Skylight Productions

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the chief strategy officer at REES + STAGER.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Skylight Productions?

Skylight Productions serves as our primary ongoing video production partner.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We bring our client projects to them when they have a video component that needs to be very professional and cinematic. That has ranged from storytelling videos to build a brand’s backstory, to testimonial videos and home tours for large custom homebuilders, to a step by step documentary of a nine-month build project that captured every stage of the process and all the different technologies that were being used in it.

Nelson (Chief Creative Officer) and his team bring a lot of creativity and insight to the strategy part, so we work with them from the beginning to help plan out the video in a way that’s going to set us up for a great final product. From there, they handle all of the content creation, including site planning, working with clients to get the shots they need, and all of the postproduction editing.

What was the team composition?

We have had the same point of contact throughout our work with them. Julie (Project Manager) is very timely and gives great weekly updates, so we are able to channel all of our communication through her and know that everything will be taken care of on our behalf.

How did you come to work with Skylight Productions?

Nelson reached out to me via LinkedIn, and we discussed our philosophies about business and customer service. It was clear that they were a good match for us from the start, so we decided to move forward with them.

How much have you invested with them?

In total, we’ve probably spent about $75,000 with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

The partnership started around April 2013 and is still ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

They have a really good marketing perspective, which many videographers do not. To find a video partner who really understands how the video is going to be used and is interested in more than just what it’s going to look like is really valuable.  They make consistently smart choices with regard to pacing and music that all lead to the specific goal of what you want the video to accomplish with your target audiences.

On top of that, they back the strategy up with really stunning cinematography and editing, so they’ve really got all of the right components necessary for delivering a top-quality product every time. They also help with optimizing their work for YouTube and Vimeo with keywords and everything so that the product is not just pretty, but it’s incredibly useful as well.

How did Skylight Productions perform from a project management standpoint?

Their team is incredibly professional, very prompt, and always helpful in walking through both our clients and their customers when they’re on camera to make sure they feel totally at ease with the process.

Postproduction is always very efficient and effective, and they have a great system for feedback in place where you can just pause the video at any point, click on it, and make direct comments. That process makes it especially easy to collaborate with our clients, because we are oftentimes having to translate the feedback between the teams, and that process eliminates a lot of potential back and forth.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The number one element that makes their work a notch above the rest is just the soul that they put into it, and the level of personalized service. You’re never just a client to them, you’re a partner with whom they have a relationship, and they are going to go above and beyond to make that relationship as positive as it can possibly be.

On top of that, they are just an incredibly skilled and flexible company, so we stick with them because they are able to create a stunning and effective final product regardless of what kind of video it is that we actually need to produce.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, because anything that didn’t go perfectly has been a result of the client side, so there is nothing at all that I would blame them for.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be really open about your business goals. All of marketing and sales are interconnected, and the Skylight Productions team understands that, so you can’t just take one piece out and try to do it on its own without a full view of the business challenges and goals that you are facing.