Unless you are an expert in filming and editing ecommerce product videos, the best thing you can do for your business is invest in professional help. Your product page videos will play a crucial role in establishing brand trust and image, and you want them to develop those things–not detract from them. Using professional help will ensure a quality end product that does a better job of converting.
Still, if professional help isn’t in your budget and you’re wondering how to make a product demo video for yourself, it is possible.
Follow these steps to create a compelling product video.
1. Plan Your Video
To plan your video, start by deciding which kind you want to use. Consider the five types discussed in part one of this guide:
- Simple product demonstration videos
- Explainer videos
- Selection advice videos
- Unboxing videos
- Customer testimonial videos
If you go with one of the first three, you’ll need to account for your resources, brand and product offering to choose between the following styles:
- Live-action: The best option for physical products
- Animated: Requires excellent design skills and works best for intangible products, like software
- Screencast: A recording of your computer screen with the narration as text overlay or voice-over
- Whiteboard: A narrative told through drawings on a whiteboard
- A combination of the above
If you have product variations, you’ll also want to decide whether each needs a video or if one video is enough for all of them. For instance, different product models might require their own video while different color options won’t.
From there, you can start planning everything you want to show or go over in your video. Be sure to keep your target audience and their pain points and concerns in mind—the same as with any other marketing tactic.
What Should You Include In a Product Video?
When planning your video, be sure to include the following components:
- The product (duh)
- Key features and benefits
- Common customer questions
- Demonstration of how the product works
- Full views and close-ups
- Sound and captions for the blind and hard of hearing (if there are any words)
- A clear message (even if there are no words)
- A touch or more of brand personality
2. Prepare a Storyboard and Script
You should have a clear idea of what you want to film before you start, so it’s best to prepare a script and storyboard.
A script is what the speaker or on-video text says. Make sure your script isn’t too salesy. It shouldn’t discuss price at all, especially if it’s on your product page.
A storyboard is a shot-by-shot visualization of the video. Storyboards can be as simple as hand-doodled slides with an explanation under each as long as it’s clear how the final video should look.
How Long Should a Demo Video Be?
The length of a product video depends on the type of video and your product. Under 1 to 2 minutes is ideal, with visual demos as short as 15 seconds and explainer videos up to 90 seconds. High-end or low-awareness products that need more explanation should remain under 5 minutes.
Time is valuable. If a video is too long, buyers will move on without receiving all the information you wanted to share.
3. List All of Your Needs
The last thing you want is to have your space and participants ready, only to have left a vital element behind—or to be prepared to start editing, only to have the project pushed back because of a missed scene or new needs.
Sometimes new, better ideas come to us, but the best thing you can do for a smooth ecommerce video production is make a list of everything you need in advance. Be sure to include everything and everyone that will be in the video, all the equipment you need to film, and everything you need to edit the final piece.
If working on your own video, you can outsource editing tasks through freelance sites or use online production tools.
4. Shoot and Edit
Once you’ve collected everything you need, go ahead and shoot your video. Good product videography for a live-action video will require high-quality equipment and lighting.
When you edit your video, be sure to consider whether to add background music. If you do, you’ll want the song(s) to fit the video, match your brand and avoid distracting from a voice-over if there is one.
You’ll also want to make sure your video doesn’t require sound to get your points across. Some people can’t hear well or may have their volume down, and not all social platforms play audio right away. If you don’t include text overlays or captions, make sure the important points are in your product description.
Do Product Videos Need a CTA?
Some experts recommend adding a call-to-action (CTA) at the end of any and every product video. This is overkill. Whether you need a CTA will depend on the location of your video. A 15-second product demonstration video within the gallery on a product page doesn’t require a CTA. Adding a CTA to videos you promote on other platforms or pages may be helpful.
11 Quick Product Video Tips
Here are some more tips for how to shoot product videos and optimize them to increase sales.
1. Prioritize popular products. If creating product videos feels overwhelming or you don’t have the budget to create a product demo video for every product in your store, start with your best-selling items. When you see conversions go up, it will motivate you to allocate efforts towards other products.
2. Promote related products. A product video can showcase more than one product, even if one is in the background. Doing so will increase awareness of your other products and can increase AOV.
3. SEO your videos. Like other website content, you can optimize your product demo videos for search engines. Be sure to use metadata, tags and titles. You’ll also want to choose a video hosting platform to embed the video on your site, and ensure that Google Search Console (GSC) includes it in your sitemap.
4. Consider UGC. User-generated content won’t always be of high enough quality to include on your website. When it is, it’s a great way to obtain free videos that contribute to your brand authenticity and community. Product review videos are among the easiest user-generated videos to create.
5. Hit every angle. More often than not, product page videos are meant to give consumers an experience similar to what they would get in person, and in person, they can see the product at every angle. Make sure your product videography captures that with several close-up shots and full views.
6. Declutter your setting. A cluttered video comes across as unprofessional and distracts from the intended focus point: your product. Make sure your video setting is clean and makes sense for your video topic.
7. Segment and personalize. As soon as you can, start segmenting your audience into relevant groups based on demographics and behavior. You can use this insight to personalize your marketing, including the videos each audience segment sees.
8. Be human. If you want your videos to speak to potential buyers and contribute to brand loyalty, make sure they feel human and are helpful. The user shouldn’t feel like you’re just cramming information at them.
9. Have a personality. To add to the above tip, your product video creation can—and should—have some character, especially if your brand has a strong personality. You can hint at this personality in small ways, down to how a model models an outfit or a narrator speaks. Are they bold? Gentle?
10. Tell a story. People like stories, and narratives hold our attention. How you demonstrate a product can help consumers envision the story of using it.
11. Don’t use fear. It’s tempting to use fear tactics to encourage a purchase, but it’s also easy for these tactics to come across like a bad infomercial and invoke negative feelings. Instead, product videos for ecommerce should focus on the positives that come with using the product.
Product Video UX: Placing Videos on Product Pages
So you’ve created your videos and are ready to put them to use, but where do they go? Simply “on the product page” isn’t enough.
Sure, someone will find your video regardless of the exact location, but to get the most out of your videos, they should be placed where all consumers are most likely to see and watch them.
Some businesses put their product videos with their product images; others place theirs further down the page.
According to research by Baymard Institute, users have a harder time finding product videos the further they are from the image gallery. This makes sense because people expect similar items to be grouped together.
So, to improve video UX, place your images and videos together at the top of your product pages.
When you place your images and videos together, don’t separate them under different tabs where the user must alternate between them. This also makes them harder to find. Instead, keep them together and distinguish your videos by putting a play icon on video thumbnails.
Once you add your video to your photo gallery, you can include it in another location on your page if you think doing so will add value and increase discoverability.
