Six Powerful Ways to Create Engaging Video Content for Social Media

You’ve surely noticed it — the fast-growing rise of video content produced by all of your favorite brands and websites.

Video content is becoming more and more important to social algorithms, which is why engaging video content, should be an important aspect of your content marketing strategy.

But don’t just take my word for it! A huge 78% of marketers say video content gives them a good ROI. Here’s why. Because it:

• Builds brand awareness
• Helps connect with your customers
• And gives you more conversions

That’s not all, either.

While long-form written content is great for deep-diving into a subject and increasing search relevance, video marketing is an effective method to establish a connection. People can put a face to your brand, rather than a nameless, faceless bunch of text on a company-branded website.

Think about your own browsing habits. How often are you compelled to watch a video, even if you had no intention of doing so from the get-go? Ever load up a fun, quirky, yet informational video while you sit back and snack, or take a quick break from work?

The average person watches more than an hour and a half of online video content per day. So it makes sense to position yourself in front of these people in the one place they’re prone to visiting almost-hourly: social media, by utilizing social video.

What Are The Benefits of Creating Video Content for Social Media

Your content strategy is lacking without making use of video content.

Why? Well, as I mentioned earlier, video is an effective way to establish and build brand awareness, engage with your audience, and convert viewers into leads or sales.

Video Builds Brand Awareness

Much of the content you produce is likely published in one location. Written content (such as blog posts) are critical to your marketing strategy, but they often appeal only to a defined subset of your ideal audience.

Chances are that you share your written content across various social media channels. The unfortunate downside, however, is that written content isn’t shared in its entirety. Snippets from a blog post make great tweets and Facebook teasers, but you’re really trying to generate a click-through to your full post.

However, video content is more interchangeable across platforms. A video uploaded on YouTube can be watched by viewers who have never even visited YouTube in their lives. It can be embedded on one of your website pages, linked (and played) natively in a social media post, and easily shared by any number of viewers.

Video content isn’t only easy to share, but it’s easy to consume.

If you’ve ever searched for a “how-to” guide, you likely found it easier to follow along with instructions via video than text.

You can appeal to specific segments of your audience who wouldn’t otherwise relate to your brand. Tapping into those who are averse to reading, but not watching, can bring awareness of your brand to a group of people you weren’t previously reaching.

Videos appeal to the different learning styles and content preferences of your wide and diverse audience. Because of this, video marketers have realized a 54% increase in brand awareness.

Further Reading: How to Make Your First TikTok Video: For Newbies Only!

Videos Boost Conversions

No matter how much personality you infuse into your writing, it’s a different experience than watching you speak and present the same words and ideas.

Humans are visual creatures; that’s a given. Watching a video is similar, in a way, to have a friendly conversation. Visual cues and nuances boost your trustworthiness and help viewers to relate to you.

What’s that mean for your brand?

An increase in conversions, that’s what!

Video is more personal than text. Would-be customers get a glimpse of who you are — they can put a face to your brand; it’s easier for your audience to relate to you. That increases their level of trust, which results in a higher likelihood they will convert to a lead or sale.

Don’t believe me?

Consider this – After watching a brand’s video, 81% of people are convinced to buy a product or service.

Video Content Helps Organic SEO

Though you may initially think otherwise, creating and sharing video content has a positive impact on your organic SEO.

Search engines, such as Google, assume your content is more relevant to a user’s search when you’ve embedded video content onto your website. In fact, you’re 53 times more likely to show up first on Google if your website makes use of embedded videos.

…And that’s not counting the ease in which visitors can be driven to your website. How often have you been sent a link to a useful or funny video, only to follow up by visiting the creator’s website in search of more?

Video also boosts organic SEO because it can increase time on site, which is proven to be a factor which affects Google rankings:

In short: if you create video content worth sharing — content that is engaging — there is a good chance you can get your content shared across social media channels as well.

6 Popular Types of Engaging Video Content for Social Media — And How to Create It

One of the challenges of creating a video for social media is knowing what types of video content are effective. Another is how do we go about creating them assuming we can handle the technical details.

Let’s look at 6 proven yet popular types of video content and how you might create content around them.

1. Live Video

Live streaming is a rapidly-growing means of producing video content. It’s fun, interactive, and oftentimes “raw” — giving viewers an inside look at your brand.

Nearly all major social media platforms have implemented a means to produce live video: Instagram, Facebook, Youtube, Twitch… the list goes on and on.

