# How to Leverage Video for Product Education and Onboarding

> A NachoTuesday interview — the C-Suite Insights series from NachoNacho, the B2B SaaS and AI
> marketplace. In conversation with Johnny Farquhar, CEO, PreviewMe.

- **Page:** https://nachonacho.com/nachotuesday/video/How-to-Leverage-Video-for-Product-Education-and-Onboarding
- **Guest:** Johnny Farquhar, CEO, PreviewMe
- **Guest on LinkedIn:** https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnny-farquhar/
- **Recorded:** 2024-03-19
- **Watch:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UtVorB7Cq8

## Summary

In this NachoTuesday webinar, Johnny, CEO and founder of PreviewMe, discusses how their video messaging platform enhances communication for sales, customer development, and recruitment teams by adding authenticity through short, personalized videos. He highlights the platform's unique ability to request videos from third parties, stemming from their initial focus on recruitment. Johnny emphasizes the power of short-form video (around 20-30 seconds) for engagement in onboarding and sales outreach, advocating for raw, unpolished content to foster genuine human connection. He also touches on the evolving role of AI in video marketing, cautioning against losing authenticity through over-reliance on it. Key Talking Points: Short, Authentic Video Messages Enhance Human Connection in Digital Processes : PreviewMe enables users to create and share brief, unpolished videos to personalize sales outreach, streamline onboarding, and improve customer engagement. Video Offers Significant Advantages in Onboarding and Product Education : Utilizing short video modules increases engagement, accelerates learning curves, creates reusable playbooks, and reduces the load on customer support teams. Early Missteps Highlight the Importance of a Focused Problem and MVP : PreviewMe's initial attempt to build a comprehensive video-based job board failed due to a diluted focus. The key lesson learned was to "keep it simple stupid" and build a minimal viable product that directly addresses a core customer problem.

