A trailer means an anglicism, which we could use some other words as “introduction,” “preview,” or “teaser”(although this synonym is more cinematic). And a trailer is used to capture attention, generate curiosity or promote the user to watch our target video.
What is a trailer
A trailer is a creative audiovisual resource of short duration, between 20″ to 30″, whose objective is to capture the user’s attention to encourage them to watch the main video, be it a longer report or a music video clip, etc.
A trailer must be different from the original video, both in form and duration. It can even be in the message since it can be more abstract, expectant, motivating, with the sole purpose of encouraging you to see the original content.
Should we make a trailer for each of our videos?
Not always making a trailer of our videos is the first thing I want to say. We are not going to duplicate our video production. It would be excessive.
However, if you have created a long video, for example, I used a trailer maker called FlexClip made a 20-second trailer of a long introduction video of mine last week. It can be a way to ensure a complete view of the video that we are really interested in showing and catch attention of the audience. Keep in mind that YouTube greatly values that your users view your videos for as long as possible (in principle, more than 30 seconds, which is already an achievement). Therefore, predisposing the user to consume this complete content can help you to better position your videos.
In addition, we will have more chances that the answer user to “call to action” ( Call to action) we may have proposed, as you will be predisposed to consume much of the content that we proposed to him in the trailer itself.
Another very interesting reason why we should use a trailer for our videos is the possibility of naming and testing other “keywords” both in the titles and in the description or tags. In this way, we are extending the opportunity for them to find us by other terms or keywords, and it also serves us as a way of testing which ones worked best.
Creating a trailer for a long video predisposes the user to consume our long-term content.
A trailer is logically a more pleasant resource to consume since it is a more dynamic and impressive product.
How to use a trailer on social media?
Since Facebook has put the batteries with the videos on its network ( click to see the referred article ), an idea that can work very well would be to share the trailer directly on Facebook and link it to our original video uploaded to the YouTube channel.
In this way:
We have content that meets Facebook standards: short video, eye-catching, able to retain the user, etc.
And we logically upload the original video to YouTube ( see tips for correctly uploading videos to YouTube ).
We do not forget the other social networks since, due to the short duration of this type of video, it would be ideal for Vine (watch out for the duration), Instagram, Snapchat, etc.
The truth is that we have endless possibilities to spread and link our content.
Of course, upload your trailer to YouTube too. One tip is that you organize your channel by playlists so that the user who browses it knows at all times what they are watching. Sure, the YouTube and Google search engines will also like that you have your channel well organized.
How to make a trailer shocking?
We can make a trailer as a movie trailer, but this will be really expensive and will require a great deal of imagination as well.
In order not to go crazy, the most normal thing is to capture «frames» or short pieces of the same video already edited, extracted from the same project, which once edited you will save as «name-of-the-original-video-trailer» which will generate another file.
In this type of video, another more dynamic music track is usually used to differentiate ourselves from the original video ( see how to download free music from YouTube in this article ).
Also, use other effects to attract attention, such as flash transitions, eye-catching labels, etc.
In short, the trailer must be different, and as we said, very short, do not exceed 20 ″.
Lastly, don’t forget to link the trailer to the original video and ask to be addressed. Also, include in the description the link to the video and explain the content to be found. In this way, if you get to the original video, you will have gained a loyal user for your most important content.
One final tip. Use your trailer in one direction only. These types of videos have a single function and should point towards the original video. That is, do not redirect your report back to the trailer.
We hope that this article on «what is a trailer and how to use it» will give you some ideas to better manage your video marketing strategy. As you will see, it is not necessary to be Spielberg to create this type of content. Surely while you edit your video, incredible scenes will appear to create your trailer.
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Thanks for reading.