1.
FACEBOOK VIDEO
DATA-DRIVEN INSIGHTS &
BEST PRACTICES
Mark Robertson
Carla Marshall
12/13/2016

2.
Mark R. Robertson
• 15+ years in internet marketing
• 10+ years in online video
• Founder of ReelSEO (now TubularInsights)
• Growth Marketing @ Tubular Labs
• Founder @ Little Monster Media
Carla Marshall
• Editor in Chief @ TubularInsights.com
• Video marketing consultant
• 8+ years in internet marketing
• 5+ years in online video
• Video marketing consultant
TODAY’S WEBINAR PRESENTERS

3.
@markrrobertson
WEBINAR AGENDA | OVERVIEW
1 Facebook Video Trends
2 Facebook Video Insights Best Practices
3 Facebook Live Video Trends
4 Facebook Live Tips
5 Totally Tubular
6 Q/A

4.
WHY FACEBOOK
VIDEO
Facebook Video Trends

5.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK: #1 MOST POPULAR SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM
Source: Pew Research Center – “Social Media Update 2016” Survey conducted March7-April 4 2016

6.
@markrrobertson
MOBILE VIDEO IS EXPLODING
• 75 % of all mobile data will be
video by 20201
• Mobile users are 1.5X more likely
to watch video daily vs.
Laptop/Desktop2
• 75+% of FB video watched on
mobile3
Sources:
1) Cisco Visual Networking Index Forecast - Feb. 01, 2016
2) “Video in Mobile Feed” by Kantar Media - Facebook IQ commissioned research lab of 114 people aged 18-30 in UAE & UK who watch short-form online video
(<10min) including ads and non-ads at least monthly
3) http://newsroom.fb.com

7.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK VIDEO & WHY YOU SHOULD PAY ATTENTION
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Sep-14 Oct-14 Nov-14 Dec-14 Jan-15 Feb-15 Mar-15 Apr-15 May-15 Jun-15 Jul-15 Aug-15 Sep-15 Oct-15 Nov-15
Growth of Daily Facebook Video Views (Billions) Sep 2014 - Nov 2015
Source: http://newsroom.fb.com
“I wouldn’t be surprised if you fast-
forward 5 years and most of the
content that people see on Facebook
and are sharing on a day-to-day basis
is video.”
- Zuckerberg told BuzzFeed News
• 8B Video Views/Day
• 500M Watching Daily
• 3X More Video Y.O.Y.
• 53% of Views via Shares

8.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK IS ALL-IN WITH VIDEO AND IT’S EVOLVING, FAST

9.
@markrrobertson
WHY NATIVE FACEBOOK VIDEO?
• Native videos get much higher average # shares than any other post1
• In mobile, people spend 5X longer w/video vs. static content on Facebook &
Instagram2
Sources:
1) Steve Rayson @ BuzzSumo - “New Facebook Share Data Reveals Why Video Is Key To Your Content Strategy” July 2016
2) “Video in Mobile Feed” by Kantar Media - Facebook IQ commissioned research lab of 114 people aged 18-30 in UAE & UK who watch short-form online video
(<10min) including ads and non-ads at least monthly

10.
@markrrobertson
Facebook Views: 68% of Views in first 7 Days, 87% of Views in first 30 Days
FOR NOW (2016) - FACEBOOK VIEWS & ENGAGEMENTS HAPPEN FAST
Data via Tubular Labs | Videos Uploaded to Facebook on Sept. 30th, 2016

11.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK VIDEO STRATEGIES
1. Use Facebook Video Features
• Uploaded Native Video
• Paid Video
• Live Video
2. Consider Nature of Platform & Consumption
• Capture Attention Quickly
• Be Inspirational
• Design For Mobile
1. Evolving Quickly
1. Tips for Now
2. Ongoing Test/Iterate

12.
BEST PRACTICES

13.
FACEBOOK VIDEO
BEST PRACTICES FOR
PAGES

14.
@markrrobertson
MOST IMPORTANT BEST PRACTICE = USE SCIENTIFIC METHOD
• Know your audience
• Interact with community
• Test, Test, Test
• Inquire
• Research
• Hypothesize
• Test
• Iterate
Image Source: Christopher Prince Boucher @ FollowThePrince.com

15.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK PAGE BEST PRACTICES: THE VIDEO TAB
• Prominently Feature ”Videos” Tab
• Create Featured Video
• Create Organized Playlists
• Include CTA to “Watch Video” (Keep on FB if possible)

