Improving Your Blog’s Video Content

It sometimes seems as though everyone is flocking to video these days. Businesses, advertisers, and presidential candidates are all populating the web with video posts where written content once stood. For bloggers of all backgrounds and interests, video posting has suddenly become a highly appealing tool for boosting traffic, maximizing SEO, and diversifying content.

If you’ve recently added video to your blog, you may have already seen an improvement in your organic search result rankings, your bounce rate, and your overall site traffic. But, when considering the changes you’ve made on your blog, you may find that your overall quality has suffered. Your video posts are mediocre and not great. You realize that changes need to be made.

Improving the quality of video content is far different from improving the quality of your written work. Here are a few suggestions for trying to boost your video output:

Talk out your argument, don’t write.

When making the switch to video, many bloggers make the mistake of treating the new medium like a slightly altered version of writing. They decide what they want to talk about, write it down, and then use that transcription to directly guide what they say. Unfortunately, what looks good on paper does not always sound good when spoken. This is especially the case when you have an opinion about your content that you seek to communicate.

In these situations, simply jotting down a few ideas beforehand – rather than writing everything out – will insure that your written word doesn’t limit the content or the natural, conversational flow of your argument. It will also, at the same time, help keep you concise. While the internet may have enough online storage to hold all your ramblings, your viewers may not appreciate a long-winded speaking approach.

Be demonstrative

A video is meant to be both seen and heard. In this manner, your overall quality will languish if you have solid verbal content but rarely anything to show your viewers. Not every video needs to be demonstrative, but using a diagram, product, or chalkboard every once in a while can help insure that your overall content grows stronger.

Take a persona

Are you a friend or a teacher? A mellow sage or an energetic enthusiast? Just as a writer needs to have a persona, so too does a video blogger need an identity – one that may not be the exact same. While it’s possible to hide beyond your words when producing written content, your personality will play a significant role in the quality of your work when making the transition to video. Having a persona can go a long way towards making that conveyed personality more dynamic and unique.

Change up the setting

Many video bloggers sit in front of a white wall, or a bookshelf, or an unassuming photograph. There’s nothing wrong with doing this. But varying up the setting can make the background more interesting – and positively integrate into your content. Instead of talking about the lessons you learned at the grocery store, take your camera shopping with you and record footage as you go.

While there are numerous benefits to carrying video on your blog, many of these benefits can be negated by a mediocre level of video quality. Hopefully these tips will help you start improving the quality of your video posts. If you find that you cannot, it might simply be best to put video aside and focus on your written content instead.