Let the young show you how to vlog your product

Melbourne Herald Sun, Thursday August 28, 2014

As a constantly adapting business person you have embraced email, web sites, the proliferation of media like computers, smart phones and ipads. You've seen social media engulfing traditional print, TV, radio and pay TV. But there's a whole medium you are aware of, but have scarcely noticed - a tsunami of YouTube Vloggers.

Last week in London some 8000 mostly youngsters from Britain and Europe crowded into Alexandra Palace for their annual convention, Summer in the City. It was an occasion for the seldom-seen stars to meet their cheering public.

The beautiful Zoella is known for her fashion tips and her fun antics in front of the camera. She has 5 million followers to prove it. Dan and Phil's vlog has evolved into a BBC Radio 1 show with millions of listeners. Four young friends run Sorted Food, a cooking site that posts two recipes a week, with the lads having fun putting the dishes together - but always arriving at a delicious-looking meal.

From the often-solitary world of the vlogger, these presenters found they were stars to their crowds of viewers, who screamed and clamoured to get selfied with their heroes.

While most of the audience was female and 20-ish, there were plenty of other demographics present. A vlog - originally a "video blog" - can be shot in a small but well-lit and mounted studio, or by the chatty presenter walking round holding his tiny camera in his extended arm. Certainly there are no production expenses to be seen.

Most of the scripts are off the cuff, which can often make them difficult to follow. You wish sometimes they would take more time to rehearse beforehand. But then that is an area of professionalism which still has to develop, and it is probably what viewers find so attractive: the fact that these are not carefully planned and scripted messages.

But if the content is interesting and the vlogger is regular, say putting one out every week, the audience will build. If it is a subject or personality that people really take to, the numbers rise into the millions, though it takes time.

This is a fast-developing medium. The vloggers are making it up as they go along, so some work well and some don't. There are a lot of sites now with girls showing how to apply make-up or put a wardrobe together; some for the young, some for the older - an over-40 beauty Nisha, in SugaPuffAndStuff, has crowds of similarly-aged admirers, with her site carrying Nestle ads.

Another promotes jewellery, another weight loss. In this they can be similar to the daytime video shopping channels. But a vlogger can establish an intimacy with the viewer that a tv studio cannot. It is this one on oneness, I think, that makes them so appealing. You see this in the questions and responses that appear in the viewers' comments that follow each posting.

The question you have to ask yourself now is, do you want to become a vlogger for your own products? Can you or one of your team, come up with an appealing personality?

Or perhaps bond with an existing site. Most of them will accept advertising under strict conditions - it will have to be a product which will benefit their readers. But it is worth your while spending an evening or two exploring YouTube to see if there is a soulmate out there who could help to spread your message.