Online shopping is convenient, but can have one drawback: customers aren’t able to see, feel, or try the things they want to buy. High-quality product videos help to offset this problem. By clearly showing a product’s main features, benefits, size, or usability in a video, you can boost your prospective buyer’s confidence in their decision.
If you’re considering adding product videos to your website, now is a great time. Access to high-resolution smartphone cameras, free editing software, and independent video production professionals makes it easier than ever for businesses of all sizes to get high-quality content that boosts conversions.
This guide breaks down the steps to creating a good product video, including Ready to get started? Read on for everything you need to know—and find out how to get help creating the perfect product video!
Why e-commerce companies use product videos
Videos do such a good job at improving the e-commerce experience that adding them to your pages may boost conversions by as much as 144%. With video, you can:
- Show your product from all angles
- Highlight interior and exterior features
- Verbally explain the material or design with a voiceover
- Appeal to your target audience’s needs and wants
- Discuss a product’s value and share testimonials
Of course, you won’t want to pack all of that content into one video. Creating a series of videos for your e-commerce product allows you to target potential customers with different content throughout the buyer’s journey.
How SaaS companies can use product videos
Product videos are also very useful for software as a service (SaaS) companies. While SaaS products typically do not involve tangible goods, video is still useful. Product walkthroughs, demos, and testimonials can all be very helpful to customers during the purchasing process.
When creating SaaS product videos you may want to:
- Give a quick general overview of all product features
- Take a deeper dive into specific user actions
- Highlight its financial or time-saving features
- Depict users of the product enjoying its benefits
What should a product video include?
When creating a product video, you can utilize a mix of motion shots, still images, interviews, and narration. Each of these elements adds value to a product video, as long as it all aligns with your brand voice. The way you structure your content will change depending on the type of marketing video you want to create. Product videos may take the form of:
- Explainer videos that talk about a product’s function and benefits, and can serve as an intro to the product for new customers
- Product demo videos that show someone using the item or software interface
- Tutorial videos that provide a more in-depth walkthrough for existing customers
The following elements are important parts of every product video:
- A short and precise product overview
- 360-degree product shots
- Detailed product shots
- Demonstration of value
- Lifestyle integration examples
- Footage that resonates with your target audience
- Call to action
Focusing on each of these areas during the video creation process can help you increase the effectiveness of your finished product.
A short and precise product overview
Videos are your chance to show and tell prospective buyers all about a product. When producing a video for a product page, it’s a good idea to keep it quick and to the point, while covering the main features a customer might want to know about. The ideal length for product page videos is between 20 and 90 seconds. This is enough time to provide important highlights without boring your audience.
You can create a short product overview by:
- Using a video host who physically points to, or clicks through, different areas of the product and explains its benefits
- Splicing together different product shots and adding a voiceover that explains what the viewer is seeing
- Using text overlays on your video footage to highlight key features
It’s typically a good idea to combine both text and audio on your product videos. This allows the buyer to watch or listen to your video depending on their needs and preferences.
360-degree product shots
This type of shot is particular to e-commerce products. By showing off physical products from all angles—including the inside—you can reassure buyers that this is, indeed, the product they want.
The way you choose to do your 360-degree shots may depend on the equipment and space you have available to you. You could:
- Ask a model to put on a wearable product and turn in a circle
- Move a stable, mobile camera around a stationary product
- Place the product on a rotating surface and slowly turn it in front of a stationary camera
If you’re selling a SaaS product, you can skip the 360-degree shots, as your product isn’t tangible. Instead, focus on showing multiple views of the software’s menus, windows, and buttons.
Detailed product shots
It’s also helpful to intersperse your 360-degree footage with detailed product close-ups. This is particularly useful in e-commerce if the product has unique patterns and textures. SaaS companies can use detailed shots to show off attractive or useful parts of the software product.
If your video camera’s resolution is very high, you may be able to capture these shots as film footage. Otherwise, you can add high-quality still photos of physical products into your video during the editing process.
SaaS brands may have an easier time obtaining close-up product images by taking screenshots or using animation to recreate parts of the software’s user interface.
Demonstration of value
Corporate product videos should help you sell an item. This means it’s important to communicate your value proposition in the video. For example, if we were creating a video about a durable hiking backpack, we might:
- Have the video host or narrator say a statement about the product’s longevity, versatility, or cost savings
- Demonstrate durability by filling the backpack with weights or striking it with a blade (only do this if your product really will hold up to the test!)
