Reels are going to continue to dominate in 2022 and making short-form video should form a big part of your content strategy moving forward.
If you are feeling at a loss when it comes to creating and sharing Reels, then follow these 7 tips to create videos that make an impact:
Ensure text appears within the first 3 seconds – your audience needs to figure out quickly what your reel is about to continue to watch it.
Use a hook – this is the message at the beginning of the video that sparks an interest with the viewer, so they stick around for the duration. Something like ‘My Top 3 tips for making a killer reel’. Or ‘This is how my reel went viral’. Instagram measures the time people spend looking at your content, as well as the interactions, so you want people to watch the whole video.
Overlaid text is essential as a lot of your viewers will be scrolling with the sound off.
Position your text towards the middle. When you share a Reel to your feed, Instagram crops it to 4:5 size of the 9:16 full screen so, to prevent your text being cropped, position it nearer to the middle of the screen.
Test length – Reels can now be up to 60 seconds, long but that doesn’t mean all your reels have to be 60 seconds. Try out different lengths and check your Insights to see what works best for your audience. You may find Reels under 10 seconds perform the best.
Check Lighting – film when it’s light and set yourself up near a window. If you’re filming when it’s dark, use a ring light. There are plenty of options on Amazon if you don’t have one. If you are filming using an iPhone, make sure the video setting is set to 4k. Good quality Reels increases reach as they are shown to more people.
Keep an eye on trends – if a piece of music is trending on TikTok, you can bet it will on Instagram too.