Making a YouTube Instructional Video? Please Get To The Point

If you are like me, every now and again you are in the situation where you need a better understanding of how to do something. In fact, the?Do-It-Yourself (DIY)?phenomenon can be largely attributed to the invention of?YouTube.?I have found that there is absolutely nothing that someone has not recorded a YouTube video about. No matter how wild and willy or far out you may think the topic is, someone has recorded a YouTube video about it. I find the same to be true for finding something out or researching with search engines such as?Google.?None of these platforms were available or had been invented when I was a child growing up in the 60’s and 70’s. We had the old fashioned dictionaries, encyclopedias and card catalogs at the local library.

I write this article as feedback for those who have recorded YouTube instructional videos and as a heads up for those who may be considering recording instructional videos in the future. In far too many cases when I am searching for an instructional video to assist me with something that I am unsure of or do not know how to do, I am finding that the instructor is much too wordy. When I was earning my undergraduate degree, I had a writing professor (I still remember his name, Don Edwards), who always returned my papers with the words in red ink that said?“Too wordy.”?His constant returning of my papers with that feedback helped me to become a better writer and to be more concise.

I am now offering the same advice for those who record YouTube instructional videos. Be aware of how verbose you are in the videos. Too often the actual instruction is embedded far into the video after much laborious talking and step by every tiny step instruction is offered. I truly understand the need to be specific and clear, however, the description of the most minute detail in my view is not needed. In fact, it is annoying and a distraction to have to listen to the instructor wax poetic before he/she finally gets to what it is that the viewer is trying to learn how to do. I have consulted YouTube videos from everything from changing the spray nozzle on the kitchen sink to how to disengage the auto-pilot in?Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020?and they are extremely helpful. It’s just all of the talking that you have to listen to before you can finally get into the meat of the presentation, which is how to do whatever it is that you are watching the video to learn how to do.

I totally understand the desire for exposure on YouTube because I have a?YouTube Channel myself,?however, an instructional video is not the place to be grandstanding and prolonging the video to become YouTube famous. The videos would be much more helpful and useful if the instructor would get to the instruction and cut out all of the superfluous conversation.

For all of you instructional YouTubers, please take this as some food for thought. I invite you to visit my website marcamedley.com