Recently a friend sent me a link to a new “computational knowledge engine” called Wolfram Alpha: http://www.wolframalpha.com/screencast/introducingwolframalpha.html.

I followed the link to 15-minute presentation about www.wolframalpha.com. I won’t go into the details – if your interest is peaked you’ll check it out. However, I do want to say that I found the presentation interesting and have bookmarked the website.

My friend’s e-mail is a textbook example of viral marketing. Before he contacted me I’d never heard of the website. Media cost to Mr. Wolfram - zero.

Recently I took a PowerPoint presentation from a client, combined with a video from small camcorder and added some captions to make a video of a presentation that the client gave at a national conference which will go on their website and probably YouTube. The cost to them was just the editing of the components into a video.

There are any number of tools that can create affordable video presentations, but technology is not the real wisdom here. The secret, or wisdom, is to make a presentation that is either (pick one) newsworthy, entertaining, compelling or evocative of some emotion. Ideally your presentation should have elements of all three.

I’m not talking Academy Award screenwriting and/or acting. The Wolfram Alpha presentation was animated screen captures of the website – probably done in Flash – and Mr. Wolfram’s pleasant voice, but the ideas and examples were intriguing and to someone who regularly does online research – compelling.

The PowerPoint presentation was serviceable, but the video was very “guerilla” and probably would have sufficed only as a record of the event. However, by combining them and adding additional content we created a presentation that was provocative and compassionate.

Now get this. If you have a website you can’t rely on it to market you. There are a bazillion websites with several gazillion added each day. Websites are like books in the world’s biggest library that will remain on some far distant shelf gathering dust until some patron either painstakingly searches them out on the library’s computer or happens upon them while patiently scanning the shelves.

Making sure that your website is chock full of a variety of copy on various topics related to your enterprise and offers a newsletter and/or blog will help you produce what are called “organic” results to searches. As most of you may know this is called Search Engine Optimization, or SEO. The companion term, Search Engine Marketing, or SEM, requires that you rent adwords. This is also known as “buying clicks,” and depending how much you’re willing to pay for the adwords, or phrases, governs where you show up in the Sponsored Links at the top or on the right side of Google’s page.

By they way, lots of companies will offer services to get you placement on “all the search engines” not just Google. This allows them to charge more and give you less, because – for the being – Google is still the gorilla of Internet Search. That may well change when Bing catches on, but for now, if you’re buying adwords, stick with Google.

Whether you rely on SEO or SEM, whether your website shows up at the top of the page when someone is searching for information and services in you line of endeavor, the problem is that someone has to look for you. As with the books on the library shelf, your website doesn’t show up on someone’s doorstep asking for attention. Or, if it does, that’s generally called SPAM.

However, if I get a video from a friend or acquaintance most often I will look at it. And the referral constitutes a form of endorsement. Media cost to the maker of the video – ZERO.

You all can and should make a video explaining what you do, why you do, and how your efforts will benefit a customer. If anyone out there says this isn’t appropriate to what you do – you’re wrong and I’ll gladly demonstrate why if you want to follow up with me – steve@rustadmarketing.com.

Is online video any different that a TV commercial? In some ways, no, but in other vastly more important ways…absolutely. Online video, or commercials if you insist, are not limited to time because the Internet doesn’t charge for broadcasting. In other words, unlike print advertising, radio, outdoor, TV, or direct mail, there is no charge for distribution…no matter the length in time, or column inches, nor the number of repeat viewings or printing necessary to effectively deliver your message.

Let’s let that sink in a minute.

With video on the Internet, you have all the time you need at no cost to you save for production expenses to explain your proposition. Because you’re not limited to 30- or 60-seconds you can rattle on to your heart’s content about all the intricacies or your passion, persuasion or profession…as long as you make it (repeat after me) newsworthy, entertaining, compelling and/or evocative of some emotion…ideally all three.