Nine reasons why you need to start with Facebook videos now

Introduction

Many brand owners are aware of the tremendous nine reasons for Facebook video content, but they often find themselves solely utilizing YouTube for their video uploads. Rest assured, you’re not the only one in this situation. The social media landscape is evolving rapidly, and staying completely up-to-date with every change is a daunting task. If you have limited time to spare, it’s advisable to at least focus on video trends, as they represent one of the most potent forms of media today.

Nine Reasons

Why, because the leverage that videos are bringing is too big for ignoring it

The rewards and benefits of uploading video directly to Facebook, are so much bigger compared to uploading it only to YouTube or God forbid, to have it self-hosted. Moreover, this is the topic of this blog post Nine Reasons, where you’ll learn the benefits of uploading videos directly to FB. Not to mention that by having tens, hundreds, or thousands of videos only on YouTube, you are leaving a lot of money on the table. Just check, your competition, if they don’t do it yet, now is your chance to move ahead of them. If they are already uploading videos to Facebook, this might be the reason you are lagging. One such example involves major artists and bands, who have thousands of videos uploaded on their YouTube channels. When you try to find their video on Facebook, there are none available. Or, if they are lucky, some fan uploaded it on their own, breaking copyright which is a topic for another post. In a slow-moving world there is still a stigma that, when it comes to videos, people still think first of YouTube, but in the dynamics of now, this is almost a thing of the past.

There are at least strong nine reasons why you should consider uploading videos directly to Facebook instead of to YouTube.

1. The First reason - Facebook got bigger than YouTube

How fast everything changes, ha… Just one year ago the undisputed champion of online video was YouTube, and it seemed like he was far from being jeopardized by anyone. Fast forward one year to today and we see that it has been dethroned by Facebook which has become a major player in online video overnight. Since then Facebook is not only outperforming YouTube with driving views but also at engagement. With video views in billions, it also became the number one source where people watch online videos. Based on available metrics and Facebook’s data, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out when the majority of videos in your network are coming from another site like YouTube. , in other words, for Facebook means that if there is more content generated by users, more revenue they will earn. Hence, it would be better for them and for their users to upload videos directly to Facebook. This doesn’t happen overnight thus it happens fairly quickly, especially when you invest in the improvement of a user’s experience and make sure that uploading a video to your website is beneficial to both parties, video makers, and Facebook.

2. The second reason - 10x increase in reach with Facebook videos vs YouTube link

Based on SocialBakers study, there is a 10x increase in reach with a video that is uploaded directly to Facebook, as opposed to a shared YouTube link.

3. The third reason - Facebook Videos is top valued, YouTube link lowest valued

Facebook News Feed prioritizes videos more than any other type of content. Next after videos, are prioritized posts with uploaded images, then text-only posts. And only after that are YouTube links. Ok, the latest craze is Facebook live-stream videos which are outranking even Facebook videos.

4. The fourth reason - Facebook videos auto-play feature (my favorite 🙂 )

When FB users are scrolling down the news feed, it allows your video to start playing automatically  This is a great attention grabber and an easy way for you to get views. Whoa – user experience at its best. Not to mention that the lack of an auto-play feature in Facebook`s news-feed makes other video links obsolete

5. The fifth reason - Call to action link

This feature allows you to add your clickable link at the end of the video. With this option, when the video ends, you have an easy way to redirect viewers to your website, sales funnel, or shop. FB allows you to address your viewer with the following call-to-action words: Book Now, Download, Learn More, Shop Now, Sign Up, Watch More.

6. The sixth reason - Right sidebar notification

When someone shares your YouTube link, it will only say “xx shared a link” versus showing the full video title when your friends are liking, sharing, or commenting on your Facebook video.

Before Facebook removed thumbnails, thumbnails appeared in Facebook videos only.

7. The seventh reason - Facebook video sponsored posts

You can not boost or run sponsored posts with YouTube or any other hosted videos.

8. The eight reason is - Wider reach with other fan pages' video

When you post another fan page’s video, you’ll have broader audience reach. We did a small case study, thus with limited resources and many variability of which we don`t know, the difference is more than obvious.

9. The ninth reason - Plus all other YouTube`s features

After the video stops playing, FB shows related videos and starts to play them automatically, it allows you to create video playlists and do pretty much almost everything that you can do also on YouTube.

Here you have it, strong nine reasons why you should be uploading videos directly to Facebook.

Conclusion

Don`t understand me wrong. The intention of this post wasn’t to bash YouTube as it is still the second biggest website in the world and it shouldn’t be underestimated by any means. The plan was to point out the major differences that will help you make better decisions. YouTube functions as a video directory where people search for certain topics while on Facebook or other video-supported social networks, videos float freely inside of the network. This way videos find their own targeted audience on their own. In the same way as when you are discovering new videos when your friends, with whom you share the same interests, are liking, sharing, or commenting on certain social videos. To stress again, the most important thing for Facebook is its user experience, and Facebook will help you with your brand or fan page in a good way. Contrary to YouTube, I like to think that social media videos find their audience on their own. Thus in the same way as with search engines, Facebook will reward you only when you`ll be posting videos regularly and when the value in the videos will be over-delivered (one of the important metrics to note is the length of time that your video is being watched). Rewards come in increased post reaches, and organic Facebook likes. Moreover, the more videos you upload, and the more value will be provided, the faster your success will come. Of course, if in your power, upload your videos to as many other video-sharing sites as possible. For search engine benefit, make sure you add them different titles, tags, and descriptions (for the extra mile, create the same video of different lengths and spin descriptions on sentence and word level). If I’ve skipped anything of importance or you would like to share more reasons, please let me know in the comments below about nine reasons. Also kindly let me know if you have any questions. 

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