- Incorporate a customer testimonial
You don’t need a long video to do this. With proper planning, you can express a product’s value quickly and succinctly.
Lifestyle integration examples
Content marketing is all about showing and telling customers how your product can solve their problems. Your company product video should indicate that you have a solution to make users’ lives easier or better, not harder.
You might opt to highlight lifestyle integration through another customer testimonial, or quickly show footage of people using the product. The footage you use to show lifestyle integration and to demonstrate value may be very similar.
Footage that resonates with your target audience
Whether you’re filming all of your footage yourself or using stock files, keep your target audience in mind. It’s important to choose scenes, images, and testimonials that feature the types of customers you want to reach.
There are three main phases that each customer will move through during their journey to purchasing your product:
- Awareness: The potential buyer has never heard of your company or product before
- Consideration: The customer is aware of your company or product, but isn’t sure if they want to buy it
- Decision: Your prospect is ready to make a purchase and is seriously considering your product
You may need to create more than one video to reach all of these audiences.
Call to action
Your product videos should end with a call to action (CTA), even if it is subtle. Subtlety can go a long way when it comes to product videos, as some viewers will be turned off by a fear-based hard sell. You can incorporate a CTA into your video by:
- Adding a final slide that reads “purchase now at” with a link
- Asking the viewer to share their story with your brand at a link or social media page
- Have your video narrator or host verbally tell the viewer where they can go to learn more information
- Providing a discount code for new software subscribers
Where to place product videos on your site
Your videos should always live on the product’s web page. This allows the potential buyer to learn more about the product’s features while making a purchasing decision. Remember to pair your video with detailed photos and a product description, too.
How to make product videos
By planning your product video strategy carefully in advance, you can save money, reduce shooting time, and improve the impact of your final product.
The following steps will help you prepare to film your first product videos.
Know your audience
Before picking up a camera, think about:
- The different audience segments you’d like to target with the video
- How the audience’s buying journey will progress
- Where you are most likely to connect with your audience at each stage of their journey
These details can influence the content, format, and tone of the videos you produce.
Consider scaling video production
If you need to create more than one video for a product or would like to make videos for several products, consider batching your production. Filming and editing more than one video at a time may help with cost savings, too.
You might:
- Opt to film similar videos for multiple products
- Get all the footage you need to create multiple videos for one product
- Edit several versions of one video for use across your website and social media
- Film general footage you can use in place of stock content in future videos
For example, if you’re filming a YouTube video, you’ll want to film in a landscape (horizontal) orientation. If you know you’re going to run an Instagram campaign as well, though, you could also get some portrait (vertical) orientation shots for Reels and Stories. Your video editor can then cut several versions of each video for use across different platforms.
When working on-site with your video production team, it can be fun to grab some behind-the-scenes shots as well. This type of footage may be useful on social media or as B-roll footage. B-rolls may appear as cut scenes between the main product shots. Your video editor will decide what, if any, B-roll footage to use.
Hire or use an in-house video team
If your company has an in-house video team, it can make the filming process extra easy!
To film a product video, you and your team will need all or some of the following:
- A video script
- Storyboards
- A high-quality camera and tripod
- An even, diffused light source
- Microphones
- Video and audio editing software
- On-camera or voiceover talent
Even without an in-house team, you can still make high-quality product videos. It’s not necessary to hire a full-time videographer or editor, either. You can:
- Hire a video production agency to produce a set number of videos
- Work with independent videographers and video producers to make product videos on an ongoing or as-needed basis
- Film product footage yourself on a camera or a phone and send it to an independent video editor
- Work with independent animators and motion graphics designers to create unique footage for your product videos
Find talent
After you decide what type of videos you’ll make—and how—it’s time to locate the talent you need for your video. If your video will have a host, actors, or a narrator, you will need a screenwriter as well as on-camera talent or a professional voiceover artist.
Of course, you can always write a video script and provide the voiceover yourself. However, doing both of these correctly can require specialized skill sets and equipment. Working with independent talent is a great way to get good product videos that are within your budget.
