I’ve been singing this song for years now and have put out several training tutorials on how to do it and given several live presentations on my tactics to make it as easy as possible…BUT:

There has always been the nagging issue of: “How do I synchronize my audio narration to my slides??”

And over the years, I’ve come up with a couple ways I do it that work wonderfully but they can be a little intimidating for beginners.

BEHOLD!

This short tutorial was recorded during one of my weekly Learn Camtasia Question & Answer Webinars and, as you can see, is repurposed to be a sample bit of content to introduce folks to that program. A good tactic to copy!

OMG…I love this new technique!

I have to give big props to the amazing Chris Webb of Compelling.tv for turning me on to this PowerPoint setting!

Enjoy and PLEASE: Leave a comment, Like, Share!!

Lon

Columbus Dispatch discovered a homeless man along Ohio’s I-71 claiming to have “the God-given gift of voice.” His name is Ted Williams, and he’s an ex-radio announcer according to the note he scrawled on a piece of cardboard that he uses to solicit change from drivers. And wow, does Williams ever deliver for a dollar. Williams tells the Dispatch about his struggles, but thankfully “alcohol and drugs and a few other things” haven’t diminished Williams’ velvety vocal cords, and he says he’s two years clean now.

Man…I would LOVE to have this guy as a voice-over talent for my videos!

This video has gone viral INSTANTLY with over 4 million views in about a day. I’m simply amazed and inspired by this awesome New Year’s story.

Enjoy, share, and comment please!

Lon

As I covered in the webinar, the new version of PowerPoint 2010 has the ability to not only do nicer, smoother animations (which I pre-created in the template for re-use) but it also Exports the slideshow DIRECTLY as a WMV video file.

What does that mean to us? Hmmm…we don’t always need to “record” the slide video with Camtasia! One more step of complexity removed.

Here’s what a couple of folks came up with using the template. Keep in mind that these are “first attempts”. Pretty impressive!!

Shannon Herod

Shannon is a friend, an excellent marketer, and a go get ‘em, get ‘er done kinda guy. He took this template and RAN with it.

Check out the first 3:15 minutes or so of this video and notice how he uses the template and the visuals to set up a longer, more in-depth software demo:

Awesome Shannon! Check out all the other great content in this info packed post HERE.

Bertram T Heath Sr.

“Big B” was a plumber for 23 years and fell victim to the lousy economy. Certainly not content with just sitting around, Bertram decided to follow a life-long passion for being artistic and creative. He’s finding that creating videos is quite satisfying. I couldn’t agree more!

And…get this…this is his FIRST real attempt at using Camtasia! Holy crap!

This video is for a squeeze opt-in page for a new product Bert is working on called Video Marketing For Newbies. Ya…kinda ironic that he chooses to compete against me?? What the hell is he thinking?

Well, I love a challenge but even more than that, I love the fact that he is plowing ahead on this like he’s on a mission from God. And I like his initiative so much I’ve decided to help him along and use his story and this project as a Case Study. Stay tuned!

I’d love to hear your comments below and don’t forget to Tweet, FB, or otherwise share these stories with others!

Of course, if YOU’VE used the template and have a story to share maybe we can add you to the Showcase!

Lon

target=”_blank”>CLICK HERE TO FOLLOW ALONG

If you’ve followed me for awhile, you probably know that I’m a big fan of big product launches.

Mostly because of the power of high quality video content! So…I study these things.

In the coming days we’ll all see, whether we like it or not, the latest round of in the monster product launch category, something called AffiliateDotCom from Mike Filsaime and Chris Farrell.

This post is the first in a series I’ll be doing to follow the process from a video marketing and Camtasia perspective.

I’ll have a LOT of great tips and techniques to share!

Here’s a link to the I5 Gold Call I mentioned.

And, if you haven’t seen the Google Search Story video, HERE it is.

I also did a tutorial that explains it HERE.

I’m interested in hearing any questions you might have about how the videos in this launch are created by Andy so leave them as comments along with any other feedback or ideas you have!

Thanks,

Lon

In version 6, to add custom images to your videos, you had to add something called a Custom Callout (in a somewhat complicated procedure) before you could add them to your timeline.

In Camtasia 7…it’s sublimely simple!! Check it out:

I totally love this new feature!!

Seriously, this could be worth the price of upgrading alone.

Oh…and this is a very small taste of the kind of content in my new, soon-to-be-released Camtasia 7 Training Course. Stay tuned!

Lon

It’s kinda what I do and how I come up with new tips & tricks and continue to expand my Camtasia video skills. I also find that watching what’s going on is essential due to the fact that “what works” and what people want changes SO fast.

In my almost 10 years of studying the evolution of marketing on the internet, I’ve found that most people don’t “get it” …but a handful of people do. And those are the people I study the most.

