Cleaver Creative

21/05/2026

Messy Zoom background? Not anymore!

Upgrade to a professional backdrop with your logo — delivered in 48 hours.

Level up your video calls today!

Whether it’s a cluttered office, a hotel room while traveling, unexpected distractions, or a generic stock image - your background effects how you're perceived.

19/03/2024

Stress and creativity don't get along.

Stress pushes us into convergent thinking — focusing on 1 quick solution.

Divergent thinking pursues many possible solutions to 1 problem.

When stressed, our brains want to get to a quick easy fix, hindering our abilities to the infinite possibilities available.

And we've all likely learned it the hard way. Stress hinders creativity! I often tell my team we cannot do great creative work when we're stressed.

But this also pertains now to collaborating with clients on their own content development.

Knowing when you're likely to get your best ideas for vlogs, articles, and content is key to tapping into your creativity. So understand when you're at your lowest stress levels and leverage it for great creative work!

Want to know more from the National Library of Medicine?

- Stress is usually accompanied by a higher negative effect which prompts individuals to apply more analytical strategies to facilitate convergent thinking.
- We all experience it. According to the PubMed database, 75% of doctor visits could be linked to stress.
- There's a difference between feeling challenged (eustress) and feeling overwhelmed (distress). Eustress can be motivating, while distress hinders creativity.

When do you have your best ideas? What helps you overcome creative blocks?



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05/03/2024

Here are some areas where Adobe Express might be considered advantageous over Canva:

1. Generative AI - Create from your imagination.
Adobe Express leverages Adobe Firefly generative AI which can create some incredible results. Canva also offers generative AI but through DALL-E by OpenAI and Imagen by Google Cloud. Each has it’s advantages but if you haven’t tried Adobe Firefly yet, check it out and see how it stacks up for your needs.

2. Stock Photos and Videos:
Wider Selection: Adobe Express offers access to millions of royalty-free photos and videos through Adobe Stock, compared to Canva's smaller library.
Higher Quality: Adobe Stock generally features a higher quality selection of images and videos due to its stricter curation process.

3. Fonts and Typography Tools:
More Font Options: Adobe Express provides access to a significantly larger library of fonts (over 20,000) compared to Canva's (around 2,000).
Advanced Typography Features: Adobe Express offers more advanced typography tools for precise control over font styles, sizes, and spacing, which may appeal to design professionals.

4. Integration with Adobe Ecosystem:
Seamless Integration: Adobe Express integrates seamlessly with other Adobe applications like Photoshop and Premiere Pro, allowing for easy transfer of projects and assets.

5. Specific Features:
Enhanced Video Editing: Adobe Express offers slightly more advanced video editing features like motion graphics and animation tools, which might be appealing for creating more complex videos.

And finally, Content Scheduling! Adobe Express allows scheduling social media content directly to platforms like Facebook and Instagram, while Canva requires linking a third-party tool for this functionality.



Which are you in, team Canva or Express?

20/02/2024

We should still be talking more about this video than Apple’s Vision Pro.

In December, Google released Gemini which was a major upgrade to Google Bard.

It outperformed Chat GPT-4 in almost all the benchmarks but even more impressive was the video Google released showing its multi-modal abilities.

In the video, Gemini recognized a 2d and 3d blue duck, invented a game with a map, and accurately played the cup game, and rock, paper, scissors.

People reacted in a couple of ways.

1. So what? A computer can play the cup game. Big deal.
2. How does this help me?
3. They faked the video by feeding it images and prompts rather than a video feed as it implies!
4. This is really amazing.

While number 3 is true (they disclaim it at the opening of the video) I’m firmly in the the fourth camp on this. The visual input and interactivity that will likely be incorporated shortly will be close to an AI assistant from the movie ‘Her’. This has huge implications for our work and life in general.

That said, I happened to watch this video back to back with a super-cut of all the Boston Dynamics robots which is admittedly pretty creepy.

Regardless of where you stand, AI is changing fast and it’s important to be up to date on the latest advances.

Has AI changed your work already? Do you see it changing in the future?

09/02/2024

I recently had someone in my network ask, should I cut this? ✂️

If the video still ’works’ without a clip or a scene, then yes!

If it still accomplishes the goals you set out for it, to:

Educate, Entertain or Inspire

and the video works just as well, cut that bad boy.

Ask yourself:

1. Does the story still make sense without it?

2. Does the video still flow without it?

3. Do I have the same feeling 😱😄😲 after I finish watching it?

If the answer to all 3 is yes, cut it!

The average watch time for online videos are:

47 seconds for an online video ad

and around 2.5 minutes for native videos.

