Video Marketing Secrets That 2x Customer Calls

This week, I sat down with Jared Petrie, who runs Treehouse Productions out of the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area. Jared started his career as a graphic designer, then found his way into photography, videography, digital advertising, and website management through what he calls a series of unique opportunities in the manufacturing space.

He spent over a decade moonlighting, applying what he learned at his corporate job during the day to freelance creative work at night, before eventually breaking away to build Treehouse full time. Today he works across industries from Ace Hardware and Delta Dental to a growing roster of home service clients, including a Milwaukee area handyman company he helped turn into the top rated handyman in the region.

We covered his tiered approach to video production, why user generated content often beats polished branding for home service companies, the channels beyond video worth paying attention to, and how he uses AI to speed up editing and pre-production without replacing the creative work itself.

The Key Takeaways

Below are the most essential insights from my conversation with Jared that you can apply to your home services business today.

1. From Graphic Design to Full Service Production, One Opportunity at a Time

Jared began his career as a graphic designer and, through unique opportunities in manufacturing, got exposed to photography, videography, digital advertising, and website management. He and his circle moonlighted on creative projects for over a decade before he broke away to build Treehouse Productions full time.

“I started my career as a graphic designer and then through some very unique opportunities, that was in the manufacturing space. But through all that I was just fortunate to have good work and good people that I was able to align myself with.”

— Jared Petrie

2. Turning a Milwaukee Handyman Into the Top Rated Company in the Region

One of Jared’s clients, a handyman company outside Milwaukee, wanted to automate his services rather than just hire more people. Jared helped build a content calendar, campaign structure, and autobooking feature, then implemented review software tied into the website that more than doubled the company’s Google reviews.

“We’re able to more than double his Google reviews. So now he’s the number one five star Google reviewed handyman in the greater Milwaukee area.”

— Jared Petrie

3. Three Tiers of Video, and Where Most Businesses Should Actually Live

Jared breaks video into A, B, and C level tiers based on what it takes to produce. A level is high production evergreen content done once or twice a year. B level, where he likes to live, is multi camera and multi light content produced every couple of days to a week. C level is when a team adopts brand standards for everyday content shot on phones or action cameras.

“B level is where I like to live. It’s multi camera, multi light. There’s going to be some branding in it, but it’s higher churn. Maybe within a couple days to a week, you’re getting these professional level videos.”

— Jared Petrie

4. Unpolished, User Generated Content Often Builds More Trust

Jared has been coaching a handyman client to embrace daily, in the field content rather than trying to polish everything up. Showing a rotten floor that needs replacing is not glamorous, but it builds the trust and validity that people searching for that exact service are looking for.

“It’s not the sexiest thing to look at a floor that maybe was rotten and needs to be swapped out. But people need to know you’re building trust and validity through visual graphics, whether that’s video or photos.”

— Jared Petrie

5. Pinterest Drove 30 Percent of Home Depot’s Growth in One Category

While working with Home Depot’s plumbing division on a water mitigation smart home device, Jared learned that Pinterest, where women who often make home purchasing decisions dominate the demographic, along with digital radio, accounted for 30 percent of that category’s overall growth. He now points other clients toward channels beyond the typical Facebook approach when they are ready.

6. Growth Hacking Tools Make Content Creation Feel Achievable

When business owners tell Jared they are nervous on camera and do not know what to post, he sits down with them and shows the small business tools he relies on, from Canva to content scheduling platforms. The goal is not to memorize every tool, but to reassure them that creating content is doable and affordable, whether or not they end up hiring him.

“I want them to know that this is within your reach. And even if you want my help, I want you to use me because I’m the right fit, not because I’m locking you into some greater system that a lot of larger agencies typically do.”

— Jared Petrie

7. AI Speeds Up Editing and Pre-Production, Not the Creative Work Itself

Jared uses AI powered extensions in Premiere and DaVinci Resolve to automatically line up visual and audio clips, saving time that used to be spent manually syncing footage. He also uses AI tools alongside research on competitors and search terms to build rough scripts and storyboards quickly, so he can pitch ideas and get client sign off before ever picking up a camera.

“It’s not replacing ultimately what we’re going to polish up ourselves, but if I can shorten that window and get ideas to people and get them out of our heads and accurate on paper as quick as possible, we can get to filming and editing quicker.”

— Jared Petrie

Looking Ahead

Jared believes the next big shift is what he calls SXO, a hybrid of search engine optimization and user experience. Ranking well and driving traffic matters less if visitors bounce right off the page, so he is spending more time helping clients build content and site experiences that actually keep people around once they land, not just get them there.

“How do you cut through that noise and that distraction and build meaningful content that are actually solutions, proving that you’re a trusted authority in that space? So SXO is probably going to be a rising trend that people put more time and energy into.”

— Jared Petrie