To be completely frank, the primary aim of short-form video content is to steal your audiences attention and keep it. Once someone enters a doom scroll, it can be very hard to stop them in their tracks and have them pay attention to your video.
With 34 million videos posted to TikTok every day, no wonder it may be hard to stand out from the crowd and have people watch, or even better, engage with your video.
But one way you can have control over this is through your edits, or in other words, the creative process and identity you give your videos through the editing process. There are a variety of tricks you can deploy that keep viewers watching – and that’s what we’ll go through today.
The importance of planning your content
Short-form content became incredibly popular as it was completely authentic and raw – think Vine from a few years ago. Users would simply upload unedited, raw videos onto the platform and – if the video was indeed entertaining – they would get views.
However, those days are gone. While TikTok and Instagram value authenticity to a very high degree, the average viewer needs to be more stimulated by what they are watching.
So rather than just pressing record and seeing what happens, it’s vital to plan out your video and put it together with proper structure. Whether it’s planning the order of what you’re going to say, how you’re going to say it or when, this will give you more control over what the final product is.
Once you have a general plan you can then incorporate little tricks to keep the audience engaged, whether that’s hooks – which we’ve spoken about here – or little bits of humour for example.
Implementing editing techniques to boost engagement
Once you have a general blueprint of your video such as what you’re going to say, when in the video you’ll cover certain topics etc. you can start to drop in little tricks in your editing process to keep people engaged without much effort.
Cuts and Transitions – implementing different types of cuts from jump cuts to match cuts can give your video flow and speed, while transitions between frames can act as mini hooks.
Text and Captions – this is a must for short-form content, having subtitles or captions is a valuable thing to keep the viewers attention. As well as that, people can watch your videos without needing to listen!
Music and sound effects – a good, viral song can genuinely be the difference when it comes to TikTok or Instagram. You won’t just rank higher on the algorithm, but the quality and impact of the video will be greater.
Don’t forget the final touches
Once you’ve got to this stage of the video-making process, it’s important to reflect on every aspect of the video and why you made certain decisions. Critically analyse why you put the transition there and not in another section, why you used that song etc.
Finally, if you feel like something is missing, it’s always good to add a bit of colour grading to the video. This will help the video pop and be more aesthetically pleasing to the eye of the viewer. There’s no set rule for this so have some fun!
It’s also wise to add a call-to-action (CTA) in your video at some point to drive follows, likes, comments – whatever it may be. The only thing with CTA’s is it needs to be natural.
But what if I don’t have time for all this!
I’m sure in many cases, it would be fantastic to implement all these practices into your video making process, but of course there is only so much time we can put towards this.
However, if that’s the case it is perfectly viable to seek professional help from the likes of Rewind the Media that can be your content assistants whenever you need them. Whether it’s coming up with new content ideas, producing top quality edits, or even analysing social media algorithms, Rewind the Media can take the headache away from content production.
I personally have used editors like Rewind the Media for years now for my own content channels and they have taken it to the next level, taking the stress out of production and editing, and allowing me to focus on the wider goals.
Also, if you’re part of the WTF Talent roster you can enjoy a nice little 25% discount for their services!
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