Telling Your Story through Video — 10 Ideas to Get You Started
Capture the action
Incorporating video into your social media platforms can bring big rewards from your viewers.
Increasing viewer interaction, drawing attention to articles, linking to important sites — the benefits of including videos in your social media are endless.
Here at NAU Social, we utilize video content on our platforms in a multitude of ways.
Here’s 10 types of video that have worked well for us (and hopefully you too).
- Events
- How-To Videos
- Top Tips
- Story Takeovers
- Behind the Scenes
- Q&As
- Blog Post Promotion
- Limited Time Giveaways/Promotions
- Testimonials (Check your DMs)
- Inspirational Quotes
Event videos
Videos of your event give you the chance to thank users who showed up, and to create a little FOMO in users who didn’t. You can show the value of your event, and hopefully encourage increased attendance at the next one.
When you’re sharing a video of your event, make sure that the video is clearly labeled so that users know exactly what they’re watching. If it’s happening live, tell them how they can join in, too (if they still can).
How to videos — Campus Rec Weekly Workouts
Collaboration and communication can go a long way in boosting views! This past year we’ve collaborated with NAU Campus Recreation to record their certified personal trainers explaining weekly workout routines for students.
Incorporating both video introductions and text-only images for screen-shots can help demonstrate the video for those visual learners, and give take-home instructions for those who’d rather get the action going now!
Live Q&A — get answers from the people who know it best
At NAU Social, we use videos to answer audience questions during our “Lumberjack Q&A” and “My Life in 5” weekly segments. Posting the “Ask me a question” sticker allows viewers to ask their question and return shortly for a video answer from the host!
#LumberjackTip This instills a “live” feel with the audience, even though our host has the opportunity to tape a few takes to get it right ;)
Tours & Behind-the-scene content
Have you ever wondered what’s really going on behind the doors of the Communication or Engineering building?
Chances are, unless you’re a Communication Studies or Mechanical Engineering major, you might not ever get the chance! We team up with our various college and departments across campus to highlight various buildings, professors, and studios with our “Tour Tuesday” feature.
This content incorporates sped-up behind the scenes looks, still snapshots, and time-lapse features (all easily available on most smart phones) to give views a glimpse at a side of campus they might not have seen before!
Tutorials & Tips — Breaking it all down
If there’s already a buzz about a specific topic, join the conversation and create an explainer video about it.
Remember, you’ve got lots of expert information to share — and people out there that’d love to learn from you!
Have a new system rolling you could go behind the scenes and share a step-by-step video about how you created a specific product, or how to use it.
Long(er) videos — highlighting major events or stories
You don’t need a huge budget or master producer to create a fully-edited end product, and you don’t need fully produced videos for every day events.
For videos that recap major campus events, highlight future activities, or introduce major announcements we put time and effort into story-boarding, brainstorming, and cranking out a product worthy of a full minute and a half of your time — plus sound enhancements too!
Check out some of these longer videos recapping Homecoming
…and this one showcasing the Interdisciplinary Global Program
Final Tips To Remember
Sound: Off, Content: On
Recent statistics from YouTube show that over 50% of video viewership comes from mobile devices. Research has also shown that 85 percent of Facebook video is watched without sound.
Ignoring the fact that a large number of your video’s potential viewers prefers to watch videos ‘sound-off’ is a common mistake.
Therefore, it’s a great idea to add subtitles along with your visuals to make sure that your message is delivered in full.
Don’t overload your video with text — people will not be able to comprehend too much information within 15 seconds.
Whenever possible — show, don’t tell.
By using text overlay, these videos can easily be viewed without sound and still make the content easy to consume for the audience! We use this feature in many of our video-style posts, including highlighting podcast features — as well as providing the direct link for downloads!
Video content has such a powerful impact on audiences in such a short amount of time — in addition to having a personal touch and a face for viewers to connect with! Keep producing your content and try out these different video styles to see what works best for you and your audience!
