Effective Strategies for Facebook Video Ads

Hello everyone and welcome to another Stucan Expert Session. My name is Ina, and today we are excited to bring on Akvila DeFazio to teach us about marketing with Facebook. Bringing together consumers and brands is what Akvila, president of Akvertise Inc., a social media advertising agency, does best. Prior to launching Akvertise, she spent the last decade working in-house at a variety of companies, ranging from ski and snowboard e-commerce to pet health insurance and event marketing via paid search and social media. As a conversion-driven marketer, Akvila is passionate about helping businesses expand their online business. online visibility and reach their goals. She currently lives with her husband and their dog in the beautiful city of Paso Robles in central California. So without further ado, here's Akvila. Akvila DeFazio, Facebook Video Ads Thank you so much for the kind introduction, Ina. Hi everyone, I'm Akvila DeFazio and today we'll be talking about Facebook video ads and how to set your metrics in motion. So let's dive right in. What are we going to be talking about today? So we'll talk about why use video and the different benefits over static images. Then we'll talk about the various goals that you can accomplish using Facebook ads and using videos for your campaign. And then we'll cover three main tactics for success, including brevity, captions, and design. And we'll showcase a number of really great B2C and B2B, pardon me, examples of different ways to use Facebook video ads. Then we'll move on to different equipment that you can use. And lastly, we'll wrap up with video editing apps for both iOS, macOS, and Android. So why use video ads? Well, for one, you can stand out among the stillness of the news feed. Everything is usually static there, and as you're scrolling down the feed, how do we capture our audience's attention? Well, video is an excellent way to do that, and through that, you can also get higher engagement rates. And while that's the case in most video campaigns, just be mindful that it also depends on the type of campaign you're running. So if you are doing an engagement, awareness, or video views campaign, you should expect... see higher engagement rates in terms of likes, comments, and shares on your video ads. If you are doing a conversion type of campaign, oftentimes we see that the engagement won't be higher there just because the focus of those campaigns is conversions. So you might see a lower click-through rate, you might see a lower conversion rate, but for those types of campaigns you should see a higher conversion volume and lower CPAs and just a higher conversion rate overall because the goal of those types of campaigns is different. And you'll want to showcase a really good video of what people can expect from your products or services. And it leaves less imagination than reading a text ad and then going to a landing page. So just something to be mindful of there. Some other reasons why you should use video is that users require a smaller attention commitment. And they're impactful and memorable. And they often receive 10% to 30% more views. So now that we know that video is great. Let's talk about some different statistics from some reputable sources. According to Invisia, viewers retain 95% of a message when they view it in a video compared to only 10% when they read it in text. That's huge. If you can get your message across easily to people using video instead of having them to read text on your ads and then go to a landing page, you've done a great job by capturing their attention and getting them to act. If you are working with e-commerce brands and clients, this stat is. incredibly important. Visitors who view product videos are 85% more likely to buy than visitors who do not, according to Internet Retailer. If you're able to showcase your product, certainly do so and bring it to life using video. If you work on the B2B end of things, also be mindful that while oftentimes people tend to be on social and it's more frequently used for B2C, don't disregard those channels because most of the world is on Facebook and even executive. So while only 59% of them would rather watch video than re-text, that completely makes sense because while many of us are busy, executives are incredibly busy. They're going to meetings, they're traveling, and they're the decision makers. So if you can get in front of them and show them a quick video and captivate them for a moment and have them to come back and complete an action, you've done a great job and certainly try out video for that. So now that you know how well video works for other people, let's talk about how video can work well for you. So what are your goals? Well, whether you're trying to get people into your marketing funnel through awareness campaigns, you can use video for just about every type of Facebook type of campaign. You can do brain awareness and get people to use it as a really great introductory point to your brand. If they're a little bit further down your funnel in the consideration stage, you can use a video to drive traffic to your website. You can do app installs or even app re-engagement campaigns to get people to download your app and maybe even re-engage with them to do any in-app purchases and showcase some features that way that they can if they pay for more features they can buy those directly through the app. And of course your video views if you're working b2c or b2b lead gen certainly bring your brand and your products and your services to life using the videos. And for post engagements if you're liking to drive a little bit more likes comments and shares you can certainly do that as well. And while the Facebook like has been devalued over the last few years, it's still important and it's great for us to use for remarketing campaigns. So if you are especially a newer page or a newer brand online and you're