This one is going to hit a little hard… but, some of you, with some of these videos…
Stop spending so much time and effort throwing junk against the wall and crossing your fingers that something randomly sticks.
I am not the video expert guy. If you’re looking for someone to coach you on video production, Owen Hemsath of Acceleratus Media is your guy. If you’re looking for help crafting your content and telling your story, especially if you’re in the real estate industry, reach out to Chad Illa-Petersen, aka “The Story Catcher.” And, if you’re looking for help with a podcast, then Sebastian Rusk is your guy, and I happen to know for a fact that he’s looking for a few people that want to start a podcast. (and all 3 would be great speakers to have at your next event)
While I do not have the video expertise of the fellas mentioned above, I… well, I run a lot, I eat a lot of pizza, and I know things about marketing.
I do a bit of video marketing for my clients, and I have 15 years of experience in what works and what does not work on social media. And, a lot of you are spending a ton of your time doing things that don’t work.
There are a lot of places I can go with this blog post, but I am going to keep it simple and focus on a few things I keep seeing, and things in which you can quickly implement some changes to better maximize your video marketing time spent.
Keep in mind, the below advice is for businesses, or people growing their brand. In your own personal use of video, if you’re not trying to grow your brand or reach a specific audience, then just do you and have fun. (I hit the “have fun” part again at the end).
Don’t Blow it Early
I watched 5 straight videos on social media, from people looking to grow their brand, in which they blew it in the first 5-10 seconds.
The first 5-10 seconds of your video matters, it matters a lot. Look, your family, your best friend, your close co-workers, they’ll watch your full videos, no matter what. They’re doing it to support you. But, if you blow the first 5-10 seconds of your video, you’ll rarely ever reach anyone new.
No matter the social network, users are flooded with a feed full of new content to scroll through. The attention span for most social media users is very low, and you have limited time to grab their attention. In fact, most users will decide to pass by your video without even giving it one second. For the rest, the ones that do pause for a moment, you’ll have 5-10 seconds to capture their attention and get them interested enough to keep watching.
Don’t Start With an Introduction
Don’t start your video with an introduction. Your video needs to start with something that grabs the viewers interest. Too often, I see businesses and people trying to promote their personal brand start out with an introduction. If you do that, you lose almost any chance of getting anyone new to watch beyond those first few seconds.
The viewer does not care who you are unless you first give them a reason to watch the rest of your video. If you’re doing a longer form video, lead off with something attention grabbing. Then, if an introduction makes sense, get to the introduction. For a long form video, a professional introduction might make sense. For a reel or anything shorter than a few minutes, spending time on an introduction probably won’t make sense.
Short-Form Video and Reels
If you’re the only one in your video, don’t lead off with an introduction. It is like when someone leaves you a voice mail and gives you their phone number – you already have their phone number…phone numbers have been showing up on phones for 30 years. If you’re posting your Reel or video from your own account, they already know who it is from, and they can click on your profile if they need to know more about you, or you can have a call to action at the end. With short form video being, well, short, and typically posted in locations on social networks in which viewers have a shorter attention span, there is an ever more heightened importance to grab the viewers attention early.
For some good video tips, check out this blog by Kyle Spishock: “How to Create Engaging Video.”
Live Video
I watched three live videos today in which all three people started out with announcing that they are live, and then paused for a while before getting into a long introduction. Here is the problem with that: Most of your video views, even if you went live, will be people viewing the video after you were live. For them, you aren’t live. They’ll notice that it was a live video, but they aren’t going to sit around and wait a minute or two as you introduce the video and wait for a few people to join live.
Then, for those that are watching it live, they are aware that it is live, all video platforms tell them it is live – why spend your first 5-10 seconds, the time in which you need to be giving them a compelling reason to keep watching, on telling them that you’re live and waiting for people to start watching. Be prepared to lead with something to get their attention – from the moment you go live. Then, if the live calls for an introduction, or if you want to stall a bit for more people to start watching live (though I don’t recommend that), you can do that 1-2 minutes into the live.
Put some thought into how you will start your videos. Do something that will cause someone in your target audience that is scrolling their feed to pause and watch more of your video.
