Why Your CEO Doesn't Have To Be The Star Of Your Brand Video

When we start pre-production on a brand video, one of the first conversations we usually have with a client is about who should actually be on camera.

And pretty often, the instinct is to start at the top.

The CEO. The president. The founder. The executive director. Whoever has the biggest title must be the person who tells the company's story, right?

Not necessarily.

We've filmed a lot of interviews over the years, and one of the biggest things we've learned is that the best person on camera isn't always the most important person on the org chart. Sometimes it's the employee who's been there for 20 years. Sometimes it's the customer who absolutely loves what you do. Sometimes it's the technician who can talk about their job for an hour without running out of things to say.

When we're helping a client decide who should appear in a video, we're much less interested in someone's title than we are in a much simpler question:

Who is actually going to be great on camera?

Pick The Person Who Actually Wants To Talk About It

This sounds incredibly obvious, but enthusiasm goes a LONG way on camera.

If you put someone in an interview chair who genuinely loves what they do, you can usually tell within the first few minutes. They light up when they start talking. Their answers get longer. They tell stories you didn't ask for. They remember little details. They laugh. They use their hands. They actually sound like a person.

That's gold for us.

Compare that with someone who technically knows everything about the company but answers every question with three perfectly polished sentences that sound like they came directly from the About Us page.

We'll take the enthusiastic person almost every time.

You can have the most beautiful lighting, incredible cameras, a perfect location and a carefully planned interview, but if the person sitting in the chair doesn't give you anything emotionally, there's only so much you can manufacture in the edit.

Being Knowledgeable Isn't The Same As Being Interesting In Videos

Obviously, whoever you put on camera needs to understand what they're talking about. But there's a difference between knowing the information and being able to communicate it in a way that makes someone want to keep listening.

That's why we encourage clients to think beyond seniority when they're choosing interview subjects.

Who tells the best stories at lunch? Who gets animated when they talk about the company? Who can explain something complicated without sounding like they're reading a white paper? Who has funny stories from the early days? Who remembers the customer that changed the way the company thinks about its work?

Those people are incredibly valuable in a brand video.

And sometimes they're nowhere near the C-suite.

Animated People Are Just More Fun To Watch

This is a big one for us.

We want personality.

That doesn't mean everyone needs to be bouncing off the walls or delivering some massive theatrical performance. Some of the best people we've interviewed have actually been relatively quiet.

But they have something about them.

Maybe they're incredibly expressive. Maybe they're funny. Maybe they're thoughtful and take a second before answering. Maybe their face completely changes when they start talking about the part of their job they love.

Those little things translate beautifully on camera.

When we're editing an interview-driven video, we're not just listening to the words. We're looking for the smile at the end of the sentence. The laugh in the middle of an answer. The moment someone's eyes light up because they remembered something. The pause where you can tell something actually means something to them.

Those moments are what make an audience feel like they're meeting a real person rather than watching a spokesperson.

Your Employees May Understand The Story Better Than Anyone

Some of our favorite interviews have been with employees who are actually doing the work every day.

They're interacting with customers. They're solving problems. They're seeing the impact firsthand. And because they're living inside that part of the company, they often have incredibly specific stories that an executive simply wouldn't know.

That's especially valuable when we're making documentary-style brand videos.

Specificity makes stories believable.

Someone saying, "Our company really cares about our customers" isn't particularly interesting.

Someone telling us about a customer they met three years ago, what happened, how they helped them, and why they still remember that person?

Now we have something.

That story may ultimately communicate the company's values better than simply asking the CEO to explain what those values are.

Your Customers Might Be Even Better

And sometimes the best person to talk about your company doesn't work there at all.

Customer stories can be incredibly powerful because the person speaking doesn't have to convince the audience that the company is great. They're simply explaining what their experience was.

That creates an entirely different kind of credibility.

If a CEO tells us their company provides incredible customer service, we expect them to say that.

If a customer tells us about the exact moment an employee went completely out of their way to help them, we believe it.

The same goes for patients, partners, community members, donors, students or anyone else who has experienced the impact of an organization firsthand.

Sometimes the strongest way to tell your own story is to let someone else tell it for you.

This Doesn't Mean Your CEO Shouldn't Be In The Video

We're definitely not saying CEOs make bad interview subjects.

We've filmed plenty who are fantastic on camera.

Founders in particular can bring something nobody else can because they know why the company exists in the first place. They remember what things looked like before there was a company. They can explain where an idea came from and what they hope it eventually becomes.

If your CEO is charismatic, comfortable talking about the company and genuinely great at telling stories, put them in the chair.

Absolutely.

The point is that their title shouldn't automatically guarantee them the starring role.

The question isn't, "Who's the highest-ranking person we can get?"

It's, "Who's going to tell this story best?"

Those are very different questions.

Don't Pick Someone Just Because They're "Good At Presenting"

There's another trap here that we see occasionally.

Someone inside the company is known as the great presenter, so everyone immediately decides they should be the person in the video.

Sometimes that's perfect.

Other times, you put them in front of the camera and get exactly that: a presentation.

Brand videos usually aren't presentations.

We don't necessarily want someone delivering perfect talking points. We want them remembering things. Reacting. Thinking. Telling us what happened. Giving us answers that don't sound exactly like the answers they gave during rehearsal.

A little imperfection can actually make someone much more compelling to watch.

We're not casting a commercial. We're looking for people who feel real.

If You Have Five People In Mind, Let Us Help You Pick

You also don't have to figure this out completely on your own.

This is part of pre-production.

If a client tells us they have six possible people who could appear in a video, we'd much rather talk through those people before the shoot than simply schedule interviews with all six.

Tell us who they are.

Tell us who can't stop talking. Tell us who's hilarious. Tell us who has been with the company forever. Tell us who knows every customer by name. Tell us who gets emotional talking about the mission. Tell us who you think might surprise us.

Those details matter.

Depending on the project, we can also have short pre-interview conversations before production. Ten or fifteen minutes talking with someone can tell us a lot about how they might fit into the larger story.

And sometimes the person everyone thought would be the supporting interview ends up becoming the backbone of the entire video.

The Best Person For Your Brand Video Might Surprise You

One of the reasons we love interview-driven production is that you never completely know what's going to happen when someone sits down in the chair.

We've gone into interviews expecting one person to carry the story and walked away realizing someone else gave us the line that ultimately opened the video.

That's part of the fun.

So when you're choosing who should represent your company on camera, forget the org chart for a minute.

Think about the people.

Who has the best stories? Who actually cares about what they're talking about? Who gets animated? Who makes you want to keep listening when they start talking?

Maybe that's your CEO.

And if it is, fantastic.

But if it's the person working three floors down who absolutely lights up every time they talk about what your company does?

Put them in the chair.