8 Steps to Producing Video Content for Your Blog
Whether you’re totally new to producing video content for your blog or this is something that you’ve been considering for a while now, the entire process can be challenging, exciting and promising all at the same time. Video content is vital in order to really succeed online these days. In fact, the inclusion of videos into your blog not only helps you to connect with a wider audience but also boosts your reach and increases time on site as well as your search engine rankings.
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Follow these steps to produce powerful videos for your blog from start to finish.
1. Consider Audience
The first pre-production step to producing video content for your blog is to think about the audience and why you want to create videos for the blog. This is where it is important to know your audience members well and to think about their wants and needs before you plan content for productions.
Naturally, if your audience is a group of pet lovers, you will probably produce content relative to animals for your blog. Likewise, if your audience is a group of teachers, you’ll probably produce videos that focus on curriculum, children, learning or similar themes in order to grab their attention and engage them.
You can get to know your audience in a number of ways. Your analytics tell you a lot about your audience such as basic demographics and behavior patterns. Before you begin producing video content for your blog, take some time to format an outline of key details relative to your audience. Who are you creating content for?
2. Prepare Script
Once you’ve defined your audience and the purpose of your video content, it’s time to prepare the script. Your script will vary based on the purpose and type of video you are creating. A good rule of thumb is to plan your script to have a very defined target audience, to use a conversational tone and to keep the topic clear and concise throughout.
Include wording that you would use to discuss the topic in everyday language. A video blog post is not the time to incorporate seldom used vocabulary or words that are only understood in a certain industry and highly misunderstood or misinterpreted outside of that industry. Keep it relatively relaxed and easy to understand what is being said and why.
3. Storyboard & Shot List
Once you have a script that outlines your video content and tells your story, a storyboard can be created to visually share the story. What visualizations will be used to produce your video content?
The storyboard shows others in the cinematography team what your story is about, how it will be visually delivered and what shots the camera crew is expected to capture to deliver the story to the audience.
Shot List
The shot list will depend on the equipment available to produce video content for your blog. If you have a full production company helping you out, the shot list will likely be rather in depth and engaged.
However, if you’re producing video content with limited resources, your shot list may be a few quick notes about how you want your camera positioned in order to capture a certain shot or scene. This is where you plan how the camera will be utilized to bring the visual elements of your film to life for the world to see.
4. Prepare Audio
You may not think that the audio is a major element or of that much importance when producing content for your blog. In fact, you probably think, if anything, that it certainly doesn’t deserve a spot that is high on the to-do list when it comes to the steps that you need to consider when producing video content for your blog, but think again!
However, the first major production related step to creating top notch content for your blog is to prepare to capture high quality audio that will sync with your video.
Make sure that you’re prepared to capture the best audio you can in production so that you can reduce stress related to syncing and, that of downright having to recapture the audio all together should you miss out on decent sound to begin with.
Optimize Audio
To get the most out of your audio, avoid using mics that are built into your camera. Aim for professional, external microphones and proper placement.
You should also make sure that your subjects are positioned facing towards the microphones or nearby the microphones when you are shooting so that you can get great sound right from the start.
5. Prepare Lighting
The next step to producing video content for your blog is to master the lighting of the area. Depending on where you are filming this could be a quick and relatively easy process, or it could be a big event that would be best accomplished with a technical crew.
Since early video content produced for a blog is likely to lack the budget to pay for a Gaffer, you’re going to have to aim to produce top notch lighting yourself!
Proper lighting is vital to your footage so here’s what you need to remember:
● Key lighting – the main light for your set. Place it to the right of the camera, just above eye level to produce a natural appearance.
● Fill lighting – the fill in light that will help to reduce shadowy appearances, this can be used anywhere a shadow has been cast by the key.
● Back lighting – placed behind the subject to produce an illuminated outline of the subject that separates the subject from the rest of the set to produce depth.
Have fun with your lighting, test it out in various ways, and see what works best for your blog content.
6. Roll Cameras
Next, it’s time to begin capturing footage for your video content. Your blog video will vary greatly depending on what you are filming, where you are filming, and what the purpose of your video is. The type of camera that you use to produce video for your blog will depend widely on your budget, experience, individual needs and the type of film being created.
Before you begin shooting, make sure that you are prepared with plenty of batteries and storage so that you can capture your footage without interruption.
7. Video Editing
Once you’ve captured the necessary shots for your video post it’s time to start editing. Editing the video will vary greatly based on several factors. A first run production that is amateur may not even pass through editing. However, if you’re working with a professional video production company to produce video content for your blog, the entire editing process will actually be mostly hands off for you.
What happens in video editing? A lot! This is where your audio is synced with the visual footage that is captured. This is where it all comes together and the colors of the visual footage are corrected to ensure continuity and an appearance that is professional and visually appealing.
Editing can take anywhere from a few hours, to several weeks depending on the total length of the finished content. Most video content created for a blog will be edited in several hours at most and is then ready for distribution.
8. Prepare for Distribution
Once your video has been edited you can distribute it. You should already have a plan in pace as to where you will distribute the content. Various video distribution options exist even for video content produced for your blog.
Naturally you’ll want to distribute the video on your blog first, but then consider YouTube, email, social media or other distribution channels that would allow you to put your video content in front of a wider audience.
Talk to Team Beverly Boy
Need help producing video content for your blog? Give Beverly Boy Productions a call at 888-462-7808! We’ll help you get started with top quality video for your blog. With 300 offices worldwide and professionals in many major cities, our team can’t wait to help you produce videos for your blog or any other reason.
