It’s 2019, and while attention spans may be at their lowest, the craving that audiences have for personal connection with content is running more rampant than ever. Data shows that branded long-form content – think videos over the 5-minute mark and ads over the 1.5-minute mark – helps build personal connection and can garner more engagement than branded short-form content.
YouTube is a great source of inspiration here. The video platform’s top content creators are experts at getting and holding their audience’s attention, which explains the 70% year-on-year increase in the number of YouTube users who follow and engage with creator channels.
Here’s are a few ways to approach long-form content for your brand.
Size matters
Let the story you want to tell dictate your video length. Take the insanely popular beauty guru ‘NikkieTutorials’, whose videos often cross the 20-minute mark and feel like a fun conversation about makeup rather than a simple how-to, or vlogger Shane Dawson, whose hour-long explorations into the lives of other YouTubers gather millions of views. If your content is relevant to your audience, people will watch.
Show, tell, succeed
As one of the most popular platforms people access when looking for virtually any kind of tutorial, YouTube has millions of ‘how-to’ videos for everything from arts and craft to tank-building tutorials. How-to has always been a popular category for brands, and for a successful, engaging video you must ask yourself some common questions: how can your brand answer a need, help people dive in, or offer something new?
Don’t forget your ABCs
Think of long-form content just as you would short-form; emotion sells. Draw the viewer’s attention from the beginning and connect with them through emotion and storytelling. The YouTube channel ‘Terribly Tiny Tales’ has over 346k subscribers and enlists talented actors to create short films that leave the viewers thinking long after the story has ended.
If you’re trying to maximize your video marketing efforts, it’s worth a try to go the long-form route. Going by the mind-boggling numbers garnered by YouTubers on their long-form content, you can’t deny that your potential audience has plenty of loyalty and love to give out.
