How to Produce a Product Explainer Using Existing Footage + Separate SME Narration
This training walks through a two-track production model for creating product explainer videos using existing footage and separate SME narration. Learn to tag clips, write edit briefs, and save reusable production templates.
Transcript
Hey. What's going on folks? It's Daniel Litwin, voice of b two b. I'm here to give you some quick tips on how you can produce product explainer content by leveraging either existing footage of your products or very low barrier to entry, new footage of your products, as well as subject matter expertise, narration. So a lot of times folks think that if you wanna launch a product explainer video, you gotta go, you know, all the way to the mountaintop. It's gotta be the most cinematic, the most engaging. But at the same time, a lot of folks tend to opt for things like AI narration or text on screen to do the explaining around your product for you. Right? Both of these decisions are just getting in the way of your video getting done and even being received effectively by your audience. I'm here to tell you that you can simplify things, leverage visuals you already have as well as easy to capture visuals with your mobile phone, And then the narration and expertise of a real internal expert, even the face right on cam SME to help make these product explainers punchier and more effective at communicating the basics of your product to your customer. So let me break my tips and tricks down here for you guys so that you can put this to work. So first things first, right? You likely already have a lot of compelling footage of your products somewhere on the shelf. You may have invested in the past in a big visual production to capture footage. You may have sales guys or marketing folks on your team that have captured visuals of that product at the trade show booth, in your showroom. Maybe there's screen shares of your product if it's a SaaS platform. Regardless, you probably already have some compelling footage of your stuff. Right? Again, raw test clips, install footage, product demos. The issue is that you just haven't done anything with them yet, or the current format they're existing in just isn't a simple product explainer. They're in a big montage or a big trade show video, or they're in some kind of customer webinar or even a customer call that you've yet to put to work. And there's no voice to it yet. There's no narrative. There's no expert. There's no human humanizing this product for your audience. So try to identify where is that compelling footage. Does it exist already? If not, try to find simple ways to capture quick new footage leveraging your mobile phone or the mobile phone lens of someone on your team, maybe a salesperson that can actually go out into the field and get some of these visuals. Next, you want to try to tackle this in a two track way. That way you don't hold up or bottleneck the process. So first thing is you wanna try to upload existing footage or some easy to capture new footage as the visual layer of your video. That can be something you upload directly into market scale as a set of clips, Right? Clip bulk upload. You could also request this content from someone else if someone else has it has that content laying around leveraging the request tool. Right? Then you wanna get the SME narration, the face to camera, voice to cam captured separately. That way it can be captured at the pace of the creator. You could build a request for this, or you could invite them into the platform and have them record direct to camera using the record tool, which is actually what I'm using to record this video right now. If you need to send a request for either the clips or for the narration, make it simple. Build a request in the platform and ask something like, hey, in sixty seconds, answer this question. What problem does this product solve? Who is it for? And walk through the basics of how it works. That might need to be two sixty second questions. Right? But you want to make it simple, you want to make it targeted and you want to make it easy for the person giving their insights to not have to just kind of brainstorm on the fly how to talk about the product. Give them the guardrails in the form of a question or direction that helps them better explain what they need to to make it an effective product explainer. So let me show you how you can do this, right? Again, if you are a creator and or you're inviting a new creator, right, to do some of this stuff proactively, the SME can just click on the record button and can build a recording room and record themselves directly into market scale. Right? This is something that I'm using literally right now for this video I'm recording. Right? You can build a recording room like this, customize it here, and dive in and record. Now if you are uploading clips yourself, if you have a lot of the visuals already, maybe on an asset management website or platform, or you've got clips on your phone you want to leverage for this product explainer. Be proactive. Go here and click upload and just upload these clips in a bulk upload, right? Get all those clips bulked together here rather than uploading one clip at a time. Now, if you need to request content from someone else, either for those visual clips for the product explainer or for the hosted SME portion, again, you can go to request here and formalize that ask. So let's hit create here and then check it out. You can type in some questions here, much like the one that I was just posing, right? Let's literally copy this in. Right? You could then ask someone to either upload the content or record a video, build this, turn it into a link, and then send it to the participant who asked to dive in. Easy enough. So that's how you start to get the ball moving on the moving pieces. Once you have these clips, right, you've got one upload or collection of clips that is the visuals, and then you've got one new recording or request of the talk track, the SME. You now wanna bulk them together into the same folder so that you can launch an edit request within the folder view, combining these different uploads and turning these different uploads into one video project for the editor. So the best way to do this is again, categorize content with folders, right? So you can find your folders here, also here, but let me just give you an example by clicking into this existing folder. So this is a generic folder, right, where I'm gonna find random uploads. Check out all these different uploads. Imagine these as different uploads that you did. Right? Maybe this is the talk track here, and maybe this is the b roll, right, of the clips for the product explainer. So now I could click this button right here, request edit from folder, and check it out. Now I've got the edit request form that's gonna take these clips and bolt them together into one video project. Easy enough. Right? So this is how you can, again, get those two lanes moving separately, but still bring them together when needed so that you can drive home the edit you're looking for. Then as you're mapping out the editing brief, right, in that edit request form, you want to try to be specific with how you want these visuals used. A product explainer is usually pretty paced out, right? There is a logic to the talk track matching with specific visuals. So on that talk track, go into the proofing room, leave notes highlighting, hey, here I want to show this product in action. Or after this bit of narration, I want to see this kind of B roll. You don't need to storyboard the whole video, but I do recommend being intentional because product videos, they have a formula, right? So you wanna try to clarify that formula for the editor so that they know how you want that product presented, especially if this is an explainer that's gonna be deployed constantly. You want it to be thoughtful and done right. So do your part by filling out the edit request intentionally. There you have it, folks. That's how you can start to produce a product explainer video using footage you've already got on hand or quick to capture new footage with your mobile phone and a talk track from your subject matter expert. And if you need more help getting that SME camera comfortable or you need guidance on how to get new footage that shows off your product, well, know where to find us. We've got your back. We're your coaches and strategists, and here to level up your visuals and the confidence of your experts. That's what I've got for y'all today. Good luck out there. Can't wait to see those new and improved product explainers.
