Disrupting Corporate Communications

In this post, you’ll see how stealing ideas from MrBeast – the #1 YouTube creator in the entire world – might help you craft a #1 “corporate” message.

We all know that video cuts through better than the written word - especially if you’re communicating with a workforce of Millenials, Gen Y, & Gen Z.

Yet I’ve heard the frustrations from our field leaders:

• “Our teams are too busy to read all the messages you keep sending.”
• “Why didn’t they respond? Your message was too long, it wasn't engaging.”

And from our internal comms team:

• “We keep producing video messages, but no one watches!”

So how do YOU create a video that your audience will want to watch, share, and talk about? What is it about MrBeast videos that make them so irresistible to over 100 million YouTube subscribers worldwide? After some exhaustive research (yes, it included watching over a dozen MrBeast videos) these Top Ten similarities and patterns began to emerge:

1. An attention-grabbing thumbnail to draw your eye
2. Super creative, click-bait video title to pique your curiosity
3. Exciting (yelling directly into the camera) intro hook, telling people exactly what they’re about to watch
4. Be passionate about the message – your enthusiasm will transfer to your viewer
5. Large, cartoonish font, closed-captioning announcements to hold the viewer’s attention
6. Over-the-top, close-up facial reactions and plays to the camera
7. Camera effects like hyper-lapse, time lapse, jump cuts and engaging transitions
8. Using music to signal mood or message changes
9. If the video’s long, tease a message midway of why it’s important to stay until the end
10. Invite or incentivize viewers to Like, Comment, and Share – that way you learn what they appreciated or disliked about your content.

Check out these snippets from a video we created and see if you recognize how we incorporated some of the MrBeast formula. This video was designed to generate some hype about a culture-building exercise package we were introducing to our field teams

This video ended 2022 #1 in Likes, #1 in Comments, and #3 in views [bested by a compliance video (#1) and exciting sales results (#2)] on our internal, corporate site.

Is closed captioning important??Now more than ever. Not only for your hearing impaired team members, but also for people who watch videos on mobile, in public, and people not native in your language or have trouble understanding the spoken word.?

How are your videos consumed? ?Do you expect a team of 10 people to lean around a smartphone and watch a video with poor sound quality??Do your teams have an external speaker for their laptop? Best-case scenario is a digital screen which can handle a web video cast or providing your teams with a cable which allows them to broadcast video on the largest format with best sound quality possible.

But I don’t have a video producer or editor on my team! Peer created content is the most widely appreciated, so get your teams to submit content and outsource the editing. There are experts all over the world who will transform your shaky iPhone video into a near masterpiece.?I’ve found experts on Fiverr who were skilled and reasonably priced.

What are you waiting for? ?Move away from the mundane talking-head-in-front-of-a- backdrop and start creating content your field teams will look forward to opening, enjoy viewing, and sharing with their teams.

How have you reinvented corporate communication? Have you taken risks with your video messages? How have they been received? Please share your experiences in the comments below.

Wait – you’ve never heard of MrBeast?? If you’re unfamiliar with Jimmy Donaldson, AKA MrBeast, here’s one of my faves... Recreating Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory? ENJOY!