looking to drive your fans up a little bit more, maybe say to a thousand, this is an excellent and inexpensive way to get people to notice your brand and like your page. And then you can use that audience for other types of campaigns. And then there's event responses. So you can, if you have any events that you're doing, if it's. first-time event, maybe show somebody in your video that is talking about the event and they're excited and they're inviting to it. And if you have repeat events, maybe like conferences or webcasts, you can showcase some other ones that you've done in the past to showcase to your audience what they could expect if they came to your event. And next up we have messages. Those are for Facebook Messenger. They're a really great way to become much more interactive and engaging with your audiences so you can do videos there. And lastly, if you are kind of further down the funnel with conversion campaigns, this is a really great way to get people to see a new type of message or new type of video where you can get people to come back and make a purchase or maybe do a sign-up form or download, whatever your goal is here, to get them to convert. So one great way to use video for remarketing campaigns or campaigns where they are a warmer audience. familiar with your brand, they've been to your website, it's a nice way to get them to come back. So if you aren't familiar with remarketing, for instance, if you go to Amazon or another online retailer and you're looking at a pair of shoes, however you don't purchase them and you bounce early from the website, you can target those people that went to your website, added to the cart, or did other actions with your brand online and to get them to come back and fulfill that action. So next up, let's talk about the three main tactics for success. We'll talk about brevity, captions, and design. Let's dive into brevity. Well, let's get to the point, so keep it short. And if you're wondering why there's a goldfish here, back in the year 2000, around the time that the mobile revolution began, according to The Telegraph, a Canadian research company did a study on the human attention span. And back then, it used to be 12 seconds. And then over the years, since we've gotten smartphones and tablets and technologies evolved even further, our attention span has been diminished to only seven seconds. That's crazy, right? So why is the goldfish here? Well, goldfish have a beat by one whole second. They have a longer attention span of eight seconds. So why is this important? Well, people don't have a very long attention span these days. And there's just so many distractions, especially as you're scrolling down the Facebook feed or the Instagram feed. So with brevity, as you may or may not already know, there's no cookie cutter formula for marketing. But what you'll want to do is you'll want to test out short form videos and long form videos and see what works best for you. With Facebook, there is a video length maximum of 240 minutes. However, realistically, no one's going to sit on Facebook watching one video for four hours. But you can use that to your advantage for something like maybe a Facebook live and then repurposing that for your other campaigns and testing different audiences. So what I mean here is that, for instance, there was a really great recent example I saw of Timothy Ferris. He writes a number of books, mostly for entrepreneurs. And he did a Facebook Live for an AMA or Ask Me Anything around the time he was launching his book. And he was asking his fans and his audience to ask him any questions. And he was responding in the video during the live segment. And then he took that video and repurposed it and turned it into an ad and tested it with audiences that may not have been able to tune in live. It was a longer form video, but it still encouraged the viewer to engage and leave comments even after it was no longer live. So it's just one great way of using a longer video and testing it out. However, if you are running Instagram, since it is on the same platform, they only have a video length maximum of 60 seconds. So here, if you want to run a similar video to your Facebook one, however shorter, you can add that at the ad level underneath where you select your video. And lastly, just put your best foot forward in the first 10 seconds. No matter how entertaining, how useful, how interesting your video is, there will always be people that drop off, usually around the 10 to 15 second mark. And there will certainly be people that watch the entire video, but just show your brand, show your logo, show your product, show your service in the first 10 seconds, and then tell that story just so you can capture people's attention right off the bat. Next, we'll talk about captions. Did you know that 85% of videos are watched without sound? Well, why is that? Facebook auto plays without sound and we also can't disregard anybody that might be hearing impaired. So is your video telling the story visually, textually, and acoustically? If not, you'll certainly want to have all three of those components and add captions. So to add captions in the ad level where you are selecting your video, right underneath you'll see a button that says choose thumbnail and captions. So here you can choose a thumbnail and right underneath there are these three options. And the first two, let's Facebook review it and it'll generate a script based on what somebody is talking about in the video if you have any verbal or spoken text. And then it'll scan it within a few first seconds and then you can edit it manually, which is super easy to do and takes about no time whatsoever. And you'll just want to be mindful that when you're doing this that you review it before you save it because Oftentimes if you have a unique brand name, sometimes it will miscaption it. Or if you have somebody speaking with an accent, it might pick up the incorrect words as well. So