Film products and additional footage
Once you have your team in place, it’s time to begin producing your video. If it’s your first time creating product videos, work with your video production agency or independent talent to determine how your shoot should proceed. During this stage of the project, you’ll want to obtain:
- 360-degree product shots, if applicable
- Product closeups
- Footage of the product in use
- B-roll footage
- Any relevant testimonial or lifestyle footage
After filming is complete, your video editing team can put together an initial cut of the video for you to review and test.
Test with customers and make adjustments
After you’re happy with the way your product video looks, roll it out to a select portion of your audience and see how it performs. There are a couple of ways that you can test the effectiveness of your content:
- Create a focus group that represents one or more of your audience segments and get their feedback on the video
- A/B test your video by producing more than one version and showing each video to a segment of your audience. You can also test a new video against an older one using the same process.
If your audience responds poorly to your video—either by providing this feedback directly or through a drop in views and conversions—make some adjustments. Work with your video team to film additional footage, re-edit existing content, or change the narration. You can then test your changes against the original video.
Upload the video to YouTube or third-party video sites
Hosting your videos may use up a lot of bandwidth and slow down your website. It’s typically a good idea to upload your video to YouTube or another third-party video site like Vimeo. You can then embed the video directly on your product pages to save bandwidth.
Review video performance
YouTube and Vimeo also provide useful analytics about your videos. You can see information that includes:
- Individual video performance
- How does one video compares to another
- How many viewers watched your video
- How long each viewer spend watching your video
- Viewer demographics
This data can help you evaluate how well your product videos perform. When reviewing product video performance, take note of any videos that outperform the others. You may want to replicate their features in your next batch of videos.
5 examples of the best product videos
The five corporate video examples below all demonstrate a variety of the shots and strategies discussed above. Check them out for some great video inspiration!
Zappos
E-commerce shoe company Zappos tries to make the online purchasing experience pleasant for its customers, offering a generous return policy, detailed product information, and product videos.
The standard Zappos product video format involves a host holding a shoe and discussing its features or benefits. Models are often used to give a 360-degree view, as shown in this Converse sneaker video:
This video gives the viewer an idea of the shoe’s style, function, and comfort, helping them feel confident about making a purchase.
The Zappos team also compiles their blooper footage into lighthearted behind-the-scenes videos. This is a great example of ways to put outtakes and B-rolls to use:
Intuit’s Quickbooks Payroll
Clocking in at just over 90 seconds long, this Intuit Quickbooks Payroll video is an excellent example of how to keep a SaaS demo quick and to the point:
Wide full-product shots, detailed up-close views, and narration make it easy for viewers to follow along and connect a bank account to their software. Intuit pre-filled the form fields in the example account for this video, which helps to keep the pacing snappy.
Because this is a demo video, it’s primarily targeted at existing customers. It could, however, also be useful to prospective buyers in the consideration or decision stages of their buying journey. The video can help potential customers confirm that the software offers the specific features and capabilities that they need.
Dropbox
In 2017, file sharing service Dropbox launched Paper, document creation and collaboration tool offering capabilities similar to those of Notion or Google Docs. The Dropbox team put together a short video—clocking in at one minute and 13 seconds—to show how the product can help busy teams:
The video uses close-up product shots and narration. One interesting aspect of the video is that as the narrator speaks to her team verbally, the responses appear in the form of doc actions and comments. This video could be useful for targeting prospective buyers in the awareness stage.
Google Cloud
Google Cloud uses animation in many of its product videos. Instead of using the actual product, this video shows animated characters looking at wireframe-style representations of software tools. The video relies heavily on a detailed voiceover that explains how Google Cloud Premium Support training works:
The video approaches the product and service from a very high level, making it accessible and appealing to potential customers who are aware of Google Cloud but have not yet made a purchasing decision.
Bose Headphones
Audio equipment maker Bose utilizes a variety of full 360-degree and ultra-closeup shots in its QuietComfort® Noise Cancelling Earbuds product video. The earbuds spin, flex and break apart as the on-screen text explains what features appear on the screen.
By calling out desirable features including flexibility, battery life, and water resistance, Bose provides the basic information any prospective buyer might want to know about the headphones. As a result, this video could appeal to shoppers who are already considering buying a Bose product, as well as those who are unfamiliar with the company.
Creating your first product video
Upwork’s work marketplace is the place to go to hire independent professionals who can help you create high-quality product videos. Whether you’re looking for help with narration, filming, editing, or all of the above, Upwork can connect you with the right talent. Start by posting a job on Upwork today.