16.
@markrrobertson
ENGAGEMENT PLAY – SHOULD YOU HAVE MULTIPLE FACEBOOK PAGES?
• Top publishers create multiple pages by topics/verticals:
• >focus of page = > performance of relevant posts
• More targeted audience interests
• BuzzFeed has >90 Facebook Pages
• Buzzfeed Parents
• Buzzfeed Weddings
• Buzzfeed Geeky
• Unilad has >20 Facebook Pages
• Tasty has pages for geography/language

17.
@markrrobertson
ENABLE PAGE MULTIPLE PAGES = ENABLE PAGE CROSS-POSTING

18.
POSTING SCHEDULE
& FREQUENCY

19.
@markrrobertson
SCHEDULING: UPLOADING BEST DAYS & TIMES
Answers:
• The best days/times to post:
• Wednesday
• Late afternoon -> Late night
Data via Tubular Labs: Facebook Videos Uploaded Sept. 2016 >500K Total Views Up to Dec. 11, 2016 (excluding Live)
late night 12AM-3AM
early morning 3AM-6AM
morning 6AM-12PM
afternoon 12PM-3PM
late afternoon 3PM-6PM
evening 6PM-9PM
late evening 9PM-12AM

20.
@markrrobertson
DIVERSIFY SCHEDULE & TEST FOR BEST DAYS/TIMES
When is Your Audience Most Active On Facebook?
• In Facebook, go to ”Insights” & click on ”Posts” = data of when your viewers are online.

21.
@markrrobertson
FREQUENCY: MORE MAY BE BETTER! – TEST UPPING FREQUENCY
• Total interactions/day increase linearly with posts per day
• Negative feedback doesn’t seem correlated to posting more frequently
• Some post 30-40 X/day w/less negative feedback vs total engagement.
Source: Dennis Yu @ Social Fresh “3 Myths About Posting Too Much Content On Facebook: 2/2015

22.
FACEBOOK VIDEO:
METADATA

23.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK VIDEO METADATA: WHAT WE KNOW!
Source: Mark Robertson & Tubular Labs - Top 25K Most Engaged Facebook Videos in Q3 2016

24.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK VIDEO METADATA: WHAT WE KNOW!
Video Titles:
• 57% of top 25K Q3 2016 videos had NO video title
• little correlation to performance in FB
• 33 Characters Average
Video Description/Message:
• 96 characters average
• 19.40% contained emojis
• 48.89% contained Hashtags
• 67.24% contained outside links
Video Title? Likelihood Related
None 0.77
Yes 0.83
BUT…
• Titles may have an affect on related videos
• May be important for Facebook search in future
• May be increasingly important for web search
Source: Mark Robertson & Tubular Labs - Top 25K Most Engaged Facebook Videos in Q3 2016

25.
@markrrobertson
MY ADVICE? LEVERAGE ALL PLATFORM METADATA FOR VIDEO
• Title – for future discovery
• Keep Short & Relevant
• Post Message/ Caption
• Enticing
• Include Strong CTA to Watch
• Include mentions to pages,
celebrities, etc.…
• Tags
• Add @People/@Pages
• Location
• Date/Time
Tags CC Others
Yes (Optional)
8 tags max
Yes (Optional)
.SRT required
Thumbnails
Location
@Friends
@Pages
Title Description Social Msg.
Yes (Optional)
65 char max
Yes (Optional)
63,206 char max
480 shown…
Facebook Video Metadata Options

26.
FACEBOOK VIDEO
FORMATTING

27.
@markrrobertson
SHORT FORM CONTENT – MAKE THE FIRST 3-10 SECONDS COUNT
Source: Facebook Marketing Science Analysis of 173 Nielsen Brand Effect Studies, March 2015
• 65% who watch first 3 sec. of a video will watch for >10 sec.
• Best performing videos range between 30sec & 2min
• 1:24 = Average duration of videos in my analysis of top 25K Q3 2016

28.
@markrrobertson
DIMENSIONS – THE RISE OF VERTICAL & 1:1 (SQUARE) VIDEO
Analysis via Mark Robertson - Data via Tubular: Top 25K Most Engaged Videos (non-live) Uploaded Q3 2016

29.
@markrrobertson
75% FACEBOOK VIDEO VIEWS ARE MOBILE: TALLER = MORE EXPOSURE
16:9 3:4 1:1 Vertical

30.
@markrrobertson
WHAT IF YOUR VIDEOS ARE 16:9?
• Try Borders w/Text Overlays

31.
@markrrobertson
As much as 85% of views happen with sound off, according to multiple publishers.1
EMBRACE THE SILENCE:
Source: http://digiday.com/platforms/silent-world-facebook-video/