Know Your Target Audience
I see a lot of videos in which I have no idea who their target audience is or even what industry the person or business is in. And, in many of them, I get the feeling that they’ve not paused to think about who their target audience is for the video. Somewhere, at some point, someone told them that they just have to start posting video content, and they forged forward without any thought to who is their target audience.
Most of your videos should be made for your target audience. I say “most,” because I can see a strategy in which you occasionally post content that is for a broader audience beyond your target audience. But for the most part, with each video you produce, think about your target audience.
You want to think about if the content of the video itself will appeal to your target audience. You want to think about if the platforms that you’re posting your video to are platforms your target audience uses. You want the copy that goes with your video to be written for your target audience. And, if you run ads to promote the video, you want to tailor the ad audience to the people you want to target.
You’re not likely to hit the target if you don’t aim for it. Aim for your target audience.
Have a Goal for Your Video
Every video should have a purpose. So many of the videos I see serve no purpose.
Videos can have multiple purposes. Some videos might be just to entertain your target audience – but if so, it better be entertaining. Some videos might be to educate, and that is great, but go into it knowing the 1-2-3 things you want your target audience to learn from the video.
Most experts in the video marketing industry will tell you that you just need to get started and start putting content out there. That is true, but they don’t mean to just blindly post videos without any purpose. They’re saying that to take away some of the intimidation that creating videos might have, and to set the expectation that seeing any meaningful results from videos takes time and takes consistently creating quality content.
The purpose of your videos goes beyond just the video itself. Think about what the purpose is of the copy that you post along with the video. Think about the purpose of where and when you post the video. You don’t need to spend hours analyzing, but put some thought into it.
If you go in with no purpose, you’ll achieve the goal of accomplishing nothing. Have a purpose – make sure your video, to the best of your abilities, fulfills that purpose.
*Pro Tip: At the end of your video, especially if the video is more than 1-2 minutes, include a call to action at the end. If a viewer has watched your entire video, you’ve earned the right to request they take an action, be it to click a link, follow your page, or whatever step you desire them to take. Analyzing how many people take the action is a good way to evaluate the effectiveness of your video.
Don’t Waste Too Much Time on the Cute Stuff
This one hurts my heart. I see a lot of businesses, and some of my friends, that will spend so much time editing a video, adding in music, finding all the right emojis to use in there copy, and they post video after video, week after week, year after year, and never get results. Their audience does not grow much, their engagement does not grow, and they see no tangible benefits.
I love when people put in the work, and I admire people that care enough to focus on the small things, and it hurts to see when they don’t get results.
The cute stuff can be the small things that make a big difference, but if your foundation is not strong, these small things have nothing to build off of. Once you have the big things dialed in, you can start playing with the small things and A/B test for what moves the needle for you.
Have Fun
OK, so not everything needs to be fun. But, if producing video is not fun, if you hate to be on camera, or hate creating content, you don’t have to! Now, if you’re the best person in your company to do it, or your self employed and handling all your own marketing, and the thing holding you back is just a bit of fear, then, I’d encourage you to give it a try. There is no shortage of people who were a bit fearful of starting some video marketing, and ended up having tremendous success. But, if you try it, if you give it an honest effort, and it is still not for you, then stop. Life is too short to spend time at something you don’t enjoy when there are other alternatives that you might enjoy that can accomplish the same goal.
There are a lot of ways to market a company or build your personal brand. If you’re going to be someone that is spending a good amount of time doing the work, you’re going to get better results doing something that you enjoy, or in the least, something you do not despise.
For me, I like writing. So, blogging is a marketing medium I look to utilize, and I am going to start writing a few blogs like this each week. I am also fairly quick witted and enjoy dropping funny one-liners, so proactively engaging with other people or other businesses content is a good way for me to initiate a connection and grow a relationship. I am decent with video, but all the little details of it don’t interest me much, so I gravitate towards the things that interest me and that I enjoy more.
If producing videos, or being in videos, is something you enjoy, and if it can benefit your brand or your business, then dive in. Dive in with purpose. Consider contacting one of the people I mentioned above to help get you started. But, if video isn’t your thing, outsource it and focus on the things that interest you more or that will produce a better return on your time.
Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Pizza 