Shorter Is Better

By Author: mike bayer
Total Articles: 6
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Shorter is better

"I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I have not had the time to make it shorter."
- Blaise Pascal
When customers want a video for their business, for some reason they think the longer it is the better. I guess this goes along the lines of how consumer behavior has been ingrained for us to think the more the merrier. I am going to argue that, in most cases, when creating a video for your business, the shorter it is the better.
The main reason for my point is the fact that the majority of people just don't watch more than one minute of an online video. Sure there are exceptions to this rule, but for the most part viewers start to get antsy around the 60-second mark. According to Tube Mogul, in a sample of 188,055 videos, totaling 22,724,606 streams, about 54% of viewers clicked away after the first minute. The next time you watch a video online, I want you to be aware of what time in the video it is that you start to lose interest. Do you notice it being at 60-90 seconds, like most people?
So you are probably wondering how a business can squish so ...
... much information into 60-90 seconds.
First, it is important to have a clear purpose for your video. Are you trying to generate leads, explain a product, drive traffic to your site, build an email list, or sell a product directly? After you have the reason for the video, it is time to come up with the message, using a script.
When creating your copy, remember to make every sentence count. There should be no "dead time," as my cousin Augusto always says. This means you need to take out all the parts not directly involved in the main message. Remember, you can convey powerful ideas with the images you use in the video, which take the place of long descriptive passages.
After you have your message put together, it should be 200-220 words. Take your script and make a storyboard, which is how you connect the images with the words. Then, once your storyboard is complete, it is time to produce the video, showing viewers your moving images.
Presto, your one-minute video is born, and when you distribute it, there is a good chance most of the people who watch it will see it through to the end.