By Sophie Barrington
Founder, Archer Creative
More than five billion videos are watched on YouTube daily. In fact, YouTube falls directly behind Google as the world’s second most popular search engine. It’s clear your customers love consuming video content. But, how do you make your videos stand out and be seen?
In 2015, Microsoft caused quite the stir when it claimed the average adult attention span has dwindled to just eight seconds online.
Regardless of whether you agree with this statistic or not, the rapid growth of video content is making video marketing more promising — and challenging — than ever.
When used well, the remarkable nature of video to capture attention, engage audiences and direct action makes it a worthy component of your marketing mix.
However, as video content continues to explode online and attention spans seemingly plummet, the challenge isn’t gaining, but holding, the attention of your viewers.
I want to share with you three ways to do just that.
1. Video Length
First, you need to consider the platform you’re using to promote your video, such as Facebook, and what your customers are doing on that platform. Getting your video length right is key to gaining views.
How many times have you clicked on a video, only to be turned off by its excessive length? Just like you, a Twitter user will be far less impressed with a lengthy two minute video than someone on YouTube. Each social media platform has an ideal video length.
- Instagram: 30 seconds
- Twitter: 45 seconds
- Facebook: 1 minute
- YouTube: 2 minutes
2. Video Display
On these same platforms, there are a number of best practices you can implement to help improve the performance of your video. High completion and high conversion rates are two indicators of success.
On Facebook, for instance, sound is automatically switched off until a user manually turns it back on. Adding captions has been shown to increase video views by up to 40%. But, that’s not all you can do to attract viewers.
- When uploading your video, select an appealing thumbnail. This static image, pulled from your video, can greatly enhance its appearance in the news feed and entice more viewers to click.
- Prior to publishing your video, research keywords your customers are using to find products or services like yours. These keywords can then be added to your video title and description.
3. Video Performance
While organic and paid views are important, the true measure of a video’s success is in driving action. Every video you create should have one core purpose, communicated by a call to action.
Do you want to sell your product, build your email list or drive traffic to your blog? This call to action — or CTA — should be stated within your video and shown visually in two ways. First, within the video description and second, by employing text overlay.
This CTA informs your viewers what to do next. By focusing on only one CTA you not only measure the performance of your video, but also remain on point in its delivery. The best videos entertain, educate and empower your audience to encourage conversions.
Looking for some outside support? Don’t wait for success, create it — with the experts in equine marketing, Archer Creative. To learn more about how we can help you exceed your growth goals in 2018, call us on 1300 077 126 or visit www.archercreative.net.au.