just be sure to go through it, save it, and then if you have your own file that already has your subtitles, you can upload an SRT file or SubRip text file in a various amount of languages. So it's easy and you can do that right through the interface. And here are two really great ads. just to showcase captions in the wild. The one on the left is the blogger teamed up with HelloFresh. They are a food delivery service. And while the video is great in terms of telling me what it is in the text, an ad copy, if I'm watching the video, I could tell that it's something food related since she's in her kitchen. However, she does a really great job of explaining. And I wouldn't be able to tell that if I was listening without sound of what she's talking about if it didn't have captions. So in this brief 15 to 20 second video, Tenley talks about how fresh the ingredients are in this food delivery service and how easy the menu or the recipe card is. And she does a really great job narrating it and unboxing it and showcasing what you can expect if you're a customer. On the right, if you're into cards, Donut Media does excellent videos. However, if you didn't have sound, didn't have captions, you wouldn't know everything that they were talking about. And they're entertaining. educational and they don't use a lot of copy in their actual description of their videos so it's important for them to use captions to get their stories across and they're doing a really great job so if you haven't checked out their videos and your cards I recommend checking them out and just seeing how you can take an educational video and also apply captions to it so what if you rely on sound well you can go beyond the captions a client of ours they're called indo window insert they make custom window inserts to increase the energy efficiency of your home. And also, they have acoustic grade ones that will dampen outdoor sounds in your home by up to 70%. And we recently received a customer video. We didn't ask for it. They just sent it to us because they were so pleased with the product. And seeing this video just really just showcased the benefits of it. But we were kind of stuck. How do we showcase this when it requires sound? people that might not be listening, especially 85% of Facebook users. So I recommended that we take the sound wave from the original video file of the before and after of the noisy streets that this woman lived on and showcased it with a sound wave since most people know what a sound wave looks like and what it resembles. And we didn't embellish it. We just gave it the brand colors and put it into the video. And as you can see, you're listening. You can definitely tell the difference of how much quieter their home is. after putting in the endo inserts and then you can also see that with the sound wave. So you can get a little creative, go beyond the caption and use every of those elements, text, visuals, and acoustics to get your message across. And lastly, before we move on, Adespresso recently said it best, think like a silent film artist when you are working on Facebook video content or Instagram or any other channel. Next up, let's talk about design. Oftentimes, we work with a number of brands and clients, and they're usually in the small to medium-sized range. Anytime video comes up, there's instant hesitation, and understandably so. Most oftentimes, people think that they need more resources, high-end equipment, like a red camera that costs as much as a BMW. However, that's not the case. All you need is your phone these days. You can make highly-produced and appearance videos at a low cost and low effort and execution by using simple tools and a number of free and premium apps. So you can use simple effects such as overlay text, slow motion, time lapse. Then there's also stop motion, which we'll go over shortly, and cinemagraph. What's a cinemagraph? Well, here's a great example from one from Flixel. They are static images with subtle motion that you can apply anywhere in the image. And they're beautiful, they're captivating, they will make you stop as you're scrolling down the feed and see what this is all about. And if you do your relevant targeting to your audiences, it'll perform even better. So here is a company called Flixel. They have an iOS and a macOS software system for people to easily make cinemagraphs. and they are beautiful and they're easy to make and they're a great option for people to use. They have free options to where you can test them out however they have a watermark on them and if you want to you can pay for their subscription services if you plan to make more without the watermark. So here's an example of one if you can just imagine with me they're not a client of ours but this is what I saw in my own Facebook feed. I don't have the original file to actually show it in motion but this video immediately caught my eye. I was scrolling down as a cinema grass. It was just a photo of this woman on the phone. But the only part that was moving was the little flickers of just the shines off the phone, off the diamonds. And it immediately caught my attention. I scrolled back up to see what it was all about. I'd never seen anything like this before at the time. So it was very simple. It immediately caught my attention. And if I was in the market looking for some new clothes, I may have clicked through to this boutique. So what's stop motion videography? So here's an example of one. Food & Wine teamed up with Yoplait Yogurt and here they did a stop motion video. So stop motion is where you take a series of still shots but you move the objects that you're taking photos of. And then once you put the whole file together it looks like a video and things are just moving across the screen. So here you can imagine with me there was a summer bag and they were trying to showcase their new line of yogurts. The first ones that came out were strawberry and everything else