You Tube has been around for over a decade, and people all over the globe use it, or at least know what it is.
If you are a video fan, you already know that in today’s world there already are many video-centric platforms, and even though YouTube may be the leader in short-form online video, other platforms supporting video, like Vine and Twitch, but also Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat – are quickly establishing their presence in today’s virtual world.
It is pretty obvious that for today’s, and even more, tomorrow’s professional success, being on multiple social platforms has become the norm. And videos are going viral!
The question now is: what can you do to best present your video content knowing there are so many platforms to choose from?
To master all these multiple platforms requires planning and execution that is a blend of creative content, experimenting, real-time iteration, and engagement with the audience.
As far as the content, it includes much more than your video. Here are some general tips:
- It’s important that you have accounts on every social and video platform that can bring you audience/fans. Experiment with publishing your content and videos to steadily build community on each platform to carry your message and build your credibility through your stories.
- Consider creating additional pieces of content for every video you publish. You should share these socially before and after you release a video. For instance, you can derive these stills and clips from your main video. This can be a great way to extend your storytelling, keep in front of your audience, and increase the engagement rate.
Even though your social platforms may not prove directly lucrative or even beneficial today, the landscape is changing so quickly that they may very soon be significant to landing a big brand deal and bring big payout.
- To set the scene and create a good prelude to inform or remind your audience/fans that your video will be published soon use outtakes, one-liners, and stills and share them on social media.
Social media platforms spread information to fans very quickly, so well edited preview clips that you publish on those platforms serve as a powerful reminders that you have just released new content on YouTube.
- Share GIFs (animated GIFs seem to be very popular, especially when humorous), memes (again, they get lots of social shares, more so when humor is involved), and one-liners that refer to your video on social platforms following the release. All this will keep your content alive and in front of the fans who may have missed the video when it was first published.
- Acknowledge top fans and comments; this is how you can keep your community active when you don’t have fresh videos to share. On each platform, engage first with your fans who have the biggest social following and fans that comment the most.
Looking at platform insights and analytics and/or using another type of tool for analytics can help you understand, as far as content and format, what works, what to use, how and when.
- Stay focused on regularly publishing and interacting with fans on YouTube, but also on the social platforms. Get into a daily, weekly, and monthly routine for publishing, engaging and responding to comments, and reviewing the insights.
Now let’s look at some tips that pertain to specific social platforms:
Vine: Create 6-second clips from your videos to share on Vine – this will bring awareness to your fans about your new YouTube video. Remember, you can, and should, always experiment with different edits to find what works best for your audience – so get creative with one-liners, single cuts, merged scenes, and action scenes (seem to be very popular).
Instagram: Create 15-second preview clips from your videos. Telling your story or presenting your message visually and dynamically on Instagram can quickly connect you with your fans. The length of Instagram videos will allow multiple scene edits.
Twitter: So many videos get shared on Twitter; however, many fans cut and paste a YouTube link without including handles or hashtags.
This is why an average of 80 percent of tweets about your videos do not show up on Twitter. If you Search for your video links, it will often show more tweets and more fans – but there are multiple links for every YouTube video, so searching for all the links to your video can be a big task.
Twitter-native video seems like it will be a good place to share 30 second edits of your videos.
Facebook: Their algorithm notably prioritizes Facebook video over YouTube and other external players, so upload videos to the native Facebook player to maximize Facebook reach.
Similar preview clips or one-liner clips that you used for Vine and Instagram can also be used for Facebook, and there’s no limit on the video length. In the description section you can add the link to the full-length video on your YouTube.
The bottom line:
Being a modern day video star means being on more platforms, using more formats and ways of engaging audience.
Each social platform serves a different function and provides different opportunities. As a video creator, you need to find the appropriate mix of media, formats, platforms and tools to connect with your audience.
Get ready for the multi-platform, multi-format video future – where multi-platform video business will make you money.