Speaker 1: No more excuses, viral videos are easier to make now than ever before. Most people think you need expensive gear and years of formal media production training to make high-quality videos that get results. It's not true. I've gone down both roads. You see, I've made videos using just my phone that blew up and went viral, and I've made videos with a bunch of fancy camera gear that also blew up. Most of us, I'm sure, have seen videos on social media that go viral and they're nothing fancy from a production standpoint. People go viral with just their phone and some very basic knowledge of media production. I've made over 500 videos in the last two years, and I've gained over 100,000 followers across all my social media pages. So guys, I've tested it all. Everything from quick and easy to make cell phone videos, to videos that take months to plan, film, and edit with all kinds of fancy camera gear. And one thing I've noticed that is the absolute most important thing that contributes to a video going viral is two things. The first is your planning, and the second is your execution. Planning is everything to do with your overall marketing strategy, script, shot list. Execution is everything to do with actually filming, editing, and making the video. So in this video, I'm mainly going to be focusing on short-form vertical video content for social media. And by now, you're probably wondering, how do you plan that kind of stuff and how do you execute it? So let's go ahead and break that down, and I promise it's not as scary as you think. All right, so first, we're going to talk about planning and conceptualization. Now, I know you might want to skip ahead, but please don't because this is literally the most important part. When it comes to video or any type of media production, you always need to think about who you're making the video for. Video is a communication tool. So if you don't know who you're going to be communicating with, then chances are you probably won't be doing any sort of communication. So first things first, you need to determine your target audience and what they want. Now, this doesn't need to take months of research and calculations or anything intense like that. It can really be as simple as asking yourself, who are you making this content for? Let's say aspiring video creators as an example. Now, what would video creators want to see? Well, they probably want to learn the basics about how to make viral videos for social media. This way, they can make it for themselves and they can make it for their clients. Do you see where I'm going with this? And that was my exact thought process for creating this exact video that you're watching right now. So you will have the best chances of making viral videos for social media if you make content based around something that you already know or have some degree of knowledge in. Now, when it comes to pre-production, which is the part where you start scripting and shot listing your video, and you can stick to a very basic content structure for your scripts. And it goes like this, your hook slash intro, your body, and then your conclusion. It's kind of like writing an essay. Start your script off with a hook. A hook is anything that evokes curiosity and makes the viewer want to watch the rest of the video. A hook can be visual, it can be audio, it can be text on screen, it could be something that you say in the first three seconds of your video, or it could just be a combination of all of them. And not only that, but a good hook will promise a payoff at the end of the video, something that the viewer gets to finally experience or realize once they make it to the end. The hook is arguably the most important part of the script because if the first three seconds of your video doesn't appeal to the viewer, then they'll just keep scrolling. The next part of your script is the body. The body can be the main points that you make that lead up to your conclusion. But remember, you don't just want to blurt out a bunch of points, you want to weave it together into a story. And a good story will always incorporate conflict and resolution, or problem and solution. And then comes the conclusion. You see, the conclusion is what the viewer has been waiting for all along. It's the payoff, it's the moral of the story, it's the reward for watching until the end. But we're not done yet. Since at this point you have the viewer's attention and they've made it all the way to the end of the video, now's your chance to give the viewer a call to action. This way they can either like, follow, comment, or share your video. And it's a good way to prompt the viewer letting them know how they can see more of your content. All right, so now that you're done writing the script, next up is the shot list. Chances are, unless you plan on talking directly to the camera the whole time, which I would advise against because it does get boring, then you're going to want to have what's called B-roll. B-roll is the footage that you capture to cut in between a talking headshot. So right now what you're looking at is just me talking to the camera. This is called a talking headshot, or also your A-roll. And B-roll is what you cut in between this main footage. I'll do it right now, and we'll cut back to A-roll, and now we'll cut to B-roll. All right, I think you get the point. Cutting to B-roll or changing up the image on screen every few seconds helps make your video less boring. So for your B-roll shot list, you want to make a list of all the shots that you need to fully tell the story that you're trying to tell. Because your B-roll needs to be relevant to what's actually being said in the video. You can't just cut to something totally random, you have to cut to something that makes sense or helps explain whatever it is that you're saying on camera. And because of that, I recommend making your shot list after you write your script. Or you could also do it as you're writing your script. Now I know we spent a lot of time talking about strategy and planning, but I hope you realize by now that this is so important to making videos. Next, let's talk about the technical aspect of setting up and filming your videos. I'm going to show you how to make high quality videos with the best camera on the market, the iPhone. Played with your expectations a