that was red in color that resembled that flavor. Then came out all the yellows with lemons and that one was the lemon flavor. So this is a very easy, captivating and effective ad to capture people's attention. And it shows a product and it's relevant to the summer months coming up. And if you work on the B2B side, just because you're on the B2B side doesn't mean you can't get creative. You can certainly apply a lot of the same tactics that you can use for B2C clients and e-commerce to B2B and bring your brand, your e-books, your webcasts to life. So here's an example from LinkedIn. This was just a static image, but if you want to try to bring some motion into it, you could apply some of the things we just mentioned, like cinemagraph. So here you can just show somebody typing on the keyboard, or if you want to do a stop motion video, you can make the watch move across the screen, or the phone, or the keyboard, and that would be enough to capture some of the tension, just some subtle movements, and then get them to read your copy and click through and convert. If you're in events, You can also do some simple ones with overlay text, either static or animated. And here's the sports company where I live and I recognize the mountains immediately as I was scrolling through and they just did a panoramic video shot across the mountains here and then just put some overlay text on it. Nice and easy, gets the point across and locally targeted for an upcoming race. And back to the whole thing about not needing expensive equipment and all you need is your phone. Here's a great example that even Taylor Swift can get away with just using her phone for a video ad. Here, just a few months ago, she teamed up with AT&T and just showcased with her phone of her in the studio recording her recently launched new album. And it was nice and short, just a few clips. And if she can do it, you can certainly do it as well and capture people's attention with minimal equipment and effort. So what will you need? Well, at bare minimum, all you need is your phone. If you've got a camera on it, go out and start shooting videos and have fun with it. If you're looking for a separate device, it's still relatively affordable. A GoPro is another excellent option, and it comes with a fantastic video editing app called Quick. In terms of area, if you aren't well-versed in photography or aren't sure where to start, you can start with just using a wall or a table, or if your table's a little too busy, you can just put a tablecloth on it. If you're showcasing any products, you'll want a clean or distraction-free space. space unless of course you're in the environment where your product or your service can be seen going back to that hello fresh example earlier where we showcased the unboxing of the hello fresh food delivery box, and a kitchen where that can be seen in use. In terms of lighting, if you're looking to do natural mornings are great, those overcast weather or the golden hour before sunset. If the weather isn't cooperating you, artificial light indoors is also another great option. However, just be mindful of shadows. And lastly, tools, video editing apps. So there are a number of these are free and freemium. You can start with some basic features, and they all have some really great ones that you can get accustomed to the app without committing to making a purchase. You have Boomerang and Hyperlapse, which are part of Instagram. They have some really great looping, and you can do slow motion and speed it up with those types of apps. If you are interested in playing around with Stop Motion, Stop Motion Studio is a wonderful app. Very easy to use where you can test out moving, taking a bunch of still photos and moving your objects around and creating a file that way. If you want to do a cinemagraph, Flixel is the company we mentioned earlier. They do really great iOS and macOS apps for that. Unfortunately, not Android at this time. And iMovie is also available on macOS. And if you're looking to do some really cool animated or static font, Legend is a really great option there. Quick is the one that we mentioned that is a part of GoPro. And if you're looking for some additional fonts for any overlay text, any special effects or filters. InShot, Filmorgo, and VidLab are also excellent options there. So just to recap, the three things we talked about are brevity. While you can try different types of lengths, try to keep it short and put the best foot forward in the first 10 seconds. However, test longer videos as well and see what works best for you because sometimes the story needs a little bit more time to get the message across. So certainly test, test, test. When it comes to captions, ask yourself this, is your video and your ad as a whole encompass all three factors of having it visually, textually, and acoustically just put together? And if you don't add captions, if you are relying on sound, find other ways, maybe using sound waves to showcase what the acoustic part is. And when it comes to design, you can certainly create highly produced video content. at low cost and low effort through a number of free and premium apps. And just get creative, have fun, start shooting video. All you need is your phone, and I encourage you to go out there and have fun. Whether you're B2B or B2C, there's an endless amount of options that you can do there. And I'll leave you with this. If 52% of consumers say that watching product videos makes them more confident in online purchase decisions, according to Infoto, this is a huge stat. So if you are working on the B2C, B2C or B2B side, certainly test out video because if you are trying to sell something, bring your brand to life, bring your products and your services and showcase that to leave less to the imagination and make it a much more seamless transaction for people to see your video, go to your site and complete the goals that you have in mind. And that is a wrap.

