Why authenticity beats scripts in solar ads

▶ 0:00Happy Sunday. Fraser from Current Renewables has done over £200,000 in just over a month of advertising with us. And that's from £5,000 in advertising spend, meaning he's got basically 40 times his money back on his ads. Now, what we're going to do today is go through one of the actual real comments on one of his solar ads that are running on Facebook and start to actually dissect why this campaign is performing so, so well.

▶ 0:26So this is a comment from Jordan Thomas and it basically sums up a few different things. Firstly, why video is so powerful, how Fraser has come off really, really well on camera, actually without any effort at all, intentionally, and how authenticity is basically the way to go, right? So a lot of the time when I go out to shoots, I mean, we've done, I think it's 100 solar video shoots now. And if you could just say if it's a two-day shoot, if you could include that as two, I think it's 100 days of shooting.

▶ 0:57And when I go out, quite often what will happen is I'll be having such a lovely conversation with the client about something they're passionate about. Maybe it's how the system's strong, how it uses the NTPTs, and how someone quoted it differently and it wouldn't have been as efficient, etc. Whatever it may be, right? We're having a great conversation. Then the camera red light goes on. And all of a sudden, that conversation becomes, like, really stiff.

▶ 1:22And I'm only going to speak in three words at a time because I want to make sure every word is perfect. And the problem with that is that you lose any relatability. You lose the ability to get someone to know, like, and trust you because it's not real. It's you trying to articulate and perfect every word and people feel it.

▶ 1:43And that's why it feels like an ad because, and that's why we moved very far away from scripting everything a very long time ago. Because when you script something down to the word, it just feels like an ad no matter how hard you try. You have to be a really skilled actor to take a script and then make it not feel like an ad.

▶ 2:01And unfortunately, you know, all credit to you guys, but most of our installifiers are not necessarily trained actors. So the far better approach is actually to prompt you to just speak naturally and to try and get over, you know, the difference between the red light being on the camera recording and it not. So one person that, again, did that perfectly would be Fraser from Carmenubles.

▶ 2:25And as such, he's getting comments like this. So Jordan said, out of every sponsored advert for any kind of trade, let alone so, this is by far the best. Give ourselves a little pat on the back for that, but obviously Fraser as well. I'm not in the market for it just yet, but I watched till the end as the chat came across as very down to earth, professional and genuine.

▶ 2:44No fake influence abides whatsoever. I don't know where you're based, but I would definitely consider your business based on how genuine you came across. Good luck with your business and I'll keep an eye out. Now, firstly, thank you for Jordan because that's a lovely thing to say, especially if there's nothing really to gain out of that other than being kind.

▶ 2:59And secondly, there's a few different things to break down out of this. So first of all, we've been doing video ads in Solar the longest. We are the best at it, hands down, without question. And secondly, he says, I'm not in the market just yet for Solar. So a lot of people have this misconception, but when you're advertising on Facebook for Solar, you are only advertising to people that are already engaging in Solar content.

▶ 3:27And yes, it is true. When someone clicks on your ad, they are very likely to be shown another five, six, seven, eight Solar adverts right after that. Because meta starts to understand what they're engaging in and does that to actually be able to reach people properly. That's how the advertising kind of targeting actually works.

▶ 3:46And the flip side is also true. When someone engages with someone else's ad, they're probably going to be shown yours if they're sour as well, right? And it's in the same area and all that kind of thing. So that's one aspect to it. But there is a huge portion of users on Facebook that we are reaching that aren't necessarily in the market yet.

▶ 4:05So they're very top of funnel. They need quite a lot of educating. They need to build trust in firstly the industry, but also the company they're going to install with. And they just need a lot more nurturing through the process. And it's going to take more time. This person probably at a minimum isn't going to go solo for another three months, probably more likely a year, two years.

▶ 4:23But that seed has been laid. And as he says in his own words, I would definitely consider your business based on how you came across. So he'll reach out in the future. And if he's engaging with these kind of adverts and watching a large proportion of them, as we go back to shoot with Fraser again and shoot new advertisements, he's going to see all of those new advertisements.

