Customer testimonials are a fantastic way to build authentic trust with your audience.
But did you know there’s another type of testimonial that’s often overlooked, but just as powerful? It’s employee testimonials.
Employee testimonial videos are the best way to showcase your company’s core culture and values.
Talking about your values and your mission statement is one thing; but real testimonials from your own team members really bring it to life and take it to a whole new level, just like with customer testimonials.
A video marketing strategy that involves testimonial videos really helps bolster trust in a brand.
But don’t just take our word for it. Let’s look at how big brands use animated employee testimonial videos to build brand awareness and increase the impact of their internal communications.
Image Source: Academy to Innovate HR
Employee testimonial videos are more than just interviews with staff—they’re windows into the heart of your company.
These videos offer a behind-the-scenes look at the people who drive your business forward, providing an authentic narrative that resonates with your audience.
Whether you're showcasing company culture, work-life balance, or your brand’s values, employee testimonial videos humanize your organization and build an emotional connection with viewers and help attract and recruit the best candidates.
In today’s trust-driven market, potential clients and future employees are more likely to engage with brands that feel authentic. When employees share their personal experiences, it adds credibility to your message, creating a sense of trust that’s difficult to achieve through traditional advertising alone.
There’s something powerful about hearing directly from the people within an organization. Employee testimonial videos offer real stories, real emotions, and real experiences. This makes them incredibly effective for a few key reasons:
Trust is one of the most valuable currencies in today’s market, and employee testimonial videos are a potent tool in building that trust.
By putting your employees at the forefront, these videos show that your company is not just a faceless entity, but a collective of individuals working towards a common goal.
When employees speak candidly about your company’s values, leadership, and mission, it provides a level of transparency that is hard to achieve through other means.
Customers and potential clients are more likely to trust your brand when they can see that your employees believe in the work they do. These videos also convey that your business fosters a positive work environment, which can be critical in attracting top talent.
Image Credits: Brafton
Creating an effective employee testimonial video requires thoughtful planning and a strong narrative. Here’s how to make your videos stand out:
Not every employee testimonial will resonate with all audiences, so selecting the right stories is critical. Here’s how to choose the best candidates:
Producing high-quality employee testimonial videos doesn’t have to be a complex or expensive process. Here are a few tips to ensure your production goes smoothly:
A remote interview with an employee was paired with animation to show the advantages of using 3D technology for product lifecycles within Kohl’s.
A peer recommendation builds a special level of trust in your organization, because it deals with the human side of things.
The video showcases the skilled and dedicated people involved in the process, and how they work hard to please their customers daily.
Because ultimately, you can’t do business without trust.
Al Boardman teamed up with Babcock to help explain and visualize their company’s new set of employee principles.
He created the initial concepts and developed these into illustrations using simple geometric shapes and patterns, to create a story that is both engaging and easy to understand.
Like the best animated testimonial videos out there, it’s deceptively simple looking but packs a punch with its clever storytelling and visual symbolism.
Cyril Calgaro was tasked with creating a recruitment campaign video for Club Med in a creative and poetic style.
So he interviewed employees of Club Med to share their unique experiences and testimonials.
To be the best in your field, attracting the best talent is just as important as wooing customers.
Club Med knows this well, so they went all out in showcasing what they have to offer to their own team members as well as clients.
Syracuse University chose to go beyond the cliché of "smiling-kids-sitting-next-to-trees" in their latest welcome video, which features a unique collage of student testimonial voices and mixed media visuals.
They opted for a lively montage of different voices and testimonials, all painting a mosaic-like bigger picture of the vibrant life and culture at Syracuse University.
This animated testimonial video was produced by Dress Code.
Kingdom of Something teamed up with designer Louis Wesolowsky to make this animation presenting the core values of the Dutch trading company, Optiver.
Rather than run down a bullet-point-style list of abstract-sounding ideals and platitudes, their video testimonial went for an approach from multiple voices of team members.
This way the company’s core culture and ideals are unraveled through personal, first-person soundbytes, telling a story of the team’s journey.
It’s fascinating and engrossing and really brings all these ideas to life.
If you are looking to build brand awareness, showcase your company culture and attract more talent, then start using animated employee testimonial videos for recruitment campaigns.
Collect inspiring stories from your employees and convert them into videos.
Let’s look at a great example from Shapiro & Duncan, who were struggling to attract talent to the construction industry, and decided to launch the campaign “build the lifestyle you deserve” using animated video.
5G is a pretty big deal, a paradigm shift in wireless that will affect many aspects of our lives.
Who better to explain what 5G is and how Qualcomm played a defining role in its launch, than their lead engineers?
Buck created this series of animated employee testimonial videos with two of Qualcomm's best, who dig deep into the nitty gritty of the network and how it's going to make our lives better.
It brings a human, personal side to a highly technical line of work.
Google is a company that needs no introduction. But what’s it like behind the scenes? Who are the people who make it work?
Google prides itself on being radically different and doing things their own way, with their unique and unconventional work culture, with bright offices, plenty of recreational spaces, and chefs manning bistros serving five-star food for hungry employees.
It all functions to create a world that’s more like an incubating nest that frees geniuses to work and play, rather than a stuffy monolithic corporate office.
So it’s no surprise that they didn’t hold back with their employee testimonial video, highlighting some of the smartest people in tech, right at home in a vibrant and unique creative atmosphere.
Adobe has become the de facto default software suite for creative professionals of all sorts– artists, filmmakers, musicians, web designers, you name it.
So their employee testimonial video is quite fittingly dazzling, colorful, and wildly artistic too, with plenty of delicious animation.
When we say you need to speak your audience’s language, this is what we’re talking about.
This video serves as a reminder that explainer videos aren’t just generic visuals providing some filler for a spoken script.
The video (including animation) and the narration and music are carefully blended together to create an experience that is greater than the sum of its parts, like a chef combining carefully-chosen ingredients expertly to create the perfect dish.
If you’ve ever used QuickBooks, Turbotax or Mint, you have Intuit to thank. And this is a video about the great minds behind Intuit.
Their employee testimonial video boldly starts with their ranking on Glassdoor, which adds some serious credibility.
Five of their regular employees share what they love about working at Intuit.
Yes, employee testimonials work exceptionally well, particularly in building trust with audiences.
They provide a transparent, humanized look at your organization, making it easier for customers and potential employees to connect with your brand.
Studies show that people are more likely to trust a company when they hear positive stories from employees.
Video is an incredibly effective medium because it allows for both visual and auditory storytelling.
In an employee testimonial video, viewers can not only hear the employee’s story but also see their expressions, body language, and work environment.
This creates a more personal connection than written testimonials or static images, making the message more memorable and impactful.
You may be tempted to go all-out and in-depth with your video, leaving no stone unturned. But the storytelling rule of “less is more” proves this to be counterintuitive.
The ideal length for an employee testimonial video is between 1-3 minutes. This keeps the content engaging without overwhelming viewers.
A shorter video ensures that you capture the key points without losing the audience’s attention.
Employee testimonial videos are a powerful way to build trust, enhance brand credibility, and showcase your company’s culture from the inside out.
By highlighting the voices of your team, you can humanize your brand and foster deeper connections with your audience. Whether you’re looking to attract new customers, strengthen relationships, or hire top talent, employee testimonials offer a personal, authentic, and highly effective approach to storytelling.
By choosing the right stories, focusing on authenticity, and ensuring high production quality, you can create employee testimonial videos that resonate with viewers and amplify your brand’s message!