When discussing the structure of a video, first determine goals. Without goals, your video could lack not only unity but also credibility.
Setting goals requires sitting down and asking a few questions before anything is put into motion. So go ahead, sit down, and consider the following questions.
What vision do you have for your video?
If you can’t spell out what you want your video to accomplish, then you’d better so some mental pruning and find the seed you want to plant. Without vision, all your efforts might be in vain. Do not underestimate the influence vision can have on a video of any sort.
Do you want to inspire or create a call to action?
Knowing the outcome of your video will provide a nice template onto which key aspects can be inserted.
Do you want users to enquire after watching it? Or make a purchase? Or to follow you on social media? This will guide your script.
These are just a few questions to address. Whatever your goal is, try to keep it SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound)
When you finally decide to create a video or hire a professional to help you, be sure you work with them to lay out your vision/mood board as the guiding force behind everything.
Whether your goal is a youtube video or a business marketing promotional clip, take the time to access your goals.
One thing to keep in mind is focus. Use the following tips as another set of rules to include in your video building strategy:
Focus: remember the purpose of your video and how it will serve your audience.
Focus: don’t ramble or spend ages getting to the first point; the goal is to capture attention and not lose it.
Focus: have a well-written script that addresses the goal and your audience.
Before any attention grabbing tactic is put into play, you need to know why this video matters to your audience.
In this regard, you must know your audience like the back of your hand. If you have not invested time in studying your audience, you’re doing yourself a disservice. And you could be losing value audience members without even realising it.
Why should your audience watch matters, it matters a lot. While videos with artistic liberties can get away with this, the video you’re aiming for it much more goal-oriented. Once you know why they should watch, you can find a hook.
This will set up the entire video. Here is where the audience will be lured in with a hook. Insert questions, statistics, interesting fact, and anecdotes to appeal to their curiosities. Once you have their attention, you can then provide them with the principle idea.
In offering the main idea to your audience, know that you’re setting the up for a journey into your world. Have a clear map of where you want to go and tell your audience about the journey before you take the first step. A transparent purpose will give the audience a reason to stay and it will give your video plenty of reliability.
Moving from one idea or image to the next might not sound so complicated, but when your mission has been drawn out, then every idea and image much correlate. And that’s where it gets a little tricky.
Transitions help bind one idea to the next and they do so in a seamless fashion. They are the links that take you from one finished thought into the next one. Set these up well and you’ll have audience members excited to see what comes next.
You’ve told your audience what you’re going to focus on, right. So now comes the bulk of the video. Here is where the main points will be featured and supported by facts, benefits, or outcomes.
For example, you want to make a video on combating fatigue or low energy levels. You can ask your audience in the beginning, Are you tired of being tired? And respond by saying, Have you considered rest, meditation/mindfulness, water, eating better, sleep. Those solutions become the body of your video, the focal point.
Another example is for selling a product. Let’s say you want to sell a phone service. You could ask, What is it you want in a mobile carrier? And then reel them in with, We’ve got what you want, we offer abc & xyz. In the body of your video, you will narrow in on those key points in greater detail.
Just before you finish, it’d be nice to reiterate what you’ve already said in a sentence or two.
This will bring your point home and remind viewers why they started watching in the first place.
Repetition is another technique that has been proven to increase memory and make information easier to recall.
Some might call this space the closer, it’s where you wrap up the sales pitch and wait for your audience to buy what you’re selling.
This is a powerful tool for building integrity. It also packs a punch for lasting effects.
Technically, you’ve closed the video, however you still have a tiny space where you can make a huge difference.
Most will stop at the pre-closer and think that’s enough, they will even consider the pre-closer sufficient, but without leaving your viewers with a call to action or any motivation, you’re sort of left them sitting there, wondering, waiting, and without any mission.
You want to leave your viewers with that final impact and here’s the time to do it. It doesn’t have to be more than a few second, but it should be huge in scope. Don’t let your audience walk away from your video without doing, thinking, or feeling something. That’s the secret ingredient and that’s what will make your video stand out in the midst of all the videos out there on the internet. Get remembered out with a stellar closing, one that your audience isn’t soon to forget.