles for the interviews with a tilt shift look (probably added in post) that gave the interviews an intimate and engaging emotional baseline.

#3 Huge

Huge: About Us from Huge on Vimeo.

This one is just flat out clever. Highlighting culture over specific services, Huge uses this video to highlight the fun and engaging DNA that Huge has. Just watching it you makes you feel completely at home with the company.

They accomplished this with a stellar combination of ambient audio and sometimes rough footage that gave a very raw feel to the video. They also chose a color grade that did little to doctor the image, giving it a more authentic vibe. In addition, they had fantastic dynamics of energy by starting without the music in the beginning and cutting it out completely in the middle.

#2 IBM

If you watch enough corporate videos, you can come to expect a certain kind of soundtrack: a minimally popy electronic and ambient sound. IBM completely switched it up by throwing in an oldie. Also they did some class act work by creating some simple animation to put their text in context. The biggest success of this piece is its dedication to a particular story: that IBM helps prevent tragedies before they happen.

#1 Intel

This one is my favorite. It’s not just because of the stellar set design and creative use of their products--which is, in fact, amazing. The editing job on this piece is impressive, and they leverage their theme song in innovative ways.

The best part of this video has to do with a specific and brilliant creative choice. Intel as a computer processing company has a product that could EASILY bore its audience. So instead of just focusing on the specifics of the technology or even what it can do, they focused on how the technology interacts with the human experience. Consistently, there are priceless reactions to applications of Intel’s product. Bravo Intel. Bravo.

I hope you enjoyed these pieces as much as I have and learned a few lessons in crafting your own who we are video in the future. What are some of your favorite who we are videos? Comment and let us know below.

If you haven’t noticed, Budweiser’s Super Bowl ads this year and last have been drastically different from years prior, especially their 2014 spot Puppy Love:

Why? Let’s just say that their sales fell after this ad. When I told my wife this she said, “But that’s my favorite Super Bowl commercial ever!”

I replied, “I know, but are you their target audience?”

“No” she said.

“Exactly.”

In other words, with the puppy spot, Budweiser made an incredibly popular commercial--popular among the wrong crowd, and their decrease in sales reflected it.

So Budweiser learned from their mistakes and honed in on their audience: mainly Gen Y and older blue collar males. Focusing on this demographic in 2015, they took a few shots at craft breweries with their spot “Brewed the Hard Way”:

They nailed it. Sales went up. It’s no surprise that despite harsh criticism from numerous hipster Millenials, they doubled down with their 2016 spot “Not Backing Down,” because those hipsters weren’t buying Budweiser anyways.

So what invaluable marketing lesson can we glean from this? Having a popular advertisement means absolutely nothing. But having an advertisement that motivates your target audience, that my friends, means everything.

About
One of the key things we value as a company is to constantly be pushing ourselves in our craft. So we were bouncing around some passion project ideas and we landed on the idea to collaborate with a poet. After reaching out to a local poet, Anthony Tei Mutua, we asked him if he could write a poem specifically for us. And he did.

Approach
After nailing down the poem, we ideated to find the specific emotions that we wanted to drive this piece. We used these keywords to then help us select a shot list that would guide us on our one and a half days of production that took us all over Minneapolis and Taylors Falls.

In post, we edited and pulled in our VO artist and coloring to push this piece to its absolute best. We also were very intentional with the sound effects we brought in to tie very specific emotions to the location of the shot.

Result
The result, is this enthralling short video that takes you on a sonic and visual journey of a poem.

Production Company: Moving Edge Media
Producer: Ryan Gates
Director: Jonathan Vinson
Director of Photography: Ryan Gates
Editor: Jonathan Vinson
Sound Mixing: John-Paul Natysin
Music: Fear Not by Ryan Talbert