Using Video Right on Social Media: Facebook
Creating video content doesn’t do much good for your business if no one can see it. And what better way to get eyes on your video than to share it across the most widely used social media platform in the world? With over 2.7 monthly active users, Facebook is one of the easiest ways to distribute your content to the masses.
The best part: Sharing your video doesn’t have to cost you anything.
Want to know more about organic video marketing on Facebook? Strap in! We’re going to go in-depth to teach you what you need to know about using the platform and sharing videos.
Organic Facebook marketing 101
First off, let’s discuss what organic Facebook marketing is. When we talk about organic marketing on Facebook, we mean reaching audiences without using paid methods of distribution like Facebook Ads.
Though organic reach of businesses on social media has declined over the years, it’s still important to understand the fundamentals of building a solid online presence. When you don’t have much of an ad budget for Facebook, organic marketing techniques are all you have. In general, those using video and managing a business Facebook account should:
Have a content strategy in place
Understand what types of content performs well on the platform
Know the best practices for uploading videos
Properly engage with audiences
By mastering these four concepts, your business will be in a better position to see greater organic reach on the platform.
Building a content strategy for Facebook
Imagine going on a road trip to a new place without ever looking at a map. That’s what it’s like if you approach social media marketing without any kind of content strategy. Your video marketing content will play a role in this overall game plan.
How in-depth your strategy is will depend on your business’s resources. At a minimum, you should start by sitting down and analyzing your goals and audience if you haven’t already. Setting measurable goals will give you something concrete to work towards and allow you to gauge the success of your efforts. Knowing your audience will help you reach the right people and craft effective video content.
The next step in developing your Facebook strategy is developing a posting schedule. Take time at the beginning of the month or week to hatch out a plan of what you will post and when you will post it. This ensures that you are posting consistently and that nothing slips through the cracks. This can be as informal as posting sticky notes on a calendar or as official as using a social media planning tool online.
Posting the right kind of content
It turns out that the secret to well-performing video really isn’t a secret at all! Facebook outlines what a good video should look like on their video help pages. The five main tips that the platform gives are:
Your video should be tailored to your specific audience
Grab your audience’s attention within the first few seconds
You should invest production quality
The video should focus on storytelling
Be able to tell your story both with and without sound
But there’s another big component of effective videos— your content should also be emotionally engaging. It isn’t enough to simply have eyes on your content. Your goal should also be to have people act on what they see, whether that’s buying your product, donating, checking out your website, etc. Since decisions are driven by emotion, it’s important to evoke feelings that push your audience into action.
Best practices for uploading videos to Facebook
The video content itself isn’t the only thing that matters when you’re trying to maximize organic reach on Facebook. It’s also important that you upload it using the best practices of the platform. When posting your video, be sure to keep the following in mind.
Facebook native video vs. embedded video
You have two main video posting options: upload your content to Facebook’s native video player or embed a link from a third-party video sharing site like YouTube or Vimeo.
While you should certainly take advantage of other platforms like YouTube and Vimeo, it’s better to upload your video to Facebook using their native player. There are several reasons to do this:
The overall user experience is better for your audience
Videos auto-play with the native player, which grabs your audience’s attention
Facebook’s newsfeed algorithm prioritizes native videos over links
Research shows that, on average, Facebook native videos receive 110% more interactions and nearly 500% more shares than embedded YouTube videos. That should be reason enough to use it!
Add context to your video with a title and description
Don’t just slap your video onto people’s newsfeeds. Start by adding a relevant, descriptive video title. This will help make your video searchable. Make sure to compose a compelling description that tells a little more about the video or introduces it to your audience. You can also use this space to tag people or check-in at a location, if that is relevant to the content.
Add a thumbnail
When your video isn’t playing, it will display a still image known as a thumbnail. Set a visually-appealing frame from the video as your thumbnail. Otherwise, Facebook will auto-select an image that might not accurately reflect your video’s topic or quality.
Include captions
Many people watch Facebook videos without sound. Some research estimates that up to 85% of videos are played without audio. This means that captions are a must. You can accomplish this one of three ways:
Let Facebook auto-generate the captions (Note: these aren’t guaranteed to be accurate)
Write the captions yourself with the caption writing tool on Facebook
Upload the captions from a .srt file
Adding captions makes your content accessible and understandable to all, regardless if your audience has the sound on.
Engage with your audience on Facebook
Unfortunately, your work isn’t done once you click “Post”. It’s important to engage with your audience after people start watching your video.
Are people asking questions? Answer them. Do they have concerns? Point them to more resources. Boost any positive experiences they share and invite them to leave a review. Engaging with people will create a more personalized experience for your biggest fans on the platform.
Conclusion
Video marketing is a two-part process. You want to start by having amazing content that will blow your audiences away with quality, storytelling, and its emotional impact. Once you have that locked down, focus on video distribution and getting it in front of the right eyes. By following these simple steps, you’ll be in a better position to increase your organic reach across Facebook and lay the foundation for success on the platform.