Achieving Synergy by Leveraging High-Quality Videos & 3d Renderings
Before we get started, let me just say…
It was hard NOT using the word “synergy” in the title of this post. It’s one of those corporate-sounding throwaway buzzwords that’s been done to death. Which sucks – because it does a good job summarizing what we’re talking about today.
Synergy in your marketing is two or more initiatives working together to create a response greater than the sum of the elements alone. That’s according to a definition I found at smallbusiness.chron.com.
With traditional marketing methods, you end up paying twice for a marketing piece – once for its design and production, and again for the placement in the media of your choice (magazine, radio, trade journal). But you only get a single return from each effort.
However, done right, your marketing today can be paid for just once, but continue to provide you with returns virtually forever. That’s especially useful if your company has a limited marketing budget…
“Big doors swing on little hinges.” – W. Clement Stone
So how does this all apply to high-quality visualizations?
When you invest a portion of your marketing dollars on a few well-considered visual pieces – details, animations and 3-D renderings of your product – you create synergies between your sales & marketing materials and your technical documents.
What that means is you’re…
Making your marketing materials more technical, but still aesthetically pleasing…
Creating engaging and attention-grabbing technical pieces that are marketing-oriented…
Adding “why statements” to your technical pieces to get in front of your prospects questions
To give you a better idea of what we’re talking about here, let’s take a look at how some of the larger building product companies have been successfully using videos and renderings in an expanding way.
Nichiha
Nichiha, the fiber cement product manufacturer, does a great job of re-purposing their visualization throughout their marketing, sales and technical documents.
Not only are they using animated installation videos on their website to demonstrate the installation of their product lines to architects and contractors…
…They’re also combining video screen shots with photographs and 2D details in their installation instructions to clearly demonstrate to installers every step needed to provide a great project…
…You’ll also find their pulling 3D renderings into their brochures and other sales documents and weaving them between their sales copy and beautiful project photos.
It’s through this synergy that they effectively & successfully demonstrate how their products can work as part of the architects next project… While also creating a consistency that runs through all of their forms of communication with their clients and installers.
For their Insultech product line, since it is one of those “behind-the-scenes” products, project photos don’t do it justice. That’s why it’s critical that they use a variety of images to demonstrate the product’s features and benefits to their clients.
It all starts on the website’s product page, where they use a variety of 3D rendering and details to illustrate the product…
If you happen to check out their YouTube channel, you’ll find they use a combination of live product demonstrations with 3D renderings and CAD drawings to properly demonstrate their products value.
In their Masonry Performance Upgrade catalog, their also using similar version of these 3D rendering to explain each of their upgrade options. And, again, we see they’re weaving the images together with sales copy, project photos and technical drawings.
Throughout their marketing and technical documents, Echelon is doing a great job of utilizing the many small pieces they’ve collected and are using them effectively across their website, their leave-behinds, and the rest of their media sources.
National Gypsum
For today’s last example, I’m highlighting the work that National Gypsum is doing. They’ve spent a lot of time and effort developing a library of product drawing, details, and animations to clarify their product lines.
(…By the way, I just finished putting together a case study of the work we’ve done together, so if you’d like to learn more, send me a quick message and I’ll email you the PDF…)
National Gypsum’s most comprehensive incorporation of the many small pieces and parts that they’ve generated and collected are brought together in their newly-released (circa June 2016) “NGC Construction Guide.”
Throughout the almost 400-page guide, they’ve brought together all of the technical details, renderings and images to clarify their extensive product lines. I’m honored to have been part of the development of the visualization pieces. Here are a few pages from the guide…
As an architect or contractor goes through the National Gypsum website, or any of the other marketing channels NGC uses, they’ll see a consistent use of the many visual pieces they’ve developed over time.
It’s through this consistency, that National Gypsum has developed an effective strategy to communicate the value their products provide, and how their clients can use those products to create the best project possible.
Conclusion
As you can see, investing in a few high-quality product renderings or videos to weave throughout your marketing and customer service strategies can be scaled as much or as little as you want.
Your strategies can adjust as your marketing budgets fluctuate. But each of these pieces can be repurposed throughout all of your communications with your client. The options are unlimited.
The traditional methodology for inventing, designing, and selling a new product is dead. There is something to be learned from the silicon-valley inspired crowdsourcing put on by sites like kickstarter or indiegogo. Essentially what is happening here is people are selling products before they are even built.
The Old-School Way of Inventing New Products
Traditionally, you dream up a new widget which solves a problem. It might be a stronger and lighter cladding or a new labor-saving metal stud which installs in less time. Regardless of what it is, the next step is to sketch it, design it, manufacture it, test it and then ultimately market and sell it. It is not until you have spent a fortune in time and money that you find out if it will be a success or a failure.
