[The articles I post on ChurchCentral are drawn from recent issues of Christian Coaching Magazine and represent a wide array of leaders and coaches as the authors.
Thanks for reading! -Jerome Daley, Publisher www.christiancoachingmag.com]

YouTube for You?

by Diane Cunningham

First, a little background on this thing called YouTube: The now ubiquitous website was founded in February of 2005 by three former PayPal employees (Hmm… wonder if this happened on company time!) In less than five years, YouTube has become the fourth most-visited website (after Google, Yahoo, and Facebook). Not bad!

Now owned by Google, YouTube has had over four billion videos viewed. Are any of them yours?

The power of video is pretty self-evident at this point. Well-crafted words will always have impact. Creative design will always engage the affective side of our brains. But video seems to be able to leap the hurdles of both intellect and emotion to invade our very souls at its most primal level. Powerful stuff, even in amateur form.

What does this mean for us as leaders? Just because teenagers may spend half their waking hours texting and uploading mobile video clips, is that a good enough reason for us to jump in? Probably not. What about because as leaders, our job is to influence people as creatively and effectively as possible? In my opinion, this makes YouTube worth a look. And the fact that YouTube is easy, available, and free helps.

So what would you want to do with it?

Well, the sky’s the limit, as they say… A visionary message, a visual introduction to organizational events or activities, description of products and services, community building by making a big organization smaller. A coaching tip of the day? How would you use it?

Getting Started
1. Go to www.youtube.com and create an account. 15 seconds.
2. Record a 1-2 minute clip, using your built-in computer camera, your cell phone, or a video camera (check out the dummie-proof Flip Cam at www.theflip.com, $129 at Target). 15 minutes.
3. Sign into YouTube and hit the “Upload” video. Another 30 seconds.

Congratulations. In about sixteen minutes, you’ve just caught up, ever so briefly, with your thirteen-year-old and changed the world, ever so slightly, in the process.

Diane’s Jedi Mind Tricks for better videos:
 Get a rough draft with a few bullet points for what you want to say.
 Don’t over-analyze it or expect perfection. Real-world conversation plays better than flawless scripting anyway.
 Use a prop—hold a coffee mug, a book, a ball, anything really.
 The first one will be a throw-away, so just have fun. Laugh, smile, be yourself. You can always delete it.
 Don’t forget to say your name and your website.

Diane Cunningham is the founder of Inspiration Strategies, where she offers coaching, speaking, life planning, and group coaching services. She is passionate to help people live purposefully and grow small businesses. www.dianecunningham.com