In 2022, social media marketing is a must-do for modern businesses. It’s one of the easiest ways to communicate directly with your target audience and it builds brand loyalty in a way that other channels can’t. In fact, customers who engage with a business on social media spend up to 40% more with them in the long term, and 93% of brands have gained a new customer due to a video on social media!
Benefits of Creating Videos for Social Media
The amount of online video content has doubled since 2018, and it’s only continuing to rise. Consumers want quick and concise information, so when you’re trying to stand out against competitors online, you need a format that’s interesting and easy to digest. By posting and sharing video content on your social media channels, you can:
Build brand awareness
Posting regular content builds trust among your audience, increases the legitimacy of your brand and ensures that you will remain front of mind when users are in-market for your products and services.
Increase understanding of your products
Video is fast becoming the most popular format for social media marketing, and for good reason. 90% of consumers say they find video helpful, and 94% of marketers say it’s helped customers understand their product or service. Use video content to highlight the best parts of your products and services, and show viewers how they work.
Generate leads and sales
For both paid and organic content, video drives more engagements, traffic, and conversions than static images or blog posts. In fact, 80% of marketers claim that video has directly increased sales.
Social Media Video Ideas
Social media videos can be almost any length and contain almost any kind of content. Video is one of the best ways to display your brand’s products, services, and expertise, and it’s a great opportunity to get creative!
Consider the kind of content that your audience would want to watch even if it wasn’t related to your brand. Whether it’s informative, like a quickfire Q&A or an industry expert explaining a complex topic, inspirational, like human stories, motivational speeches, or talks on thought leadership, or purely entertaining, like this #satisfying TikTok powerwasher, your video content should offer some value to the viewer.
If you’re still not sure what kind of social media video content to produce for your business, here are a few ideas to get you started:
Product/Project Showcase
Use video clips to highlight the best features of your products, or create time-lapse videos or before-and-after compilations to showcase large projects and achievements.
How-Tos & Explainers
Create content that shows how to use your product in interesting ways, for example, recipes or craft ideas, or educational videos that explain current topics. Invite expert team members to discuss new technology and answer frequently asked questions about your product or industry.
Client Testimonial
Use real-life stories and statements to show how your business helped someone, solved an issue, or made a difference.
Event Promotion
Create a trailer to generate excitement about an upcoming event such as a conference, webinar, awards night, or party. Share highlights from previous events, demonstrate your company culture and use the opportunity to promote other businesses you work with.
Thought Leadership
Many businesses now stream events such as announcements, webinars, and interviews using live video features on Facebook Live, LinkedIn, and other platforms. Hosting regular professional live video events can help establish a brand as an industry thought leader as well as allow the opportunity to share knowledge and answer questions in real-time through live interaction.
Social Media Video Formats
When using social media, it’s important to consider what kind of content your audience is searching for. Each platform is unique, so what works for one won’t necessarily work for another.
For TikTok or Snapchat, short videos are the way to go, whereas users on Facebook are more likely to watch longer-form content. How-tos are the most popular form of content on Instagram, but B2B audiences on LinkedIn may be more interested in presentations or case studies.
As the most visited website on the internet, it can be hard to get noticed on YouTube if your target audience is not already subscribed to your channel. However, it’s great for longer-form content, and once uploaded, it’s easy to share and promote on other platforms such as Facebook or LinkedIn.
Social Media Video Specs
Each social media platform has different formats and there are unique uses and specifications for each. For example, YouTube content is now watched broadly on TV as well as desktop and mobile, but almost 80% of users only access Facebook on mobile devices, so portrait video is often better-performing than landscape when viewed on social media platforms.
Many videos can be shared across platforms or edited, but taking the time to check the requirements beforehand will ensure that your videos are optimised for viewing from the beginning.
