HOW TO GET THE MOST OUT OF NATIVE VIDEO ON FACEBOOK

accessibility of technology and platforms to post video on have made video content some of the most popular and viewed content on the web. In fact, video makes up for 78% of all web traffic (in terms of data use) and that number will only grow in the future.

Part of what is facilitating the increasing ubiquity of video is that hugely popular social platforms like Facebook and Twitter have begun supporting native video—videos that have been uploaded onto that particular social platform’s video player. Thus if a user wants to upload a video, but only wants it seen only by his or her Facebook friends and not every single person on YouTube, he or she is more likely to make use of native video on Facebook or Twitter (or Twitter video sites like Vine or Periscope).

More companies are beginning to develop platform-specific video strategies to take advantage of each platform’s unique strengths. On Facebook, for example, when you publish video you have a higher visibility and a greater likelihood of engagement as you are publishing your content to a network of people who have already expressed interest in your company.

So what are some ways to better connect with your audience via Facebook native video?

One golden rule of Facebook video is that videos that are the length of 1-2 minutes tend to perform the best. Thus, if you’ve created a longer video that might be better geared for a YouTube or Vimeo audience, you can still create excitement for it on Facebook by posting a 1-2 minute highlight from the video.

Another important practice to employ on Facebook is consistency. The greater frequency with which you can deliver valuable content to your audience will result in increased engagement from your audience. So if it’s easy for your company to churn out videos and you have a surplus of topics, posting regular video content will help to boost engagement.

Finally, since Facebook allows you to upload video from your smartphone wherever you might be at any time, this allows for two additional and effective strategies. The first is to record videos on location from events and conferences pertinent to your industry. The second is to answer audience questions by creating original videos and posting them directly to Facebook. By presenting yourself as an industry expert, you can boost the engagement with your company while also increasing your authority in the eyes of your audience.

So if you haven’t started taking advantage of the native video functions on Facebook or have found your audience on YouTube plateauing, implement the above strategies to heighten user engagement on Facebook.