32.
@markrrobertson
CAPTURING THE VIEWER: EMBRACE THE SILENCE WITH TEXT IN VIDEO
• Use Big Font Text Overlays
• Use Text Cards to Advance Narrative
Source: Refinery29 “USING DARK POSTS TO A/B TEST VIDEOS ON FACEBOOK”
STUDY: A/B Test of Text Overlays

33.
@markrrobertson
EMBRACING THE SILENCE: TRY CLOSED CAPTIONS & SUBTITLES
One client in a study by 3PlayMedia saw an increase in watch time of 25% with CC
Source: Facebook

34.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK CLOSED CAPTIONS TIP
• <5 Min? Automatic with Paid Promotion
• Have a transcript?
1. Let YouTube do the speech-to-text
1. Download the SRT from your video.
1. Also tools like Downsub.com
2. Re-Upload SRT to Facebook Video

35.
@markrrobertson
RECAP = CAPTURE ATTENTION ASAP FOR VIEWS & ENGAGEMENT
• Dimensions:
• Test Various Aspect Ratios
• Drive Immediate Interest:
• Use Compelling Opening Shots
• Use Strong Visual Cues
• Text, Title Cards, Supers, Brand Assets
• Clear CTA to “Watch” In Post Copy
• Embrace Silence:
• Subtitles/CC & Text Overlays
• Quality audio still important
• Important sound bites after 3 sec.
• Most users will not rewind

36.
A FEW EXTRA TIPS

37.
@markrrobertson
CUSTOM THUMBNAILS STILL IMPORTANT
• Remember: auto-play often disabled + thumbs show in videos tab/library

38.
@markrrobertson
IT’S SOCIAL = INTERACT!
1. Comment first on your video to encourage more
2. Like others’ comments
3. Respond to comments
= >2 MORE views & >3 MORE Interactions

39.
@markrrobertson
BEWARE: LICENSED MUSIC AND OTHER LICENSED CONTENT

40.
RightsManager.fb.com

41.
TEST, MEASURE &
REPEAT

42.
@markrrobertson
FACEBOOK PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT
Focus on:
• Interactions vs. Views
• Shares/comments =
powerful engagement
metrics
• Average % video watched
• Also – study negative
feedback
• Hides of posts, spam
reports, unlikes

43.
@markrrobertson
EMBRACE PAID MEDIA – BOOST & TARGET VIEWS
• Many Facebook video publishers leverage
paid promotion to test, drive views, &
expand reach.
• Tips:
• Start Video Ad Boosting when engagement
ratio >2-4% = Cheaper
• Look into FB Dark Posting for A/B and
Multivariate Testing
• Ad thumbnail must have less than 20% text
• BONUS:
• Add CTAs

44.
@markrrobertson
A/B & MULTIVARIATE TESTING TECHNIQUES
1. Segmented Audience Posts (Organic)
• Downsides
• Manual measurement & comparisons
• Start over when winner is determined
2. Unpublished, Paid “Dark” Posts
• Provides views, interactions, expanded
audience, and social proof
• Tips:
• Use Power Editor to create unpublished posts
• Run in Mobile & Desktop News Feeds Only
• Upside vs. traditional video ads:
• Shows in news feeds and not on publisher
page until published
• Winner when published, keeps all views,
interactions

45.
FACEBOOK LIVE
VIDEO TRENDS

46.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
WHY FACEBOOK LIVE VIDEO?
• Facebook Live – officially launched to all users in April 2016
• Facebook Live Videos are watched 3x Longer than regular
videos
• Facebook is giving greater prominence to live video:
“We're making a small update to News Feed so that Facebook
Live videos are more likely to appear higher in News Feed
when those videos are actually live, compared to after they
are no longer live.” (Facebook 2016)
Source: http://newsroom.fb.com/news/2016/03/news-feed-fyi-taking-into-account-live-video-when-ranking-feed/

47.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
FACEBOOK LIVE ENGAGEMENT
• Facebook has stated that Live Videos are considered a
separate type of content < BIG clue to video publishers
• Facebook Live streams also generate 10x more engagement
(comments, shares, reactions) than standard Facebook videos
Sources: : http://newsroom.fb.com/news/2016/03/news-feed-fyi-taking-into-account-live-video-when-ranking-feed/
http://newsroom.fb.com/news/2016/04/introducing-new-ways-to-create-share-and-discover-live-video-on-facebook/

