Business Goes Straight to Video

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And while a company can suppress unauthorized video on its own sites, it can do little to contain the viral spread of clips on sites like YouTube. "We did anticipate that people might use that promotion for a platform for their own agendas," says Chevy spokesman Travis Parman. "We weighed the risks against the benefits."

He says Chevy "screened ads that could be offensive or defamatory" but posted all the rest, including some negative ones. Consumers submitted more than 30,000 ads, resulting in 5.8 million page views, he says.

Companies retain much more control when their online videos are used internally. Cisco Systems (CSCO) Chief Executive John Chambers hosts regular breakfast conversations for employees. Those who can't attend can view the breakfast via streaming video. Later, that video is posted on the Intranet.

Each month, Cisco releases about 300 videos internally to its employees and about 50 videos externally. With each new product launch, for example, Cisco includes video that discusses the product's vision and capabilities and includes a demonstration of how to use it. Salespeople can then make the same demonstrations to their customers.

Watch the Pro

Similarly, companies such as Deloitte and American Express (AXP) use video in their e-learning programs for employees. At Deloitte, nearly all the 35,000 employees participate in e-learning courses. The company works with SmartPros (PED) and about 20 other external vendors to add video to courses to demonstrate role-modeling behavior as well as coaching and sales behavior.

Deloitte also uses video of internal experts to explain difficult or dense passages in required reading. "Having a subject matter expert appear changes the pacing of the program and gives learners a chance to see the experts in the organization," says Kathryn Hallenstein, national director of e-learning at Deloitte. Typically video adds about 10% to 20% to the cost of a course, says Hallenstein.

Video can also be used to give outsiders a glimpse into how a company works, either for marketing or recruiting purposes. When blogger Robert Scoble worked at Microsoft, his job involved creating videos of the people and products at Channel 9, Microsoft's video blog. Scoble did it all without a camera crew, makeup, lights, an editor, or any of the other tools companies might think they need.

Fast Phenomenon

"I just went in and had a conversation with somebody about what they were building," says Scoble, who now is vice-president for media development at video podcast startup PodTech.net. "I found people really respected that." Although Scoble left Microsoft in June, the Microsoft video blogs continue to draw in more than 5 million software developers and other viewers each month.

"If you don't have video and audio and lots of pictures on your blog, it's very 2005," says Debbie Weil, corporate blogging consultant and the author of The Corporate Blogging Book. Yet, when Weil finished writing her book about a year ago, people in the business world were barely talking about video blogging.

Increasingly, companies are also letting employees talk about their working experiences in videos on recruiting Web sites. For example, to get across the idea that Enterprise Rent-A-Car promotes employees from within, the company shows a clip of Chairman and CEO Andy Taylor talking about how he began behind a rental car counter in high school and college and worked his way up.

Virtual Recruiting

Perhaps the video that gives new recruits the best idea of what it might be like to work at Enterprise is a short clip that describes the environment as "chaotic" and "slightly insane," with one employee saying that he didn't want to "work at a job where he had to sit at a desk and be quiet." "We look for people that thrive in a fast-paced environment and are highly social," says Marie Artim, assistant vice-president for recruiting at Enterprise, which hired 7,000 college grads last year.

"The next phase will be for companies to include recruitment videos with job postings," says Peter Altieri, founder and CEO of Wetjello, a video recruitment company. Once more companies begin to use video to attract candidates, Altieri expects that jobseekers will start creating videos to submit to companies along with their résumés or e-profiles.

That trend is still nascent, though, and Altieri estimates that there are fewer than 200 video résumés on sites like YouTube and RecruiTV, the online video recruitment portal that Wetjello created.

Video résumés may be a thing of the future, but one thing is certain now: Plenty of consumers are eager to view and even create videos related to brands such as Coca-Cola, Chevrolet (GM), and Doritos. For the Super Bowl ad contest, Frito-Lay received more than 1,000 Doritos commercials from consumers. "The quality of what we saw was impressive," says Frito-Lay's Mukherjee. "It was worth it to put this money behind consumer expression."

Blendtec's Wright concurs. In December, the month after the "Will It Blend" campaign began, the blender maker's online sales surged four times over the previous monthly record.

Rachael King is a writer for BusinessWeek.com in San Francisco.