Prior to launching Akvertise, she spent the last decade working in-house at a variety of companies, ranging from ski and snowboard e-commerce to pet health insurance and event marketing via paid search and social media. As a conversion-driven marketer, Akvila is passionate about helping businesses expand their online business. online visibility and reach their goals. She currently lives with her husband and their dog in the beautiful city of Paso Robles in central California. So without further ado, here's Akvila.

Akvila DeFazio, Facebook Video Ads Thank you so much for the kind introduction, Ina. Hi everyone, I'm Akvila DeFazio and today we'll be talking about Facebook video ads and how to set your metrics in motion. So let's dive right in.

What are we going to be talking about today? So we'll talk about why use video and the different benefits over static images. Then we'll talk about the various goals that you can accomplish using Facebook ads and using videos for your campaign. And then we'll cover three main tactics for success, including brevity, captions, and design.

And we'll showcase a number of really great B2C and B2B, pardon me, examples of different ways to use Facebook video ads. Then we'll move on to different equipment that you can use. And lastly, we'll wrap up with video editing apps for both iOS, macOS, and Android.

So why use video ads? Well, for one, you can stand out among the stillness of the news feed. Everything is usually static there, and as you're scrolling down the feed, how do we capture our audience's attention? Well, video is an excellent way to do that, and through that, you can also get higher engagement rates.

And while that's the case in most video campaigns, just be mindful that it also depends on the type of campaign you're running. So if you are doing an engagement, awareness, or video views campaign, you should expect... see higher engagement rates in terms of likes, comments, and shares on your video ads.

If you are doing a conversion type of campaign, oftentimes we see that the engagement won't be higher there just because the focus of those campaigns is conversions. So you might see a lower click-through rate, you might see a lower conversion rate, but for those types of campaigns you should see a higher conversion volume and lower CPAs and just a higher conversion rate overall because the goal of those types of campaigns is different. And you'll want to showcase a really good video of what people can expect from your products or services. And it leaves less imagination than reading a text ad and then going to a landing page. So just something to be mindful of there.

Some other reasons why you should use video is that users require a smaller attention commitment. And they're impactful and memorable. And they often receive 10% to 30% more views. So now that we know that video is great. Let's talk about some different statistics from some reputable sources.

According to Invisia, viewers retain 95% of a message when they view it in a video compared to only 10% when they read it in text. That's huge. If you can get your message across easily to people using video instead of having them to read text on your ads and then go to a landing page, you've done a great job by capturing their attention and getting them to act.

If you are working with e-commerce brands and clients, this stat is. incredibly important. Visitors who view product videos are 85% more likely to buy than visitors who do not, according to Internet Retailer. If you're able to showcase your product, certainly do so and bring it to life using video.

If you work on the B2B end of things, also be mindful that while oftentimes people tend to be on social and it's more frequently used for B2C, don't disregard those channels because most of the world is on Facebook and even executive. So while only 59% of them would rather watch video than re-text, that completely makes sense because while many of us are busy, executives are incredibly busy. They're going to meetings, they're traveling, and they're the decision makers.

So if you can get in front of them and show them a quick video and captivate them for a moment and have them to come back and complete an action, you've done a great job and certainly try out video for that. So now that you know how well video works for other people, let's talk about how video can work well for you. So what are your goals? Well, whether you're trying to get people into your marketing funnel through awareness campaigns, you can use video for just about every type of Facebook type of campaign.

You can do brain awareness and get people to use it as a really great introductory point to your brand. If they're a little bit further down your funnel in the consideration stage, you can use a video to drive traffic to your website. You can do app installs or even app re-engagement campaigns to get people to download your app and maybe even re-engage with them to do any in-app purchases and showcase some features that way that they can if they pay for more features they can buy those directly through the app. And of course your video views if you're working b2c or b2b lead gen certainly bring your brand and your products and your services to life using the videos. And for post engagements if you're liking to drive a little bit more likes comments and shares you can certainly do that as well.

And while the Facebook like has been devalued over the last few years, it's still important and it's great for us to use for remarketing campaigns. So if you are especially a newer page or a newer brand online and you're looking to drive your fans up a little bit more, maybe say to a thousand, this is an excellent and inexpensive way to get people to notice your brand and like your page. And then you can use that audience for other types of campaigns. And then there's event responses.

