One of the most common questions from schools is this: How can I get more engagement from our followers? Engagement leads to more views, and this reach is one of the most critical metrics that schools use to define success.

The goal is to reach thousands of people each week with your posts, but it is a noisy world out there! How can your school get more of that attention?

Two words – more cowbell!

Oops, I mean these two words – more video!

Facebook, Twitter and Instagram all take videos now, and the shorter, the better. You don’t need to worry about a perfectly edited video to share on your page. Check out this example that reached over 3,700 on a Facebook page with just 1,500 fans.

Here are 4 tips to making video part of your weekly content strategy:

1. Don’t worry about perfection – People get consumed with the need to trim, add music, add fade effects and more. None of that matters! Well, of course there is a time and place for that type of editing, but your daily social media updates don’t have to be perfect.
2. The shorter the better! – Videos that are seven to 10 seconds long actually perform much better than videos longer than one minute. The stats don’t lie; most video views fall off after 30 seconds, many after just 10. So share that little snippet of students swinging at recess, or a child saying they love a book because it is about football and they love the Packers.
3. Share at least one video per week – Upload them directly into the social media platform. It’s fine if you have a YouTube or Vimeo account for your school, but native videos perform much better inside Facebook.
4. Batch some video shoots – Schedule 30 minutes to visit a classroom in your school. Explain that everyone in the class is going to take turns coming out to be on a video for the school’s social media pages. Tell the kids what question you plan to ask them so they can be a bit prepared with their answer. Questions may along the lines of:
   • What do you like most about going to school here?
   • What is your favorite memory about 2nd grade?
   • What do you want to be when you grow up?

Put kids in front of the camera, start recording, and then ask them the question. Summer is coming up, which leaves many schools scouring for content. Sharing one of these videos each week will be easy to schedule out and fun for your community to enjoy.

I can’t wait to see your videos. For more video ideas, check out this blog post that provides 33!