You may already know what video tutorials are, but if you merely see them as a function of your customer onboarding process, you’re missing a huge opportunity. Tutorials can also be invaluable for retaining customers. When done well, they can transform skeptical, unsure customers into power users and proponents for your product.
Tutorials need to be produced with intentionality and creative sophistication to be able to pull their heft in your marketing budget.
In this blog post, we will cover the basics of doing just that and provide some “secrets” to level your video tutorials up a notch (or three).
Why Service and Product Video Tutorials Are Vital for Tech Companies
Video tutorials don’t just show users how your product works—they show them how it works for them. This is where abstract promises like “Speed up your design workflow” become reality.
While effective promotional technology video production can bring customers to your product, strategically-scripted tutorials keep them there.
The role of a video tutorial is both to teach and to reduce friction. The faster and easier it is to complete a productive task successfully, the more enthusiastic the user becomes about exploring a tool further.
This taps into the endowment effect, a behavioral economics principle that suggests people place a higher value on things they feel ownership over. As users engage in absorbing, hands-on tutorials that allow them to interact with the product immediately, they become more reluctant to abandon the product after investing time and effort into learning it.
The result: free trials turn into paid subscriptions, and lower subscription tiers are enthusiastically upgraded.
Making such a tutorial isn’t always easy to do, but it’s worth it. In the tech sector, much of what you’re selling isn’t tangible. Code, algorithms, cloud services—they’re grammar for engineers and devs but confounding to the non-technical people you’re trying to help.
Consider an elderly woman trying to navigate the interface of an app that reminds her to take her medicines. If she has difficulty using the app or parsing the readings, she might avoid using it altogether — stressing her caregivers out.
On the other hand, if there were a video tutorial hand holding her through each step of the process, explaining each step in a visual, simple, yet descriptive way, she would grow more confident in using it. The theory of self-efficacy then materializes: users are more likely to adopt and continue using a product when they believe they can master it capably.
How Effective Video Tutorials Drive Growth for Tech Startups
Video tutorials can directly impact your business’ bottom line. They do this by:
1. Reducing churn: Ineffective video tutorials—or worse, the absence of tutorials—can lead to user frustration, eventually driving them to quit. Investing in clear, actionable tutorials directly reduces churn by ensuring users can quickly access the product’s core value without exasperation.
2. Creating upselling opportunities: Video tutorials can be strategically designed to introduce users to advanced features or premium functionalities at the right moment. For instance, a user completing a basic task might be shown how upgrading to a premium plan unlocks higher efficiency tools. This is a form of contextual upselling where the tutorial does more than teach—it subtly drives users toward features that justify higher subscription tiers.
3. Providing valuable user data: Video tutorials can be a testing ground for understanding user behavior. By analyzing how users interact with your tutorial content, you can gain insights into which aspects of your product need improvement or further explanation. This feedback loop helps in refining your product and better catering to your audience’s needs.
The Basics of High-Quality Video Production
Here are the key elements of producing a successful video tutorial:
1. Scripting and Storyboarding
A solid, well-thought-out script is the backbone of any tutorial video. It should be in clear and concise language, guiding viewers naturally from one step to the next while addressing potential user pain points. Map out each step, including details of screen recordings, animations, or live demonstrations of the product in use. Great scripting also ensures that the message remains on-brand and consistent with your company’s voice.
2. Production
Depending on the approach you plan to take, production could involve some or all of the following steps:
1. Preparation: Set up the product or software environment for filming. Ensure all necessary tech tools, APIs, or demo accounts are ready for smooth demonstrations.
2. Screen recording: Capture on-screen activity, such as software interfaces, step-by-step workflows, and user interactions with the product.
3. Live filming: Film any physical product demonstrations, if applicable (e.g., unboxing, hardware setup).
4. Voiceover & narration: Record a voiceover that explains each step or feature clearly, matching the pace of the visual demonstration. Consider using an expert or customer support personnel for authenticity.
5. On-camera presentation (optional): If necessary, have a presenter or product expert walk viewers through the process in front of the camera.
6. Animation: Animations are among the most engaging forms of educational video content out there, and our clients have used it to explain everything from how germs spread to how ocean gliders work. Read our in-depth guide to animation for technology companies.
3. Editing
Editing is where your raw footage is transformed into a polished final product. This involves cutting unnecessary content, adding annotations or graphics for clarity, and ensuring smooth transitions between scenes. High-quality editing ensures that your video is both professional and engaging.
4. Post-Production Techniques
Post-production is where background music, voiceovers, animations, and other elements bring your tutorial to life. Rock Creek’s professional post-production services ensure that your video is visually appealing, easy to follow, and aligned with your brand’s aesthetic.
The Secrets to Creating Impactful Video Tutorials
In Made To Stick, authors Chip and Dan Heath propose the SUCCESs communication model. The things that often remain in your memory are those that are Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, and Stories. These principles can be applied to educational video production too.
1. Simple: Tech products are inherently complex and often daunting, so video tutorials need to be simple. You and your team may have spent so many months or years on the product that it’s easy to fall prey to the “curse of knowledge” and create overly technical videos that can alienate your users.
Here’s where hiring our video production company can really help — we’ve worked with enough companies to know how their audiences process information and learn, but we aren’t knowledgeable enough about the technicalities to confuse them!
2. Unexpected: A great video tutorial hooks users by showing them something they didn’t expect. Maybe that’s a shortcut they didn’t know existed or a feature that solves a problem they didn’t know they had. This element of surprise keeps users engaged.
3. Concrete: Abstract concepts don’t stick. Video tutorials need to be concrete, showing users exactly what to do step by step. Screen recordings, annotations, and real-time examples make the information tangible.
Consider a novelist learning how to configure Obsidian, a markdown-based knowledge management tool. She wants to structure her research and write in a clutter-free environment while still retaining control over the formatting—without needing to learn about CSS or Vim key bindings.
Instead of explaining every technical detail of how coding works, a video might focus on the practical steps the writer needs to customize the software to organize information the way she wants. This helps make the tutorial accessible, no matter how complex the underlying technology.
4. Credible: Users need to trust the information they’re receiving. Including an expert voiceover or testimonials from users from similar psychographics can add credibility to the tutorial.
5. Emotional: Effective product tutorials tap into the user’s emotions. Why should they care about learning this product? Maybe it saves them time, helps them do their job better, or makes them look smart in front of their boss. If you can connect the product’s value to the user’s emotions, they’ll be more likely to engage.
6. Stories: People remember stories better than facts. A case study or customer success story embedded in a tutorial can make the information far more relatable and memorable.
Award-winning video production services in Washington, DC
Rock Creek is a leading full-service video production company in Washington, DC. Thanks to our years of experience in video production services, we get the intricacies of video storytelling and the unique challenges tech companies face.
As an award-winning video branding service in DC, we have also helped numerous tech companies enhance their customer engagement, improve user adoption, and drive growth through high-quality video content. Whether you need help with scripting, shooting, or post-production, we’re here to handle every aspect of the process, ensuring that your tutorial videos are not only informative but also unforgettable.
Ready to take your tech company to the next level with professional video tutorials? Contact Rock Creek today!
