The average attention span of a viewer is just 8.5 seconds. The first few seconds of your video must grab the views attention. Lots of people scroll through social media news feeds and automatically scroll past anything that is not instantly appealing. If the video automatically plays it should pull them in from the start. Exciting visuals, bold colours, cute animals, whatever it takes to draw their attention. 

At the same time, you should always use the first few seconds to give the viewer an overview of what the content of the video will be.

You can grab attention and give an overview at the same time. A short, snappy list of features to be found in the video that will benefit the view can be delivered in a dynamic way by your spokesperson. This can be coupled with effects and overlays to make the visuals pop. 

Use thumbnails, opening frames and middle frames.

Facebook and YouTube all you to upload a thumbnail which becomes the cover for your video. These thumbnails can instantly grab a views attention and let them know what the video is about before even playing the video. They are the ultimate first impression tool/

Putting some effort into your thumbnail can drastically increase the integration and play rate of your videos. Thumbnails should be high quality sharp images and text that display the best aspects of your video.

For platforms that don’t allow thumbnails, it is always a good idea to make sure that your opening frame of video is almost like a thumbnail as this will often be used as a thumbnail. The same goes for the middle frame.

Create a catchy title that catches the audiences attention. Use keywords so that it is more likely to show up in search results, but also tell the view what the video can do for them. Tell them the result to be achieved by watching the video.

As most people use mobile devises to connect to the internet, it is essential that your video ad is optimised for mobile devices. Check that your text overlays are large enough to read on a small screen. You can also make a square or portrait version of your video to grab more attention by filling more screen space on social media feeds.

Google loves video content and an effective SEO strategy for your videos can really help your video to be seen in search results. Always write a description of the video content to accompany the video. Make sure to use keywords.

Make sure to include your website and social media URLs in the video description. If people eat to get in touch with you, they want to do it quickly. If they are reading the description and have to exit the video description to follow an ad link, they may just abandon the ad completely. 

Facebook is the ultimate content distribution platform. The laser fine tuning that can be applied to your targeting is astounding. You may be aware that you can target your facebook video ads, you may also be aware that the visibility of you standard page posts is less. But did you know that you can also target page posts?

With Facebook organic reach in decline, targeted posts can really help you to reach the right people with your posts.

You can define your audience by Age, Gender, Location and language.

You can also target the posts to people’s interests. 

Ask the view to do something at the end of the video. What should the viewer want do at the end of the video? Encourage them to do it without being too pushy.