Whoever it was who said …Starting A Business is a Bitch!…I need to buy them a drink.
As SyncLab Media comes up on it’s first year of creation there are many things to look back on and marvel at how far Mark Neace, John Lymberopoulos and I have come in the development of a video centric digital marketing agency. However, there is still a ways to still go before a perfectionist like me feels we have ..made it!.
Fortunately, there are many more things that happened this past year to learn from. Some were good and others not so good. All of which was a learning experience for which is what I enjoy the most about being the operations director.
Strategy Comes First
One of the many things that set SyncLab Media apart is putting ‘thought before action’. In looking around the market we saw…and heard from our clients…of other production companies who hear their clients say they need a video and then jump in to produce ‘A Video’. We stepped back and asked the tough question of the client…”Are you sure you need a video?” The answer sometimes was surprising.
In forming the SyncLab Media mission we felt strongly we needed to get a clear understanding of what type of video best suits the client’s needs before we assumed anything. That is why we mandate a strategy session with clients before a camera is ever mounted.
Agency Approach
Our establishing a digital marketing strategy before producing a video proved to be a positive learning experience with each of our clients. So much so we found we needed to look towards growing the company by bringing in more experts in the traditional marketing. This moved us quickly to now being a full service digital marketing agency that helped clients manage their digital marketing campaigns. A big part of that management came in the form of after production support.
This moved us into embracing all of Google’s products. Supporting our clients became a normal part of the SyncLab Media operations.
Google+ Rules
It is no surprised this past year to see the popularity of Google+ gain traction with more and more businesses. I predicted in 2011 that the way a business markets its product or service changed when Google launched Google+.
All of the pull back many business made in 2011 to financing another marketing campaigned was reversed when business owners and executives started getting involved with gaining a better understanding of social media and finding that being found on the Google Search Engine was more profitable than being on TV.
It was no brainer for the more intuitive managers of business to see how Google+ was helping them be Found. I was excited SyncLab Media focused on educating more and more people on why they need to dedicate more time to learning how G+ can help their business. It proved to be a productive move for the company.
Video Centric
Of course we never ventured away from our core competency of producing quality creative videos to meet the client’s needs. We spent a large portion of this year educating businesses on how quality video’s are a must in delivering their message to consumers. It was very rewarding to hear from our clients on how much more exposure their business was receiving once they placed a studio produced video on their web-site.
Problem Solving
There was not a day go by this past year where there was not a problem to solve. Anything from figuring out why we had the wrong keys to our office to finding away to tell clients why their video does not go ‘viral’.
Sure, it would be awesome to not have a problem to solve and there are days when some problems are lesser than others. However, without a problem to solve means we are not pushing to find the better ways to help our client’s.
How do we help?
We get calls every week from businesses who have either had a previous bad experience with social media or who are tired of hitting their head against the wall doing their own digital marketing. These are the businesses we enjoy helping.
What we pride ourselves in doing is supporting the digital marketing that is produced. We will never just hand over a video along with an invoice and expect the client to be successful. Strategy, production and then support is our tagline and that is pretty much what happens when a business signs on with us.
This past year we have done a number of projects that helped clients and gave us the opportunity to learn new things we probably would not done on our own. That is what got us through the first year..I can’t wait to see what happens in our second round of offering solutions.
Let me know how I can help.
