Short-form Video’s Time To Shine

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Short video is taking over the online world. It’s both beautiful and grim.

Everyday, online video is getting easier to access, and even easier to create. Because of apps like Vine and Instagram, videos are becoming one of the main reasons people even log onto the Internet. According to AdAge, over 40 million people are on Vine, while 150 million plus are on Instagram. That’s a lot of users.

Twitter and Facebook own Vine and Instagram respectively, and people are leaving the text-based social media for their quicker video counterparts. Pop culture has even seen these apps’ relevance. Trends, memes, slang, and even social groups have appeared from this medium. It’s truly marking its place in history, but why?

It’s because short video is both the fastest and the most alluring way to convey a message. If you manage to entertain your audience while telling them about your service or product, you’ve got a memorable and potentially viral advertisement on your hands. Major brands have been doing this for months now, be it the stop-motion animation of Dunkin Donuts’ paper flower or Trident Gum’s chewing-face close-ups!

That is where the beauty of accessibility to online video lies. Any person can make any video about anything. In fact, it is so easy that you could accidentally hit the record button while pulling your phone out of your pocket and make a short viral hit. It makes video accessible.

On the flip side though—it’s ruining our attention spans and giving us an unhealthy addiction to Internet’s speed. We’re becoming so accustomed to this short format, that anything over 30 seconds almost seems too long. People are clicking out of longer videos on YouTube, closing web pages that take too long to load, and going insane over buffering streaming content.
It’s hard to decide whether Vine and Instagram are helpful ways to communicate, or detrimental to our already short attention spans. Time will tell, as the number of users of these appsare predicted to grow even more in 2014.

Visual Data Infographics

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What does your business do? Why does the customer need it? Do they know that yet? Most importantly: Does your product/service need a simple, sharable, and visually awesome explanation? That’s where we come in, with infographics!

 

Infographics are used frequently all over the net. You’ve seen at least one. You can’t log into the internet without stepping across one. Maybe it was the awesome Batman one that was passed around twitter and Facebook for a couple of years now. That’s because it’s a great way to show data. It presents information in a beautiful, but purposeful and simple way. It serves two purposes—looks good and tricks you into learning. Those kind of go hand-in-hand.

 

Here’s an example of one of the many infographics we’ve produced for our clients.

There are four ingredients that make up any successful infographic. These are Data, Design, Why, and Shareability. If it’s missing one of these elements, it won’t reach much of any audience. Think of it as a table… a table of info. If you remove a leg, you’re not gonna have an amazing table. Each aspect is essential. So don’t go without these four things:

 

Data:

It’s he backbone of the infographic. The entire reason you need one created is so you can display your data in an easy and simple way. You want everyone to understand. Data without the rest of the elements is boring, and flat out invisible to everyone. Gather your findings and be ready to have them represented in a beautiful fashion!

 

Why:

Well, you’ve got your data all ready to be shared, but what for? Say you’re looking to educate people on your product or service. You’d state a problem, and the purpose of the infographic is to explain how and why your business is the solution. Here’s where you make yourself important; here’s where you deliver your message.

 

Design:

Here’s where you take your what and why from above and make sense of it. Design puts everything in order and educates the viewer. Several points are to be touched upon: the information must be displayed clean and simple, it must look great so as to encourage reading, and there must be purpose to it. Meaning, you display your info in a fun, simple and creative manner that shows you know what you’re talking about. Bring eyes to your data.

 

Shareability:

Okay, your infographic is almost complete! What’s left to do is load it up with links to you and your social media outlets. You must let the viewer know where this image is coming from. Which brings us to a big decision: where do you put it? Of course you’re going to put it on your twitter and facebook, but where else? SEO will help, and as long as this is floating around the internet, it’ll grab eyes and bring attention to your business. So proper placement is key. Besides creating the infographic for you, we here at MOS are also able to put it in the right places.

 

Get a hold of us, and let’s visualize your data together!

-The MOS Creative Team

Check out our other Tumblr!

Cutout Animation: Cartoon Puppetry!

