- Increase user engagement on your social media channels by creating animated videos, infographic templates, video ads and other graphics.
- Social videos are one of the best ways to tell a compelling story about your business and your brand.
- Once you become proficient in creating animated videos and quality social video posts, consider using them in other areas to widen your reach.
- This article is for small business owners seeking to market their brand to a wider audience using short but visually engaging videos on social media.
Video is one of the best tools available to take your business to the next level of consumer engagement. Even if you struggle with social media marketing, the top video editing apps offer much simpler, quicker ways to create visually compelling and engaging stories about your brand or product.
Social video apps, available on both Android and iOS mobile devices, can help bolster your business using a variety of visual content strategies such as time-lapse videos, animation, GIFs and long or short video clips. And the best video editing apps out there make these tools and strategies much easier to navigate and execute.
Whether you’re trying to create viral content or just inform your audience about products and services, these video apps can help you get the job done.
The top social video apps
There are several social video apps to choose from online and in the app store, but we’ve narrowed the list down to five to help you choose the video-making app that best suits you and your business.
1. Canva
Canva has been a popular graphic design tool for years. It’s used by individuals and marketing professionals to make stunning flyers, social media posts, business cards and more. With Canva Animator, users can create the same beautiful social posts, only now they can be animated with six different effects for free or a small fee. This is a fantastic feature, especially for brands already accustomed to working with Canva.
Canva Pro also features Premium Video, a low-cost, simple way to create engaging social videos. Even those new to Canva – or to any graphic design application – will find all the mechanics user-friendly and compatible with all the social media platforms.
2. Adobe Express
Adobe Express, previously known as Spark, is a true game-changer. This tool is completely free, and its easy-to-use interface guides you as you create beautiful videos that can contain your own graphics, video clips, icons, images or text. You can search for free graphics covered by a Creative Commons license or buy one from the Adobe digital library, which has an extensive collection of materials.
Adobe Express has a remarkable number of free themes to make it easy for anyone to create high-quality short videos that look and sound professionally crafted. And the free music library further elevates your video’s impact.
No matter what video app you use, be sure to respect image copyright rules to avoid running afoul of intellectual property laws.
3. VistaCreate
VistaCreate by Crello is like Canva in many ways. The functionality and ease of use are at about the same level, and VistaCreate is also free. Where VistaCreate jumps to the next level is the fully customizable animated posts.
While Canva allows you to animate the text of your post, VistaCreate provides fully animated post templates. All you have to do is add your text, save and upload to your favorite social channel. These files are saved as MP4 and can be played anywhere that allows video.
4. Lumen5
Lumen5 is a great option for businesses of all sizes that produce regular blog content. Its AI technology allows you to easily transform blog content into a stunning video. The free service pulls images and words from your posts, which you can then customize as needed to create a video that catches the viewer’s eye. Make it interesting enough to keep people watching, but leave viewers wanting more so they click through for the full story. Free and paid plans are available.
5. GoPro Quik
Quik is a free phone app by GoPro that allows anyone with an Apple or Android mobile device to quickly and easily piece together images and videos and make captivating movies. Even if it’s only a few seconds long, Quik can make the difference in how engaging your content is.
It offers a huge selection of templates that you can individually customize to make it look as though hours of editing and design went into each video. Do not discount this powerful piece of software simply because it is on mobile platforms.
You can also engage in video livestreaming on social media to grow your audience and keep users engaged with your brand.
How to choose a social video app
Video marketing is one of the most effective media formats to promote your business and brand, according to Jean-Pierre Gautreaux, CEO of Venty Media.
“[Video] allows you to stand out from your competitors, and people love them because it makes it easy to share and consume information,” he said.
There are numerous video editing apps you can use to polish your videos. Here are the key features to pay attention to when choosing a social video app for your marketing campaigns.
Pricing
The differences in pricing for video tools are enormous. Some free or cloud-based applications offer a surprising range of features, while businesses with specific or advanced needs might prefer a paid service.
Editing capabilities
The more editing tools you have, the more options you have for enhancing your video footage. Adding video effects, animations and photo editing tools can improve your media marketing efforts.
Usability
It’s best to find out if the app is user-friendly. Does it slow down video production and the overall editing process or speed it up? Even many paid services come with access to free trials — test before you buy whenever possible.
Video formats
Check to see if you can produce a video in both portrait and landscape modes. Can you optimize the clips for different social channels? If you and your team use different platforms for your mobile devices, it’s important to verify that the app is iOS and Android compatible.
Direct imports
Uploading user-generated video content can be done faster and easier if the app allows you to import your finished product to multiple social channels simultaneously. This can be especially effective for businesses looking to boost customer engagement and brand loyalty.
Social media is one of the best platforms for expanding your business’s customer base, and video is the most effective way on social media to attract the attention of potential customers.
How to make a social video
Social videos can be as simple or as complex as you want to make them. On the simple end, you can shoot some great videos on your phone. The more complex end involves getting a higher quality camera, lights and sound equipment.
The most important thing to understand when creating social videos is that they need to have a compelling narrative. People recognize good versus bad storytelling, and by taking the time to create a coherent narrative, you set yourself up for success:
Start with a hook
With so much content available for users, you need to capture their attention in just a few seconds, or they will move on to the next post in their social feed. Try capturing the interest of your audience by speaking to their needs or interests immediately and then transitioning into your message.
Find the right format
Each social platform has a preferred or native video size and format. Facebook and YouTube have a 16:9 preferred aspect ratio. Instagram has a few format options, but the most common is the square 1:1 aspect ratio for the timeline and 9:16 for Instagram Stories.
Choose an optimal length
YouTube and Facebook lend themselves well to longer videos around 2 minutes or more. Instagram videos perform better when they are between 30 seconds and 1 minute. For the latter, you may need to break the story of your business into multiple videos.
Use captions
Many users watch videos with the volume down on their phones. Cater to these users by including captions in your videos — this way, they can follow along without turning up the volume on their phones.
Have a clear call to action
Tell viewers what you would like them to do after watching your video. Consider how you want viewers to engage with your brand. Do you want them to like and share your video? Do you want them to visit your website? Make your CTAs clear and succinct, and users will respond.
How you film your videos and how involved you want to get with editing really depends on where you want your videos to end up, so begin with the end goal and target audience in mind.
Social media marketing with video is effective
On all of these platforms, moving images convert better than text or static images. Once you become proficient in creating animated videos and quality social posts, consider implementing them in other areas such as profile or cover images and in ads to garner even more interest in your brand.
“Videos have a higher organic reach on all social media platforms and keep users engaged for longer,” Gautreaux said.
Whether you’re a small business or a multimillion-dollar corporation, creating quality video content is one of the best ways to reach your target audience. By creating animated videos, infographics, video ads and other social graphics, you increase user engagement on all your social channels, which in turn increases interest in your business.