5 minutes
With video encroaching more and more in our professional lives and helping to market our businesses, one of the most powerful formats of this medium is the video interview. Whether you're interviewing success stories from members (credit unions) or clients (industry vendors), these objective testimonies are powerful pieces of communication.
To see the emotion and transformation from the interviewee causes an immediate connection with the audience. That's the beauty of video. It captures facial expressions, voice inflection, body movement and so much more that enhances the message’s delivery and connection. It’s challenging to create that with text or audio.
So if you are going to venture down the video interview road, here is the successful video interview trifecta that will sure to connect and possibly convert your audience.
Be Succinct
As with most successful online videos, brevity is key for high viewership. There's a reason why so many people watch video, they’re short and to the point -- at least the good ones are.
So a timing rule of thumb is keeping your productions around two or three minutes. People are in a hurry these days. If you can get your point across in that amount of time — or less, the more views you will receive.
And for the interview format, unless it’s incredibly compelling, you want these to be short, as well. The last thing you want is to have your subject going on and on about something or veering off on an unrelated tangent. Boring your audience is not the end goal. It’s all about audience engagement. If this scenario occurs, editing for brevity is a must.
Keeping your video interviews brief also keeps your audience engaged. Even if the video goes long for some reason and you can’t edit it down, break it up into multiple parts or a series. Then tease the next part coming up like a cliffhanger for your viewers to keep them coming back for the next episode.
Another bit of advice for brevity, coach your interview subject beforehand, telling them to keep their responses short by getting to the point quickly. You might have to shoot a few takes, but it will be worth it in the performance of your video interview. Study after study has shown short videos receive high viewership
Be Informative
Like being succinct, you have to be quick presenting your information. Studies have also shown that viewers check out of a video within seven seconds if it’s not interesting. So whatever golden nugget of information you or your interviewee has, present it within seven to 10 seconds to keep your audience engaged.
Here’s an idea: Place a compelling teaser quote or soundbite from the interview at the beginning of the video to hook your audience immediately. That soundbite from your subject may naturally occur later in the video, but it’s so compelling you have to tease or lead with it at the top of the video to hook your viewers. The viewer will see it later in the video and connect the dots. It’s a very effective technique that most TV newscasts have perfected over the years. So why not your online video interview?
Another tactic is to use a list: “5 Ways to Save for a Rich Retirement,” “4 Steps to a Robust Savings,” “3 Effective Strategies to Improve Your Mortgage Lending Performance” are a few examples.
If viewers see a list like these in the title, they are more likely to watch because they know they can get through the points quite quickly. But the caveat here is not to make the explanation of each step, strategy, method, etc. long. Keep them brief, as well, so you can move on to the next one.
Be Entertaining
You don’t have to be a clown, magician or stand up comedian for these productions, but having a bit of energy and personality sure helps. Remember the high school teacher in the movie “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” (dating myself, I know)? He would take roll in class in a very monotone, boring voice: “Bueller … Bueller … Bueller …”
It was funny in the movie because most of us can relate to going back to our high school days. But it won’t transfer very well in an online video interview. Your audience will click over to a cute kitten dancing to the Grease soundtrack video in a millisecond if you or your guest sound like that. It won’t matter how good your content is, having a vanilla mannequin as a guest and/or host spells disaster for any production.
So, again, make sure you and your guest have energy. It shows passion, interest and enthusiasm — and viewers are attracted to this positive vibe. Having this vitality and optimism may take some guest recruiting. But once you find a few, it’s gold.
Surprisingly, finding folks like this is getting easier and easier today, as many of us — along with the younger generations — are getting used to video because of smartphone technology. It’s not such a big deal anymore stepping in front of the camera because it’s happening everyday for a lot of people. We are becoming more and more acclimated to being on camera than ever before.
So the camera is not just for actors and newscasters anymore. With the advent of the smartphone camera, it’s for all of us. And this mobile tech means finding upbeat guests for your video interviews won’t be as challenging as in the past. They just might need a bit of coaching on how to be brief and get to the point quickly.
Again, video interviews are very powerful pieces of communication. They catch every nuance of a person’s personality and how deeply they were affected by your credit union’s help. Viewers can see it immediately. And that’s good TV.
Mike Lawson, principal and founder of the PR/marketing firm DML Communications and the host of the online CUbroadcast show, has two decades of journalism, public relations and marketing experience. His unique and robust knowledge allows him to meet the varied needs of editors, end-users and clients. Lawson's expertise enables him to enhance his clients' market exposure through media relations, social media tools, advertising efforts, target marketing strategies and more. He also speaks on PR, marketing and media issues to audiences nationwide.
