The Language Business

ICEF Berlin November 2009

Were you at the ICEF Workshop in Berlin two weeks ago? 1740 professionals working in international education were, and this video captures some of them at work.

Et maintenant...

Que vais-je faire? Well the answer is that I have made a (sort of) video for a school in France. Since I haven't actually visited the school, I suppose I am now in agency country which is a bit of a challenge to my self-image. But there it is. It was fun making this, and they are very nice people (I do know that much). 2 minutes only.

Seeing is believing?

I’m guessing, but I think that is one reason why videos of schools are popular. Delving into somebody’s web site can be difficult in another language (when did you last look for something on a Chinese site? or even a German one?) but seeing pupils/students in a school, their staff and their buildings in action, even if you don’t understand everything they say, can create a strong impression.

And if the thesis is correct, and there are people who want to make video a part of their review process, it is not efficient for them to search through non-standardised and usually monoglot school sites to see if there’s a video there. That is the thinking behind our new site UK school videos. If the viewer is interested by the video, there is a simple link to the client web site, so the site is in effect a video portal for boarding schools and language schools.

It’s still very early days but we have excellent results from Yahoo and Google, and some of the videos on the site have already been watched there several hundred times. So far approximately 10% of views result in clicks through to the school site.

China likes video

We know that China likes video because whereas on our site "English in Britain" our visitor numbers come from all over the world led by the UK, Italy, Saudi, Spain and so on, visitors to our video site are led by China. Big time. In fact China accounts for more than half our visitors. And country No. 2 is Brazil.

The video here is made up of interviews with students from China, Korea and Japan (including some previously unused footage) and will, I hope, stimulate more interest from those countries in EFL courses in these islands. The schools' videos can be seen in full on our "The Blackie Report" site.

Marketing Video

Just two minutes long, this is a plug for our video services.

Language School Video in Dublin

ICEF Berlin 2008

The three interviews here will, I trust, be of interest to marketing and management people in the language business. All the videos here may be watched (as here) on YouTube, or else in higher definition on English4Today.tv and The Blackie Report. Note that the interviews took place where there were plenty of people around, so there is a fair amount of ambient noise.

The first (and much the longest at almost 9 minutes) is with Markus Badde, the CEO of ICEF. He talks here about his formulae for success in Workshops around the world.

In this second video, Carolyn Blackmore, the Chief Executive of Quality English, tells me what QE is and how it operates.

Finally we have here an interview with Jan Capper, Executive Director of IALC.

London language school video

Also viewable on English4Today and The Blackie Report.

Engaging with video in Manchester

I spent an enjoyable day in Manchester recently talking to students and staff at Manchester Central School of English, and recording events on video (6 minutes). The link above will show the YouTube version, or you can watch in higher definition here. Manchester has solid appeal for overseas students with its universities, its vibrant atmosphere and of course its football teams. They have a couple of mentions in the video, but it was also quite a big theme during the course of the day!

Students Talking

Something different. The idea is to have a video which generically promotes studying English in Britain to students. Because it only features students talking, students may find it easy to relate to. The video lasts for 3 minutes and 40 seconds. Click on the flag to activate the link.