For reference, here’s the average run time for a video on each platform next to the maximum run times available.

TikTok 7-15 seconds av. 3 minutes max

Instagram Reels 15-60 seconds av. 60 seconds max

Snapchat 7-10 seconds av. 10 seconds max

Twitter 44 seconds av. 2 minutes max

Instagram Feed 30-60 seconds av. 60 seconds max

Facebook Feed 1-2 minutes av. 1 hour max

YouTube 2-12 minutes av. 12 hours max

LinkedIn 30 seconds av. 10 minutes max

What's your rule of thumb for video length in a world of ever-shrinking attention spans?



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07/02/2024

Businesses go wrong creating generic avatars for their video content.

They’ll say, "Our customer avatar is 30-45 year old, makes $60k-$120k a year." and then wonder why their content doesn’t connect.

Vague descriptions lead to vague messaging, and ineffective results.

But here's the shortcut:

Think of a real person in your network.

Someone you know well.

It can be a current client or someone you’d like to work with.

Think about their job, their personality, their needs and motivations.

Talk directly to them in your video content.

Why does this work?

Even when the words are the same, your tone will change and people who are similar to that ‘avatar’ will connect more with your content.

But will we eliminate people unnecessarily?

No! HubSpot reports companies using buyer personas see 50% higher conversion rates. SmartBug says content aligned with customer avatars generated 70% more leads and Demand Gen Report says 90% of B2B buyers expect content tailored to their specific needs.

What’s your niche? Do you niche down more to sell more?



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16/01/2024

New Year, New Me

Well... kind of ~

The video below is not really me.

It's an avatar created with HeyGen.

Yes, it’s a little creepy but it also allows me to speak up to 49 languages!

Is it perfect? No.

But it's inevitable that technology will get better and better.

And in 6 months to a year, it will be harder to discern from a real recording.

In 5 years it will be nearly impossible to tell the difference.

But creativity and authenticity will be the hardest part for AI to imitate.

Before there was Photoshop, there was airbrushing and before that, with the advent of photography, capturing our images on film seemed like dark magic.

Innovation that feels a little scary now will be common-place before you know it, so try it for yourself and see what you think.

We’re currently testing intros for outgoing video messages and getting some great results with this. Now if it could help me brush up on my Italian :D

Are you ready to become fully digital?

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29/12/2023

Wishing you all a Happy Holidays! 🎄

BIG thanks to my team for their incredible work.

Jho, Archimedes, and our newest team member, Louie Mozar.

Thanks to our partners Walker Walmus, Shafay Arif, and Michael Luchies.

And a big shoutout to our amazing clients for all your work this year:

Kevin Peranio
Chalmers St. Consulting
Straza Consulting
Media InSite Caribbean
Rockstar Bingo, and
Krista Aders

2023 was wild. I settled in North Carolina after 14 months of traveling and working around the world.

We grew one of our client's revenue by 50% ARR.

We started a marketing partnership with another client to integrate their inbound/outbound messaging and started their online community.
We also did a LOT of tests this year in Google ads, Facebook ads, and LinkedIn messaging and there's a bunch more planned for next year.

Until then, I'm wishing everyone in my network safe and joyful holidays with your family and friends.

Please check out our website to learn more: https://www.cleavercreates.com

05/12/2023

Why don't we document our case studies?

Because sometimes we can't use them.

The problem we solve is potentially embarassing to the client or they just need to keep that story internal.

So we don't document it.

We invoice, take the win and move on.

If this sounds like you, STOP.

Put pen to paper and document the case study anyway! Even if you have nowhere to publish it yet.

With time, their opinion will likely change. And they may be comfortable with you sharing your case study at least as 1-on-1's. And, if you don't document it, you'll forget how powerful that work was.

What's your case study documentation process? Enquiring minds want to know!

Please check out our website to learn more: https://www.cleavercreates.com

21/11/2023

Early in 2020 I realized this new form of video production — coaching clients on how to create their own video content

- also had had big value for my personal life.

Specifically, interviewing my parents.

Since then, we meet monthly and record our calls and I’ve been asking them tons of questions about their lives.

With advances in transcription and AI clipping, we’ll turn this footage into a searchable library where future generations can ask their great-grandparents questions about their lives ala Christopher Reeves and Marlon Brando in Superman. (Shoutout to my fellow nerds)

You don’t have to go this far, but I highly recommend this exercise for at least one Zoom recording with your parents.

Get them on Zoom, ask them the important questions, and you will be amazed at the results.

Have you ever recorded an interview with your parents?

Please check out our website to learn more: https://www.cleavercreates.com