The Playbook for Creating YouTube Videos for Business
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Audiences are hooked on video content. On YouTube alone, people are watching over a billion hours of content every day. With all of this attention on video content, there are opportunities for companies and organizations that want to get their message seen. But video creation can be a challenging and costly endeavor for any marketer.
Thankfully, there is a process for aspiring content creators that can make the task of recording your videos sustainable, saving you time, money, and giving you more freedom to work on the creative parts of video production. Below we share our playbook for those businesses seeking to tap into the YouTube game, whether you’re starting your very first YouTube channel or have been making content for a while and are ready to take your playlists to the next level.
Start with a Title
Before pressing record on your camera, you should always have decided upon a title. Many people consider titles and keywords to be the last step before uploading your video to YouTube, but by having a title ready before shooting, you help yourself in two ways.
- Keep the content concise
- Focus on the title first
By focusing on the title first, you are forcing yourself to figure out what titles somebody may want to click on. Optimizing your subject for key terms people are searching for will also set your youtube channel up for efficient social media sharing.
This can take the form of building intrigue but often takes the form of keyword research and choosing a target audience. We suggest creating a list of valuable keywords in your niche then creating a title for each keyword you’d like to be discovered for. This becomes the basis of your content production strategy.
From this title, you can expand into your channel description, channel trailers, and video descriptions. These descriptions can also be recycled on social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram to enhance any video marketing campaign.
Script Ahead of Time
Everyone would like to be eloquent and thoughtful completely off the cuff, but even the most talented on-camera personalities struggle sometimes. Scripting your dialogue, or having some bullet points to refer to, will help you make sure you say what you want to say without unnecessary stray tangents or too many “ums” and “ahs”. It also ensures you stay on point because the YouTube crowd has a short attention span. As soon as they’re bored they click off your video, so this isn’t the time to be rambling. Another great thing about having a script is that you won’t forget to make an important point.
Several affordable teleprompter options on the market can work with smartphones or tablets. These range in size and price, but there’s even a small one that screws right onto the front of most lenses and uses a phone to run the script. This kind of technology is not out of reach anymore. We do suggest practicing on your own with a teleprompter before the shoot so you can get comfortable with the script ahead of time.
Batch Recording
To grow your YouTube channel, you’re going to need content–and lots of it! Many successful content creators and influencers put out a video every 1-2 weeks, and without a solid plan, that can be overwhelming. Producing your hours of video—brainstorming, scripting, shooting, editing—one at a time could easily turn into a full-time job that brings a lot of unnecessary stress. Instead, consider producing your videos in batches.
Script several videos in advance and then shoot them back to back all in the same day. Not only will you be using your time more efficiently, but this can also help cut down production costs (more on that below) and give you a more easily scheduled publishing cadence.
Using this method, it’s possible to record a year’s worth of content in just a couple of days. For example, one video a week is 52 videos. Consider shooting once per quarter and filming 13 videos in one day. It’s not as tough as it seems when using this approach.
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Rent Gear if Needed
Now let’s talk about the cost of creating this much content. If you don’t have all the gear required to produce videos and you’ve already gone shopping, you probably have some serious sticker shock from the upfront costs. Quality cameras, lenses, lights, mics are very important to looking and sounding good, but they can be very expensive. Don’t let that stop you from pursuing your YouTube dreams.
There are several video equipment rental companies, many based online, that offer reasonable day rates on equipment. If you are using the batch method to shoot multiple videos in a single day, it’s far more cost-effective to rent the gear that you need rather than buying it outright. As your channel grows, you can start acquiring the gear you need over time. When it comes to purchasing equipment keep this in mind: Audio is most important, lighting is second most important, camera quality is least important.
Hire a Professional (Small Business Too!)
If doing all of this sounds too daunting, there’s another cost-effective option available: hire a video professional. A video production company will already own the needed equipment and they know how to get the most out of it.
Hiring a video production pro will allow you to focus on the content while someone else handles the technical parts of the shoot. They can also help with on-screen coaching and advising on scripting if needed. If you’re shooting one or two days per quarter, the day rate for a video professional could end up being similar in cost to renting equipment and shooting it yourself but you get the expertise of a professional.
We believe video content can help almost any company or organization and with this approach, it can be systematized and knocked out just like any other item on your to-do list.
For Those in a Hurry, Here’s the TLDR to Optimize Video Content:
- Complete the keyword research and figure out your titles first so you know what videos to make
- Script your videos ahead and use a teleprompter to stay on point
- Shoot as much as you can in batches so you can save time and skip the stress
- Rent the gear you need to look and sound good or hire a video professional to handle the batched shoot days for you so you can focus on nailing the new video content
About the author
Kendrick Disch
Kendrick is a YouTube Certified growth strategist, cinematographer, videographer, photographer, and marketing technologist, solving problems with a camera, keyboard, and even sometimes his bare hands.
Before founding Vertical River, He worked for agencies, brands, and a multi-billion dollar ‘not for profit’. His passion is guiding clients to success by navigating the Vertical River.
