Why Facebook Is Prioritising Your Videos

When to post, what to post, where to post – these are the questions digital marketers ask themselves every day. The tricky thing is, there isn’t anyone answer. There are so many factors that dictate how we plan a digital strategy. Luckily, a new Facebook trend can answer at least one of those questions – what to post.

Facebook will now prioritise video content over all other posts, including images and link shares. And they don’t want a 30 second, product heavy spot either. Trends show that Facebook wants videos longer than 3 minutes with highly original content. They are looking for authentic content creators who can produce repeat and return videos. We know, longer than 3 minutes? What about thumb-stopper content, you cry to the heavens. I thought millennials had an attention span of 12 seconds, you yell as you alphabetise hashtags.

Why the change?

Well, while that all may be well and good, the reality is that Facebook is shaping up to take on YouTube as the destination video platform. That might sound like a fool’s errand, but Facebook has the largest user base in the world – over 2 billion – and therefore has the biggest direct audience in the world. They are reaching for the stars, and pulling your 3-minute-long videos with them.

This means that brands shouldn’t be shying away from long form video content. Engaging with narrative ad campaigns driven by original concepts will lead to better performing social media posts, and not just on Facebook. The rise of IGTV has seen brands posting longer video content on Instagram as well. IGTV in particular is appealing to users for it’s play – pause – fast forward function that doesn’t exist for Instagram feed videos.

Bye-Bye Short Form

After years of being told that short form content is what gets consumers engaged, it seems the pendulum is swinging back the other way. GLUE Content Founder Felicity Whelan notes the importance of longer video content, “Brands need to venture away from the traditional thinking that the shorter the content the better as this isn’t necessarily the case anymore. More than ever brands need to build a content bank that consists of both short form and longer form video content.” 

GLUE Content is a Melbourne based video content production and animation agency, producing content for some of Australia’s leading companies, brands, agencies and sporting organisations.