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04 Video Channels

Video isn’t a one size fits all format. To reach the right audience, you need to know how to make and distribute videos across different channels.

The use of video on social media has skyrocketed over the past few years, driven by:

Increased numbers of people using social media globally
Audience preference for information delivered visually rather than via text
A growing number of businesses who say that video has the best return on investment (ROI)

Social media video marketing, however, isn’t just a matter of creating a few videos and sprinkling them around various social media platforms. If you want to implement an effective video marketing strategy for your business, you need to know how to make videos for different social media channels, and you need to identify the best video marketing platforms for reaching your ideal audience.

As a general rule, the more video marketing channels you use to share your content, the better. However, if you’re publishing your videos on channels that aren’t relevant to your target market, you’re wasting time and money because your potential customers are simply not going to see your videos. So it’s important to do your research, find out which social media channels your audience likes to hang out on, and create videos specifically for that channel that will grab their attention.

Here are a few video marketing tips to help you create just the right videos for each channel.

Platform First

Facebook Video

  • Keep your brand identity front and center of everything you create so that your video content is easily identifiable with your company
  • Native videos provide you with great visibility and analytics, so upload videos directly to Facebook.
  • Pin a video to the top of your page to introduce your company, highlight a product, and set the tone for your page.
  • Think about accessibility by including text transcriptions of all the audio content.

Instagram Video

  • Keep in-feed videos and videos in Instagram Stories short, light and engaging. Incorporate a small story when possible.
  • Videos play on silent until users unmute the sound, so put an emphasis on engaging visuals to entice users to turn the sound on, but don’t assume they will.
  • Leave longer content for IGTV.
  • Try out Instagram Reels - they’re super easy to add audio or music to, and you can upload premade videos, edit multiple clips into one, or create original content in the app.

Snapchat Video

  • Snapchat is all about immediacy, so focus on what’s going on for you right now.
  • Snapchat videos tend to be off the cuff and playful, so go for a similar unpolished and playful quality in your own videos.
  • Keep the Snapchat aesthetic by using emojis and notes in your videos.

Twitter Video

  • Keep your Twitter videos topical.
  • Get to the point quickly and make it engaging.
  • Add captions or subtitles to your videos.
  • You can post the same content multiple times.

LinkedIn Video

  • Use visual storytelling to hold your audience’s attention.
  • Put the most important content within the first 10 seconds of the video.
  • Keep brand awareness videos to under 30 seconds.

TikTok Video

  • Don’t push products, tell stories and add value.
  • Look for trends - user-generated content is the basis of this platform, so encourage your community to share their own videos.
  • Post often, and don’t be afraid to repurpose existing content to build your audience (for example, shave an existing podcast or video down to 15 seconds).
  • Comment! Make sure you interact with those who are engaging with your content.
  • For an example, look to some of the videos from Asos’ first brand campaign on TikTok - the #AySauceChallenge - which rewarded them with 1.2 billion video views in the first week.

YouTube Marketing Tips

As the second-largest search engine after Google, and with almost 2 billion active users, YouTube is currently the most powerful video channel for marketers.

In fact, in 2018, 87% of marketers said they used YouTube to publish video content, and 90% of them found it an effective strategy.

If you’re just getting up to speed with social media video marketing, here are our top 5 YouTube marketing tips to help you create effective videos that catch the attention of your target audience.

  • Research your competition
  • Find inspiration from popular channels
  • Optimize your videos
  • Schedule video content consistently
  • Analyze the response to your videos

For more detailed YouTube marketing tips, read Learn How to Promote your YouTube Channel next.



Though YouTube is the powerhouse of video marketing channels at the moment, it is by no means the only option out there. Here are a few of the most popular alternatives:


Vimeo
Vimeo is an ad-free platform whose clean interface means there’s little to distract viewers from your content.
Daily Motion
DailyMotion uses the same layout and provides the same video categories as YouTube but is more popular with European audiences than Americans, so it may be a good choice for brands wanting to target European markets.
Metacafe
Metacafe users tend to focus on funny, short-form videos, so this channel might be a good fit for brands looking to create an informal, playful vibe.
Twitch
Twitch is a live streaming video platform that can be watched live or on demand. Users say it handles live streaming a bit better than YouTube.

Video Specs

Posting videos across multiple video marketing channels isn’t a one-size-fits-all affair. Each platform requires different video dimensions and lengths, and you need to be aware of these during the video creation process in order to make a video that will display optimally on each platform.


YouTube Video

FormatTypeMetricsSpecs
.MOV
MPEG4
MP4
.AVI
.WMV
.MPEGPS
.FLV
3GPP
WebM
How-To Videos
Product Reviews
Unboxing Videos
Vlogs
Haul Videos
Best-Of Videos
Educational Videos
Brand Videos
Explainer Videos
Total Watch Time
Viewer Retention
Video Engagement
Top 5 Videos by Views
Minimum size: 640 x 480 pixels
Maximum size: 3840 x 2160 pixels

Aspect ratios: 16:9 and 4:3

Max. length: 12 hours long (verified accounts only)

Click the link for more on YouTube's Current Specs

What Next?

Now that you've got to grips with the most popular video distribution channels, discover tips for getting started from our video experts in Chapter 5. Or skip to Chapter 6 for a step by step guide to video production.