▶ 4:43So you're going to see different hardware. He's going to see different installs. He's going to see how Fraser and the business develops all the time. So it's this long-term play that we are in fact, believe it or not, the marketers of the industry are bringing more people into solar. It's not just taking more of a share for their specific clients.

▶ 5:02It is also increasing the size of the pie, no matter what advertising format you're using. So it's really interesting, this one. And what I'll do is I'll actually bring up the ad itself so we can break down some of the reasons that it comes off so well. And actually how quite a lot of the time it's the less effort you put in and the more you just relax into it, the better it comes out.

▶ 5:28So let's play this out here. Right, so today we're in Honitav on this installation. It's another slate roof installation. We have seven on the east facing roof and then we have two on the south facing roof. Then two on the south facing roof. You'd be surprised how much extra generation that actually adds. So right away, you can tell there's no hook here.

▶ 5:50There's no, did you know you could save 70% with your solar panel? And if you're qualified, but only if you're in a specific postcode. Oh God, leave it at all. It's just a natural conversation over it. It's as if you're just there with Fraser. And the only way I can describe it is that the way we try to manufacture the ads is that Fraser is literally walking someone around the installation and talking to them very naturally, even having a conversation in a way with them.

▶ 6:19And you should feel it enveloped into this environment and this conversation rather than feeling like someone's just projectile vomiting a load of statements and facts and hooks at you, right? It's just not how you get high quality leads out of this advertising format. The way he says he chuckles kind of and he says about the two panels actually, they do a lot more than you might think.

▶ 6:43Like he's not saying, it's going to save an extra 10, 12, 21%. Like it's just, yeah, it's going to do some good stuff, right? It's natural and authentic. Especially when we've got the east-west and then an extra two on the south on the front. As we walk through, around to the side of the house, that's our BC run. Yeah, so, and the other thing for us is that we just need to get out of the way of the person on camera quite often.

▶ 7:12So, a lot of the time people with the video ads, they'll put like these like crazy transitions on like sparkles and like all this stuff and music. And we, a lot of the time with our editors, it's actually about stripping it back and make, you know, focusing attention on whatever the installer is talking about. And if not, then.

▶ 7:32So, if they're not talking about something specific, then you just keep focusing on that. We try and keep everything as neat as possible. Highlighting the DC there is just a nice touch to actually show exactly what Fraser's talking about. Unfortunately, we do have to stick around everything to MTS standard. Again, that's just real.

▶ 7:45Like, everyone says, you know, the stickers, we've lined them all up perfectly and it looks amazing. The stickers just don't look good, do they? Like, if you had the choice and it wasn't really important for safety purposes, you just wouldn't put the stickers on. So, like, why lie about it? So, Fraser's just gone, yeah, unfortunately, we do have to sticker it up, but, you know, we make it as neat as we can.

▶ 8:05But, we try and do everything to the best of our standard and give the advice for our service that we do offer. Inside here, we put our sub-DB, so on every installation, we install a separate fuse board with its own RCBA breakers, so that anything in the house stripped doesn't affect the solar. This also houses the meter, the import-export meter.

▶ 8:28Then, from there, we have our low-level clipped cables. If we look into the hut... So, you can see there, we've just used a subtle transition to just take a cut out of either a silent period or a period that wasn't useful at all and didn't provide it authenticity as well. Box, shack, whatever. And then, again, hut, box, shack, whatever you want to call it.

▶ 8:48Whatever you want to call it, you can see there are two 6-kilowatt inverters and there are two 5-kilowatt batteries, so that equals a 12-kilowatt inverter. We could have done a better job on the BROT, to be fair, because there's another EcoFlow stack on the right. The Cascade EcoFlow system, but the best part of the installation and the most elegant and beautiful-looking installation I'm going to show you.

▶ 9:09If you follow me around back, I'll show you now. One of the biggest concerns we get is flat roofs, and can panels go on flat roofs, and what systems can go on flat roofs. Is it going to damage the flat roof? Is it easy to take off of the flat roof? So that, you know, relaying loads of questions and things like that, that's again another attempt to kind of think about what is the viewer thinking right now, and how can I pre-empt those questions and overcome those objections, and make whatever point I'm about to make, make sense.