## Full transcript

Good afternoon everyone, and good morning over there in Australia. I believe it's five o'clock in the morning—is that right, Johnny? It is, Andy. Well, the early bird gets the worm, as they say. Better you than me, I guess! You're building a great company over there, so I guess every hour of the day is really important. As a founder, it's crucial to get out there and build the business. And with a newborn now, it seems like you have two full-time jobs, if you ask me! (00:32) Well, I don’t know which is the full-time job—whether you finish work and then start with the baby, or the other way around. We're lucky that she's sleeping through the night at the moment, so that gives us a bit of relief. That’s a great plus! So, you're the CEO and founder of PreMe. Could you tell us more about what you guys do over there and how your company helps others? (00:56) Sure! PreMe is a video messaging platform designed for sales, customer development, and recruitment teams. It allows our customers to create a series of short, branded videos that they can share as part of their sales process. This adds much-needed authenticity back into increasingly digital processes, helping with human connection. One unique feature of our platform is the ability to request videos from third parties. This feature is attributed to our recruitment roots, which we started out in but shifted from due to COVID. The ability to request videos delivers huge returns, especially when customers are hiring new staff, making the platform extremely versatile. Definitely. So, where did you get the idea or inspiration to start this company? It actually started with my brother not being able to get a job out of university. He graduated from one of New Zealand's universities, and like every other grad, he looked the same on paper. They all have their grades and qualifications, but what makes him unique—his character, charisma, and attitude—can't be captured on a page. After 50, 60, or 70 job applications, he was despondent, wondering where it all went wrong. There was nothing wrong with him; the process was flawed. So, we explored how a graduate could append a short video to their CV and eventually built a video-based job board, which the market didn’t embrace. Well, I’ve been there before too. As an entrepreneur, some ideas work and some don’t. Timing and trends play a big role. You could have the right idea, but sometimes people aren’t ready for it. It comes full circle to what you do today. You take those lessons and apply them to a new business model. Personalization is key, especially for onboarding and sales outreach. In a world where people are inundated with cold emails and impersonal marketing, connecting with human beings is crucial. (03:16) How does video contribute to this? Bringing back personalization in product education, onboarding, and sales outreach can be significant. Fortunately or unfortunately, the problem is the same across various use cases—whether it’s a candidate connecting with a recruiter, someone selling a product or service online, or customer success teams trying to humanize the onboarding process. Onboarding can be time-consuming. It’s a repeatable process, and 90% of your customers will use the product or service in substantially the same way. If everyone doesn’t attend a virtual meeting, you’ll need multiple touchpoints to ensure everyone is brought up to speed. This often means dealing with follow-up questions, which are usually similar across different customers. (04:10) Then there’s the issue with product walkthroughs. Everything needs to be polished, but video content is often updated, and businesses spend thousands on product updates only to face constant changes. This can lead to the abandonment of the video strategy or make it too costly to maintain. There are three key opportunities to effectively utilize video in both onboarding and product walkthroughs: Higher Engagement: Humans are visual creatures. Video content typically receives more engagement compared to static media or text. It also provides measurable metrics, so you can track how long people engage with the content. Faster Ramp-Up: From an onboarding perspective, video can accelerate the learning curve, helping users get up to speed more quickly. Reusable Content: By creating and packaging videos, customers can revisit them as needed, ensuring they have a reliable resource. (05:35) The third benefit ties into the concept of a Playbook. By creating a video and audio-visual Playbook, you significantly reduce the workload on your customer support team. This Playbook allows your team to produce evergreen content around onboarding, which can be shared with customers. Based on the questions you receive, you can continually refine and improve the quality of the onboarding experience. (06:04) That’s a great point. Many of the videos you create can be utilized in your FAQ section. You can place them at relevant points in the onboarding experience. Instead of overwhelming users with information all at once, you can introduce bite-sized videos that describe specific features as users navigate through the product. This approach helps break down information into manageable pieces. What you're saying resonates with me. People are very visual. No one wants to read through large blocks of text anymore. Combining video with text on screen, showing the dashboard, and demonstrating how things work can connect better with people overall. (06:28) I agree. Short-form video is essential for any process. If you’re creating a module for onboarding with five stages, make five short videos. If there are subprocesses within those stages, create even shorter videos. If a video is a minute long and you wouldn’t click on it, you can’t expect a prospect or customer to. Especially in cold outreach, where you’re intruding on someone’s time, you need a compelling reason for them to click on the video. (07:29) The shorter the video, the better. A short video, for me, would be about 20 to 30 seconds. It’s more manageable for someone to decide if they want to invest 20 seconds in a video. On the other hand, if a video is 2 minutes or longer, people may not bother clicking on it, even if it’s highly relevant to them. Short videos ensure that you capture attention quickly and avoid losing opportunities due to length. (08:25) Time to value is crucial, especially for new users trying to understand your product. If there’s too much friction upfront before users see the value you can provide, it kills your conversion rates. People don’t want to invest a lot of time and effort just to determine if your product is the right fit. A couple of minutes in a video can be a barrier to a good onboarding user experience. (09:13) What other tips would you recommend for