This is something we notice a lot watching all kinds of companies' videos, across pretty much every industry we work in.
A lot of corporate video gets made for the wrong audience. The owner loves it, the team is genuinely excited about how it turned out, everyone claps at the internal screening, and then it goes live and kind of just sits there, not really doing much for the business beyond that initial round of applause.
The reason usually comes down to this: the video was built to impress the people inside the company instead of actually connecting with the people outside of it, who don't share the same context or emotional investment in the brand.
Your customers aren't watching your video thinking about you. They're watching it thinking about themselves. That might sound a little harsh, but it's true, and it's actually good news once you understand it, because it gives you a clear filter for every decision in the video, from the opening line to the final call to action.
They're thinking: does this company understand what I'm dealing with? Can I trust them? Is this even worth my time right now? A video that never answers those questions is just an expensive piece of content that mostly makes the internal team feel good about the investment, without actually moving a prospect any closer to a decision.
The good news is that this is a genuinely easy problem to fix once you know to look for it. Always focus on putting the customer at the center of the story instead of the company. Show them what working with you actually feels like, from their perspective, not yours, and not from the perspective of someone who already knows and trusts your business. Answer the questions they're already asking themselves before they ever have to ask you directly on a call.
A few practical shifts that help with this: open with the customer's problem, not your company's history, because nobody watching cares how you got started until they know you can solve what they're dealing with. Use language your customer actually uses, not internal jargon that makes sense to your team but means nothing to someone outside it. Show outcomes and results, not just process and equipment, since most customers care far more about what changed for them than how the sausage gets made. And let a real client explain the value in their own words when possible, because it carries more weight coming from someone with nothing to gain than it does coming from you.
One useful exercise before your next video project: write down the three questions you think a prospect has in their head before they'd ever consider working with you. If your script doesn't answer at least one of those questions in the first thirty seconds, it's probably still centered on your company instead of theirs, and that's worth fixing before you ever get in front of a camera.
So before you start your next video project, ask yourself honestly: who is this actually for?
If the honest answer is "us," it might be worth rethinking the approach before you hit record, because a video that only satisfies the people inside the building rarely does much for the people you actually need to reach.
