It is best to keep explainer videos under two minutes in length. But, this advice comes with conditions. Different platforms, messages, and audiences require different video lengths. This means that you will need to edit your video to be 15, 30, or 60 seconds long if you want it to be broadcast on TV, cable, or online. Digital distribution is becoming more popular because it is more flexible, and shorter micro-content is trending on platforms that allow longer videos.
You will get better results if you make specific videos that are only as long as they need to be, instead of sticking to a strict rule. This means you should communicate your message clearly and concisely without any unnecessary details or information.
This article provides an in-depth look at ideal video lengths for various social media platforms and hosting situations. We have created an infographic that explores the best length for a business video, which outlines the most important points.
Where did the two-minute rule come from?
After two minutes of watching a video, engagement starts to drop off, according to a 2016 study by Wistia. From minute 2 to minute 3, there was about a 5 percent increase. After the engagement rate drops at a similar rate until six and a half minutes. That’s when it levels off just above 50%. After engagement levels off at around the 13-minute mark, it starts to decline again.
There are a couple of important takeaways here. The level of engagement is the same for videos up to two minutes long. You will likely see the same level of engagement for videos that are 15 seconds long or 110 seconds long.
Second, people don’t automatically walk away after two minutes. The majority of your audience will still be present even if some people do leave. If your video needs to be at least six minutes, audiences who have watched it this long will probably watch it for a little longer. Don’t worry about losing your audience by making your content too long. If what you’re offering is useful or entertaining, people will probably stay with you for a little longer.
The Wistia data has a few limitations that should be noted. Wistia is a company that provides video software and hosting services to businesses. The guidelines they have for videos probably work for videos that are self-hosted, but might not be as useful for videos on social media websites. This company has over half a million videos that have not been properly divided into categories. That means we’re dealing with averages here. In short, your results may vary.
How to Choose the Best Length for a Business Video
How long your video should be depends on how much time you have and what you want to show.
My favorite thing about my job is the people I work with. I love the people I work with because they are so supportive and friendly. Your video’s length should be determined by what is necessary to get your point across and nothing more. You don’t have to aim for a specific number of minutes or seconds. Some things to keep in mind when writing: Instead of worrying about the length of your text, focus on your message and how to make it clear, concise, and engaging. Here are some things to keep in mind: These best practices will help get you started.
1. Start with a single, focused message
If you try to communicate too many messages, your audience is unlikely to remember any of them. Multiple messages require longer, more complex videos. The attention of your viewers may wander. topic: How to be a good student Answer the question, “What are some tips on how to be a good student?” If you need to, you can make a bunch of videos to answer other questions people might have.
2. Know where your video fits in the marketing funnel
If someone is not familiar with your business or product, they will not know what to expect. A long video might be too much to ask them to commit to. In contrast, videos for your established audience can be much longer. If you are creating a video tutorial that will be shared on social media, it should be less than one minute long. A follow-up email to customers after they’ve purchased a product can be a little longer. You want to help new customers understand if your product is easy to use. In the second case, you provide more information because users depend on you to help them understand what they have purchased.
3. Know your audience
If you want to make a healthcare video about a life-threatening disease that your target audience has, it’s more likely that they will be willing to give you their time than if you’re just telling them about a new flavor of popcorn.
4. Know the context
If you are making a video for an event or a training session, your audience cannot click away; you can afford to go a bit longer than in a purely digital application.
5. Plan your video length based on your platform
The social media platform you use will determine the length of your video. If you use a self-hosting platform, you will have more control over the length of your video. Do not simply create a video and share it on every social media platform. Decide ahead of time where you are going to post your video. We go into detail about how long a video should be for each platform below.
Best Length for a Business Video By Platform
Each platform has different length recommendations based on what the platform can host and what its target audience wants to view. When deciding on an ideal video length, keep in mind where you plan on distributing the video. There are many different types of social media platforms, each with their own guidelines. Here are some of the more common ones:
Facebook Ads
Length: 15 seconds
You can share Facebook feed video ads as long as 241 minutes. That’s minutes, not seconds. You could create a Facebook ad that would run for four hours. It is not advised to do this by either the platform or us. According to Facebook, shorter video ads are more likely to be watched all the way through as opposed to longer ones.
In-stream video ads should be no more than 120 seconds to avoid annoying your audience. You should keep this in mind when serving ads to someone who is actively watching something else. Minimizing the disruption is a smart strategy. When sharing videos on your Facebook page, try to keep them under two minutes.
The optimal length of a tweet — 71 to 100 characters
This length provides you with enough space to share your message, as well as enough space for someone who retweets you to add their own message.
You can find the optimal length of a tweet for your Twitter account by looking at your Twitter analytics.