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While there are many different styles of animation, one of the most-utilized and quickest styles is Cutout Animation, also known as Flash animation because of the program that’s used to create it. It’s a great way to bring characters to life with a rather fast turnaround. It’s no wonder that many animated television series use it. If it’s good enough for TV, it’s good enough for your marketing campaign.

We’ve done many of these in the past. If you remember our articles about our projects with Foodem and Bumblejunk, you’ll know how good we are at it! Here’s another example of our work, with Mosaic Power! Meet Mo!

The way this animation technique works is all the graphics are pre-drawn. Faces, hands, mouths, eyes—every motion a character will make. The result of that is a Character Puppet, or a Character Rig. The puppet can be reused over and over again, to make it look like it’s constantly moving, even though it’s repeated drawings. Neat little trick! This also perpetuates a feeling of consistency and legitimacy. It’s beneficial if you have an idea in mind that involves characters, but you don’t have any available actors to portray them in a commercial. Cutout Animation is the vehicle that’ll bring your ideas to life!

As stated above, many cartoons on television employ this tactic. Some of the more famous examples are Archer, Family Guy, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Dan Vs, and Brickleberry. The characters run the gamut of motion, while in actuality, these are re-used graphics, over and over. It’s beautiful and fun to watch, just as it is fun to make. (Honestly, some of our favorite projects were cutout animation.)

Since this is such a popular style, it’s very likely that people will latch onto commercials done in this manner. That, mixed with the popularity of youtube, our SEO, and just a dash of creativity, a cutout commercial will be beneficial to ANY marketing campaign. Remember, animation is able to do whatever you want, and is 100% editable. Cutout animation is no different! So perfecting an animated video for you is just one of the many things we at MOS Creative are proud to do! We see a production from conception to completion, all in-house! Pretty versatile if you ask me! Give us a shout and see what we’re about!

Let’s make beauty together. We want to help you stand OUT! So let’s get to work!

Here’s 3 quick reasons why Cutout Animation might be the perfect fit for you and your business:

1. Puppets.
Prepared puppets are a great alternative to having an animator draw a new drawing every single frame, like traditional animation. It can get completed in days-to-weeks, rather than years!

2. Puppets take the place of live actors.
If you have an idea but no actors to help out, then it’s just a voiceover and a puppet or two away from being realized!

3. Re-utilization.
These puppets can be used over and over again. If you have multiple campaigns and want to keep your character appearing throughout, then it’s no problem. We can pop the puppet back in, and make it do some awesome moves for ya!

Our thing is that we love helping you stand out. That’s just what we do, and we’re happy to do it for you. Let’s chat and see how we can bring your ideas into this world!

-The MOS Creative team.

 

Easy Halloween costumes for the procrastinating marketer

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The air has turned brisk and the still-green grass is hiding beneath a thin layer of auburn-stained leaves that faintly crackle and rustle with each step you take. We’re approaching the final days of October, people, and you know what that means… HALLOWEEN!

So please ignore the glistening trees, shiny ornaments and alluring bows of holly that for some reason already adorn the aisles of your local Target and Walmart, and for a few more days let’s relish in the holiday which year after year gets pushed aside like the inconsequential step-child of celebrations. Halloween is not just for kids, my friends, it’s a serious event!
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What it takes to be Steve Jobs

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“Why join the navy when you can be a pirate?” Wiser words never uttered by a man more influential and responsible for single-handedly transforming the computing and mobile landscape.

Steve Jobs told us to be crazy. He told us he wanted to put a ding in the universe. He didn’t put a ding, but he sure left an Apple.

A single glance at the non-stop media coverage, and you’d think America’s greatest superhero finally befell to his kryptonite. #SteveJobs, #iSad and #ThankYouSteve rotate Twitter’s trending topics, and pictures of our generation’s Thomas Edison continue to flood Facebook’s news feeds.

But in no jest, he was a hero to millions, probably billions, of people he never met. He changed the way we think about and interact with the world. Every time you have to ask your kid a computer question, remember, he’s the reason.

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Back to Basics: What is your Marketing Objective?

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When it comes to this whole marketing thing, do you sometimes feel like you’re in over your head? Maybe you’re new to the “branding” concept? You hear so much talk about “engaging your audience” via Facebook and social media, but are you completely lost in where to even start?

