When I make a video of products at the store, I open the camera on the smartphone, point it in the right direction, hit the "Start" button and hope I get something good. However, since research indicates that video is the way to go if you want to get more interaction on Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms (live video gets the most attention from the various social media platforms, followed by edited video, photographs, links and text posts), this article in Adweek caught my attention. It looks at how Tasty, an offshoot of Buzzfeed, used video to become the number one source of videos watched on Facebook and the world’s number one "food network" (take that Food Network) with 9 million subscribers on YouTube. Here are four things Tasty did to improve watchability of its videos:
- Shoot top-down. Most people watch Tasty (and other) videos on their phones rather than on a computer monitor or TV screen. This means people watch videos looking down at their hand rather than across as if the viewer sat on a couch or in a chair. Thus, Tasty shot their videos, like this one for fried cauliflower "chicken" from the perspective of the viewer.
- Show, don’t tell. Tasty usually shoots its videos closely enough to the tabletop and clearly enough that the viewer can easily see how to make the recipe. However, the site does provide a link to a more detailed explanation and ingredient list, in case the viewer is intrigued enough by the presentation to want to look at the recipe in more detail.
- Optional sound and understandable. Tasty realized that, in a lot of cases, viewers would want or need to watch the videos with the sound off. After all, listeners do not want to have the voice of someone describing how to properly season a steak in the middle of a business meeting (yes, everyone gets bored sometime during a meeting or other event and starts scrolling through their feeds while someone else is talking. It can get rather embarrassing when the audio autoplay starts up). So Tasty made the videos clear enough to understand without sound and in many cases added closed captioning to the bottom, just to make it clearer. Tasty also realized English is not the first language of a good number of its viewers so wanted to make the operation clear enough that someone who doesn’t know English could understand. Given that so many high quality boardgames come from Europe, game companies, especially, have to consider that viewers may not speak the native language of the designer.
- Hands in pans. In its videos, Tasty does not show the faces of the people preparing the recipes, only the hands. This keeps the focus on the food. People tend to get distracted by faces, not so much by hands. By showing only the hands of the chef, the viewer’s attention is kept on the food (or game), where the company wants it.
Could this method be adapted to games? Sure. Make a short top-down video, showing only hands moving the pieces or cards with closed captioning, along with a voice-over, explaining what is going on and a link to the website for those wanting a more detailed explanation. It is hard to argue with Tasty’s success.
The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.