Make these nine types of video content as a small business owner

If you haven’t found your love of video creation, or at least worked out how to make it work, it’s likely that it’s because you’ve been trying to copy someone else’s style rather than find your own. There are nine key types of video content for small business owners, and finding the type that fits your personality, skills and energy levels is KEY. The best way to work it out is experiment and find what sits with you best. 

When reels first came out there were two distinct camps of people. The ones who pointed and danced their way to their customers, and those who decried that sort of behaviour as unprofessional and unseemly for small business owners and experts. 

I’m writing that a modicum of guilt. Because I used to say what I felt most people want me to say, and not what I believed myself. See as I was telling people that “you don’t need to point and dance on Tiktok to get an audience” I knew that I was WATCHING those sorts of videos and both being entertained and learning from them

Of course, it’s true that you don’t need to do that at all if it’s not your thing. But I also feel that calling that type of content “unprofessional” or “unbecoming”, two words I’ve seen used in Facebook groups when talking about that type of content is missing the point about what professionalism actually is.

Truth be told, if you are going to judge ME on my professionalism by what I’m wearing, how I move, or whether I can point to something on the beat of a Lizzo song, it’s likely I’m the wrong fit for you. Because I want to be judged on my values, my commitment to help you understand marketing, and my dedication to you and your business if and when we work together.

The thing is, we all need to find our own style of video creation. And just as I’m happiest dressing up and being a bit of a weirdo on camera to help teach marketing principles, you might be best doing a voiceover, or maybe doing a video of you talking directly to camera in your car.

There are so many different types of content, and there are particular types of content creators – and we as business owners need to work out which ones fit us best – for me as a marketing coach, I’m not interested in forcing someone into a costume, but instead, help them find their own style

(If you want to find out which of the five types of content creators there are, and work out your ideal style, listen to this week’s MAP IT Marketing podcast – we walk through each one)

I prefer volume over quality – mainly because I have a lot to say and it pours out of me – and some have a quality over volume and that’s also ok.

And, as I’ve got more fluent in my marketing, the more creative ones don’t take so long. This one took me 15 minutes from idea to publishing.

People want your authentic self

If you feel like an arse pointing and dancing to music in a video then DON’T

It’s not about what we do. it’s about whether we feel good and comfortable doing it.

Why?

• Because the days of the highlight reels on social are well over. People want an authentic glimpse into who we are. 
• We want to focus on relatability above everything else, no matter what our content creator type is.
• We don’t want to make gimmicks bigger than us, we want to see people invested, and we want them to be eager to be converted into customers.

The more relatable it is, the more people can connect with us 

As we create our content we want to consider it hitting three goals

1. Will it improve my visibility

2. Will I be remembered

3. Will it help people build trust in me

There are lots of different types of content and the ones that fit your content creator type will vary. With my coaching clients, I suggest you pick a topic and try to create content in each type of content style to find the ones that fit you best. This can help you identify the content creator type you are.

So, grab a few topics you want to talk about and then make a piece of content (either video or a static post) in each of these styles

Here are the nine types of video content for small business owners to use:

1. Tell us about your personal journey with this topic. Share a struggle, talk about how you’ve developed that skill, or why you wanted to start a business selling it

2. Share a lesson learned. We want to know about your big life lessons or experiences

3. Give us a hot tip – Something someone’s going to want to share and look at again. A how to that makes your topic easy to understand or useable, but make it quick and easy to follow

4. Turn on the YODA charm and give us some sage advice, going deep on explaining your topic. Show off your depth of knowledge about it

5. Rant it out – give it to us straight and pull no punches – why is your topic SO IMPORTANT FOR US?

6. Take us deep on the topic as a strategic breakdown – and show us how we’d be able to get amazing results with is

7. Tell us how you really feel – give us an insight into you, and how you feel. Share your challenges, and difficulties and how you’re pushing through them. Share a little bit of your private life, or help us peek behind the curtains of your business.

8. Make it beautiful – create something gorgeous – a stop motion or animation, a scripted film retelling a story, a Canva created image with a strong caption

9. Make us laugh, give it to us light-heartedly. Create a meme, a skit or share a recent imperfection

As you give each one a go – think about which ones come easy to you, which ones you enjoy the most (you might need some skill development) and which ones aren’t you (eg: rants and embracing the artists don’t fit me at all – but they fit some of my clients)

I’d love to know which ones of these do you think you’d enjoy making most?

And which ones feel like a hard NO right away?

THIS is the beginning of discovering your own style…

and NOTE: Not a single one of these needs you dancing or pointing a finger at anyone.

(not that there’s anything wrong with that! )

Cool huh?