Hello and welcome to this whistle-stop tour of the inner workings of Glacé Media. Who we are, how we came into being and how we turn clients’ ideas into top-grade video content.
Think of it as a bit of a story book. A captivating retelling of the life and times of Glacé Media. From the initial registration with Companies House to us building video production services from Manchester and beyond.
Ok, maybe captivating is a bit of an oversell, but what you will get from this blog is a clear insight into how we operate. How an individual or an organisation comes to us with the smallest speck of an idea and then we see it through to the delivery of professional video content fit for a whole host of digital platforms.
We’ll even walk you through our production process step by step.
If we’re all ready, let’s begin.
Who Are Glacé Media?
Founded by Matt Green (Creative Director) and Marcus Johnson (Managing Director), Glacé Media spawned from a shared background in marketing and creative video production.
We’d like to give you this highly-dramatic, cinematic storyline (because that is what we love) of how Glacé was the coming together of two dynamic minds, frustrated in a fast paced digital industry who shared a vision to cut through and create a production company that would rise above the ordinary to provide a video production service that delivers genuine impact and results for all their clients.
However, we’ll have to save this synopsis for the Hollywood film script based on our lives.
The real version is a little more long winded and involved failed musical endeavours, sporting mishaps and dodgy office set-ups crammed into bedrooms. But the long and short of it is, we’ve known each other since we were 5 years old. Our primary school musings might not have been based around editing styles, marketing campaigns and camera angles, but, we’ve shared a love of all things creative all through our lives.
From working on radio stations as teenagers, producing music and performing live, to writing daft comedy ideas, our creatively grounded friendship eventually led us to video production, more specifically the founding of Glacé Media in 2017.
Our Creative Director Matt Green extended his journey into the world of video and film when studying at the University of Salford, developing skills and industry contacts that became invaluable later on.
His marketing expertise grew further during his time working for Cushman & Wakefield on the delivery of marketing content and strategy for the restaurants within the Corn Exchange in Manchester City Centre.
A strong grounding in hospitality marketing was established and ever so coincidentally this was the industry Glacé Media really flourished in the early days.
This takes us on to our Managing Director, Marcus Johnson. An unlikely candidate to enter the world of video production following his History degree at Lancaster University and his subsequent failed attempts to become a rockstar, but the enduring desire to develop a creative pursuit into something much bigger never left him.
Entering the world of social media marketing via Ancoats based digital agency Run2, Marcus honed his craft of translating creative visions into real world actions. His time at the marketing agency wasn’t just experience. It gave him a clear vision of Glacé Media needed to be and what type of video production service it should provide.
Already flirting with creative production alongside Matt, being thrust further into the world of digital marketing made it clear to him the impact that video content can have across digital platforms. It also made it even clearer that so many brands and businesses were totally missing out on or misusing this power. The quicker Glacé could get this message out there the better.
With subsequent years seeing the pair driving the business forward with their full time involvement, Glacé over the last few years has grown beyond hospitality focused content to work alongside a vast array of brands and businesses.
Inroads into corporate sectors alongside businesses such as Müller, Papa Johns and Bezzerwizzer have seen us implement our marketing and branding visions alongside our creative wherewithal to assist organisations in capitalising on the power of high-quality video content across various platforms and campaigns.
Further developments in producing product videos for e-commerce platforms and animated content for explainer and instructional-focused videos means that we have been able to help our clients cover all sorts of content bases, boosting their communication abilities both internally and externally along the way.
As we push on into the future, our vast experience working with clients, strong network of production partners and never ending drive to creatively develop means that at Glacé we now offer a full video production service with many different options that help our clients get their messages out in a way that strongly resonates with the intended audience.
But just remember, our roots in digital marketing always remain at our core. For us, producing content that is optimised for use across relevant digital platforms is a given. When a client begins the production process with us, on top of pushing to create original and engaging content, we are constantly assessing how the videos will have the most impact.
The questions are simple.
- Who does the client want to reach?
- What reaction do they want from them?
- Where are their audience most reachable?
By constantly asking ourselves these questions we time and time again produce videos that resonate with the intended audiences, elicit the desired response and are optimised for the correct platforms.
Endless creativity seems like something to strive towards. But truly great content is created when creativity has a framework to work within. We have this framework and we have the creativity. You can see for yourself where the rest takes us.
The Glacé Media Video Production Service
I know, I know, after hearing that unbelievably inspiring origin story you are chomping at the bit to start a project with us.
Hold your horses, we will admit we are great, but we wouldn’t want to be responsible for you throwing yourself blindly into a situation that’s not right for you just because of the power of our incredibly captivating writing.
For full transparency and a lovely little touch of insight for you all, we’ve laid out below the full process we go through when completing a video project with a client.
From start to end, all the nitty gritty. Hey, it’s so insightful you may even feel like you’ve already completed a project with us and don’t need to actually contact us to get a real-life video production service going (please do tell us if this happens as we might have to tone it down a bit. We still do have a business to run.)
Without further ado, away we go.
