4 Tips on How to Make a Video Go Viral on Facebook
Article by Elaine Bennett
Social media platforms have become every brand’s go-to channel of communication, engaging with their audience, and establishing an overall presence online. Among them, Facebook has reigned supreme for years now as the predominant platform of choice among people of all generations, so naturally, brands do their best to keep an eye on relevant trends and be where their customers want them to be. Today, the rising trend of video content has pushed more brands into creating immersive, engaging videos in an attempt to attract more customers their way.
And rightfully so, since 53% of customers state that they will engage with a brand upon watching a video on social media. If that gives you a chance to increase your lead generation efforts, increase their interest in your products, and boost your ROI, then it makes perfect sense so many brands want to find themselves on the Facebook video map. Still, to avoid being lost in the sea of videos constantly posted on this platform, brands need to find ways to make their videos “pop”. Here are a few tips to increase your chances of producing a Facebook video that will go viral!
Keep Your Video Short and Sweet
Every brand has a story, so they try using videos for the purpose of storytelling, which is always a plus when you’re trying to create content that will reverberate across a platform. Sometimes, however, you might get carried away and create a video only your most hardcore fans will appreciate all the way through. Since people scroll down their newsfeeds without too much focus, you need to create captivating videos that will manage to grab your audience’s attention until the very end.
It all depends on your audience, the kind of content you create, and what your audience responds to the most, but as an example, HubSpot uses videos no longer than a single minute on Facebook. This is their sweet spot for grabbing their audience’s attention and avoid their videos being interrupted midway through. Find your own sweet spot based on analyzing your previous video campaigns and stick to it.
Choose Video Content that Matters
Do you remember GoPro’s firefighter video with the tagline “Be a Hero”? Everyone does. That’s what makes the content so profoundly powerful – it has a story, it’s dynamic, it’s charged with emotions, and it resonates with their target audience. It’s perfect for the market. Brands facing fierce competition in oversaturated markets such as Australia need to go above and beyond in order to deliver content that is truly worthy to become viral.
Today, more brands choose to work with experts in video production in Sydney because they want to achieve the same powerful effect of quality and relevance. Once you find the kind of content that connects you with your target demographic, you can work alongside people who specialize in creating engaging videos. Of course, few brands can deliver a viral video on their first try, so it’s vital that you keep analyzing and going back to your previous content until you refine it well enough to reach that viral value.
Cross-Share Your Video Whenever You Can
A video on its own will rarely get the fame you want for it simply by posting it on Facebook and waiting for those views to soar. Even brands that are household names still do their best to promote and share their video content across all possible channels. They post links on other social media channels they have, they encourage influencers to share them, and they utilize backlinking to add more juice to their video’s relevance.
Moreover, brands should also promote their videos when possible and inspire their audience to share, comment, and engage in any other way possible. If you want a particular video to get more attention, make it your cover video on your Facebook profile on top of all other efforts, to give it an extra dose of visibility for those who visit your page.
Introduce Captions for Your Videos
People typically spend time exploring their Facebook feeds while commuting to work, during their lunch breaks, when they’re bored and distracted, and often when they shouldn’t. So, they mute their videos by default, only to play the sound on those videos they decide to watch in their entirety. When you have any kind of dialogue in your video, or there’s a missing piece of the story that cannot be told with footage alone, add captions.
These will make your videos far more enjoyable, and a greater portion of your audience will be enticed to click and watch. Captions that help them follow the story without any sound also need to convey the right emotions that you’d otherwise inspire with the help of music or simply human voices. Even though the video itself is the focus of your post, make sure that you use language that is in line with that video and that will be as appealing as the video.
Not all videos are created equal. If you want yours to be in the spotlight of one of the world’s most beloved social networks, you should keep these tips in mind and use them during your next video marketing campaign. They can help you reach your audience and leave the right impression so that you can increase your brand visibility and your relevance in the market.