80% of audiences would rather watch live video from a brand than read a blog, but which types of content lend themselves to live video?

• Webinars
• Seminars
• Live training
• Interviews and Q&As
• Product introductions
• Tours
• And sneak peeks

Take a look at Experian’s live weekly #CreditChat stream on Periscope. The #CreditChat live stream is a way for Experian to talk about topics that are relevant to its audience. Moreover, Experian encourages its audience to engage with the stream live via social media.

Past chats are archived to create a wealth of useful evergreen content — all of which increase Experian’s SEO.

Creating Engaging Live Video Content

Facebook offers a set of tips and tricks for creating live content, which are applicable across the spectrum of broadcast platforms:

1. Tell your audience ahead of time when you’ll be going live.
2. Go live only when you have a strong internet connection.
3. Write an informative, catchy description of what your broadcast’s about.
4. Ask your audience to subscribe to your stream or turn on broadcast notifications.
5. Greet and interact with individual viewers.
6. Stream for longer periods of time.
7. Wrap up your broadcast with a definitive close.
8. Go live often, and mix up your types of broadcasts.

Creating live video boils down to one simple rule: be genuine.

Provide live content that your audience cares about, and show them that you care about them.

Engage with them, respond to feedback, and accept that live content doesn’t have to be perfect — it just has to be interesting.

Further Reading: Livestreaming Changes Everything

2. Tutorials

Have you ever tried cooking with a written or printed recipe? If you’re anything like me, the instructions often get stained or lost. If not, it’s still a hassle to track each step while mixing ingredients, timing everything, and remembering how long everything needs to cook.

Compare that to a video tutorial which not only speaks to you but shows you what you’re supposed to do step-by-step. There’s a wealth of online tutorials to do everything from baking a cake to rebuilding a car engine.

Tutorial videos are one of the three most-effective types of video content. They’re a great way to create value for your readers by capitalizing on your industry expertise to teach and transfer some skills.

Take a look at this tutorial by Jamie Oliver. It’s exceptionally helpful and relevant to their audience:

How to Create Tutorial Videos

There are three key steps to creating engaging and useful tutorial videos:

1. Prepare by writing a video script and practicing your presentation.
2. Identify the video’s purpose and stick to it.
3. Be genuine, and convey personality.

A well-made tutorial can serve as evergreen content that your audience repeatedly turns to. Even after someone’s consumed the content to solve their own issue, tutorials are easily shared among a viewer’s network.

You could use a tweet or message like – “Hey, I know you were planning on repainting your kitchen cabinets. I used this video when I did mine. Hope it helps!”

Effective, right?

Further Reading: How-To Videos: 9 Practical Tips to Create 7 Different Types for Your Business

3. Behind-the-Scenes Video Content

We humans are curious creatures. We love knowing how things work, including our favorite brands. There’s something to be said for bearing witness to the “magic” happening.

Behind-the-scenes content is an ideal way to show your audience what goes on, well…behind the scenes, of course. It’s the type of content where you pull back the curtain and show everyone the team behind your product or service, and exactly how much work goes into producing something of quality.

I’ve repeatedly mentioned how video content builds trust in your brand. Creating a behind-the-scenes video is an ideal way to humanize your company by showing off your company culture, creative process, “bloopers,” and highlighting the personalities that make your brand your brand.

Look at how behind-the-scenes footage helped a winery stand out:

What similar sort of content can your brand produce to relate to your audience, or stand out from your competition?

How to Create Effective Behind-the-Scenes Videos

Here are five ideas to consider when creating your brand’s behind-the-scenes content:

1. Put a spotlight on your team, customers, or audience — create a human connection.
2. Give your audience a look at aspects of your brand’s unique history and traditions.
3. Showcase your products or services, and use the opportunity to request feedback and ideas.
4. Create a teaser for a new product or service.
5. Dedicate a specific social media channel to exclusive behind-the-scenes content.

Further Reading: 15 Killer Video Marketing Tips to Succeed in 2024

4. Explainer Videos

What does your product or service do? What pain-points does it solve for your intended audience? How does it help them, and why should they fork over their hard-earned cash in exchange for it?

We’ve already established that people are more likely to buy a product or service after watching a video about it — especially when compared to reading about it.

An explainer video is a short video for you to describe your brand, your product, or your service. It’s a way to connect with your audience and give them an idea of what it is you do.

Take a look at this explainer video from Dollar Shave Club:

Within the first few seconds, Mike, the founder of Dollar Shave Club, explains exactly what the company is and what it does — and what value it brings to the brand’s audience.