marketers creating videos that convert, both for onboarding and sales-oriented content? Truth be told, Andy, I'm not a marketer by trade, so I can’t speak to the process in detail. However, when it comes to video content, one thing we've observed is that more polished content isn’t always necessary. Particularly for onboarding, videos don’t need to be overly polished. Yes, you can hire someone to produce a polished product review or walkthrough, but for marketing collateral, people want to see the real people behind the business. For instance, sending a text-based message on LinkedIn versus a short video introducing yourself can have a significant impact. (09:45) It doesn’t need to be polished. Just a simple introduction, like "Hi, my name is Johnny. I'm from New Zealand, with a law background, now a tech company founder," can break the ice in a unique way. It diffuses the perception of a faceless entity behind a computer. My advice is to keep videos raw—don’t over-polish or overthink them. (10:17) We’ve experienced this with NachoNacho as well. We initially aimed for the perfect video, but constant UI changes made it impractical. Instead, we opted to create videos that cover core features, knowing they wouldn’t be perfect but would effectively showcase our product. As a startup, speed is crucial. You can always improve later with more resources, but getting videos out there is better than striving for perfection, which can hinder progress. (11:06) Speed is essential, especially in the early days of a startup. Finding someone confident enough to create content without worrying about perfection can be challenging. There are many people who will appreciate hearing your message, even if the production quality isn’t top-notch. (11:36) Conversations like this one provide valuable tips and insights, even if they’re not highly produced. If one person takes away something useful, it’s a success. Raw conversations can be just as effective as polished content. (12:24) Looking ahead, where do you see video marketing evolving in the next few years? AI and tools like Sora are setting the direction. The ease with which someone can use AI to create content, from simple requests to complex manipulations, is increasing. AI will play a significant role, but we must also consider the implications of overusing it. (13:04) While AI can create engaging content, it’s crucial to avoid over-relying on it. Using AI to replicate personal tonality and features in a multitude of videos can strip away authenticity. The challenge will be distinguishing authentic content from AI-generated material. If many videos are AI-generated, the task will be to ensure your video appears genuine and tailored to the recipient. (14:09) Where do I see video marketing evolving in the next year and beyond? I believe AI will come to the forefront much more. However, this will also present challenges for those creating authentic content. There’s a risk of over-relying on AI tools, which can lead to overcompensation, similar to watching a bad movie with excessive CGI. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. It’s important to focus on the story and the value of the content. (14:38) We see many social media channels and platforms like YouTube flooded with new video content. Yet, the question remains: Is this content truly engaging and interesting? Much of it is still low quality. The real winners will use AI as a productivity tool to handle about 80% of the workload while maintaining the personalization and human element that truly makes videos effective. It’s about clearly thinking through the content and using AI to enhance your editing skills, but at the end of the day, good content and storytelling are crucial. (15:30) AI can indeed supercharge imagination. If you have a seed of an idea, AI can help expand it and provide new directions. However, it’s essential to refine and craft something authentic from that initial idea. (16:01) Can you tell us more about how PreviewMe works? If I’m a new potential customer, how would I use PreviewMe and how do I get started on your platform? Sure. PreviewMe operates on a subscription model, but you can sign up and use the platform without immediately paying. You can create and share a series of video links for various purposes like outreach, onboarding, or product reviews. One of the best entry points for using PreviewMe is adding a video email signature. It might sound simple, but it's a highly underutilized piece of real estate. (16:38) In a typical email signature, you might only have a static image, contact details, or company branding. With PreviewMe, you can create a short video introducing yourself. It doesn’t need to be overly polished or sales-oriented—just a friendly introduction. For instance, you might say, "Hi, my name is Johnny. I’m a family man and a sports enthusiast." This personal touch helps warm up your communications. (17:10) You can create this video with PreviewMe’s native text prompts and basic editing tools. Once created, the video can be embedded as an animated GIF in your email signature. This GIF will appear in every email you send, and you can update it anytime from PreviewMe. The same principle applies to automated email marketing campaigns, LinkedIn connections, and evergreen content for businesses. You can create and share video content to engage with potential customers or prospects effectively. (18:10) Lastly, while recruitment was our starting point, it’s still a significant part of what we offer. With the current job market dynamics, having applicants submit a short video can help distinguish between those genuinely interested and those who are not. It’s a valuable tool for both employers and applicants. (19:10) You don’t want to end up just another resume in a pile of hundreds, analyzed solely by keyword automation. The personal touch of a video can make a significant difference. Initially, businesses would get inundated with applications, leading to hours of interviews or relying on someone’s ability to spot talent in a stack of CVs. (19:39) Seeing and hearing candidates can provide valuable insights into their personality and suitability. This approach will be increasingly important, especially in challenging economic times. (20:11) What would a good video look like? For general sales emails, a brief 5-second introduction could work. For example, "Hi, I’m Andy from NachoNacho. Looking forward to doing business with you." For LinkedIn, which values personal connections over products, you might create a hyper-personalized message. For instance, "Hi, I’m Johnny. I see potential for collaboration between PreviewMe and NachoNacho. We specialize in video messaging, which could benefit your product reviews." (21:09) You can also include a more general connection request, starting with a friendly introduction. For example, "Hi, I’m Johnny, CEO and founder of a tech company based in Australia. I’m a father and passionate about technology." This approach provides both personal and professional context, helping to break the ice without making a hard sell. (22:10) People prefer to do business with other people, so making a personal connection is key. The advice is to avoid coming across as too sales-focused. Even if you have a valuable product, trying too hard to sell can be off-putting. Personalization is crucial, as email inboxes are crowded. Even with a well-crafted video, ensure your subject line is catchy enough to encourage recipients to click. (23:06) It’s important to avoid making video content look like a sales message. When dealing with email outreach, you face various challenges. LinkedIn, on the other hand, is a tool that allows video to create a more genuine connection compared to email. (23:36) Reflecting on earlier iterations of the company, including your early experiments with video, can you share any other failures and what you learned from them? Certainly. The first version of our product is a prime example. We didn’t build what we would consider a minimally remarkable product to test our assumptions quickly. Because we didn’t come from a recruiting background—I was a lawyer trying to transition out of law, and my brother was an economist turned tech owner—we felt compelled to build everything to make it work. We initially landed on a marketplace concept, trying to cater to every employer's wish. However, this approach diluted the problem we were trying to solve. The platform became too complex, with too many moving parts, and lost focus. (24:43) The problem started with helping candidates stand out. Initially, we wanted to help individuals showcase their attitude, aptitude, and charisma. But the project evolved into creating a marketplace with features akin to “SEC on steroids” for video. This shift caused us to lose our way. The lesson learned was to keep it simple. Feature creep is a real issue, as customers may request features that may not align with solving the core problem. It’s crucial to stay focused on your mission and avoid adding unnecessary features that don’t benefit the majority of your users. (25:18) I’ve also faced challenges with feature development, where excitement led to building features that didn’t align with the core product mission. This distraction can lead to a product that doesn’t adequately address customer problems or provide a better experience. On the positive side, these experiences are invaluable. They help you refine your product and better understand what features are truly needed. A strong, simple foundation allows you to build upon it more effectively. Once you achieve product-market fit, you can layer on additional features based on customer feedback and repeated requests. (26:12) The concept of MVP (Minimal Viable Product) is powerful. Starting with a product that solves a simple problem allows you to achieve product-market fit. Once you understand what your customers appreciate and who they are, it becomes easier to add features that meet their needs. (27:03) What other challenges did you face, and how did you overcome them? Could you elaborate on what it was like operating during COVID, particularly with a tech startup and potentially a global team? Operating during COVID was undeniably tough for everyone. We had to adapt quickly. Initially, a customer feedback highlighted that while we had a big platform, what we did best was something simpler, which ironically was the problem we aimed to solve. We pivoted and took a simpler approach to market. (27:56) Instead of targeting the New Zealand market, we decided to go straight to the UK, a larger market with more opportunities. However, the market dynamics changed rapidly. During COVID, the demand shifted, and finding suitable candidates became challenging. The market became very candidate-heavy, and our video solution for recruitment wasn’t as relevant. (29:09) We faced a situation where no one cared about the problem we aimed to solve. Even in graduate recruitment, where we originally had some traction, companies were cutting down and preparing for the storm. With thousands of candidates applying for a single job, the challenge was how to stand out. The answer became clear: video. Businesses needed to showcase their culture, mission, and team beyond just job postings. By using video, they could highlight what makes their company unique, which became a simple and effective solution. (31:02) The next challenge was that businesses couldn’t create enough videos to keep up with the hiring backlog. Ironically, businesses wanted to use PreviewMe to sell their opportunities but didn’t have the time to create these videos themselves. We had to pivot again, adjusting our approach without overhauling the product. (32:16) We overcame these challenges by reconfiguring our product to address a different market and use case. Sometimes a small pivot or repositioning can lead to significant improvements in product uptake and usage. (32:44) It’s interesting to see how a pivot can lead to valuable learning experiences. Our recruitment roots remain a part of our platform, but we’ve adapted to current needs while keeping those foundations in place for future use. (33:14) I appreciate hearing that you find value in our video messages. I’m glad they stand out in your inbox. I completely agree that videos can enhance communication and make emails more engaging. (33:40) As we near the end of our time, I’d love for you to pitch PreviewMe again. Why should listeners choose PreviewMe, and how can it help their businesses grow today? PreviewMe is an incredibly versatile messaging platform. It effectively serves both outbound and inbound video content, with a particular strength in inbound recruitment. If you’re looking for a one-stop shop for all your video needs, PreviewMe is the place to explore. (34:06) Feel free to reach out to us or directly to me, Andy. I can walk you through the platform and identify where video can provide the most value for your business. (34:39) I’ll make sure you receive a personalized video to welcome you as a new customer. We’re excited to have you on the platform. (35:06) For those interested in PreviewMe, we recommend checking it out in NachoNacho’s B2B SaaS Marketplace. You can get it today with a 20% cashback offer, which is a great deal. Start utilizing the power of video and personalization to enhance your marketing efforts and grow your business. (35:36) It was fantastic catching up with you, Johnny. I always appreciate our conversations. Take care, and thanks for this opportunity.

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