Overview
This video, led by Daniel Litwin, walks through a practical two-track production model for turning raw product footage — including test clips, install footage, and product demos — into finished explainer videos. It covers every step from organizing existing assets to writing a structured edit brief, and shows how to route both footage and narration into a shared production workflow. The session closes by demonstrating how to save the first approved video as a Saved Order, giving teams a repeatable template for every product variant that follows.
What Is This?
A two-track production model separates the visual asset track — existing product footage — from the audio track — SME narration recorded independently — and combines both through a structured edit brief that defines how the two elements intercut in the final video.
What You'll Learn
- Tag and organize existing product footage into clearly labeled folders for production use
- Send a focused SME narration Request that gives subject matter experts precise direction
- Route footage and narration tracks into a shared folder to streamline editor handoff
- Write an edit brief with explicit intercutting structure so editors have no ambiguity
- Save a finished, approved video as a Saved Order to create a reusable production template
- Apply the same workflow to multiple product variants without rebuilding from scratch
Key Insights
- Organizing footage before production begins eliminates delays and prevents editors from working with unlabeled or redundant clips.
- A focused SME narration Request — rather than an open-ended one — produces tighter audio that matches the pacing of existing visual assets.
- A written edit brief with explicit intercutting instructions removes guesswork and reduces revision cycles.
- Saving the first approved video as a Saved Order turns a one-time production into a scalable template for the entire product line.
Deep Dive
One of the most common inefficiencies in B2B video production is treating each product explainer as a net-new project, even when the underlying assets — product footage, demo clips, install recordings — already exist. The two-track production model taught in this video addresses that problem directly by separating the workflow into two parallel streams that converge at the edit stage.
The first track is visual. Before any narration is recorded or any edit is started, existing footage needs to be reviewed, tagged, and organized into clearly labeled folders. This step sounds administrative, but it is foundational. An editor working from a well-tagged folder library can move efficiently. An editor working from a disorganized drive cannot.
The second track is audio. Rather than scheduling a full interview or leaving SME guidance open-ended, this model uses a focused narration Request — a brief that tells the subject matter expert exactly what to cover, in what order, and roughly how long each section should run. That specificity produces narration that actually fits the footage, rather than narration that has to be cut down or padded to match visuals.
Once both tracks are complete and routed into a shared folder, the edit brief becomes the critical document. A strong edit brief does not just describe the video — it specifies the intercutting structure, flagging which narration segments pair with which footage clips. This level of detail reduces back-and-forth between editors and stakeholders significantly.
Finally, saving the approved output as a Saved Order means the production logic — the folder structure, the brief format, the intercutting pattern — is preserved and reusable. Every subsequent product variant starts from a proven foundation rather than a blank page.
Frequently Asked Questions
What types of existing footage work best for this production model?
Test clips, installation footage, and live product demos are all well-suited to this workflow because they show the product in real operating conditions. The key requirement is that footage is tagged and organized before production begins, so editors can locate and sequence clips efficiently.
How detailed does an SME narration Request need to be?
It should be specific enough that the SME knows exactly what to cover and in what order, with a rough sense of timing for each section. An open-ended Request tends to produce narration that is too long or structured in a way that does not match the visual assets already in hand.
What is a Saved Order and why does it matter for product teams?
A Saved Order is a preserved record of a completed, approved video production — including its structure, brief format, and asset organization. It functions as a reusable template, so teams producing explainers for multiple product variants can replicate the same workflow without starting over each time.
Related Topics
Teams who find this workflow useful should also explore how to write effective video briefs for recurring content formats, since brief quality directly affects edit efficiency across all production types. Understanding how to structure SME interview Requests more broadly — beyond narration-only use cases — is another adjacent skill worth developing. Building a consistent folder taxonomy for media assets is a foundational practice that supports this model and scales across an entire content operation.
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