48.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
FACEBOOK LIVE ENGAGEMENT
• Top 10 news creators on
Facebook who uploaded
video content between July
21st and October 21st 2016 –
Tubular compared the
performance of their non-live
vs live videos.
• As a whole, these creators’
Live videos generated a
higher engagement than their
Non-Live videos. We found
that:
• Live videos averaged an
engagement rate of 4.3%,
compared to the 2.2% of
Non-Live videos.
Source: Tubular Labs

49.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
FACEBOOK LIVE – BEST DAY TO STREAM (VIEWS)
• Based on 46.1K Live
videos streamed
between Sep 9 2016
and Dec 8 2016 with
>100K Views
• Streams broadcast on
Wednesday
generated the most
views
Source: Tubular Labs

50.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
FACEBOOK LIVE – BEST DAY TO STREAM (ENGAGEMENTS)
• Based on 46.1K Live
videos streamed
between Sep 9 2016
and Dec 8 2016 with
>100K Views
• Streams broadcast on
Monday, Tuesday &
Wednesday
generated the most
engagements
Source: Tubular Labs

51.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
FACEBOOK LIVE – BEST TIME OF DAY TO STREAM (VIEWS)
• Based on 46.1K Live videos
streamed between Sep 9
2016 and Dec 8 2016 with
>100K Views
• Streams broadcast
between 9pm and 3am
UTC (1pm and 9pm
Pacific) generated the
most views
UTC time zone
• Late night - 12am to 3am
• Early morning - 3am to 6am
• Morning - 6am to 12pm
• Afternoon - 12pm to 3pm
• Late afternoon - 3pm to 6pm
• Evening - 6pm to 9pm
• Late evening - 9pm to 12pm
Source: Tubular Labs

52.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
FACEBOOK LIVE – BEST TIME OF DAY TO STREAM (ENGAGEMENTS)
• Based on 46.1K Live videos
streamed between Sep 9
2016 and Dec 8 2016 with
>100K Views
• Streams broadcast
between 9pm and 3am
UTC (1pm and 9pm
Pacific) generated the
most engagements
UTC time zone
• Late night - 12am to 3am
• Early morning - 3am to 6am
• Morning - 6am to 12pm
• Afternoon - 12pm to 3pm
• Late afternoon - 3pm to 6pm
• Evening - 6pm to 9pm
• Late evening - 9pm to 12pm
Source: Tubular Labs

53.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
FACEBOOK LIVE – WHAT TYPE OF CONTENT IS DOING WELL?
Source: Tubular Labs

54.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
TOP CONTENT – LIVE & NATIVE
Source: Tubular Labs

55.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
FACEBOOK’S TOP 10 MOST VIEWED LIVE VIDEOS 2016
Source: http://newsroom.fb.com/news/2016/12/facebook-2016-year-in-review/

56.
FACEBOOK LIVE VIDEO
TIPS

57.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
BEST PRACTICE TIPS: LIVE STREAMING DURATION
• Facebook recommends that you broadcast live for at least 20 minutes, although
the feature supports broadcasts of up to 4 hours for live-streams that you’ll want to
archive.
Why?

58.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
BEST PRACTICE TIPS: LIVE STREAMING DURATION
• One of the big challenges you may face with broadcasting live on Facebook is
getting enough viewers to tune in. Streaming live to a handful of people won’t give
either party a satisfying interactive experience
• Although Live is heavily promoted on Facebook, every brand should aim to
maximize viewers

59.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
BEST PRACTICE TIPS: LIVE STREAMING DURATION
Pre-broadcast:
• Email blast
• Social media push
• Facebook post
• Facebook ad
• Instagram post or Story
• Ask viewers to subscribe to
notifications

60.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
BEST PRACTICE TIPS: LIVE STREAMING DURATION
• Don’t be be discouraged if there are only a handful of viewers present when you
first go live - it can still sometimes take time for your audience to find your live-
stream.
• The longer you can keep the broadcast live, the higher the chances are for viewers
to find you.
• The longer you stream, (and the more engaging your live-stream is), the higher the
chances are that you followers will share to their own News Feed. That way, it gets
seen, and shared by others, who may share it themselves, attracting even more
viewers……..

61.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
BEST PRACTICE TIPS: LIVE STREAMING DURATION
Remember to:
• Add a compelling description
• Keep the (late) audience up to date and engaged
• Interact with the audience via the comments section

62.
@Carla_Marshall - @TubularInsights
BEST PRACTICE TIPS: 3 EXTRA TAKEAWAYS
• See what's working with native video uploads - can it be replicated via live?
• Source copyright-free music, or buy a license for background music (Epidemic
Sound or other music libraries)
• Check reactions to previous live-streamed content to see where engagement/views
peaked

63.
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64.
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