Here are the specs for the most common video formats for each social media platform:
Dimensions: 1280×720
Aspect Ratio: 9:16 (portrait), 16:9 (landscape)
Dimensions: 1080×1080 (minimum)
Aspect Ratio: 16:9 (landscape), 4:5 (portrait), 1:1 (square), 9:16 (Instagram Stories and Reels)
Dimensions: 1280×720 (landscape), 720×1280 (portrait), 720×720 (square)
Aspect Ratio: 16:9 (landscape or portrait), 1:1 (square)
Snapchat
Dimensions: 1080×1920
Aspect Ratio: 9:16
TikTok
Dimensions: 1080×1920
Aspect Ratio: 9:16
Dimensions: 360×360 (minimum) to 1920×1920 (maximum)
Aspect Ratio: 1:2.4 to 2.4:1.
YouTube
Dimensions: 426×240, 640×360, 854×480, 1280×720, 1920×1080, 2560×1440, 3840×2160
Aspect Ratio: 16:9
How to Create Engaging Social Media Videos
Video content immediately grabs the viewer’s attention, but in order to keep it for more than a few seconds, it must remain engaging by providing relevant and valuable information that’s presented in an interesting way. In order to make your social media content more watchable, consider:
Entertainment
It sounds obvious, but more entertaining content is more likely to be shared by users. Focus on interesting, upbeat topics, and get creative with your storytelling. Don’t be afraid to comment on and share others’ content in addition to promoting your own!
Engagement
If you want viewers to engage with your content, respond, and give feedback, use formats that encourage interaction, like adding a poll to Instagram Stories, or asking users to comment and share their experiences.
Subtitles
Although voiceover can be effective in explainer videos, most users prefer videos with subtitles than voiceover alone, as social media video content is often watched without volume.
Repurposing Content
You can use cut-down versions to promote longer-form content, for example, post a short trailer on TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram Reels, or YouTube Shorts, and link to the longer version of the video for those who are interested.
Steps for Creating a Successful Social Media Marketing Strategy
The goal of marketing is to grow and scale your business by promoting your products and services. Social media marketing is just one aspect of this, so before you begin creating any social media content, it’s important to develop a media plan and consider how this fits into your overall marketing strategy.
- Define your goals
Whether your goal is improved brand awareness, more website traffic, or increased sales, understanding your goals is key as it will define not only the kind of content you should produce, but the amount, schedule, and how it is distributed.
- Choose your channels (carefully)
You don’t need to create a profile on every single platform or update 10 times a day! In fact, that’s more likely to annoy your customers than engage them.
Focus on quality rather than quantity and think carefully about your messaging – Instagram videos might be great for a restaurant or fashion boutique with amazing visual content, but it may not be the right platform for a professional services company.
- Measure performance (and adjust accordingly)
The way you measure the success of your social media content will differ depending on your goals. Make sure you are tracking the key performance indicators such as views, shares, clicks, and reactions and analyse your content for insights.
Do videos with more text perform better than those with less? Maybe mobile placements work best for your brand? Perhaps Facebook drives a lot of traffic to your website, but most of your qualified leads actually come from LinkedIn? Test these theories, monitor results, and use your learnings to improve your future content strategy.
Final thoughts
Although it’s a bigger investment of time and budget, video has been proven to be one of the most effective formats for social media marketing. Well-produced video content is more informative, engaging, and memorable to the viewer, and achieves better awareness, traffic, and conversions for the brand.
Simply put, it drives business results.
Many consumers now expect brands to be active on social media, and in 2022, there’s no excuse not to be, so if you’re on the fence about Facebook or lukewarm about LinkedIn, it’s time to get into gear and start creating content!
Hire a Professional Video Production Company
With the amount of video content we watch constantly increasing, those who invest in high-quality video production now are sure to stay ahead of the competition.
At Inspireworks, we’re passionate about creating video content that grabs attention, tells engaging stories, and inspires viewers, all whilst looking great.
If you’re ready to create social media videos that accomplish your marketing goals, contact us today.