I’m not surprised. Go ahead, just try Googling “marketing ideas.” You’ll get 40,200,000 search results.

Talk about information overload. No wonder most business owners don’t even want to think about their marketing, so they put it off for as long as possible. I’m thinking you need a little direction. Am I right?

I’m gonna level with you – doing it right is not as easy as it looks. That’s why there are millions of professional marketing firms out there. And for the most part, the professionals will do a good job for you. But whether you’re coming up with the creative ideas, or you’re paying someone else to do it for you, you should NEVER go into your own marketing strategy blindly. It’s EXTREMELY important that you get involved. After all, who knows your clients, your product and your company’s needs and goals better than you do?

So before you delve into the details of how often to Tweet and which keywords to base your SEO around, let’s start with the basics. I just want to get your feet wet and get you thinking. Always start by figuring out what your marketing OBJECTIVE is. Everything else will come from there.

What’s your Objective?

1. Awareness – Potential customers must know of, or be reminded of your existence, your location, your product, your price range, and what makes you stand out from the competition

2. Build Contact List – Your mailing list is like gold. It’s what you rely on for promoting any campaign, and it takes a lot of nurturing to build and keep.

3. Get Involved – Your business is not soul-less. Companies are made up of people, and people like to patronize companies that they know go out of their way to help other people. Your company’s positive image reinforces the perception that you are genuinely caring and sharing.

4. Staff Incentives – A cared for and happy team makes for a harmonious, smooth operation. Customers can tell when your employees don’t want to be there. Think about the grouchy, frowning cashier at the supermarket. Make sure your employees feel appreciated!

5. Excitement – This is the kind of energy and excitement that makes you stand out from the competition. This is when you need to turn on your thinking cap and come up with some really creative promotions.

6. Frequency – When you’re trying to be “the place to go.” This is a brand loyalty thing, and keeping them coming as frequently as possible.

7. Publicity – For this one you’ve got to be interesting and newsworthy. Maybe you’re doing BIG things for the community, or you’re doing something so completely out of the box that it’s a story too good to pass up.

8. Generate Traffic - Simply getting people in the door or on the website is your goal here. Contests are great for this! You want to get potential customers to complete some sort of action, whether it’s entering the contest or downloading a form.

9. Branding – Image is everything. Period. If you don’t define your company and your brand, the market will define it for you. And that’s never what you want!

10. Increase Sales – a.k.a. Up-selling – This is every CEO’s favorite! From the sneaky but ingenious psychological tactics (a la putting candy, gum and magazines in the grocery checkout line) to having an in-depth understanding of how your industry works, there are really unlimited opportunities to do this one.

11. Creating Activity - Most industries have their “slow” periods during the year, but that’s not set in stone. This is where you will get creative to make the slow season profitable.

12. Trial Offer – Who’s gonna turn down a free sample? Come on, you’ll love it. This is when you really want to get those potential customers who are living on the edge to finally make the plunge – but without any of the risk.

(Great list compiled by Tom Feltenstein – And if you’re looking for a good book on the basics, try Tom’s “Encyclopedia of 401 Proven Killer Promotional Tactics”)

Your Fear of Searching the Mobile Web has a Cure!

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Don’t you hate when you’re surfing the web on your mobile phone, but the website does not fit perfectly on your screen? You may have to enlarge it and scroll to read the text, or try and zoom in? Looking at websites on your phone at times is not fun. However, there is a very simple answer to this conundrum. Web2Mobile, Inc. is the nations first mobile software in the United States that allows users build a mobile website in just three steps! Continue reading →

Finally: Facebook brings you instant ads

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Did you update your status recently?

Pay attention to the ads in the right column. You may soon notice an uncanny relevance to your instant desires. No, it’s not the universe giving you a sign. It’s Facebook’s newest advertising platform that is currently in testing (you know, a small study group of only 6 million users or so).

So what’s the big idea? It’s Facebook’s version of intent-based advertising. It basically delivers real-time ads based on your wall posts and status updates.

Here’s how it works. Let’s say you’ve got the munchies and update your status to, “Could really go for some pizza right now! Who’s in?”

You could get an instant ad or a coupon from Domino’s, Papa John’s or Pizza Hut. Continue reading →