How To Create Five-Star Library Video Content

Video has become vital to getting engagement on social media and most platforms have made it easy for even the least tech-savvy person to tackle. By posting more video content you will boost interactions with your social media, and your website, while also setting your library apart from competitors who might not be embracing video just yet. Video is all about storytelling and who is better equipped for story time than your library? Grab a smartphone, hit record and let’s get started! 

Short & Sweet

The idea behind video content marketing is to make something that’s eye catching and highly shareable.  Put your best foot forward right from the start. Making the first three seconds of your video the most visually pleasing will be sure to stop someone from scrolling and capture their attention. The majority of social media users watch videos without sound so it’s best to portray your message in a way that doesn’t need sound or includes captions. Not sure how to do that? There’s a ton of free resources for editing together short videos for social media. Most of these editing tools are easy to use and allow you to add captions, title slides, music or cool effects to your videos to make them stand out.

Cater to the Platform

It’s important to know when you’re creating your video, where it will be shared. Each platform comes with different specs and a different audience, so tailoring your video sets you up for success. According to statistics gathered by video production company breadnbeyond, YouTube is used by 55% of marketers, making it the most used channel for video marketing. So, this is the top dog when it comes to videos and leans more toward in-depth content and longer videos. As events have gone virtual due to the pandemic, the New Jersey State Library has utilized YouTube to post recordings of our events so that people can still attend if they might have missed it. Having those events in full on YouTube is a great resource for patrons and also allows us to pull shorter clips to share on social media as well to increase viewership.

Next up is Facebook with more than 4 billion video views taking place every day. Posting native videos to Facebook rather than a YouTube link will prioritize the content in your followers’ news feed. Instagram and Twitter are best for your short videos averaging 15-30 seconds. Instagram focuses on the visuals while Twitter is more for showing voice and personality. Tweets with video currently see 10 times more engagement than those without. Using the correct hashtags on both platforms help get your video to the right people. And of course, if you want to tap into your younger audience, TikTok is the place to do that, but do it quick—the ideal video length is 10-15 seconds! TikTok is great for participating in video trends or using popular songs off the For You page to create more engagement.

Video Brainstorm

Now that you know the best practices and the quirks of each social media platform, you’re probably thinking what are these videos supposed to be about?! Valid question and ultimately that’s for you to decide, but I’m happy to float a few ideas by you. As mentioned above, recording any virtual events and posting them in full is a great way to increase attendance or viewership. When events happen in person, promoting what to expect at the event leading up to it through video, then creating a highlight reel after the fact can help spark interest. Other than upcoming events, what else is new and exciting with your library? Are you offering a new service, running a program you’d like the community to hear about or have exciting new equipment to show off? Utilize video to talk about these things or even show them off and do a tutorial. Video is a flashy way to get people to actually see the resources that you have and how it could benefit them. You could make short informational videos on frequently asked questions at the reference desk or top things you wished your patrons knew about your library. Get personal with introductory videos about the faces you most often see at your library, the staff! And last but certainly not least, BOOKS! We recently wrote about making story time virtual, but that’s not the only way to incorporate books into video marketing. Interview your colleagues for recommended reads, do short book reviews or talk about the newest books you have at the library. Whatever video content you create, just remember that being authentic and telling your story is what resonates most with viewers.