▶ 9:40There's really two options you can have with a flat roof, there's a bucket system, which is a cheaper option. It does its purpose, it doesn't look as good, it's basically a bucket you weigh down and your panel attaches to it, or you can have a nice, sleek-looking, all blacked-out ASDEC, in full system, which I think is by far the best part of this installation.

▶ 10:03And, if I could say to myself, it's something I would have flat in my garden. So as you can see, on this house, we have panels on the back, on the front, on the other front elevation, on the flat roof, and there's one reason because of that. First off, they have this sauna, which absolutely canes electricity, so 9 kilowatts.

▶ 10:26I see, that's brilliant, absolutely canes electricity. You know, instead of everyone saying, so we have the sauna, it's a very high drawer appliance. Like, yes, if you would typically talk like that with the customer, yeah, through, like, crack on, because that's authentic. But you don't need to force that, like, if the way you speak is that sauna absolutely belts it, it canes electricity, then just say that normally, because otherwise there's going to be a huge disconnect between the person they engage with, the likes in the video, and the person that actually speaks to them on the phone, or that comes out to survey, or that even just owns the business and teaches everyone else within it, you know, how to run things.

▶ 11:04So we're always about not putting words in people's mouths and actually just letting them do their thing. When that's going, that's drawing so much, then if I take your attention down here, they have a hot tub. In my eyes, this is a perfect garden. You can jump in the hot tub, jump in the sauna, jump in the hot tub, you've got solar, it's all generating it, you're not paying for anything, it's all free.

▶ 11:26And again, just natural language, just talking to someone as if they're a human. And the other point here is he's speaking to one person, as opposed to speaking to lots and lots and lots of people. You know, a lot of people feel like they have to be this presenter, because they imagine this ad's going to be seen by a thousand people.

▶ 11:44But instead, Fraser's just focusing on, okay, how can I, how do I normally speak to someone? And even just forgetting there's a camera there and just speaking to the videographer, I'm just saying like, you know, if I'm getting a hot tub, I'm getting a sauna. This is the best scenario we could ever have. So if you've got a sauna and high energy bills, why don't we put a load of panels on every elevation of your roof to panel not only a sauna, but your hot tub as well.

▶ 12:07Click the button below, fill in some contact details, and we'll be in touch. And there you go. And then we've just got some really nice B-roll of him interacting with customers, being a smiley, happy chappy there. So that, yeah, is just a breakdown. And obviously, you know, we have plenty of ads that follow that same structure that are just as authentic as that one.

▶ 12:30But I thought this was just such a good example, because it's been reinforced by a member of the public without any prompting. So it really is great to see. And I think that if you're looking to get on video and you recognize the importance of it, or maybe you've already tried some video ads before, but you just didn't think that they really were you and that they've really presented your business in an accurate light.

▶ 12:54Like, you know, we could be at one site all day just trying to get the perfect sequence of words to come out of your mouth that you think is the most professional and the absolute best. Or we could go to seven sites. You could just crack on with it, be yourself and just talk as you normally would. And maybe it won't be perfect.

▶ 13:16Maybe you'll say something that also would you go, maybe, you know, that is that word, you know, the best word that I could have used. And then, you know, is that, is that going to put 1% of people off? Yeah, maybe it will, but it's going to actually allow you to form a connection with the other 99% who were the ones that were actually going to buy from you anyway.

▶ 13:35So just like, like get over it, get over the 1% that might not like the way that you speak. Because it's not worth fretting over. If you try and please everyone, you're going to please no one. So, yeah, that's my, my little speech. And I hope you enjoyed this little breakdown. And I'm really excited to see more of these kind of comments coming through because I know this made Fraser's day and it certainly made our day as well.

▶ 13:58Because, because we basically gave Fraser the platform to be able to be himself and put that out there in the format that he wanted. So, cool. Thanks for watching. See you in the next one.