CEOs, managers, and financial advisory services have long used video (live stream or prerecorded) to connect with employees, share important information, or relay updates.
Now generative image AI tools can help us create an avatar, train software to mimic our voice, upload a script, and splice them all together for the final product.
Avatars can be customized to reflect your organization’s branding and convey a consistent tone.
And most importantly—they’re just a lot of fun.
Our CEO Josh played with some tools to see what the total time investment would be for a marketing team to trial an avatar video.
First: Find an AI tool for headshots
You can use Fotor (free), Leonardo (basic version is free) or Midjourney (which is now pay-to-play) for this step. This video shows how you can insert faces in Midjourney.
Some of these are close, and some are hilarious. Like a mashup of Lionel Messi and Gabriel Macht.
Second: Record voiceover or audio It’s possible to use a short audio clip to convert text to speech online for free with ElevenLabs’ AI voice generator.
Or, you can record a full voiceover for your video with a mic and some time.
This is the area most likely to humanize your video. The ElevenLabs’ voice generator does a pretty great job of mimicking (which makes me slightly nervous about what my kids are going to do with this tech in the future—excusing absences or car rentals in my name, who knows?).
Third: Use D-ID to animate
D-ID will take your generated images, and once you drop audio in, it’ll generate the video output.
You can tell here that every part is slightly off. It’s close, but not quite there. The teeth are a little horsey. There’s a divot in the forehead that looks like a hammer hit it. The smolder effect could be pulled back a smidge.
Josh’s total amount of time invested: About an hour. Not bad for a first try.
How you can use avatar videos in your marketing or communications
Avatar videos also offer flexibility in delivery, allowing leaders to reach remote or distributed teams seamlessly.
Through this approach, you can enhance communication channels, strengthen employee engagement, and cultivate a culture of transparency and collaboration within the organization.
Give it a shot and let us know how it goes!
