Video Production Services Deliver a Reel Deal
Read time: 5 minutes
Reaching the tribal population with the rich, cultural story of United Tribes Technical College (UTTC) on a limited budget is no easy task. So, when the Bismarck Mandan Chamber asked UTTC for a video to use as a resource to help high school students envision a college-bound future, they turned to Midco.
“I knew I wanted to focus on internships because our internship program gets students that work experience for the hire after college,” said UTTC Career Services Director Connie Sheehan. “But how were we going to craft this important message? What approach should we take? We needed help.”
UTTC is a two-year tribal college operated by Three Affiliated Tribes of Fort Berthold, the Spirit Lake Tribe, the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, and the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians. UTTC has served over 10,000 American Indian students from more than 75 federally-recognized Native American tribes across the nation, offering programs in occupational education and training in a culturally-relevant setting.
"Midco’s creative services team is flexible, responsive, highly communicative, effective and their fees are more than fair. I give them a 10 out of 10. Work with them. You will thank me!"
Building leaders who empower their communities is central to the UTTC vision. The Midco creative team knew it was important to capture that spirit in this video, so they proposed sharing the UTTC experience from the perspective of three student interns.
“Midco guided us in terms of what we should focus on,” said Sheehan. “They worked with the students we selected, helping them get comfortable on camera. We would do a take, and then the Midco team would cut, asking the student a question so we could elaborate on certain topics. It was an intensive process, but it worked so well!”
The Midco creative team offered students multiple ways to share their UTTC stories – from using a teleprompter to responding to questions asked off-screen. The team also captured footage across campus to offer an exciting preview of the full college campus life.
“Midco covered everything!” Sheehan said. “We are not video specialists. Thankfully, Midco’s creative team are experts we can rely on. They are storytellers, videographers, editors, equipment handlers, transporters – they have a good grasp on everything we need, all in one. Plus, they made their workflow coincide with our deadline and our very limited availability. There were such small pockets of time we could work with, and they captured footage according to our schedule. They had so much equipment! They hauled it out every single time.”
“The Midco team brought the expertise to our project that we needed, and the price was so reasonable!” Sheehan continued. “A lot of our funding is from grants, so our finances are limited. Midco’s high quality production services matched with their competitive pricing made them a dream to work with.”
An unexpected bonus from this project partnership was the volume of content Midco’s team captured. Upon review, the footage provided enough material that UTTC’s College Relations Director, Brent Kleinjan, was able to create a recruiting video for the college at large. “It turned into a nice collaboration that we didn’t intend on!” Sheehan said.
“It’s been challenging to recruit in a pandemic, in a virtual world,” said Kleinjan. “Our Midco ad rep contacts me when there are opportunities for us. This was a great one.”
“Video gives us credibility and reach,” Kleinjan continued. “We’ve worked with other firms and production companies, but Midco footage is always high quality, and it fits within our budget needs. Sometimes we want video for commercial use. Sometimes we have content that is too long for a TV ad, so we need a long-form option. Midco gives us the ability to create both. Their creative process is collaborative, so we can speak to our vision and goals, and they can figure out how to execute it. They guide us throughout the entire process. Midco knows what shots we need to get and what messaging should be incorporated to ensure an effective finished product.”
"Midco’s high quality production services matched with their competitive pricing made them a dream to work with."
“The feedback we’ve received from high school counselors, the Chamber, and others has been amazing. They are grateful because nothing existed for career-related information before. The interns in the video were genuine and addressed real-life issues they faced,” Sheehan said. “You want students to feel that success is within reach, and that UTTC will help them transition to the workplace. This video offered students an underlying message that ‘if we can do it, you can do it.’ That sense of empowerment students get from watching the video is, for me, exactly what I wanted to happen. This video went above and beyond our goals. It’s really moving. Midco did an awesome job.”
“Video is one of the more important tactics for us,” Kleinjan added. “Midco is versatile in what they can offer. Their production quality is strong, and when paired with ad placement, they give us the regional reach we need.”
“Trust me,” Sheehan said. “Midco’s creative services team is flexible, responsive, highly communicative, effective and their fees are more than fair. I give them a 10 out of 10. Work with them. You will thank me!”