Video is a powerful storytelling medium. Just ask Thomas Clifford, who has been using video for many years to tell some great stories. Many of them might have seemed dull or unclear at the outset, but video and smart storytelling can work real magic.

We’re seeing quite a few startups use video prominently on their website as a quick and very helpful way to show off their products. This makes a lot of sense; not because what they’ve built is necessarily complicated or difficult to understand, but because visuals are almost always more compelling and interesting than text. I can read five bullet points that speak to your value proposition, or you can just show me.

Short videos also force you to think creatively and distill your value proposition down to its very essence. You don’t want to ramble in a video; it looks a lot worse than rambling in text. So you have to put considerable effort and thought into what story you want to tell and how. And why you’re telling it.

Video = good. There, simple.

Now for a more personal connection to the power of video and storytelling. Stresslimitdesign was engaged by Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) to produce a short video about greening corporate fleets. Pardon? Greening corporate what exactly? You want to paint my feet green? Not feet – fleet. Cars. Lots and lots and lots of cards. Corporate fleets are big in the US. There are millions of corporate fleet cars. And they create a lot of pollution. EDF wanted to promote the importance of making corporate fleets a bit more environmentally friendly. This isn’t about a couple kids with Methos and bottle of soda. This isn’t some chubby Star Wars fanatic swinging around a light saber. It’s a serious topic, difficult to promote and get people excited about.

Stresslimitdesign took on the challenge and put an immense amount of work into creating the video you see embedded below. Soon we’ll be releasing a “How To” micro-site that walks through how the video was created. But what makes this video particularly cool (at least for me) is that I did the voice over! That’s right … click the play button on the video and you’ll get a chance to hear yours truly. I used the best “announcer voice” I could muster. It took about 2 hours to get right. I hope you enjoy it!

Please do me a huge favor and help spread this video around. It’s important to get the message out there, and everyone deserves to hear me, right? *smile*