In a lesson for anyone doing video online, MTV reports they nearly doubled the viewership of their MTV news videos between 2008 and 2009.
How did they do it?
They made their videos shorter. For example, instead of offering long video interviews with celebrities or musicians, they chopped those interviews into multiple, bite-sized segments. And viewership skyrocketed.
Why? Because people prefer short videos on the web. Or as MTV news VP Ben Wagner put it, “users live in a search and social universe…it’s about more, shorter and faster.”
MTV news also used a similar technique text stories. Rather than running 1,000 word articles, they used provocative headlines and only the most interesting paragraph from an article. The result? Readership of articles increased 40% in the same time period.
Great tip Dave! This shows it pays to keep things brief and to the point.
How true Dave . . . we live in a fast paced, scan and move on, electronic, multitasking society, it’s a shame, but that is the way we live.
Those of us who are trying to enter our thoughts and messages into the stream of consciousness of the general public have to recognize this fact and adapt in order to survive.
Keep up the good work . . . sometimes it may seem that we don’t appreciate all of the hard work you do to keep us up-to-date, but we really do!
Just Plain Bill