All industries and professions are interesting. Pick any industry or walk-of-life and there can be interesting takeaway video made about it. Think of content videos, or "content marketing" if you will, like your business' very own TV show or channel. And that of course implies that content videos are not lonely: they tend to come in multiples. 

Typically, a content video strategy involves the serializing of video production. Why make one video about what your business does (or how you do what you do) when you can have a dozen? This is less about storytelling and less about making a commercial and very much about showing the world why what you do is fascinating and important. 

For example, if you own an auto shop, perhaps you show your audience what can happen if you don't change your brakes or oil as regularly as you should. Of if you are a financial advisor, perhaps you make a video that explains the benefits of a retirement fund. If you make pottery, maybe you make a video that explains something unique about clay no one else in the world would know about but you.

Your business is professional at what it does right? Well, then content marketing is the way to prove that by creating real, honest, informative and even entertaining  content.

Here's a fun word for you: infotainment. Infotainment means giving your customers good insight in the best way you can. 

A subset of content marketing, if you will, is the testimonial video. Testimonial videos are talking-head interviews with customers who have used your products or services and they have something nice to say about the experience. Pretty straightforward idea and a solid marketing tool. People like your business and they are happy to tell others about it. Good stuff.

Now then, there are a few things to be wary of with regards to video content marketing. Business owners these days feel a lot of pressure to be "content creators." But not everyone, for one, likes being on camera and, secondly, most are not formally trained in the ways of producing good video. Third, producing serialized content is also very time consuming and can distract from managing the core functions of the business. 

Content marketing should not necessarily be confused with turning your business or individual persona as a business owner into an "influencer." Not everyone needs to launch a "how-to" or  "training" video series and not every business needs to post video on a regularly scheduled basis to reap the benefits that video marketing can provide. This is a trap that social media companies set and over producing can run the risk of being a drain on your business' resources. 

And although there are a lot of devices and apps that make producing video easier and even fun, sometimes it's best to focus on what your business does best and leave the video production to the professionals. There is a chance that a poorly produced video can have the opposite effect: instead of attracting customers to your brand it pushes them away. 

For better or worse (better if you are a video marketer!), we live in the era of social media and it tends to run the full gamut when it comes to content, messaging, technical formatting and length: long videos, short videos, widescreen videos, vertical videos, animations, live action, dancing, lip-sync, Meta Reels, TikTok, Stories, YouTube Shorts, etc. You would be forgiven if it all feels a bit dizzying and confusing. 

LENGTH

To start making sense of video for social let's first consider video length. With regards to length, when you're talking social media, videos tend to be on the shorter side: 15 seconds to 90 seconds depending on the platform you are producing for. 

And generally speaking, Meta (Facebook and Instagram) and TicTok tend to be the biggest players for shorter-form content. YouTube does have their Shorts; but YouTube is also the preferred choice for longer-form content that is easily sharable and embeddable elsewhere.

So as a general rule of thumb if you're making longer videos: YouTube might be your best bet. If you want to do shorter videos: consider Meta or TikTok. 

ASPECT RATIO

Let's consider aspect ratios. Arguably, the widescreen (or "horizontal" or "landscape") video is still YouTube's best offering. This is, in part, due to YouTube also being a "living room" app found on connected TVs or smart TV platforms such as Apple TV, Amazon and Roku.  Think about sitting on your couch and watching longer-form content on a widescreen television. YouTube is a player in that arena and that in itself is enough to inform the process of making video for this type of setting: long and wide.

Meta and TikTok, on the other hand, tend to be where we find more vertical (or "portrait") video aspect ratios. This is, in part, due to the handheld device's vertical design and mobile nature. Shorter and more vertical aspect ratio videos play well in this consumer mode.

DISTRIBUTION

A third aspect to consider is how sharable or embeddable your video is. Since YouTube offers an easy and effective way to share via text and email or embed on other sites, YouTube tends to be one of the best options for doing so.

Think of it this way, if you can text your grandma a link to a video and she can watch it without her having any trouble... that's a good indicator of which platform you want to use if sharing your video outside the publishing platform is important to you. And as of this writing YouTube tends to pass the grandma test. 

But that's not to suggest that your audience isn't conveniently contained within the platform you're publishing to. By all means, build efficiency into the marketing process by gravitating towards where your audience naturally is. 

STYLE

Lastly, another aspect to consider when doing social video is how performative or informative your content will be. Some apps like TikTok tend to reward performance over more straight-faced take away. It's important to take a step back and ask what stylistic approach best serves your needs.

For example, if you own a cafe and you want to promote a new drink item on your menu you could, perhaps, take a more informative approach: you may want to explain how much thought and attention you put into sourcing good ingredients and demonstrate how the process you use to produce your products is better than your competitor's. A straightforward, talking-head style video that simply tells it like it is clearly and with less stylistic embellishment might work quite nicely. 

You could, however, opt for a more performative approach. Maybe there's a famous song lyric or movie dialogue quote you find on Instagram Reels and you create a lip-sync with that along with a text-on-screen that delivers the message about your new menu item in a more playful or funny way.  Again, that might get the attention you're looking for. 

PUT IT TOGETHER

Taken together, the choices a video producer makes with regards to longer vs. shorter, horizontal vs. vertical, embeddable vs. not embeddable and performative vs. informative have a lot to say about the type of video to make, its messaging and where it is published. 

Here is a very short list of some of the most popular social video types used to market a business:

• Meta (Facebook and Instagram) Stories

  • Rule of thumb, keep them under 15 seconds and remember that Stories disappear after 24 hours; full vertical aspect ratio (16:9) tends to be best

  • Think short announcements, reminders about local events, running a daily promotional deal, temporary / seasonal, a visual gimmick to draw attention, a humorous stunt, a chance to be more candid and brief with your branding and messaging

• TikTok, Reels & Shorts

  • Can be longer but perhaps keep it under 2 minutes total as a general rule of thumb; semi (4:5) or full (16:9) vertical tends to be the best route to take with aspect ratio

  • Can lean more heavily on the performative rather than informative approach; process, trainers or how-to videos tend to be sped up as a way to be more entertaining as opposed to exhaustively explanatory; visual gimmicks, humorous stunts, music and dance are often used; content marketing and testimonials should be kept short

• Commercials

  • Can be long, but best to make them 15 to 30 seconds in length; horizontal widescreen if on YouTube and semi or full vertical if on Meta

  • A chance to be more buttoned-up and scripted in your messaging, more preproduction and thought put into what you want to say and how you want to say it

  • Use Google Ad Words or Meta Ad manager to serve your ads; avoid "boosting" posts on Meta and opt for the ad manger instead -- it's harder to use but ultimately it's more robust and provides better data analysis