Maybe it’s just me.
I have a good friend who used to be the conductor of the Navy band, and the son of a friend who’s in the Marine Band.
There’s a TV in office that’s passively on all day while I work. I don’t pay much attention to the news that’s on it all day, but on the inauguration I watched a bit paying a little more attention than usual to the military bands.
If it were me, I would have figured out a better shot ahead of time. And I would fire whatever idiot had the national news shots of the bands against a backdrop of a fence with razor wire at the top.
Overall, I know there’s Covid and fears of riots this time. But with the world watching it certainly seemed to make us look like a 3rd world country. Between no audience and frankly way over the top security, with too little concern about how things would play on TV didn’t exactly set the right tone, in my humble opinion.
Now, In all business settings I’ve always been an “Everything Counts” person. The setting, office staging, what a prospect sees, hears, smells as they enter your offices are all crucial. In the age of Zoom meetings I’d argue that all of that is even more important.
Make sure you are looking at everything you do from the view of how’s my client or prospective client going to process this – how’s it look, what tone does it set.
I can’t tell you how many businesses I see on a regular basis that miss this simple thought. Recently I spoke to a sales representative for an internet firm. Obviously working from home – rather than a professional back-drop, or even a green screen he was in his bedroom with a closet that had what looked like a shower curtain as a door.
For Zoom meetings, I’m fairly over poorly done “green screen” video, but it’s really inexpensive to get a really professional looking backdrop. I was at a party at Jeanine Pirro’s (Judge Jeanine) home a couple of month’s ago. She had a huge flatscreen TV used as her back-drop when broadcasting from home, which looks a lot better than “zoom’s green screen feature.”
In everything you do think about each of the “impressions” you make, and make sure it’s congruent with your brand. That certainly includes ads you run, your website (which I’ve got to say – rarely have ANY personality,) your video backdrop, your office décor and structure, and EVERYTHING Else.