The Modern Way of Inventing New Products
The online-tech world has a different way now, a leaner and smarter way. You design the product, focusing not on how it will actually work, but on the problem it will solve and what it will mean to the customer. You make a great video, throw it up on kickstarter and if the idea resonates with people, they will put money in up-front to get your widget. If enough people do this, you meet your goal and you now have the money to actually make the thing.
I’m not suggesting that building products should be created this way, but maybe there is a lesson to be learned here.
[convertkit]
Have a Virtual Version of Your Invention Made First
What if you took your latest and greatest idea and created a video which used photorealistic 3d animation to demonstrate what the product is, how it works and why someone should use it in a 3 minute video? That is exactly what a few forward-thinking bpm’s have been doing for years.
You then pass that video up and down your organization, or to an industry partner or investor. If everyone agrees on the potential of the widget, you then use the video to put the idea in front of your potential customers and then gauge their interest.
If they show a high enough level of interest, then you go ahead and manufacture the widget without the risk of it being a complete failure in the market.
You Will Improve Your Invention Before Building It
An unintended consequence of this methodology has often been the refinement of the product design at a far earlier stage. Typically, when someone hands me a new product design, I will make my 3d model of it, but I will also model it in-context so we can show how it is installed, where it is installed and why. In that process, if there is an inherent design flaw in the product, we will find it far before the thing is mass produced, or even before it exists in the physical world at all.
For Example
For example, when you watch this video below, think about how this could have been created long before this product was ever actually manufactured (it wasn’t – but I thought it would make for good food for thought). Consider the possible implications of that in the way your organization invents new products.
Regards and I hope you find beauty today, even when it does not yet exist.
-JY
About the Author :
Jason Yana has 2 decades of experience in architectural technology, 3d graphics and construction marketing. This unique combination provides highly-effective visual representations of building products that fuel marketing and support efforts.
His award-winning body of work informs, inspires and educates building product customers.
Sharing interesting and engaging content online through blogs and social media has become a primary part of any marketing effort. It has also, consequently, been a source of confusion and often ends in frustration for many marketing directors. I have personally seen and experienced the power of content marketing for getting new customers and, in general, helping connect a valuable service with customers who need it. I think that we all now agree that content marketing is a powerful thing. Here’s the problem, what content are we going to share, anyway? Rather than guessing or scratching our chins for eternity, let’s use a few recent surveys and see what we know for sure.
We know from the Construction Marketing Associations recent survey that:
97% of respondents said they use social media in their marketing plans in 2013
47% have blogs
91% are on linked in
This is great, this shows that the construction industry is getting involved and understanding that people are going to research products and services online far before they contact you. They will search the internet, or ask their network of contacts for advice online, or they will see quality content produced by a manufacturer or service provider online and they will take notice.
The Most Used Social Platform Used by Manufacturers is YouTube
This makes a whole lot of sense because there is nothing more engaging and powerful than video to demonstrate the what, how and why of a product.
The Butt-Crack of a Tradesperson Will not Sell Building Products
Only 3% Rate It as Effective, Let’s Fix This.
Using video to market building products is a double-edge sword, however. If you think that throwing up a 20 minute video from a handheld camera on a job-site is going to help sell your products and get them specified, I am afraid that you are going to be disappointed with the results. Video needs to be professional, to the point and it needs to make the product the star of the show. I’m talking about a 3o second video, a one or two minute video, which captures attention, informs, educates and convinces elegantly.
So, according to the research, only 3% of the manufacturers surveyed found their video content to be effective, lets fix this . . .
Here are three forms of engaging video for building product content marketing.
Video is the most popular medium for manufacturers to share content, and the biggest challenge is finding engaging video content to share about products.
1. The 3d Animated Marketing Video to demonstrate visually how a product works and why someone should use it
Click Image Above to View
2. The 3d Animated Installation Instruction Video which uses high end photorealistic animation to show clearly how a product is installed or used
Click Image to View Video
3. The Snippet Animation – A very short, shareable, tweetable short video clip demonstrating a product in action.
Dealing with how to install a building product should not be an after-thought. How a product goes together can sometimes be the single deciding factor in product selection for DIY and professional installers. Architects and specifiers also like to see well thought out installation information to feel comfortable about how well thought out and designed a product is.
Composite Decking and Railing by Duralife
Duralife is a high strength, high quality composite decking material which comes in two flavors. One using face screws and the other using an innovative hidden fastening system. Duralife also has a nice railing system. We created three animated install videos which highlight the main features and benefits of the systems, while demonstrating the step-by-step installation process.
The videos are useful for marketing purposes on the company web site, for internal training purposes, installer training purposes and are great to share on social media as well as on a big screen at a trade show. Sales staff can be armed with these videos pre-loaded on ipads to make dynamic presentations anywhere.
