4 types of short video user psychology to help you create short video content

The surface research of short video "content output" is about the structural form of the content, but the underlying research is "user psychology". Only when it touches the user's psychological feelings can it be called high-quality content.

Nowadays, the short video industry is so hot, more and more people want to get a piece of the pie. What if they can become an Internet celebrity? However, competition in the short video industry is becoming increasingly fierce, and homogeneous content and lack of routine are difficult to be liked by the public. What are the psychological factors of users?

This article summarizes four major user psychology to help you produce content based on "psychological habits", it will be hard not to be popular!

1. Scarcity

When you watch short videos, you will definitely find out what you pay attention to, and the algorithm platform will recommend relevant content to you.

For example: If you want to learn how to put on makeup, you can receive makeup instructional videos through the algorithm; if you want to lose weight, you can receive weight loss tutorials through the algorithm.

In fact, the more you lack something, the more your attention will be attracted to it, even without you realizing it.

Don't you believe it?

Look at two groups of studies: In one study, the subjects were randomly divided into two groups, but one group ate heartily and enjoyed themselves, while the other group was starving.

They were asked to recognize a series of English words that flashed on the screen at a speed of about 33 milliseconds. Such a task would be difficult for any normal person. You might think that hungry subjects would be less able to concentrate and therefore perform worse on the task.

But the opposite was true: The hungry subjects performed just as well on the common vocabulary test as the well-fed subjects. However, they were able to recognize food-related words faster and better than the well-fed subjects.

This means that the feeling of scarcity caused the subjects to automatically and powerfully turn their attention to food. This means that under the influence of scarcity, users' attention will automatically and powerfully shift to unmet needs, even without them realizing it.

The short video platform helps you capture this information and constantly recommends videos to you based on your needs, so the more you watch Douyin, the more addicted you become.

For short video content creators, how to use the psychology of "sense of scarcity" to attract fans?

This requires us to analyze our target fans and understand what they want before making short videos. What are their senses of scarcity?

2. Sense of Resonance

Resonance is a physics term. The encyclopedia explains that it is the phenomenon whereby an object makes sound due to resonance. For example, if two tuning forks with the same frequency are brought close together, when one of them vibrates and makes a sound, the other will also make a sound - identification is an important part of resonance.

If you want your short video to become a hit, you must resonate with your fans. Resonance can be divided into positive resonance and negative resonance:

Positive resonance is the recognition of others towards you, which makes users feel that what you said is right, makes users feel good, and makes users feel that you have expressed their "feelings".
Reverse resonance is when others disagree with you and think that what you say doesn’t make sense, making users feel that it goes against their ideas.
Identification will bring about the embodiment of identity value, which is the "resonance point"; disagreement will lead to controversy and cause complaints, which is the "complaint point". Both are likely to spark heated discussions among fans, thereby driving up topics and increasing the chances of producing hits.

The short video is a very good example of "positive resonance": it tells the love, mentality, life, etc. of men and women over 30. After watching it, I feel like it is about myself.

Everyone in the video said what they think: the most useless thing in the world. After listening to them, I felt that what they said was very right and I developed a sense of identification with them psychologically; some short videos not only make people identify with them, but also touch people's tears, making them cry involuntarily. On the contrary, "reaction and resonance" will trigger collective complaints and ridicule, but because of the "complaints", it is also impressive.

For example: Tucao Conference, Chen Xiang Six-thirty, etc. These videos are so relaxing that people can already see the "pitfalls" and can't help but complain a few words.

Sometimes, "conflict" will bring about complaints, such as: role identity conflict, common sense cognition conflict, plot reversal conflict, value conflict, etc. For the audience, as long as the video challenges their cognition and ideas, they may have the urge to leave a message.

3. Sense of Gain

Although short video platforms are mainly for entertainment and relaxation, many users also come here to learn, hoping to gain "new knowledge" and "information" by watching videos. Therefore, the content of short videos needs to create a sense of "gain" for users, making them feel that they will gain something after watching the video.

You can provide information (useful news, valuable knowledge, useful skills) and express opinions (opinion comments, life philosophy, scientific truths, life insights) in the video, and many people are still very interested in it.

You can also show the [benefits] that users can get in the video. As long as it is good for users, they will be willing to follow you. Many vertical accounts have gained a large number of accurate fans because they fit the users' sense of "gain".

In terms of "sense of gain", you can also review and interpret a hot event in a timely manner by combining it with hot topics, which can also gain a lot of attention. For example: the epidemic in the United States, Huawei 5g, Kobe's achievements during his lifetime, etc.

In addition, there is also some [sense of gain] that reflects the user's "getting a bargain" mentality, and users want to get goods through "low price" or "free". Therefore, we often see some short videos promoting products that emphasize the price advantages on the basis of showing the product usage scenarios. Or a short video blogger randomly gives out benefits in order to "spoil fans".

4. Curiosity

Curiosity is caused by the information gap, which is the difference between what we know and what we want to know.

For a single video, you can also use "curiosity" to guide users to watch the entire video and increase the "completion rate". "Leaving suspense" is a very useful way to stimulate curiosity.

The following are two short video structures that can plant the seeds of curiosity in users’ minds.

Throw out a question at the beginning (create suspense) + tell a story in the middle (combining cases + argument verification) + express personal opinions or guide interaction at the end. This formula is especially suitable for vlogs and personal sharing videos, such as the video below: Throw out a question at the beginning and create suspense "How much money can you make in a day as a customer service representative in Shenzhen?" Raising a question makes people want to read on to find the answer.

Tell stories in the middle and state the facts based on your own personal experience. At the same time, use more numbers in the copy to enhance memory, such as "What does it mean to make 100 to 200 calls on average every day? That means you have to talk for 8 hours straight", "The handling rate must reach 90%."

Express your own views at the end and arouse resonance. “You have to know that no matter where you are or what your profession is, don’t underestimate yourself and always have the courage to fight the world to the death.”

Moreover, one advantage of this short video copywriting formula is the suspense at the beginning. Asking the question "Do you know..." can help you accurately screen target fans in one sentence, attract their attention, and retain interested fans.

For short video copy of this type, after expressing the point of view at the end, you can also raise a question, such as "Do you agree with my point of view? Welcome to leave a message in the comment section", "What do you think..., leave a message in the comment section", and other similar copy that guides interaction.

Put the result first + prove the result + give unique insights and opinions or reversals at the end, so let’s learn from them! The above are the four common types of user psychology. Understanding these psychology can help us reach users directly, touch a certain point in their hearts, and produce popular short videos.

What’s important is that every time we make a video, we should think more about: What feelings can this video evoke in users? Which type of user emotions does the video target? What voice does the character express for the group of people he represents?

Users are a collection of needs. If you understand them, you will also understand the "needs". If you do things according to the "needs", the chances of success will be very high.