VIDEO: HOW HARVEST DOES IT

CACM recently chatted with Amanda Gray, VP of Marketing at Harvest Landscape, about a new YouTube video series called The Harvest Lab that the company launched at the start of the year. So far Harvest has released six videos of varying lengths covering everything from mulch to bee removal to birds and nesting.

“We started off with once-a-month releases,” she said, but admitted that to be successful with videos, frequency has to be much higher. “You should be releasing videos every week. We started recording longer videos and turning them into shorter pieces.” Some are teasers about upcoming content. Frequency is now up to two longer episodes a month with bonus shorter episodes in between.

The goal? “Help viewers understand what happens behind the scenes with landscape,” she said. “It’s not just about the service we provide, but the beauty of our environments, what it means to work in our environment and what we come in contact with all the time like fires, birds, bees, etc.”

Gray said the idea to invest more into video came about as the pandemic made it difficult to see people in person and let them know what Harvest did. “We thought, ‘Let’s embrace the educational aspect of what we do and share it with people.’” The content is geared toward anyone not just managers and board members but their children and anyone interested in the environment.

Harvest produces videos both with internal staff and with outside videographers and directors—it depends on the length and what the video is for. Gray said there are many talented videographers on social media including Instagram that are passionate and have their own equipment to shoot and edit.

TOP TIPS

• Keep it short. Gray says their sweet spot is around four minutes. While it’s hard to fit great information in that short of time, viewers start disappearing after that mark.

• First 10 seconds are crucial. You only have a few seconds to capture their attention. Watch the timelines in your videos to see where interest peaks.

• Use social media to guide viewers to your content. Whether it’s Instagram, Facebook, Twitter or TikTok, make sure to use social platforms to distribute your videos or links to your YouTube channel. In addition to your website, these channels bring your message to a broad audience and viewers vary widely on each platform.

• Timing matters. Gray said scheduling is just as important as the channels you use. Understanding when content is going to be viewed and making sure that you create and send it out to the social media world at good times. “You can spend all this time, attention and money on video and editing but if you don’t post it at the appropriate time, you will miss an entire window of people,” she said. There are many tools that help you identify best times and how to get the most out of your efforts.