Why Post Video To Social Media: 3 Tips
by Kathleen Aikin| Aug 05, 2019
Why Post Video To Social Media: 3 Tips

Several recent reports show that video content outperforms every other type of post on social media. In other words, using video content in social media marketing is a very good strategy. In this post we look at some numbers, and try to work out what this means for content creators and marketers.

Renderforest put together an insightful report on social video marketing. Here are some of their statistics:

  • 100 million hours of video per day is watched on Facebook.
  • Video posts are shared 1200% more often than text and image posts, combined.
  • 16% of YouTube videos are embedded, linked, or shared.
  • 82% of Twitter users watch videos on Twitter.
  • 45% of all Internet users watch at least 1 hour of video content per week.
  • 4.6 billion video ads are watched online each year.

Are you seeing the value of video marketing on social media?

Best Facebook Post Format For Engagement

BuzzSumo spent a lot of time looking at video on Facebook, the below image is sourced from their 2019 Ultimate Guide to Facebook engagement, and you can clearly see the value of video.

BuzzSumo: Best Facebook Post Format

How To Optimise Your Videos For Social Media

Before you post your video, there are a few things you should know about video on social media. There are certain traits that a video post must have before it can perform well on social media.

Tip 1: Your Video Should Make Sense On Mute

85% percent of Facebook users watch video on mute. What this tells us is that people who use Facebook are reluctant to want other people to know! They could be using it as a distraction during a dull meeting or class, or maybe they just want to be polite.

There is also a strong argument to be made for accessibility as part of your strategy, and the fact that many users like to watch video while multi-tasking, making open captions a requirement.

Whatever the reason, videos that are easily understood without sound cater best to Facebook’s user base. You should consider embedding open/closed captions into your video.

Tip 2: Aim For Between 180 And 200 Seconds, Or 10+ Minutes

Statistics show that for Facebook, videos between 180 and 200 seconds, or about as long as a song on the radio, have the best engagement on social media. Longer than 200 seconds, engagement tends to drop off. This may be a testament to how long people can keep interest, or how much time they want to spend on social media in general.

This story is a little different in YouTube-land. The folks at TubeFilter took a fascinating look at what was happening in YouTube, and the below graphic comes from them. Their conclusion, longer equals better for YouTube, with 10+ minutes video’s achieving the best life time views.

TubeFilter: Life To Date (LTD) Average Views verses aggregated Average View Duration

Tip 3: When Should You Post Your Video

Answer: it depends on your audience. No, really, it depends on your audience.

Evening Posting Works Best On Facebook

A study found that posts made between 7pm and 11pm get the most engagement on Facebook. This varies somewhat depending on your audience’s demographic.

For example, users in nonprofit industries have some hot spots for engagement earlier in the day⁠—but in general, posting in the evening as opposed to during the morning and afternoon commute tends to fare best.

Take a look at your Facebook Audience Insights to see where your followers live, and choose convenient times for them to see your posts.

Posting Around Lunchtime Works Best For Instagram

Instagram has been found to have the most engagement between 10am and 3pm on weekdays, with very low engagement on Sundays specifically.

We follow the people behind Sprout Social, as they really know what is going on - the below graphic is from their best times for social media post.

Sprout Social: Best Times To Post On Social Media - Instagram

Post In The Morning For Twitter

The most engagement on Twitter happens at 9am. It greatly drops after 4pm, so plan on posting during the daytime.

On LinkedIn, Post On Wednesday Mornings

The most engagement on LinkedIn happens between 9am and 11am, as well as 12pm (think lunch time). on Tuesdays through Fridays. The platform has very low engagement on Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays.

Conclusion

Posting video on social media on social media has a great return on investment because of how much engagement video posts get. That said, video posts need to have certain traits to perform well. Video posts should be understood with the sound turned off, not longer than about three and a half minutes, and shared at strategic times of day.

To summarise, pay attention to who your audience is and where they live, as well as which social media platform you’re posting on. In other words, to get the most engagement, avoid posting on all of your social platforms at the same time.

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