So you can, if you have any events that you're doing, if it's. first-time event, maybe show somebody in your video that is talking about the event and they're excited and they're inviting to it. And if you have repeat events, maybe like conferences or webcasts, you can showcase some other ones that you've done in the past to showcase to your audience what they could expect if they came to your event.

And next up we have messages. Those are for Facebook Messenger. They're a really great way to become much more interactive and engaging with your audiences so you can do videos there. And lastly, if you are kind of further down the funnel with conversion campaigns, this is a really great way to get people to see a new type of message or new type of video where you can get people to come back and make a purchase or maybe do a sign-up form or download, whatever your goal is here, to get them to convert. So one great way to use video for remarketing campaigns or campaigns where they are a warmer audience.

familiar with your brand, they've been to your website, it's a nice way to get them to come back. So if you aren't familiar with remarketing, for instance, if you go to Amazon or another online retailer and you're looking at a pair of shoes, however you don't purchase them and you bounce early from the website, you can target those people that went to your website, added to the cart, or did other actions with your brand online and to get them to come back and fulfill that action. So next up, let's talk about the three main tactics for success.

We'll talk about brevity, captions, and design. Let's dive into brevity. Well, let's get to the point, so keep it short. And if you're wondering why there's a goldfish here, back in the year 2000, around the time that the mobile revolution began, according to The Telegraph, a Canadian research company did a study on the human attention span.

And back then, it used to be 12 seconds. And then over the years, since we've gotten smartphones and tablets and technologies evolved even further, our attention span has been diminished to only seven seconds. That's crazy, right? So why is the goldfish here? Well, goldfish have a beat by one whole second.

They have a longer attention span of eight seconds. So why is this important? Well, people don't have a very long attention span these days.

And there's just so many distractions, especially as you're scrolling down the Facebook feed or the Instagram feed. So with brevity, as you may or may not already know, there's no cookie cutter formula for marketing. But what you'll want to do is you'll want to test out short form videos and long form videos and see what works best for you.

With Facebook, there is a video length maximum of 240 minutes. However, realistically, no one's going to sit on Facebook watching one video for four hours. But you can use that to your advantage for something like maybe a Facebook live and then repurposing that for your other campaigns and testing different audiences. So what I mean here is that, for instance, there was a really great recent example I saw of Timothy Ferris.

He writes a number of books, mostly for entrepreneurs. And he did a Facebook Live for an AMA or Ask Me Anything around the time he was launching his book. And he was asking his fans and his audience to ask him any questions. And he was responding in the video during the live segment.

And then he took that video and repurposed it and turned it into an ad and tested it with audiences that may not have been able to tune in live. It was a longer form video, but it still encouraged the viewer to engage and leave comments even after it was no longer live. So it's just one great way of using a longer video and testing it out.

However, if you are running Instagram, since it is on the same platform, they only have a video length maximum of 60 seconds. So here, if you want to run a similar video to your Facebook one, however shorter, you can add that at the ad level underneath where you select your video. And lastly, just put your best foot forward in the first 10 seconds. No matter how entertaining, how useful, how interesting your video is, there will always be people that drop off, usually around the 10 to 15 second mark.

And there will certainly be people that watch the entire video, but just show your brand, show your logo, show your product, show your service in the first 10 seconds, and then tell that story just so you can capture people's attention right off the bat. Next, we'll talk about captions. Did you know that 85% of videos are watched without sound? Well, why is that? Facebook auto plays without sound and we also can't disregard anybody that might be hearing impaired.

So is your video telling the story visually, textually, and acoustically? If not, you'll certainly want to have all three of those components and add captions. So to add captions in the ad level where you are selecting your video, right underneath you'll see a button that says choose thumbnail and captions. So here you can choose a thumbnail and right underneath there are these three options.

And the first two, let's Facebook review it and it'll generate a script based on what somebody is talking about in the video if you have any verbal or spoken text. And then it'll scan it within a few first seconds and then you can edit it manually, which is super easy to do and takes about no time whatsoever. And you'll just want to be mindful that when you're doing this that you review it before you save it because Oftentimes if you have a unique brand name, sometimes it will miscaption it. Or if you have somebody speaking with an accent, it might pick up the incorrect words as well.

So just be sure to go through it, save it, and then if you have your own file that already has your subtitles, you can upload an SRT file or SubRip text file in a various amount of languages. So it's easy and you can do that right through the interface. And here are two really great ads.

just to showcase captions in the wild. The one on the left is the blogger teamed up with HelloFresh. They are a food delivery service.

