Three reasons why nobody is watching your videos

So, you finally got there. At last your funky new video is up online. It took a while but you managed it. Sorted the script, storyboard, got it filmed, edited and it’s finally uploaded. That’s it all done, right ? Sit back, relax and wait for the work to come rolling in …

Erm … well, no, actually. That’s only step one. Just like anything out there, you need to get it in front of people .. oh, and when you do, you need to keep them watching.

So, why are you not getting the views ? Here are just three reason why this may be the case …

1. Your videos are just too long.

We pretty much know that these days, many of us have the attention span of a goldfish and the skittish nature of a butterfly on a nectar-hunt. There is just so much information out there, the only thing that’s going to grab (and keep our attention) is something short and snappy. So, not only will sub-one minute videos work wonders for you, but those opening 5-8 seconds had better be REALLY good, to stop your audience from just swiping away and on to the next bit of content.

2. It’s not all about The Tube

Say “Video” and YouTube will pretty much spring to mind above all other platforms - but it’s certainly not the only one out there and not necessarily the place that you should to be uploading to. Whilst you will find about 30% of internet users on YouTube, you will find that FaceBook is by far the more popular social media channel. So, with 8 Billion daily video views on FaceBook you can bet that if you are not uploading content there as well (and by that we mean “original content”), you’re definitely going to be missing out on a slice of that pie.

Whilst some of your target audience might be present on both YouTube and FaceBook, the key here is to work out where they actually spend most of their time and that will help to guide you as to what type of videos you should be creating and where to post them.

An annual Social Media report, like this one from Avocado Social, will give you some great stats about who is using which platform, and what ages they are etc.

3. Bad headline, bad press.

You know how many people despise how tabloid newspapers use misleading headlines to attract readers ? Well, when you do the same thing for videos and use a misleading video title, it’s known as “clickbait” and is highly frowned upon. Not only do you risk turning off your audience if they find that the title has little to do with the content, you also risk ruining your brand - that can either manifest itself in people not bothering to engage with your content in the future, or with bad comments which can negatively affect people’s first impressions of your channels.

As well as this, many of the social media site these days will penalise you for clickbait and your SEO could suffer tremendously as a result. Facebook even announced some time ago that they were actively going to reduce stories from sources that consistently post clickbait headlines.

All in all, it simply makes sense to create a video and have its title match as closely as possible, so users find what they’re looking for. The rewards will be greater and more organic. Also, keep the title to less than 60 characters so it’s not cut off in search results