Making the most of video for your nonprofit.
Learn how your nonprofit can start making videos to help you raise awareness for your cause and achieve your goals.
Why video?
No matter your nonprofit’s size or focus, videos can help you reach, engage, and persuade your audience on LinkedIn.
Here are a few key reasons why videos are so effective for nonprofits right now:
• Video is in demand: 81% of people said they wanted to see more short-form video content from brands.
• They prompt action: More than eight out of 10 people (84%) say they’ve visited a website after watching an organization’s video ad.
• They’re growing more popular: Video is the fastest growing format on LinkedIn, with uploads up 34% year over year.
• They’re engaging: Videos see 1.4x more engagement than other types of posts on LinkedIn.
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Check out this free LinkedIn Learning course,
Creating a Video for Your Nonprofit, which features an example from a real nonprofit and walks you through every step of creating compelling videos from the fundamentals to post-production.
What kind of videos should your nonprofit post?
The most effective videos nonprofits post on LinkedIn tend to:
Focus on impact.
Your audience follows your nonprofit because they care about the work you do. Videos that tell the story of your organization’s impact can inspire your viewers to help you make a difference.
Video ideas:
• Fundraising details: Share stories from a recent fundraising drive and consider demonstrating how the money raised by your nonprofit is used to benefit those you serve. Learn more about creating impactful nonprofit fundraising videos.
• Event and community highlights: Hosting or appearing at an event? Get team members to record some footage. Edit together highlights and include narration explaining what the event was about and the impact it had on your cause, like this video from City Harvest.
• Thank-you video: After a successful campaign, record a member of your team thanking your supporters for their help and detailing how your organization will use the money you raised, like Remote Area Medical did after Giving Tuesday.
Feature real people.
The most effective nonprofit videos on LinkedIn tend to focus on real people, making them feel authentic and relatable. Capture attention by featuring people directly involved with your organization’s work, like your leadership team, staff, or volunteers.
Video ideas:
• Thought leadership: 62% of surveyed nonprofit professionals have used LinkedIn to successfully establish thought leadership for their executives, and videos can play a key role in those efforts. Leverage the subject matter expertise at your organization! Videos like this example from The/Nudge Institute are an excellent way to educate and inform your audience, and move them to action.
• Volunteer and community spotlight: If a volunteer has been working with your organization for a long time or goes above and beyond, ask if you can interview them for a spotlight video like this example by Brown Bagging for Calgary’s Kids.
• Meet the team: Put together a video or even a series of videos introducing your dedicated team. Have each member introduce themselves and speak on their role, like in these videos from Give. Help. Share and Hope for Haiti. This kind of content is also a great way to support your employer branding efforts and introduce new hires.
Be highly shareable.
One of the best ways to have your videos reach new audiences is to make them as shareable as possible. Giving your supporters reasons to share your videos with their network helps drive organic reach, raising awareness of your cause and attracting new followers.
Video ideas:
• Focus on timely content: If you can create videos about breaking news related to your cause or upcoming calendar moments, like Conservação Internacional did with this video during 16th UN Biodiversity Conference, you can grab your viewer’s attention with immediate relevance.
• Call out supporters: Get permission from volunteers, corporate partners, and other supporters to give them a video shoutout. Be sure to tag any named supporters so they get a notification when the video is published, like TECHO does in this video post.
• Offer reasons to share within the video itself: Let people know how much it means for them to share your content. For example, explain why you’re trying to spread awareness about a cause and how sharing the video will help you reach that goal.
Getting started with video.
You don’t need expensive equipment to make great videos for your nonprofit right now; all you need is your phone or a computer. Follow these steps to get started:
Before you start filming, come up with a basic outline for what you’d like your video to cover. Agree on who will be in the video and what you want them to say or do.
Video planning tips:
• Start small. Think of video ideas that you can execute in a single workday.
• Consider a short script or bullet points to help your speaker stay on track. Ideally, they shouldn’t look like they’re reading, so keep it simple and allow room for improvisation.
• Help your speaker feel comfortable by offering to practice beforehand and encouraging them to do multiple takes.
Most cell phones include video recording cameras that are high enough quality to fulfill your nonprofit’s needs. If you want to take your videos to the next level, consider investing in a ring light and lavalier microphone.
