Our Guide to Social Media Video Marketing

There’s no denying the power of social media when it comes to brands connecting with their audience. People spend a huge amount of time on their socials and you’re most likely missing out on valuable exposure if you’re not visible on those channels.

With that in mind, we’ve put together some information for social media video marketing for use across all the major platforms so that you can make the most of them.

One of the great things about using videos organically on social media is you’re afforded more freedom than you are on other paid channels, and it’s up to you to judge how polished the videos need to be, as well as the type of content you post.

While the channels aren’t going to take your videos down (unless they are in some way offensive or contain copyright infringement), you do need to be aware that all your actions will reflect on your brand and help to shape public opinion about it, whether good or bad.

That’s why, even if you’re doing candid, behind-the-scenes videos or reposting memes, you should make sure whatever you post is still in line with your brand values and guidelines.

You should also set goals for what you hope to achieve from your social media videos so that you can measure success effectively. These goals could be anything from a percentage increase in followers, more audience engagement and more website visits to increased sales on a certain product range.

Video formats: Standard feed videos, Facebook Live (livestreaming), and Facebook Stories (temporary content).

Audience: Facebook has a broad demographic, with the most popular age group being 25–34-year-olds. Facebook is also the most popular social media platform among seniors, although they only account for around 10% of Facebook’s advertising audience. The platform also reaches more teens aged 13-17 than other social media channels, but this popularity could be waning.

Runtime: Facebook Stories can be a maximum of 2 minutes long and feed videos can be anywhere from 1 second to 240 minutes, so there are plenty of possibilities when it comes to the content you create. However, it’s worth noting that audience engagement tends to fall sharply after the 2-minute mark, so you should keep that as your goal for a maximum runtime in most circumstances.

Video formats: Standard feed videos, Instagram Live (livestreaming), Instagram Stories (temporary content), IGTV (long videos), and Instagram Reels (short videos).

Audience: Instagram also has a broad demographic, but the largest advertising audience is 25–34-year-olds, with 18–24-year-olds not far behind. This younger group is most likely to visit the platform multiple times a day.

Runtime: Instagram will support standard feed videos up to 1 minute long, but 30 seconds is a good length to aim for, as videos on the platform that received the most comments averaged 26 seconds according to a HubSpot study. Instagram Stories can be a maximum of 2 minutes for ads or 15 seconds for organic content. Instagram Reels can be 15 or 30 seconds long and IGTV videos can be up to 15 minutes long if uploaded from a mobile or 60 minutes if uploaded from the web.

Video formats: Standard feed video and livestream.

Audience: As with the other platforms, the largest demographic of Twitter users is 25–34-year-olds, but their second-largest demographic is those aged between 35 and 49.

Runtime: Standard Twitter feed videos can be a maximum of 140 seconds long, but videos between 20-45 seconds see the most engagement on the platform, so it’s best to shoot for that.

Video formats: Standard feed video, video ads, and livestream.

Audience: LinkedIn is a professional-orientated social media platform and the largest demographic is 46-55-year-olds, with the second-highest being 36-45. 26–35-year-olds still represent a significant portion of LinkedIn’s demographic and their presence is growing.

Runtime: The max length for feed videos is 10 minutes and 30 mins for video ads, but LinkedIn themselves suggest a 15-second runtime is best for ads.

The most popular videos across social media are constantly changing and trends come and go. While some of these may be worth jumping on, there are a few formats that perform consistently for brands, such as:

That concludes our brief social media video marketing guide, but there are more platforms out there and audience preferences are subject to change. At the end of the day, you are the expert on your own brand, so find a video style that works for you and do some investigation to find out which channels your target audience frequents. 

If you are looking to create video content to market on social media, you’re welcome to get in touch with us to find out more about our video filming and editing services.