bit. You didn't see that coming, did you? Now the reason I say this is the best camera on the market is because the best camera is the one that you have. And it's amazing because you can plan, shoot, and edit your videos all with your phone. Now, first things first, before you start recording, you need to get your settings right. I'm using an iPhone 12, but most phones should have these options. When you film yourself talking to the camera, you want to set your camera to record at the highest resolution possible. And you're going to want to set it to 24 frames per second. This will give you the most detail and look the most natural. Now you may be worried about the image quality that your phone can produce. But you see, the thing is that image quality is more about lighting and not so much the camera that you're using. All you need to know about lighting is that you should have at least one main light source for your face. And the bigger the light source, the better it will look. I'm using a video light with a softbox. But if you don't have one, then you can film yourself next to a large window during the daytime. The next thing you need to know is composition. When filming yourself vertically for social media, composition is very easy. And that's because your subject pretty much should always be centered along the center line of the frame. Now it's time for audio. You see, good audio is also very easy. Because no matter what mic you use, as long as it's close to the audio source, which is your mouth, then it will sound its best. As you can see, my mic's right here. The key to good audio is clarity. If it's hard to hear what you're saying, then it will kill your video. Okay, great. So at this point, we've covered all the basics when it comes to setting up your camera and audio and lights and everything like that. Now let's talk a bit about actually presenting to the camera. Now, the more confident and natural you feel on camera, the better your video will perform. This is because people are attracted to confidence. And being confident also positions you more as an authority. And there's no way to cheat this stuff. You just have to put in the reps and practice over and over and over again. But I do have some tips for you that might help make it easier. As you talk to the camera, you want to pretend like you're talking to a friend. And the good thing is, is that if you're in a studio or you're at home, you don't have millions of eyeballs looking at you in that very moment. It's just you by yourself with a camera. There's no pressure. You can always stop recording and then try it again and again and again. Also, another great tip is that the more prepared you are, the more confident you will be and come across on camera. So this is even more of a reason to do your pre-production. Okay, great. We've recorded the content. Now comes the editing. When it comes to video editing for virality, you don't want to overcomplicate it. Use whichever video editing software you're most familiar with. They all pretty much do the same thing. If you're totally new to this stuff and you want the easiest way to edit videos, I would recommend using some of the easier softwares like CapCut. As long as you can cut clips up and sequence them properly, then you're pretty much good to go. But when you're editing your videos, one important thing to keep in mind is that you want to always cut out all the dead space between your clips. So that means that even if there's a half second where you're not talking and it's just quiet, you want to cut that space out. You got to make every second count. That's because the algorithms are going to judge your video based on percentage viewed. So you need to make sure you're cutting out everything that's not contributing to telling the story. With short form video for social media, less is more. Something to keep in mind is that you want to use pattern interrupts as much as possible when editing your videos for maximum virality. You need to do something to keep the image from looking the same for too long. Now, you also want to pay attention to the pacing of your video. Try to keep a consistent pace by making sure that your cuts are somewhat evenly spaced out unless you're going for a specific creative look and feel. Now, the last thing is adding captions. Captions are for people who stumble upon your video when they happen to be in a loud area or a quiet area like a library where they can't listen to your video out loud. And on top of that, they also give the viewer something else to look at and something else to hold their attention. So you spent all your energy planning and producing your video. It's finally ready to upload and make you go viral. But wait, there's a few more things you need to make sure of. Firstly, you need to tell the social media algorithms what your video is about so that they can show it to the right people. You need to write out a caption for your video. Your caption needs to capture the essence of what your video is about and use keywords specific to the target audience that you're trying to hit. Hashtags can also be used to help guide the algorithm in the right direction. You want to use hashtags that are relevant to the video. Now, once your video is live, there's a few things you need to do to help that video go viral. First is engage with the comments as soon as possible. You can ask your viewers questions in the comments and actually try to facilitate a discussion or conversation around the topic of your video. And this works really well because if the viewer watches your video and then comments on your video, the algorithm will know that your video is really resonating with your audience so they'll push it out to more people. So after you're done all this stuff that we've talked about, the next tip for maximum virality is to just post more content. You'll get better at identifying what type of content and topics your target audience wants to see. I hope you make use of these tips that I just shared to help you make better videos and go viral on social media. They've definitely helped me and if I can do it, so can you. If you want to find out how to create an irresistible Instagram account, please sign up to our Instagram Academy online course. Tap on the link in the description to find out more about the Instagram Academy.