And while the video is great in terms of telling me what it is in the text, an ad copy, if I'm watching the video, I could tell that it's something food related since she's in her kitchen. However, she does a really great job of explaining. And I wouldn't be able to tell that if I was listening without sound of what she's talking about if it didn't have captions.

So in this brief 15 to 20 second video, Tenley talks about how fresh the ingredients are in this food delivery service and how easy the menu or the recipe card is. And she does a really great job narrating it and unboxing it and showcasing what you can expect if you're a customer. On the right, if you're into cards, Donut Media does excellent videos.

However, if you didn't have sound, didn't have captions, you wouldn't know everything that they were talking about. And they're entertaining. educational and they don't use a lot of copy in their actual description of their videos so it's important for them to use captions to get their stories across and they're doing a really great job so if you haven't checked out their videos and your cards I recommend checking them out and just seeing how you can take an educational video and also apply captions to it so what if you rely on sound well you can go beyond the captions a client of ours they're called indo window insert they make custom window inserts to increase the energy efficiency of your home. And also, they have acoustic grade ones that will dampen outdoor sounds in your home by up to 70%.

And we recently received a customer video. We didn't ask for it. They just sent it to us because they were so pleased with the product. And seeing this video just really just showcased the benefits of it. But we were kind of stuck.

How do we showcase this when it requires sound? people that might not be listening, especially 85% of Facebook users. So I recommended that we take the sound wave from the original video file of the before and after of the noisy streets that this woman lived on and showcased it with a sound wave since most people know what a sound wave looks like and what it resembles.

And we didn't embellish it. We just gave it the brand colors and put it into the video. And as you can see, you're listening. You can definitely tell the difference of how much quieter their home is. after putting in the endo inserts and then you can also see that with the sound wave. So you can get a little creative, go beyond the caption and use every of those elements, text, visuals, and acoustics to get your message across.

And lastly, before we move on, Adespresso recently said it best, think like a silent film artist when you are working on Facebook video content or Instagram or any other channel. Next up, let's talk about design. Oftentimes, we work with a number of brands and clients, and they're usually in the small to medium-sized range. Anytime video comes up, there's instant hesitation, and understandably so. Most oftentimes, people think that they need more resources, high-end equipment, like a red camera that costs as much as a BMW.

However, that's not the case. All you need is your phone these days. You can make highly-produced and appearance videos at a low cost and low effort and execution by using simple tools and a number of free and premium apps.

So you can use simple effects such as overlay text, slow motion, time lapse. Then there's also stop motion, which we'll go over shortly, and cinemagraph. What's a cinemagraph?

Well, here's a great example from one from Flixel. They are static images with subtle motion that you can apply anywhere in the image. And they're beautiful, they're captivating, they will make you stop as you're scrolling down the feed and see what this is all about.

And if you do your relevant targeting to your audiences, it'll perform even better. So here is a company called Flixel. They have an iOS and a macOS software system for people to easily make cinemagraphs.

and they are beautiful and they're easy to make and they're a great option for people to use. They have free options to where you can test them out however they have a watermark on them and if you want to you can pay for their subscription services if you plan to make more without the watermark. So here's an example of one if you can just imagine with me they're not a client of ours but this is what I saw in my own Facebook feed. I don't have the original file to actually show it in motion but this video immediately caught my eye.

I was scrolling down as a cinema grass. It was just a photo of this woman on the phone. But the only part that was moving was the little flickers of just the shines off the phone, off the diamonds. And it immediately caught my attention. I scrolled back up to see what it was all about.

I'd never seen anything like this before at the time. So it was very simple. It immediately caught my attention. And if I was in the market looking for some new clothes, I may have clicked through to this boutique. So what's stop motion videography?

So here's an example of one. Food & Wine teamed up with Yoplait Yogurt and here they did a stop motion video. So stop motion is where you take a series of still shots but you move the objects that you're taking photos of. And then once you put the whole file together it looks like a video and things are just moving across the screen.

So here you can imagine with me there was a summer bag and they were trying to showcase their new line of yogurts. The first ones that came out were strawberry and everything else that was red in color that resembled that flavor. Then came out all the yellows with lemons and that one was the lemon flavor. So this is a very easy, captivating and effective ad to capture people's attention. And it shows a product and it's relevant to the summer months coming up.

