Why are So Many Videos on LinkedIn so Bloody Boring?

...How to connect with your audience using videos on LinkedIn - and keep them watching...)

I recently saw a posting from an international law firm in which they had a really nice format comprising six video tiles. Each tile had a title and all you had to do was click on the tile and watch the presentation.

The field of law is not one in which I ever practised, but it I have no doubt that the speakers knew what they were talking about.

It was how the videos were formatted and how the speakers said what they had to say that I think needs improvement.

First:

They were all obviously reading out loud from a script.

There’s nothing wrong with relying on a script, but reading scripts out loud makes it really, really boring.

All the performances, but one, were wooden, to say the least. That is not a criticism of the individual speakers because, in real life, I’m sure they are very animated and interesting speakers.

But just reading the script in front of a camera really doesn’t do the job properly.

There seemed to be no engagement with the audience. I thought, ‘Why bother with the video when all you have to do is put the script in an article?’

Second:

Why were there no captions?

I guess many of the target audience would look at the posting at the office.

Very few people actually click on a video unless there are captions. They don’t bother to put in their earphones at work.

Videos on LinkedIn are so ephemeral that they are lost in seconds. Unless, that is, the ‘save for later’ button is clicked.

The fact is that videos die a very early death on LinkedIn unless the audience can be engaged immediately.

Third:

Who was the intended audience?

 I would imagine it was an international audience given that the speakers came from all over the globe, but what was done to help non-native English speakers understand the speakers’ words?

Nothing.

Because there were no captions.

Apart from that, one of the speakers was not a native-English speaker and spoke too quickly. It was difficult to understand some of his words.

That’s why we need captions.

That’s why we need people NOT to read their script out loud. Even if they have captions.

Fourth:

The performances were so wooden because the speakers were having to concentrate so much on reading out their script word-for-word, rather than speaking naturally.

Reading out loud means we don’t think about other ways in which we can make our speech engaging and attractive to the audience.

When reading a script out loud, it is very difficult to use facial expressions, body language and gestures. Only one of the speakers managed to do any of that – and it made her contribution the best of the lot. In terms of delivery, that is. I cannot comment on the content.

Fifth:

Relax!

Each speaker was recorded before an almost identical background and it was as if they had been dragged there to speak at gunpoint.

Apart from one, they all looked very nervous. They sounded nervous. Perhaps, undoubtedly, because they were nervous.

I can understand that – as a very experienced speaker (either as a corporate trainer or in my former life as a litigation lawyer) I am always nervous before I deliver a presentation. When coaching clients on public speaking, I always tell them that nerves are a good thing – but they’re good in order to fire you up before your presentation.

When you actually present you have to give the impression that you are a confident and competent speaker. The speakers were clearly competent – but they didn’t appear confident.

Far better to have them looking far less like lawyers, sitting down, perhaps, in an easy chair and simply being asked questions in interview format or, being (and therefore looking), comfortable and simply talking in a relaxed way with their audience.

Come to think of it, why not just do it in selfie-format?

Sixth:

‘But’, I hear you say, ‘they have to stick strictly to a script’.

Well, yes and no. There is a way you can make sure that you stick strictly to a script (alliteration is not essential) but without it sounding as if you are reading the script out loud. Why? Strange though it may see, because you are not.

This can be done in a way which allows you to use appropriate facial expressions, tone, intonation, volume, pitch pace and pauses. It can make you sound interesting. Just like Pres Obama does. It’s a very neat and easy trick and one which anyone who presents on video can learn.

Seventh:

Who wrote the scripts? It’s one thing to write an article addressed to other lawyers – it’s another to write in a way that captures the attention of your real audience. If that audience is international, if it comprises non-lawyers whom you want to attract as clients, then ‘lawyer-writing’ doesn’t work.

But, writing a script in the way that one actually speaks does. Provided, that is, that we speak with simple words and definitely do not try to impress with how clever we are.

To connect with an international audience, we have to write and speak in a different way

Obama is an expert in this – his speeches read just as well as they sound. That is because they are crafted by a brilliant orator in collaboration with an excellent speech-writer.

To connect with an international audience, we have to write and speak in a different way. We have to write more like a journalist. And then we have to say it so that the audience wants to watch, listen and is impressed.

All this helps with your branding – do you want to sound like a stuffed-shirt, ivory-tower, Yale/Harvard, Oxbridge bunch of superior beings, or approachable human beings who know their stuff, can explain it easily and whom ordinary people can connect with?

Eighth.

It all looked very much like a stage-managed and expensive production. Perhaps there were many takes. None of this is necessary.

Ninth.

For more on the how to say like Obama, look here.

Tenth

If you want some training about how to do this properly, PM me here on LinkedIn.