VEED

Making online video editing easy 

‘These days, every company is looking to use more video to engage their prospective customers, current users or even internal teams. But going from raw video clip to beautiful end product can often take hours in the editing booth and, historically, has required strong technical chops. VEED alleviates that pain with a web-based, easy-to-use video-editing suite that lets non-professionals create pro-quality videos.’

Pros

‘With a straightforward timeline view and the ability to quickly add subtitles, graphics, seamless transitions and all sorts of other effects, VEED can save you from a four- or five-figure video-agency bill and puts you in control of your creative content.’

Cons 

‘As with any freemium product, some of the most powerful features are hidden behind the Basic or Pro plan price gates so, depending on how intense your video requirements are, you'll likely need to upgrade to one of those advanced plans within a short amount of time.’

Cost 

There's a free plan, along with Basic ($10/month), Pro ($18/month) and Enterprise (bespoke price). 

AnswerThePublic

Find out what customers are really asking 

‘Have you ever watched those YouTube videos where celebrities answer the “most frequently asked questions” about them, taken from Google's auto-complete search? That's what AnswerThePublic provides, but for any product or topic. Say, for example, you sell orange juice and you want to know what else consumers care about or consider when thinking about your product. With a simple search on AnswerThePublic, you instantly have access to a visualized web of hundreds of related FAQs from the masses.’ 

Pros 

‘The tool's power is in the data it gathers from major search engines like Google and others. This can help identify new product lines to launch, surface new ideas for content marketing initiatives or just give you a more holistic view of customer relationships with your product.’

Cons

‘While it's great for mass learnings, it's more of a blunt tool than a precision device. If you're looking for a more nuanced perspective or customer data, you can't beat talking to individual customers.’  

Cost

There's a free plan, along with the Pro package (from $79/month) and the Expert ($199/month)

Wynter

Optimize your messaging

‘Knowing whether your messaging is resonating or driving the customer actions you want is often very difficult. Take your company's main landing page – you probably have a big header claiming your main value proposition, maybe some descriptive text or imagery, a handful of buttons designed to drive users to log in or buy now, and so on. That's where Wynter comes in. The platform allows companies to very quickly set up a hyper-specific panel of either current or prospective customers, all for the purpose of reacting to very granular areas (chosen by you) of your website or product.’ 

Pros 

‘You can select the area of your website for feedback, identify the type of user you're hoping to appeal to, and then ship an interactive test via Wynter. The feedback you receive from the panel is like comments on a Google Doc, but for your site.’

Cons

‘One downside is that the product can get pricey quite quickly, depending on how many tests you run –  but, if you have the budget to optimize, this can really drive material improvements.’

Cost 

There's a free plan for companies that have their own audience to invite as panelists. Then there's Starter, for companies that want to run up to three tests a month (tests start at $1,198), and Enterprise (bespoke pricing). 

This article was first published in Courier issue 45, February/March 2022. To purchase the issue or become a subscriber, head to our webshop.