And if you work on the B2B side, just because you're on the B2B side doesn't mean you can't get creative. You can certainly apply a lot of the same tactics that you can use for B2C clients and e-commerce to B2B and bring your brand, your e-books, your webcasts to life. So here's an example from LinkedIn. This was just a static image, but if you want to try to bring some motion into it, you could apply some of the things we just mentioned, like cinemagraph.

So here you can just show somebody typing on the keyboard, or if you want to do a stop motion video, you can make the watch move across the screen, or the phone, or the keyboard, and that would be enough to capture some of the tension, just some subtle movements, and then get them to read your copy and click through and convert. If you're in events, You can also do some simple ones with overlay text, either static or animated. And here's the sports company where I live and I recognize the mountains immediately as I was scrolling through and they just did a panoramic video shot across the mountains here and then just put some overlay text on it.

Nice and easy, gets the point across and locally targeted for an upcoming race. And back to the whole thing about not needing expensive equipment and all you need is your phone. Here's a great example that even Taylor Swift can get away with just using her phone for a video ad.

Here, just a few months ago, she teamed up with AT&T and just showcased with her phone of her in the studio recording her recently launched new album. And it was nice and short, just a few clips. And if she can do it, you can certainly do it as well and capture people's attention with minimal equipment and effort.

So what will you need? Well, at bare minimum, all you need is your phone. If you've got a camera on it, go out and start shooting videos and have fun with it.

If you're looking for a separate device, it's still relatively affordable. A GoPro is another excellent option, and it comes with a fantastic video editing app called Quick. In terms of area, if you aren't well-versed in photography or aren't sure where to start, you can start with just using a wall or a table, or if your table's a little too busy, you can just put a tablecloth on it. If you're showcasing any products, you'll want a clean or distraction-free space. space unless of course you're in the environment where your product or your service can be seen going back to that hello fresh example earlier where we showcased the unboxing of the hello fresh food delivery box, and a kitchen where that can be seen in use.

In terms of lighting, if you're looking to do natural mornings are great, those overcast weather or the golden hour before sunset. If the weather isn't cooperating you, artificial light indoors is also another great option. However, just be mindful of shadows. And lastly, tools, video editing apps.

So there are a number of these are free and freemium. You can start with some basic features, and they all have some really great ones that you can get accustomed to the app without committing to making a purchase. You have Boomerang and Hyperlapse, which are part of Instagram.

They have some really great looping, and you can do slow motion and speed it up with those types of apps. If you are interested in playing around with Stop Motion, Stop Motion Studio is a wonderful app. Very easy to use where you can test out moving, taking a bunch of still photos and moving your objects around and creating a file that way. If you want to do a cinemagraph, Flixel is the company we mentioned earlier. They do really great iOS and macOS apps for that.

Unfortunately, not Android at this time. And iMovie is also available on macOS. And if you're looking to do some really cool animated or static font, Legend is a really great option there. Quick is the one that we mentioned that is a part of GoPro. And if you're looking for some additional fonts for any overlay text, any special effects or filters.

InShot, Filmorgo, and VidLab are also excellent options there. So just to recap, the three things we talked about are brevity. While you can try different types of lengths, try to keep it short and put the best foot forward in the first 10 seconds.

However, test longer videos as well and see what works best for you because sometimes the story needs a little bit more time to get the message across. So certainly test, test, test. When it comes to captions, ask yourself this, is your video and your ad as a whole encompass all three factors of having it visually, textually, and acoustically just put together? And if you don't add captions, if you are relying on sound, find other ways, maybe using sound waves to showcase what the acoustic part is.

And when it comes to design, you can certainly create highly produced video content. at low cost and low effort through a number of free and premium apps. And just get creative, have fun, start shooting video. All you need is your phone, and I encourage you to go out there and have fun.

Whether you're B2B or B2C, there's an endless amount of options that you can do there. And I'll leave you with this. If 52% of consumers say that watching product videos makes them more confident in online purchase decisions, according to Infoto, this is a huge stat. So if you are working on the B2C, B2C or B2B side, certainly test out video because if you are trying to sell something, bring your brand to life, bring your products and your services and showcase that to leave less to the imagination and make it a much more seamless transaction for people to see your video, go to your site and complete the goals that you have in mind.

And that is a wrap.

Transcript for:Effective Strategies for Facebook Video Ads

Transcript for:
Effective Strategies for Facebook Video Ads