How To Optimize Your Videos For Instagram

For a while now, video has been taking over social media, be it Facebook, Instagram or even Twitter. For instance, according to Statista, people on Instagram spend 51% of their time watching videos while the number for Facebook stands at 46%.

At the same time, social media analytics tool quintly reports that video content on Instagram receives 49% more interactions than photos. For a photo-centric network, these numbers are telling. The trick here is to get people to stop scrolling and pay attention to your content. Instagram gives brands a lot of flexibility when it comes to formatting their videos so bite-size product tutorials or 60-second commercials, the choice is yours.

Then there is the 15-second vertical video supported by Stories, and IGTV for long-form content. On August 5, 2020, Instagram also introduced Reels, which lets you record and edit multi-clip videos in a serious competition to the likes of TikTok so without further ado, let’s get right into it!

The General Rules

1. Shorter Videos Sometimes Provide Better Results

When creating videos for Instagram, you should keep things short and brief. This is because the human brain processes visuals a lot faster than text, and on a platform like Instagram, we tend to scroll faster. To fit this user behavior, a HubSpot study found that the best length for Instagram videos is about 26 seconds; They tend to generate the most comments.

Just make sure you share your best information in the first few seconds and choose a thumbnail that attracts attention for those users who don’t have autoplay turned on.

2. Optimize For Mobile

There is no denying that Instagram is primarily a mobile app. Yes, you can access it on desktop, but there are several things that you can only do on the app, including posting. So if you’re looking to create quality video content, optimize them for mobile.

This means making sure the video and overlay text are easy to see, even on a smaller screen, and if you’re linking to a landing page, that should be optimized for mobile as well. You can also experiment with different overlay colors and fonts, and scale up the ones that work best.

3. Know Your Goal

Every video you share on Instagram should have a purpose. Do you want to generate sales? Do you want to drive more traffic to your website or a conversion-optimized landing page? Or do you just want to improve your brand image?

Without a clear goal, you’ll trigger what is called a paradox of choice where your audience won’t know what to do next so they will end up not doing anything at all. Since producing good video content is time-consuming and often costly, you want to get a return on your investment, like a shoppable post that lets you link to the multiple products featured in the video.

4. Use Captions Wisely

On Instagram, most videos that autoplay do so with the sound turned off, so you need to add text to get your message across. Used right, short captions can also help pique the interest of viewers and get them to watch the whole video, and even turn the sound on.

Just make sure you don’t use too much text, and standing on its own with no audio track, your video should still appeal to the eye.

5. Editing And Scheduling Your Videos

Are you looking to create more awe-inspiring Instagram content? We got 3 words for you: Instagram video editors, and there are many of them. Like Splice, which is a part video editing app part photo montage tool that can help you create great content from your existing photos and videos. It’s owned by GoPro and it’s incredibly simple and intuitive to use. It’s also one of the best ways to reformat your videos to Instagram’s default square format.

Then you have apps like Boomerang and Hyperlapse that let you optimize how your videos play, be it GIF-like, looping forward and backward to create a short, snappy video, or a quick video of something like a sunset or a city tour that would otherwise be too long or too slow for Instagram.

And once your videos are ready, you can also optimize their scheduling with tools like Agorapulse and Later.

The More Specific Rules

1. In A Regular Post

In 2015, Instagram introduced video formats to support landscape, square and vertical content. The technical specs are as follows:

2. In Stories

For Stories, we recommend keeping things raw and in-the-moment, much like you would on Snapchat, to avoid users swiping and leaving. The technical specs are as follows:

3. On IGTV

Like Stories, IGTV videos display full-screen; The difference is how you can get into long form content with run times of 1 hour for verified and large Instagram accounts. The technical specs are as follows:

4. On Reels

And finally, Reels lets you record and edit 15-second videos that you can then share to your followers on Feed, or if you have a public account, to a wider community on Explore. They are a short-form of content in full 9:16 portrait mode, and they can be anywhere between 3 and 15 seconds long.  The videos can also be filmed in one take or in a series of takes stitched together, and they can only be uploaded from mobile. For your caption, you can use up to 2,200 characters and 30 hashtags, just like in Feed posts.