How Tech Company Lightricks Is Winning Audiences With Its Video Marketing

No doubt you’ve come across Lightricks: The innovative tech company’s host of visual content creation apps, including Videoleap and Facetune, has over 500 million downloads worldwide, snagging awards like Apple’s App of the Year. It boasts Kim Kardashian as one of its famous users. While this has fueled the company’s popularity, the credit also goes to an entire video production team creating engaging content and winning audiences around the globe, one marketing campaign at a time.

Lightricks Video Production Lead Matt Veysberg shares how his team conceptualizes a video campaign and the secrets behind their incredible journey to amass a TikTok following from scratch.

Shivan: Matt, thanks for joining us for this conversation. Can you tell us a little bit about the video production team at Lightricks?

Matt: It’s an unusual combination for a video production team to be in a tech company. We’re the in-house, go-to team for every video production need that any team might have. So, it could be an A to Z production for a creative aimed for a Facebook campaign, a YouTube campaign, a TV production, or a digital asset that one of the design teams might need for a specific ad.

“It’s an unusual combination for a video production team to be in a tech company.”

Shivan: What are the benefits of using video as a marketing tool?

Matt: We found that video is the most powerful way to convey a message. If we want to connect with a user on an emotional level and communicate the product’s value in the best way possible, video is the tool to make it happen. Whether we’re talking about a big-scale TV campaign or a digital campaign on Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok, video is the way to do it. You can implement many elements inside that visual sequence and convey brand and product messages within 20 seconds. And 20 seconds is all it takes for a person to decide on whether they want to use a product or not.

Shivan: How do you start thinking about a video marketing campaign?

Matt: We’re a data driven company. We like to put the creators first. When we do any kind of video campaign, we try to communicate the best value for the product and not just push an advertising messaging.

Since we have a wide range of products, we take a different approach for every product when creating content. If we are talking about the products aimed towards small business owners, we’re taking more of a testimonial approach since we want to show the actual users of that product. If we’re talking about something more creative, we show the usage of the products using product demos. Tutorials, testimonials, storytelling ads, there are a lot of different ways that we’re getting our name out there.

Shivan: Lightricks has amassed over a million likes on TikTok. How did you build your TikTok strategy and ultimately find success?

Matt: We decided we wanted to explore TikTok as a platform since it’s new and exciting for everyone. We decided to give the keys to the kingdom to TikTok creators to create the most appealing content in volume using our products. And Glimmer was the best way to go. We started working with a TikTok producer to source out talent and create that content. We ended up creating more than 20 different videos for a variety of products, AB testing them and running them as ads. We found the specific format that works for us and is how we decided on what comes next. From that point, we ended up actually hiring our own TikTok team in London. We have currently three TikTok creators full time who are managing the product pages, being the faces of the product and creating content based on the experience we had. So, it was really beneficial for us.

Shivan: How have you used Glimmer to tell your brand story?

Matt: Since COVID, Glimmer became an essential part of our workflow. I was able to execute remote productions and work with different companies worldwide within my home office. It’s a game changer for us, whether it is a remote production, a visual assets project or working with different script writers or producers. So, it’s been a wild ride with Glimmer, but it brings us a lot of results and a lot of value.

One project that we sourced through Glimmer was for Facetune. That was during the first stages of COVID lockdown. We had to be creative. We found an agency in London through Glimmer and worked with them to create a set of assets with different models in a selfie style shoot. We used those assets for running Facebook campaigns. All it took was a properly planned production and a few iPhones traveling from one model’s house to another. That was the whole production and it brought us amazing results.

“We decided to give the keys to the kingdom to TikTok creators and create the most appealing content using our products in big volume”

Shivan: What are tips you can share with our community about content creation?

Matt: For UGC content specifically, I think the better approach is to consult with TikTok creators. Those amazing 18-year-olds. They know it better than us.

Find the pain points of your potential customers, then turn that into actionable items. The best way to avoid mistakes is to actually know what the users want.

Shivan: What platforms are you keeping an eye on?

Matt: One of the key focuses is YouTube. YouTube as a platform has a lot of best practices and rules of its own. It’s purely based on good creative, and we are hoping to use Glimmer to craft that creative.

It might seem that we’re a big video production team, doing so much work, but it’s actually 14 people. Having the ability to tap into another world of creators gives us the ability to be different, to be colorful.

By Shivan Sarna, Head of Stories