What makes this length optimal? Tweets at this length get more retweets. People who use hashtags tend to have more engagement than those who don’t. This is shown by their higher reply rate, retweet rate, and combined reply/retweet rate.
Where’d this data come from? A pair of studies have found that tweets with 100 characters or less are the most effective. For a 30 day period in the fall of 2012, Track Social studied 100 major brands. Buddy Media conducted a study of 320 Twitter handles from major brands over a period of two and a half months at the beginning of 2012.
The optimal length of a Google+ headline – 60 characters maximum
Google+ updates typically have large, bold headings at the top of the page, with the body of text appearing below them. The most effective headings to optimize are the top ones. The ideal length for a tweet is 60 characters or less.
What makes this length optimal? This is the maximum length that a Google+ headline can be before it breaks to a second line.
Where’d this data come from? Farnworth tested the length of posts on Copyblogger and found that they were successful. He found that bold headlines could have up to 60 characters before additional words would become cut off and bumped to the second line.
The optimal width of a paragraph – 40 to 55 characters
I never really considered the width of my paragraphs before researching this topic. Although readers might not be consciously aware of it, usability studies and psychology suggest that they nevertheless notice small details in a text.
What makes this width optimal? The content is easy to understand when it is presented in this width, and readers feel confident that they can grasp the material.
Where’d this data come from? Derek Halpern of Social Triggers compiled data from two research studies and concluded that the optimal length for a tweet is 40-55 characters. Daly of Boston College, who found that black women age 65 and older are more likely than white women in the same age group to live alone, have fewer close relatives and friends, and spend more time alone. The studies he cited found that black women age 65 and older are more likely to live alone, have fewer close relatives and friends, and spend more time alone than white women in the same age group. Dyson of the University of Reading as well as a 1992 study from a team of Netherlands researchers.
The optimal length of a domain name – 8 characters
Some of the best domain names have the following characteristics in common: they are short, easy to remember, and have some connection to the site’s content.
- is short
- is easy to remember
- is easy to spell
- is descriptive or brandable
- does not contain hyphens and numbers
- has a .com extension
It can be difficult to determine the length of a dot-com because they are often bought quickly. If you are having trouble securing the .com website of your dreams, more and more websites are going the routes of .co and .io.
What makes this length optimal? The most popular websites on the Internet tend to have domain names that are this length.
Where’d this data come from? An analysis was conducted in 2009 by Daily Blog Tips of the top 250 websites in Alexa site rankings. They counted the words and characters that appeared in each domain name.
The optimal length of a hashtag – 6 characters
What makes this length optimal? One experts says that using a six-character hashtag is the best way to get your message across on Twitter. This is because it is the maximum number of characters that can be used in a hashtag while still allowing people to retweet it and add their own comments.
The optimal length of a LinkedIn post – 25 words
The most effective LinkedIn profile length depends on your target audience. Who are you trying to reach?
In 2012, Compendium published a report that analyzed statistics on LinkedIn length for different types of businesses, including B2B and B2C. Here’s what they found.
What makes this length optimal? The Compendium study provides recommendations based on the results of clickthroughs. The ideal length of a LinkedIn post is the length that gets the most clicks.
Where’d this data come from? Two hundred companies were studied by Compendium in 2012 in order to extract best practices for social media usage from business-to-business and business-to-consumer interactions.
The optimal length of a blogpost – 1,600 words
We found that the ideal length of a Buffer blog post is around 1,600 words. We recently did a blog content audit, and one of the things we found was that the ideal length of a Buffer blog post is around 1,600 words.
You should aim to write around 1,600 words to get started.
Most of our posts that perform well are around 2,500 words.
This suggests that you should compare the lengths against your own data. If you’re just starting out, it might be smart to start off with 1600 words per post, and then adjust from there.
What makes this length optimal? If you want readers to spend a lot of time reading your content, make it this long. The total time spent on the page is highest when the length is 1,600 words.
Where’d this data come from? In December 2013, Medium analyzed how long readers spent on blogposts on its network.
The optimal length of a YouTube video – 3 minutes
The average person speaks 150 words per minute, so a two-minute video would have around 300 words. However, most people only have about 45 seconds of video, so you would need to edit your story down to about 150 words. At what point does someone lose interest and click over to the next link? This is a big question for video marketers who create their content with timestamps in mind, just as bloggers compose their posts with word count in mind.
What makes this length optimal? The average length of a top video on YouTube is this long.
Where’d this data come from? On average, the top 50 YouTube videos are 2 minutes and 54 seconds long. In an interview with Clinton Stark, Google researchers from the YouTube team confirmed that the ideal length for a video is three minutes.
Conclusion
Hopefully you’ve found some good insights from this experiment. This data should be used as a starting point for your own testing and iterating. What works for other people might not work for your specific audience.
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