Prompt Playbook: Getting Started with Short Form Video PART 5
📱 Getting Started with Short Form Video using AI | Playbook
In the last Part we shot our first video and posted it up to TikTok.
TikTok may or may not be a channel you want to focus on. But it has great video production tools so we started here to simplify production.
In this Part we’re going to take that video and get it out on multiple platforms.
Record once, publish many.
Let’s go.
Let’s get started:
Repurposing for fun and profit
Repurposing is the act of taking a piece of content and adapting it to other channels.
We’ve already done the hard part - we’ve made a short video!
That short video will work on multiple platforms.
For instance
YouTube Shorts
Instagram Reels
Are specifically made for short videos.
As well as these though shorts work well on pretty much any social media platform
LinkedIn
Facebook
X/Twitter
Where should you be posting? It depends on your market and where the audience hangs out!
Thankfully reposting to multiple channels is nice and simple using the method I’ll show you.
Therefore if you are unsure of the best platform I’d recommend posting on all of them and seeing where the videos work well!
Download your video
Step one is to get a copy of your TikTok video.
Now, you can download directly from TikTok but your video will have a TikTok watermark on it.
Personally I don’t really like it so I use third-party downloading tools.
The one I use is https://snaptik.app/ which works well on phones.
This tool will allow you to download the video file without the ugly watermark.
Add subtitles
I now like to take my video and run it through another app to add subtitles.
This is particularly important for X and LinkedIn where people tend to have their audio turned off.
Having immediate subtitles will let the viewer watch silently or let them know whether it’s worth turning the audio on.
I personally use an app called Captions. It’s free with some premium options.
All you need to do is create > import > select the video and Captions will use AI to transcribe your audio into text and add subtitles.
You select the style of the subtitles (they have some neat looking animations) and then export. Very simple, no fuss, no manual work required.
Uploading to other platforms
For simplicity I’d recommend having all the social media apps on your phone. You just go through one at a time adding the video (now subtitled) and uploading.
Each platform will have slightly different requirements for the title and description.
Thankfully Captions also helps here. Once you’ve transcribed and added captions you can automatically generate a title and description using AI:
Grab those and either use directly or adapt them into your social media posts alongside your video. Either way you’ll save time.
Word of warning on the hashtags - they tend to be a bit crap! Instead enter these manually as required.
Do this on as many platforms as you can, at least initially. And repeat for a couple of weeks - seeing what platforms seem receptive.
You’ll also find that some videos just do better on certain platforms because they resonate for whatever reason. You’ll spot patterns as you post more and more.
For example I find that anything with a vaguely political bent does well for me on TikTok whereas educational tutorials do best on YouTube Shorts. The only way to know this is to post and observe.
Once you have a good feeling of what seems to be working on what platforms you can start to i) focus on those platforms and ii) experiment with formats.
Worry about that later though. For now just get started!
Premium Prompt - Bonus Boost
Getting started with any new platform with a new content type is hard. I won’t pretend it’s not!
Getting those first followers is a drag. Always is.
So, as Premium readers here’s the deal. Drop your socials in the community and I’ll make sure your new accounts get some love.
If you’ve been in the community a while you’ll know I personally try to engage with all of your X posts (when I see them!).
Let’s do the same with any new channels you branch into with short video - just drop you profile link and I’ll give you a follow and engage.
I’ll also (gently!) bully others to do the same. 😝
Pulling it together
You now have ONE tactic to produce short video.
No research, no additional reading, no complications needed.
It’s enough to go ahead and shoot the darn thing.
So…what are you waiting for? Shoot!
Here’s a reminder of what we covered this week
Part 1: Small but deadly. Why short form content works.
Part 2: Format focus. What will we make videos about?
Part 3: Content channels. How to get inspired for limitless ideas.
Part 4: Rapid recording. How to create shorts easily and in volume.
Part 5: Repurposing for fun and profit. Hitting multiple channels using short form.
Keep prompting,
Kyle