Why do some marketers struggle to get any kind of significant results and a select few absolutely CRUSH everything they touch?

Well…study them to find out!

Frank Kern is one of those folks I mentioned. If you’ve never followed a Kern launch, I suggest you do so because there simply is none better. I posted about the first step of list generation with a viral video tactic he used recently.

The actual launch phase is now in full swing and you can follow along by getting into the flow and watch the video sequence HERE:

Let me be clear about some things once again:

• Yes, that’s an affiliate link. I guess it would be stupid not to use it.
• I am NOT recommending the product. I have not seen it or used it.
• It’s gonna be expensive and not for everyone.
• I’m not even taking the time to put together a bonus like most of the 10 gazillion emails you’ll see for this.
• In fact, if I were you and was interesting in buying? I’d probably find someone with a huge bonus and buy it from them…

I don’t care if you are interested in it or not and I’m not trying to get you interested in buying it…but I suggest that you study the process.

Hidden in the outstanding free content and strategies Frank gives away in these videos are the actual elements that make this launch flow so effective.

Can you spot them? Leave a comment and let me know what you find and what you think! I’ve listed some of my favorites so far below.

Please, let’s NOT get into any kind of ethical debate over semantics or specific tactics. I get that some folks don’t like anything that has to do with “sales” or persuasion. I concede that Frank is a master at ninja NLP mind tricks…so be it.

I’m focusing on some core concepts:

• The “story”, imagery, and sound MAKE this video series compelling. As video marketers, we can rock like this too.
• Selling sucks and is hard! Instead, I want to draw people towards me and not simply push stuff .
• Success is in the VALUE that you provide.
• Doing this is a lot more work!
  Online Pharmacy Comprar

  But I’m getting REALLY tired of lazy ass marketers…

And, as Frank puts it:

1. Be SURE you know what they want (and that you can actually help them get it).

2. Demonstrate you can give it to them by helping them right from the start.

3. Make an offer that’s obviously a no-brainer for them …and do so kindly – with their best interests in mind.

4. Give them a reason to take action now.

The philosophy that we are “paid in direct proportion to the value we provide to the marketplace” is one that I completely subscribe to and I hope that most of my members and subscribers would think that I follow.

I also love the saying:

“Shock & Awe Coolness”!

And Andy Jenkins recent launch of the Video Boss coaching program was another perfect example of a well executed pre-launch flow using basically the same video flow as the main sales tool.

I recommend this excellent post by Andy as a great example of the strategic thinking behind these two launches:

I’d like to show you how NOT to build a list
by Andy Jenkins on March 6, 2010

I absolutely love the thinking and systems behind these launch examples and can’t wait to put together a sequence of extreme value and relationship building content for my next big launch.

Your thoughts?

Lon

In case you missed it, here it is again:

Me? I saw a brilliant video…almost a work of art. The combination of imagery, perfect music, and use of screen capture “scenes” put together into a 60 second collage was awesome.

But when it was over, I immediately thought, “Whoa! I could do THAT!”

Since I’m speaking at Bob “The Teacher” Jenkins S.I.M.P.L.E. Event this month, I put together my own little “search story”. Here it is:

The really sweet part? I don’t have to pay $3 million bucks to air it! Actually, this clip is WAYYYY long because I couldn’t resist putting in the Cape Fear clip, so the 3 1/2 minute video would cost $10.5 million during that TV time slot.

The biggest concept to understand if you want to make one of these yourself is that it’s made up of individual “scenes” captured with Camtasia individually and then stitched together during editing.

If you tried to just grab ALL the footage in one recording shot? Hmmm…that would be VERY messy and you would never end up with anything that looked smooth. The biggest problem is that most of the scenes are “sped up” to give that cool fast typing effect.

I tried using Camtasia’s Clip Speed feature for this at first but since you can’t see the effects of the speed up until AFTER you produce, it was a TOTAL nightmare (come on Techsmith!! Uggg…).

I gave up and dropped the clips into Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum where the whole thing was a complete snap and I could monitor the timing and tweaks in real time. Syncing the music, sounds, and other audio was also a breeze in Vegas.

I exported to a AVI file and did the Pan & Zooms in Camtasia (which is easier than Vegas to me), and rendered it out to MP4 Flash.

These kinds of videos aren’t new. They are called Search Stories and you can see other examples on this YouTube Channel.

A big thanks to Andy Jenkins (The Video Boss) for his blog post that gave me the inspiration and motivation to whip this out.

BTW…it took me about 7.5 hours, start to finish. Planning (as usual) took the biggest percentage of time (about 3.5 hours), setting up my “shots” and rehearsal about 2 hours, and the rest in editing and final production.

What do you think?

Lon

Very nice!

Yes, it’s a bit involved but soooo worth the watch! Just for the ideas you can get from it for any screencast work.