To sell building products you have to get the products in front of your potential customers. This can be a huge headache. Traditional photo-shoots are time consuming, complex and often extremely expensive. Special lighting rigs, set construction and or location selection and scheduling are all hurdles to overcome. All these things need to be done long before any images are actually produced and the results are unpredictable.
Consider now, if there was a way to display any product as realistic as photography, but in any context while saving time, money and resources. What if you could have these things done before the product was even mass-produced?
3d rendering has become so advanced that you might not even know that catalogs such as IKEA are ditching the traditional photography sets and using 3d renderings instead. 3d imaging offers more flexibility, more affordability and provides many advantages of photography. There is still a huge need for great product photography – without question, but there are many reasons to choose 3d rendering instead. 3d product renderings offer unlimited flexibility and the ability to be on the cutting edge while your competition is still wrestling with photographic nightmares. Moreover, there are some products that are just not photo-friendly. Some are inside-the-wall products that are not meant to be visually appealing – a talented 3d illustrator can make them beautiful. Some products are too heavy or large to photograph easily. Sometimes you want to show the internal parts of a product and how they work which is incredibly difficult with photography.
3d Rendering – Lower Cost, Less Time
A traditional photo-shoot takes time to initiate, set up, light and rig and get just right before you even get around to taking pictures. There are numerous challenges that just don’t exist in the virtual world. While a photo-shoot might take tens of thousands of dollars to produce, a 3d rendering of a product can be as low as $500.
To change the setting of a photo-shoot midstream would be cost-prohibitive and is usually impossible for building products. A 3d rendering can show a product in any scene, any context at any time and can be changed at any point in the process. The flexibility of changing colors, textures and showing variations of products can be done with little added cost.
3d Rendering for Product Prototyping and Product Launches – Just-in-time Marketing
For new products, 3d renderings can be produced before the prototype is even created. Marketing and sales materials can be created before or while the product is being developed and can aid in the product design process. Usually a prototype is engineered and created long before marketing can happen. With a 3d rendering, marketing and product development can occur simultaneously in more of a just-in-time marketing approach.
The result of integrating product design, prototyping and marketing visualization accelerates the time-to-market for new products and allows for market testing during the process. What if you could test-market 3 variations of a product design showing it in photorealistic images in a real-world scenario? Could you put those 3 variations in front of potential customers and let them decide which one is the best option? Could you do that with traditional photography?
Sales and marketing could have photorealistic images of how a product looks, how it works and how it is installed on day one, or before. On day one, a beautiful set of installation animations, details and images would all be in the hands of your sales representatives.
3d Renderings Make Emotional Connections with Customers
Let’s be honest here, some products do not make an immediate emotional connection with potential customers. When someone walks into an apple store, or a granite showroom – there is a clear emotional response. When an architect is deciding which type of flooring underlayment to use – I don’t think there is that same type of response – could there be?
Here is an example of what could be done with that flooring underlayment to make an emotional connection using a 3d rendering that would not be possible with photography.
Blow Away Your Competition With Animation
Are you convinced yet of the power of 3d rendering in the sales and marketing of building products? If not, consider animation. Once you have 3d models and renderings produced, you’re are more than half the way there to having photorealistic animations and videos of your products. A well-produced video can increase customer engagement, demonstrate the what, how and why of your product and eliminate problems in the field all in one solution.
For more information on the power of animation and view a case study – see this article
Below is an example of a 3d animation for a building product.
Some Case Studies of Building Product Marketing Using 3d Imaging
Regards and I hope you find beauty today, even when it is not pretty.
-JY
About the Author :
Jason Yana has 2 decades of experience in architectural technology, 3d graphics and construction marketing. This unique combination provides highly-effective visual representations of building products that fuel marketing and support efforts.
His award-winning body of work informs, inspires and educates building product customers.
Expressing Technical Functionality and Finished Appearance with one Cutaway Perspective Drawing
This is an example of a product that comprises the structural, and the finished aesthetic appearance of a wall. The Isometric cutaway drawing expresses what this thing is, how it works and why someone would choose it for a wall system.
What is One-Step?
(description from their web site)
The OneStep Building System is a holistic, high performance building product whereby the entire exterior structure of a building can be built using only ONE product, ONE trade and ONE Step! It’s design is adapted from a concrete form masonry unit (CFMU).
OneStep combines the beauty of masonry, the strength of concrete and the energy efficiency of polystyrene insulation into a singular building product, which dramatically simplifies the construction process and reduces the environmental impact of high performance buildings.
3d Subdivision Surface Model Created
Textures Applied and Rendered
Animated 360 Spin (using old school animated gif)
Full Cutaway Perspective Wall Assembly Showing a Real-World Installation
Here we can see what is happening inside the wall, the reinforcing bars – the grouted structural portion of the wall, the layer of insulation, the moisture drainage plane, the flashing at the base and the finished exterior surface all at once.
