Challenge / Problem:

Cortez Brothers was faced with the challenge of harnessing and delivering over 3,000 individual pieces of video that needed to be arranged and rearranged in a multitude of ways, in order to use them as work samples for our own clients. To further complicate the process, each client required a different lineup of videos.

Solution:

Prior to employing Simian, our entire staff was tethered to our physical offices and to a computer capable of editing videos and then printing them onto an archaic thing called a “dvd.” Today, we are able to assemble reels of work on the fly, and deliver them into the hands of our clients within minutes rather than hours from anywhere and at any time.

Results:

This is the part of the brief where I’m supposed to write down jargon about the practical benefits of Simian, but i’d rather tell you a story...

Imagine a harried working mother who used to stress about last-minute childcare because clients would need to see videos ASAP. First, she would stick a crying baby in a sling and rush to the office. Next, she would pray that she would be able to convey instructions to a video editor over the wails of the newborn strapped to her back. Lastly, while attending to said newborn, she would be able to make the client happy and meet their deadlines...all at once.

Fast-forward to the adoption of Simian. Now she is able to send out a reel of work to a client from her iphone while sitting in her minivan, while waiting for the kids to get out of school.

Put simply, Simian has made it possible for me to juggle home life and a successful business. It allows me to tend to my family and our clients quickly and concisely, without being tied down to an office computer or editing bay 24/7.

In terms of tangible results, Simian has helped us slash our Fedex and UPS fees to practically nothing, which is how we used to deliver reels of work. Simian has also enabled us to free up our staff, thereby allowing them to put together work samples from anywhere on the globe they happen to be. From traveling in South america, on the phone with a client or on the set of a current broadcast production, Simian gave us the ability to quickly deliver exactly what our clients were looking for, to precise specifications in seconds.

Simian provides the ultimate peace of mind. With Simian’s competitors, we were always waiting for the other shoe to drop in the form of outages, down time, system crashing, prices getting hiked sky-high every few months and no one picking up the phone when we were in desperate need of customer service. With Simian, we never worry about any of these things - ever. I’d say quantitatively, we have experienced a 110 percent improvement in peace of mind and as a result, we are better able to stay focused on growing the business and strengthening the company as a whole.

Examples:

Cost savings:

Cortez Brothers slashed physical delivery and dvd printing fees by several thousand dollars a year and didn’t have to invest in hiring or training additional video editors for the office; we were able to simply train staff to arrange and rearrange videos using Simian for delivery to our clients.

Additional revenue:

Because employees are no longer tethered to physical computers and locked into the process of editing videos into a precise order, they are free to take on for other work. This allows us to grow the Storytelling side of our company, which grown to include work on feature films, tv and consumer brand projects all over the globe.

Brand Awareness:

Once we began using Simian, we were able to verify which of our clients were seeing our work samples and by using Simian’s ‘heat mapping’ function, exactly who was paying attention to what as it was happening. If our work samples weren’t hitting their mark, we could use heat mapping to make immediate changes and better deliver what our clients needed -- sometimes, before they asked for it.

Time and Energy Savings:

This is where Simian is priceless. We no longer needed to tie staff to the physical office and to editing bays in order to get work samples into the hands of our clients. Simian has freed up dozens of hours of work each week by digitizing videos and allowing us to arrange and rearrange them in countless permutations.

Repurposing:

Once we digitized the videos and trained our staff on how to use Simian, it was easy to take an additional step and tie Simian into our website. Now our end users and potential clients curious about our services can see our work samples in highly customized ways. If they only want to see work samples that relate to the automotive industry, or (for instance) comedy or kids, they can visit our website and find the exact lineup within seconds.

Bernadette Rivero - President