Tips for Creating an Explainer Video

The key to creating a useful explainer video is to explain your product or service simply and succinctly. The ideal length of an explainer video is between 60 and 90 seconds, so focus on conveying one key message.

Similar to tutorial videos, you’ll want to write a script beforehand. Bear in mind that an explainer video should weigh in at about 150 words per minute, so keep the script short.

Identify the problems faced by your audience, how your product or service solves that problem, how your product or service functions, and end with a call to action.

Further Reading: Animation or Real People in Your Online Video: Which is More Effective?

5. Q&A’s

Q&A videos provide you with the opportunity to quickly address and answer questions posed by your audience. It’s a great format to build your credibility while serving a genuine purpose.

I’d guess you’d be hard-pressed to find someone unfamiliar with Chef Gordon Ramsay. Imagine having the ability for Chef Ramsay to answer your cooking-related questions?

Well, Chef Ramsay did just that in an informative, entertaining, and educational Q&A video:

Note that questions were garnered via social media, stoking those ever-important flames of engagement and building hype for the Q&A video to follow.

Consider, too, the case of DocuSign. DocuSign allows for contracts to be signed electronically.

Naturally, one of the questions most frequently asked by DocuSign customers is, “are electronic signatures legally binding?”. A short Q&A video answers that question in an engaging and informative way that demonstrates the benefits of using the service.

Creating a Q&A Video

Q&A videos give you the opportunity to create a wealth of video content related to your brand. Start off with a series of videos answering your customers’ most frequently asked questions.

Then get creative, similar to the example with Chef Ramsay above.

Engage your audience via social media and host scheduled Q&A events in which your audience asks questions which are then answered by your brand in a video format.

It’s a great way to prove to your audience that your brand cares, while simultaneously interacting with the people you hope will buy or use your products or services.

Further Reading: 15 Magical AI YouTube Video Makers

6. Event Videos

Attending an event is like finding a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow when it comes to creating video content. With so much happening at an event, it’s important to focus as much of your audience’s attention on your brand.

A well-made event video doesn’t need to market a product. However one that highlights the best part of an event can convey a lot of information about your company, product, and culture. If done well, it can do so in a way that is unique and cannot be conveyed through other business videos.

Consider for example this event video from Harley Davidson:

Not only does this form of content create a veritable treasure trove of video content, but it can generate hype for your attendance at a conference or tradeshow.

Creating Event Videos

Leading up to an event, focus on demonstrating why your audience should attend. Consider the following questions:

• What takeaways can they expect from showing up to the event?
• Is it a good way for them to grow their network or learn industry secrets and tips?
• How will what you are providing at the event help your audience?
• Can meeting you or your staff have significance and value to your audience?

Tech manufacturer NVIDIA uploaded a video showing the show floor of CES 2018. The video presents compelling reasons for attendees to drop by the NVIDIA booth and serves to announce new and innovative initiatives on display at the event:

Scheduling or holding ad hoc interviews and testimonials with excited attendees is a great way to drum up support for your brand and get them to share that content on social media.

After the event, those who couldn’t attend can still get a taste of the event if you create a summary or recap video. Use such a recap to participate in online discussions of the event, or submit it to the event organizer with permission to share it with other attendees.

Further Reading: The 15 Most Impactful Corporate Videos to Inspire You

Conclusion

Creating engaging social media video content will only serve to strengthen your social marketing strategy. Better yet, you don’t need a professional video studio to produce video content your audience will care about. Oftentimes, all you’ll need is a smartphone to get the job done.

Above all, remain genuine, focus on creating video content your audience will find useful and make use of the growing social media support for sharing video content.

When implemented effectively, engaging video content will increase awareness of your brand, better connect you with your customers, and more easily convert them into sales and leads.

So, go on — get filming! We can’t wait to see your videos fill-up our social media feeds.

Looking for more YouTube or video marketing advice? Check out these additional resources:

• The 11 Types of Short-Form Video You Can Leverage TODAY
• A Complete Guide to Branding for YouTube Creators
• What I Have Learned From Creating a YouTube Reality Show
• YouTube Cards: What They Are and How to Best Leverage Them
• YouTube Video Optimization: Simple Tricks Beginners Can Implement To Rank Their Videos
• How to Sell B2B Products and Services with B2B Marketing Videos
• Animation or Real People in Your Online Video: Which is More Effective?

Hero photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash