2006: Marketing Ourselves Leads to a USA Trip

In the first article of this series I wrote about the exciting first year of YourFilm. The other side of the coin? We worked with just four clients in 2005 – one of them on a contra basis.

Still, we were doing what we loved and tickled by the novelty of being paid for it. In retrospect, we weren’t charging enough, but we weren’t yet ‘business people’ (spoiler alert: it would take a while before we tumbled to that.)

Showing at least some nous though, early in 2006 we decided to reinvest some of our hard-earned profits with an email marketing company, The Media Buzz. I have no memory of how we came to choose them, but with online marketing like PPC and SEO in the ‘Dark Arts’ categories as far as we understood, email seemed like a good way to spread the word.

Our budget was massive to us, and I’m sure, tiny to them. We arguably didn’t realise just how much we had riding on the campaign’s success, but as I recall, we were also na?ve enough to assume it would just work. After all, we’d won our first client thanks to a link placed on a team-building website!

Amazingly, luckily, thankfully, we quickly got a nibble from a technology firm, MVI (1), based in Birmingham. They needed video content shot on the factory floor, which demonstrated their system for managing downtime and errors on production lines, punctuated by interviews with system operators and managers.

We hauled ourselves to the glittering metropolis of Birmingham to meet them, and fairly quickly agreed on a budget for an exciting project:?

·?????? Filming in the 亨氏 (condiment sachets) and Calypso Lemonade (drinks and ice lollies) factories in Telford and Wales, respectively

·?????? Travelling to Chicago to film at Berner Foods Incorporated (liquid cheese in jars), then onto Toronto to film at Marsan Foods Limited (ready meals).

It immediately felt like a milestone project. The size of the client, the multiple filming days and locations, the international travel, and a budget which frankly was equivalent to our entire first year’s turnover. We were chuffed!

The trip was.. eventful. The story involves, in no particular order:

·?????? An ornery Russian taxi driver

·?????? A snowstorm

·?????? Roller-skating waitresses

·?????? A vicious wet-shave

·?????? An attempt to smuggle a weapon onto a plane

·?????? Unplanned nudity

·?????? Air India’s two-curry inflight meal service

We recently reconnected with Andy Neilson , our client at MVI, and talked to him on our podcast about the trip to the USA. To hear the full story, watch the episode here.

The rest of the year was fairly prosaic by comparison:

·?????? Continuing to work with various Sure Start centres around the region – apart from the one our TomTom (Google it, kids) somehow failed to direct us to, leading to the pitch meeting being cancelled after they waited an hour for us to arrive. Shameful!

·?????? Working with a business support organisation, Winning Moves (2), to create case study videos for their clients ranging from furniture makers to fish oil supplement suppliers

·?????? Getting out of the spare bedroom at my parents’ house and into our first tiny office, at TEDCO in Jarrow

2007 would mark another year of change, with new clients, new challenges, a new company (officially, at last!) and a nervy wait at the bank on Christmas Eve…

Keep an eye out for the next article in this series, coming soon.

Written by Matthew Newman, Co-founder of YourFilm.

Note 1.

MVI was a UK-based technology company headquartered near Birmingham in 2006, specialising in software solutions for data management and business intelligence. It served a range of industries, offering tools designed to optimise operational efficiency and decision-making processes. Known for its innovative approach, MVI attracted attention from global players, leading to its acquisition by the USA-based CDC Software Cono Sur in 2008. The acquisition marked a strategic move for CDC to expand its portfolio and presence in the European market. Following the integration, MVI ceased to operate as an independent entity.

Note 2.

Winning Moves Ltd is a UK-based consultancy specialising in business diagnostics, digital solutions, and research and evaluation services. Established over 25 years ago, the company operates as a social enterprise with a mission to “inform better tomorrows,” placing social value at the core of its work. Their clients include national and local government organisations, economic development agencies, business support bodies, and charities, all aiming to improve economic, environmental, and societal outcomes.