Why Video Content is a Must-Have for Food Bloggers
How video can take your food blog to the next level!
Video remains one of the quickest ways to captivate, educate and engage people, regardless of niche. The effectiveness of video content in grabbing and holding the attention of audiences has been repeatedly proven. Given that digital video is already ever-present online and a favored form of content consumption among users, it's no surprise that creators have recognized its potential as a powerful tool for driving engagement, following, and traffic to their food blog.
It has the ability to engage and captivate audiences in ways that written content or static images cannot. With the rise of platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram Reels, video has become an increasingly popular medium for sharing information & entertainment. Video allows creators to showcase their personalities and creativity while providing valuable information or entertainment to their followers.
Video isn’t the future of social media and online content, it’s the present.
As a result, content creators are recognizing the power of video as a tool for building brand awareness and engaging with audiences online. With its ability to convey emotion, tell stories, and provide immersive experiences, video is undoubtedly poised to play an even greater role in shaping the future of social media and online content.
Here are 8 reasons why food bloggers should be doing video:
Video is more engaging than text or images alone.
Video can show complicated steps or a process to a recipe, helping your audience achieve success making it.
Video can help build trust and credibility with your audience.
Video can improve your search engine rankings.
Video allows you to reach a wider audience.
Video is highly shareable on social media platforms, increasing the potential for virality and exposure.
Video allows you to showcase your personality and brand in a way that written content cannot, helping you further connect with your audience.
Payouts & RPM are higher through video advertising, so having video on your website could earn you more money!
Does Video Feel Scary to You? It’s OK!
For some of us, video can feel very daunting, and rightfully so! Trust me, you’re not the only one!
The process for making videos can take HOURS, and if you’re taking a video of yourself or adding a voiceover, it may take a lot of trial and error to feel comfortable on camera. It can add a lot of pressure!
Let’s talk about some basics about how to get started making video content for your food blog & social media pages.
Getting Started
The #1 thing to remember is: KEEP. IT. SIMPLE.
Your video does NOT need look like it was filmed in a professional studio in order to resonate with viewers.
Start off by using what you have available to you: your smartphone!
Making Videos for Social Media
I’m working on creating a separate, future newsletter to dive into this topic further, so I’ll keep it brief here!
If your goal is to drive social media engagement, filming on your phone is the most approachable way to get started. It is also the easiest form to then share your finished video on your platform of choice. Try starting off by filming in directly in an app so that you can take advantage of this.
If you’d prefer to not show your face or do a voiceover, the great thing is you don’t have to! Add some background music instead.
Here are some ideas for a food or recipe creator to make videos about recipes for social media. Keep these videos around 30-60 seconds.
Recipe tutorials: Create step-by-step video tutorials that show how to prepare a specific recipe, highlighting key ingredients and techniques. TIP: you don’t need to show the ENTIRE process here. Just filming clips of a few steps and a clip of the final dish is enough for a GREAT video!
Meal prep videos: Show viewers how to meal prep for the week by creating a series of videos that demonstrate how to prepare healthy and delicious meals in advance. ASMR is a great style to match with these types of videos!
Cooking tips and tricks: Share your expertise by creating videos that offer cooking tips and tricks, such as how to chop vegetables quickly or season meat perfectly.
Ingredient spotlights: Highlight specific ingredients by creating videos that showcase their versatility and provide ideas for incorporating them into various dishes. You could put together a compilation or slideshow of past dishes where you used this ingredient.
Kitchen hacks: Share innovative ways to make cooking easier and more efficient, such as using kitchen gadgets or repurposing common household items for cooking tasks.
These are just a few ideas to get started! The possibilities are endless when it comes to creating engaging and informative recipe videos.
Benefits to Having Videos on Your Blog Page
There are a few things to keep in mind if your goal is to start including videos on your blog and recipe pages.
You will want to ideally film the entire recipe process to pair up with the recipe, since users are looking for details and tutorials on how to make the recipe (the intent is different than social media videos).
Doing this can be a bit more time consuming but also has great benefits.
1) Video can earn you more money: if you are using a built-in player with your ad network (Mediavine, AdThrive…) you can upload your videos directly into the platform and earn a much higher RPM.
If you are not currently with Mediavine or AdThrive, I would encourage you to take advantage of including video on your blog page by uploading your video to YouTube and embedding it onto your blog page (my suggestion would be near the recipe card since most people ‘jump to recipe’).
If you’re able to get more YouTube followers, you can take advantage of monetizing through YouTube.
2) Video can give your SEO efforts some more juice!
Video integration may improve your SEO. While Google has not officially declared that video improves SEO ranking, there is a substantial amount of data that backs this up.
It appears that Google prioritizes results that contain a video component, which makes sense since video is more engaging AND we know the overarching fact that Google’s goal is to provide users with the best content!
Google will often pull up rich results like these:
You’ll notice a couple of things here.
The video results are all YouTube videos (remember, Google owns YouTube: YT is going to be preferred by Google) and some organic results are shown AFTER the video results.
In this case, for my search query, “how to make chocolate”, I was shown 3 organic results at the top of the page, and then the video results. This means if you are not in the first 3 rankings, your content is less likely to be clicked on (which is normally the case anyway, but the video results add even MORE difficulty when you’re lower on the list).
3) Having video on your page can reduce your bounce rate by creating a more ‘sticky’ environment for readers, therefore improving your page’s favorability for search engines. It may also present your page as having ‘higher quality’ content, therefore making it enticing for other publications to backlink to your page (further improving your SEO).
If you host a video with poor quality and insufficient context, your website's ranking may suffer as search engines tend to avoid directing users to pages that offer little or no value.
Video Recording & Editing Software
Here are some top rated video recording and editing software brands:
Adobe Premiere Pro: This is a professional-level video editing software that offers advanced features like color correction, audio mixing, and special effects.
YouCut: a versatile video editing app that enables you to edit, merge, and trim videos with ease while offering a variety of filters, effects, and music options.
iMovie: This is a free video editing software for Mac users that allows you to create high-quality videos with easy-to-use tools.
Filmora: This is an affordable video editing software that's great for beginners, offering features like basic color grading and text animation (I use Filmora for all my video content, both on my PC & via an app on my smartphone)
CapCut: a user-friendly video editing app that allows you to create videos with a range of features and tools.
Creative Tips
Here are some tips for creating and sharing videos:
Produce engaging videos that capture viewers' attention and encourage them to watch until the end. These types of videos are more likely to be shared and linked to by others on social media.
Research different styles and get inspired! You don’t have to recreate the wheel when it comes to video styles. Try different techniques and styles until you find the right creative fit. Search social media and YouTube for top performing videos and pull some inspiration to boost your efforts.
Create a series of videos or playlists on YouTube that guide viewers through related content, keeping them on your channel for longer.
Encourage others to embed your video on their own websites or social media channels to expand your reach and get backlinks.
Promote your video across multiple channels, such as social media, email marketing, and advertising, to attract more views and potentially earn backlinks.
Pay close attention to the metadata for each video you create in order to optimize its search engine visibility.
Master Your Mindset
If you are feeling intimidated about making videos, first of all, know that you are not alone! It can feel demotivating to see so many people publish awesome video content and feel like you can’t compete. Yes, quality matters, but what matters more when it comes to video is your ability to engage the viewer and help them achieve their goal. I’ve watched plenty of GREAT videos that didn’t have the most PERFECT lighting, or the presenter stumbled on their words.
It’s not about being perfect, it’s about how to help the viewer.
Stay tuned!!! In coming weeks I will be going in more detail in future newsletters about how I make my video content, how to leverage different social media sites, and more!
