Think Like a Director

How AEC Marketers Can Support Virtual Interview Teams

If we are all video stars now, then the best way an AEC marketer can support his or her technical team in virtual interviews and presentations is to think like a movie director. All the rules for personal presentation apply, but there are some additional considerations for having your team and your brand represented virtually with consistency and professionalism. Here’s how to think like a director for your AEC interview team and get the best virtual shortlist interview results:

Turn your outline into a script.

Spend time upgrading your presentation outline to a script, complete with speaking roles, timing and directions on how technology will be used at different points throughout your interview. As a marketer, consider and provide direction on what is most effective to show on screen and when. Do you have a group of speakers? Are they at individual work stations and in view during the whole presentation? Is that distracting? Do you have a group of speakers collected (and socially distanced) in one room and the camera on the group? When should the screen show only the slides? The key is to be clear and specific in these directions. Allow time to test various methods and see which feels best.

Assign roles — for the stars and stage crew.

Emcee: You likely know which of your technical experts will be on the interview, but arguably, it is more important than ever to assign one of your presenters to open, guide and close your presentation, much like an emcee.

Tech Support: Who will be your technical support contact(s)? How will you get in touch if something goes wrong? As a marketer, you might consider assigning yourself as the technical meeting host so that you can deal with any issues that arise and leave your team to focus on their messaging. Consider providing your cell number and other contact information to your client in case of technical emergency.

Group Text: Don’t risk meeting chat mishaps -- set up a group text on your cell phone with your presentation team. Maybe you used to stand in the back of the room to hold up your hands for time warnings or to remind your team to smile? Get a group text going for those same kinds of purposes. You may not be holding the slide clicker, but you can remind your presenters to speak slower, pause for questions or watch the time.

Bonus: A new benefit to virtual interviews? If your colleague didn’t cover the exact right points, you can text a reminder for him or the next speaker to cover it! Talk about a stealth operation. Just make sure your team doesn’t all check their phones at once on camera.

Choose the set.

Here is where marketers should help make a judgement call on digital vs. real-life backgrounds for video feeds. If your team is working remotely and everyone will be visible, are you okay with the variety of settings (and level of tidiness) everyone will be in? If you have several presenters, what can be done to unify the look and emphasize your brand? Maybe it’s branded company shirts, asking everyone on the team to find a solid wall to sit in front of, having everyone use a “blur my background” tool, or using a digital background that includes your logo. The challenge with digital backgrounds is they can sometimes crop or blur people in distracting ways, so you’ll need to weigh the pros and cons.

Hair, makeup, wardrobe!

Just like in-person meetings, agree on wardrobe ahead of time. Is everyone wearing a branded company shirt? A button down? Tie or no tie? Also, with the quarantine, it’s possible that team members are overdue for haircuts and facial hair trimmings. Encourage your team to take care of those hygiene tasks as best they can before their virtual “close-ups.” For ladies, hair and makeup just like you would for the office, though to avoid looking washed out on camera, consider a slightly darker eye and lip.

Pro Marketer Tip: In Zoom, you can make subtle enhancements with the “Touch Up My Appearance” tool, explained here.

Conduct a dress rehearsal.

Marketers, rejoice! You now have an even more convincing argument to get your team to practice its interview ahead of time: technology. Set a rehearsal time that mimics as close to the “real thing” as possible. Ask your team to sit in their final location and use the same equipment they will use for the presentation. Practice all speaking roles, screen sharing, digital handoffs, and chat capabilities to test and adjust for top audio and visual quality.

Pro Marketer Tip: Solve as many technical challenges as you can. Consider creating basic instructions for your team using screen shots and simple graphics to show your speakers which buttons to push when the time comes. They WILL thank you.

Lights…

Is it difficult to see anyone? If so, ask your team to try different lighting and locations around their homes for the best results. Avoid dark caves, and bright windows. Want more professional lighting without a big price tag? We all work in AEC—ask to borrow some clamp lights from your favorite construction friends or pick some up at the hardware store. Any college photography student will tell you that something like these works amazingly well for flexible, nearly free lighting solutions.

Pro Marketer Tip: For more on how to use clamp lights for video, here’s a super basic video that you can share with your technical teams.

Camera…

During your test run, check crop, zoom and angle for everyone. Have your team members crop and zoom their video images all roughly the same way. Is the shot to include head and shoulders? Just neck and head? More torso? Consider that the more people are on the call, the smaller everyone’s images are, so a tighter crop (i.e., mostly head and neck) will make people more visible. If people are further away from their cameras, they appear smaller and there is a lot of (potentially very distracting) background captured. Check and assist your team with camera angles so they are not too high or low. And please, no crotch shots.

Pro Marketer Tip:

Aim for having everyone’s heads appear to be roughly the same size across all video frames. This goes for headshots in your SOQs, too.

Action!

With these additional preparations, when it’s time to join the virtual interview, your team will be able to focus less on the technology, and more on messaging and winning the next project. As an AEC marketer, serve your team like a movie director doing everything you can to reduce technical, audio and visual challenges so your team can shine.