These days, video content is seeing a rise in the media most used in content marketing. A survey with the CMO Council recently has found that almost 80% of senior marketers foresee an increase in video’s role as far as visual content strategies are concerned.
With technology evolving as fast as, if not faster than marketing strategies, it makes sense to believe that many of us carry powerful cameras in our pockets. That’s right, phone cameras can be used to experiment with video content, and produce great content. That doesn’t mean all the videos you use in your marketing will be shot on your phone. However, when timed right, such a video can have a big impact, regardless of the quality. So here are 3 great tips for creating eye-catching and effective content using just the phone in your pocket.
- Aim for speedy editing. If you want to exchange one video for another quickly, make sure you shoot as carefully as possible. This ensures smoother, easier, and overall quicker edit. Get enough footage, but not to the point that sorting the clips becomes an insurmountable task. Long and steady shots are better than short, shaky clips that will ultimately become unusable.
Remember, too, to shoot longer than you think you should. Once you start editing, clips you felt were long may turn out to be shorter than you thought. Use different angles as well when shooting for your video so that you can jump cuts and other jarring transitions, because these can impact the viewing experience in a bad way.
- Pay attention to framing in interviews. Including these in your videos will help generate more interest, not to mention tell the story better than second-hand information would. As much as possible, have your interviewee look at you, so that it’s more obvious that there is actual on-going dialogue between you and your interviewee. Don’t forget to hold your phone around the subject’s eye level as well.
By doing this, you lessen the need for B-roll – in this case, shots of the environment or of you as an interviewer conducting said interview – because requiring both that and A-roll (footage of the interviewee) may do more harm than good for your video content.
- Work on post-production for smoother workflow. Publishing content while it’s still relevant is important to marketing, and this means your post-production workflow should be as fast and smooth as possible. Send all videos you take on your phone directly to your business’s visual media library, or the equivalent of it, so that it’s immediately accessible to your editing team.
Remember to keep video length in mind, because this can change depending on the platform you’ll be using to share the videos. Blogs, for instance, usually use clips that are 1 to 2 minutes long. Shorter videos belong on social media sites like Twitter. If needed, write a short article to accompany the video content and complement it, not steal the spotlight from it. Use said article to share any insights or information that wasn’t captured or can’t be shown in the video.
All in all, videos shot on your phone are meant to be short, relevant, and compelling, so plan ahead, shoot efficiently, and edit well to produce timely and valuable content for your audience.