Initial Brief
Straight off the bat, we want to hear from you. Whether this be a left-field idea scrawled on the back of a beer mat after hours in a pub or a fully blown brief ready to rock n roll with, we want to get a sense of what is in your mind at this early stage.
So don’t hold back in emptying your brain into the initial brief to us.
I’m talking links to YouTube videos you like (no, this doesn’t mean Premier League highlight compilations from 2004), references to other businesses or filming styles as well as any specifics you definitely want to include as inspiration for the video production service.
This is just a brain dump so throw whatever you like in there.
Talk Through
Now that the contents of your brain has been official dumped out on us, it’s time to get an initial chat going. Whether this is in person or via the much-loved format of a video call, this will give us the chance to start refining the project.
Here we will dig further into the practical elements of the project. What will you be using the video for? What are the aims of your video? Where will it be published? All of this will begin to give us a gauge of the direction we take it in.
The chat will also give us the opportunity to ensure we fully understand the creative whirrings currently in your mind and that we are all singing from the same hymn sheet. We’ll also engage with some friendly back and forth to ensure a healthy repartee is well and truly flowing early on.
Watch out for phrases like “start preparing your Oscars speech”, “don’t worry, we’re used to improvising” and “no we don’t know Robert Pattinson, but I’ll see if I can get his email.” You get the gist.
We Pitch To You
Now we know what you’re after, it’s time for us to show you what we’ve got. From your initial brief and the follow-up grilling we’ve given you in our chat, we will put together our thoughts and ideas and then pitch them to you. These will include;
- Creative ideas for the video
- Production approach (how we’re going to film it)
- Costs (booooooo!)
From here you can get an insight into how we’ve interpreted your thoughts and hopefully be blown away by our creative visions.
On a more basic level what this will give you are some practical options as to where we can take the video project as well as a better look at the outcome of our video production service.
Depending on the type of video or videos we are looking at, these options could be vast or they could be pretty tight. Either way, you’ll be able to see some clear routes to completion.
The creative options will give you choices with regard to what the content of the video will be and the production options will give you choices when it comes to the scale of the project (how much we throw at the production quality) and the logistical approach that works best for you.
Discuss & Decide
We don’t want to overwhelm you with death by video call so this one is optional for you. But we always find it useful to have another chat at this stage.
Once you’ve read through our ideas and discussed them internally, you can then feed back to us and pose any questions.
From here we will explain our thinking in more detail and nail down the direction you want the video production service to go in.
You may want to tweak some of the ideas, or you may just want to take our proposal off the shelf and carry it straight to the checkout.
Either way, by the end of this phase we will have an approach locked in and ready to go.
You can now start dropping into conversation with clients and customers that you’re in the process of working with a super cool and edgy video production company who are going to shoot a killer piece of video content for you. Just don’t forget to pay your deposit and we’re happy for you to name-drop until your heart’s content.
Bring The Plan Together
This is mainly on our side, but this is where we action everything we’ve decided on; Book in the filming days, secure locations, sign off storyboards, scripts and timings and confirm all the delivery dates.
Admin, admin, admin. Nobody ever boasts on LinkedIn about how great they are at booking events into the calendar, but once we get going you’ll be bloody glad you did. Planning is the secret weapon of our video production service.
Film & Edit
Now we really come into our own. Our camera crew don their black t-shirts, get the cameras locked and loaded and start filming some mega video footage.
This is where you get to stand next to the monitor on set and nod in approval. You can also film some footage on your phone of your work colleagues recording pieces to camera to send around the work WhatsApp group with the caption “Think they’re film stars ”.
Once we’ve captured everything we need, the edit begins. Because we have planned immaculately we can dive straight into the edit (see, planning does come in handy).
Review Time
We’ll nail out a first version of the video and get it over to you for feedback. From here you can give us general stylistic feedback as well as specific timestamped changes. We will then back and forth the edits until you have what you’re after.
This then puts us in a prime position to edit together any extra versions of the video or videos. We’re talking specific social edits, adverts, teasers & trailers. Basically anything we can upsell you on in the meantime
From here we then get ourselves to the point where you have all the final versions of the videos you asked us to produce. Just like that the video production service is complete. We told you we would deliver and we’ve only gone and bloody done it.
Share It With The World
It’s time to share with the world your new digital pride and joy. Take the plaudits for how amazing the video is, but don’t get complacent at this stage. It’s not just a matter of idly sticking the video on your YouTube channel and the whole world will see it.
You need to make sure you are proactive in sharing your content on the right channels, at the right time, and with the right captions.
Whether this is where your marketing team kick into gear or your marketing agency takes over, this step is crucial to make sure the content performs as well as possible.
But do not worry, we won’t completely abandon you at this stage. We will send you on your merry way with pointers and advice as to the best way to use your new content. Plus if you need a few extra tips along the way you can just drop us a message. It’s all part of the video production service.
If this has sparked some inspiration and you want to get that corporate video ball rolling straight away, don’t hold back in getting in touch with us.