Video shooting tips:
• Hold your phone vertically to film in the 9:16 aspect ratio that is best for LinkedIn.
• Put a light source in front of (not behind) your subject. This could be a lamp or a natural light source, like a window.
• Minimize background noise by filming somewhere quiet when possible.
If you want to edit your video, there are several free video editing software apps that can help, such as Canva and CapCut for desktop.
Make sure your final edited video is 5MB or smaller, or you won’t be able to upload it to LinkedIn. Ensure your video is in one of the file types LinkedIn supports, like MP4, MOV, or AVI. See the full list of supported file types here.
Video editing tips:
• Trim unnecessary pauses and gaps to try to make your video as concise and substantive as possible.
• Prioritize naturalistic editing and keep effects and transitions to a minimum to ensure your message doesn’t get lost.
• Keep the subject in the center of your frame and keep the edges of your video free of important elements, as these could get obscured by the LinkedIn user interface.
• If you’re embedding captions, place them around two-thirds of the way down the video, instead of at the very bottom.
When you’re satisfied with your video, follow these steps to post it on your nonprofit’s LinkedIn Page:
1. Make sure you’re logged into LinkedIn and are an admin of your nonprofit’s Page.
2. Click the “+ Create” button on the admin dashboard of your organization’s LinkedIn Page and select “Start a post.”
3.Click the option to “Add media” to the post and select your edited video file.
4. Use the editor tool to add a title (optional), toggle auto-generated captions on or off, or upload your preferred thumbnail for the video. Use your caption to provide context for the video your viewers are about to see.
5. Write some copy to accompany the video. Tag any participants in the video to encourage them to engage and share.
6. When you’re ready, click “post.” It may take a few minutes for your video to appear on your Page. You can also schedule a video to post later.
Nonprofit video best practices.
Incorporating the following data-backed best practices into your videos can help you maximize their performance.
Keep it short
To maximize how many people watch until the end, aim to keep your videos between 30 and 90 seconds long.
Optimize for mobile
Most of your viewers will watch your video on a mobile device. Use vertical framing and make sure any graphic elements are big enough to read on a phone screen.
Aim for emotional impact
The best nonprofit videos tend to speak from the heart. Don’t be afraid to make videos featuring impassioned, personal discussions about why your cause matters.
Include a strong call to action (CTA)
End your video by appealing to your viewers to take immediate action. This could be by donating, volunteering, or taking another critical step. You can also add this CTA in your caption or comments and share relevant links.
Get to the point
People decide whether they want to keep watching a video within the first few seconds of starting it. Get your viewers’ attention with your very first shot to keep them watching.
Include captions
Adding captions is important for accessibility and helps ensure anyone watching your video on mute still gets your message. You can embed your own captions or use the ones LinkedIn automatically generates for your video.
Differentiate your brand
While you can take inspiration from what other brands are doing, don’t lose sight of what makes your nonprofit unique. Stay true to your voice and keep your branding consistent to ensure supporters instantly recognize a video from your nonprofit.
Respond to any comments
viewers make on your video to raise its visibility and prompt further engagement.
Learn more about using key moments to boost stakeholder engagement.
Measuring and optimizing your nonprofit video success.
By keeping track of how your nonprofit’s videos perform, you’ll start to learn what your audience wants to see from you. This can help you produce more impactful videos over time and provide valuable insights to inform your broader messaging and approach.
To measure your nonprofit videos successfully:
• Monitor what matters: Important performance metrics to watch for your videos include impressions, views, engagement rate, click-through rate (CTR), and shares. These metrics can provide important information about what’s working and what isn’t. For example, if people are watching your videos but your CTR is low, you may need a more compelling call to action. Try adding a time-bound prompt at the end of your video, such as “contribute within the next 48 hours and your donation will be matched.”
• Look for dips and spikes: Both your most and least successful videos have plenty to teach. Closely analyze those videos with either positive or negative performance anomalies. Did you do something different that you could either replicate or avoid in future?
• Build benchmarks: Once you’ve created a few videos, you can get a sense of how an “average” effort performs. Use these benchmarks to gain a quick, relative understanding of how successful each new video is.
For more information on how to keep track of your engagement, get to know your LinkedIn Page analytics.
Ready to post your video? Don’t forget to tag @LinkedIn for Nonprofits in your video posts so we can engage and increase the reach and visibility of your videos!
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