Data is at the heart of everything we do, even creativity. Those most beautiful and thought provoking videos could be a creative masterpiece, but if it doesn’t get engagements was it really worth the effort to make it.
Acadia Creative Producer Chris Vidal sat down and created a guide and answered common questions around video metrics.
Q: Why create a post on video metrics?
A: When it comes to creating content, obviously, you can do it from a paid lens. But it can often be difficult to really evaluate whether a piece of content is performing well or not with reference to organic or just brand-made content. So within that lens I was trying to put some more education around that point and to help people understand hey, these are where these metrics line up with actual actionable data.
Q: How do you decide which metrics to focus on?
A: If you're trying to maximize for a certain type of thing, let's say relevancy, then you're gonna go with Likes. You're gonna go with that metric and try to maximize on that. Obviously, you can try and focus on all of them, but I think a great way to start thinking about content is by first trying to figure out which metric you're trying to tackle or at least the two or three top metrics.
Q: Are all metrics equal when it comes to video content?
A: I don't think so. I think a lot of the metrics have a lot to do with the community that you're building. If you're building a value-based community where you're trying to get as much value to your viewers as possible, then maybe you're gonna be optimizing for savings and maybe it's not as important if you're getting a massive amount of likes. I think comments as a general metric are important because that's just engagement as a whole and that's how you speak to your community. It’s showing how the community feels about your content, product or your service.
Q: If your goal on a piece of content was to get users to save it, how would you approach that content?
A: I really simply think about what would force you as a user to hit that save button, that's a specific action. It's one or two clicks on most of the platforms, so it's something you would have to really want to keep around for future reference. So within that mindset you have to really use this lens of value. You're either teaching something to the audience that they didn't know or you're solving a problem for them that they encounter quite often. They need to feel compelled to take those extra steps to save the content.
Q: What can people learn from underperforming content when it comes to planning for the future.
A: I think there's two things you can do tomorrow to hopefully improve. Number one is ask yourself seriously, “what is the purpose of your content?” Go a little deeper than just, “I'm trying to sell a product or service.” If your viewer was sitting in front of you, what would you really want to tell them? I think putting it through that lens really helps.
Number 2 is make it less salesian, a bit more organic and more personal. And then on this flip side of that purely from a content creation standpoint is optimizing it. It doesn't matter if you have the holy grail at the end of your video. If you don't optimize those initial two to three seconds, it doesn't matter. People are gonna scroll faster and all that great information is gonna get lost.
You can see Chris’ entire guide below and learn more about Acadia’s Performance Creative Services by clicking here.