One month after the launch of the video account: Which ones are likely to become popular?

On the afternoon of February 19, the application for Video Account was suddenly suspended, leaving the operators who had originally planned to make a big splash on Video Account confused. However, according to industry insiders, the suspension "will not last too long" and the service will be back online soon.

Since its launch nearly a month ago, WeChat Video Account has been attracting attention from people in the industry. The most common question is "how to apply", which shows that many peers are planning to make some attempts. Moreover, according to our observations, the number and data of videos on the video account have shown a significant increase recently.

Just yesterday, "Uncle Qiuye" posted a message saying that his video account of the same name used a video with 136,000 views, which brought more than 10,000 readings to the public account article linked below the video, more than 1,000 new fans of the public account, and more than 400 new paying readers.

What are the operational skills for video accounts at this stage? What are the most liked videos we have seen? What are your peers trying? What experiences are worth learning from? After all, I believe that the application for the video account will be resumed soon. To prepare for the future, today, we decided to take another serious look at the video account.

“How to apply for a video account” received 10w+ views, and operational skills make it easier for content to become a hit?

The "Uncle Akiba" video account has over 100,000 views of content, with the theme "How to quickly apply for your video account", which introduces the specific steps for opening a video account and publishing content. It consists of three parts: pictures, BGM, and voice-over commentary. As of press time, it has received 1,433 likes.

The video also designed several details to divert traffic to the official account, such as adding a line of text at the bottom of the video: "Follow Uncle Qiuye's video account to share good books and practical information", and at the end of the video there is the words "Click to follow" the video account, and there is also a preview for the next video.

This video brought considerable data conversion to "Uncle Akiba", with 10,000+ readings on the official account, 400+ paying readers, and 1,000+ fans of the official account.

Even though he had done the preparatory work for traffic diversion, the effect was still beyond the expectations of "Uncle Qiuye" himself. Therefore, he also mentioned in the article "My video account has exploded, with over 100,000 views, but I want to slap myself in the face" that with the blessing of such traffic, the header image of the video account should also be changed to a picture that guides attention to the official account, and the conversion data will be better.

In addition to "Uncle Qiuye", I have also frequently seen various activation tutorials and operation skills videos on the homepage of the video account recently, with a few hundred likes and up to 5,000+ likes (it is not ruled out that this is related to the fact that I pay more attention to new media content and that many of my WeChat friends are new media practitioners). According to the ratio of views and likes of "Uncle Akiba", there are many popular operation skills with 10w+ hits, which shows that such content is very popular among video account users at this stage.

For example, the video account "Jiuxian Zhang" posted "How to open a video account in 60 seconds", which had 5,972 likes and 955 comments as of press time, most of which were asking how to open a video account.

The video account "Repeatedly Reset to Zero" has also posted similar content - "Teaching you step by step how to open a video account", and currently has 3169 likes and 248 comments.

There are many similar contents. It seems that creators can often get higher likes and popularity through this type of content than other content. Since the video account is still in its early stages of promotion, such popularity comes more from the actual needs of the video account users. Most people have access to the video account but do not have the authority to publish, so they urgently need to know how to obtain the ability to publish content, which has promoted the creation of explosive products.

Important knowledge points about the video account: How to activate it? What are the operational skills?

Since so many people want to know about the opening and operation of the video account, I will list and review some of them here for you.

First of all, how to open a video account?

If you are lucky enough to be tested in grayscale, you can find a small camera pattern in the upper right corner of the video account homepage. After clicking it, you can directly register and successfully open your own video account.

But most people need to scan the QR code and fill out an application to prove their influence and upload original video works in order to qualify for opening a video account. It should be noted that one WeChat account can only open one video account.

However, the video has just announced the suspension of the application, and it is not yet known when it will be resumed. But I believe it will be soon.

When the internal test of the video account was launched on January 21, Xinbang published an article titled "Inspiring! WeChat has finally released its big short content move, and the video account has just been internally tested (with video illustrations)” preliminarily explains the characteristics of the video account, including that “public account fans and video account fans are not connected” and “there is currently no limit on the number of pictures or video content that each person can post per day” and so on.

A month has passed. We have been constantly exploring and trying through the "Xinbang" video account. After experiencing various problems such as length, size, copywriting, etc., we updated various knowledge points about the video account to help novices re-emphasize the key points.

1. Content format: video/picture (+ copywriting)

Video accounts support single video or picture posting, and also support video/picture + text format, but do not support pure text format. The uploaded video cannot exceed 60 seconds, the number of pictures cannot exceed 9, and the maximum word count of the copy is 1,000 words. At the same time, it has been observed that the copy can display a maximum of 3 lines of content, and any content exceeding 3 lines will be folded.

It should be noted that the cover of the video account defaults to the first second of the video and cannot be selected or modified, so this frame needs to be prepared in advance when making the video.

2. Size format: Aspect ratio between 16:9-3:3.5

The size of pictures and videos in the video account is set to a range: the aspect ratio is between 16:9-3:3.5. According to official WeChat tips, square pictures/videos can be published directly. If it is a horizontal screen, the recommended width:height = 16:9; if it is a vertical screen, the recommended width:height = 3:3.5.

It should be noted that images with aspect ratios within these two size ranges can be sent out normally. If they exceed these sizes, they will be cropped. (From our blood and tears)

3. Video account homepage: single-column information flow, non-immersive experience

The homepage of the video account is sorted in a single-column information stream, which is a non-immersive video viewing experience. You can see the avatar and nickname of the next account. However, the video playback is in an infinite loop, and you cannot drag the progress bar or pause the playback. If you don’t pull down, you will keep watching the same video in a loop.

4. Operation: The number of fans will not be displayed to the public, and only dissemination within WeChat is supported

At present, the sharing function of the video account only supports "send to friends" and "share to Moments", and cannot be downloaded. According to my test, users with the entrance to the video account can share the content of the video account for the second time, but users who do not currently have the entrance can only like it and cannot share it again.

In terms of data, operators can see three types of data: the number of fans, the number of views, and the number of shares. The only data that fans can see when they click on the video account are likes and comments.

In addition, the operator has a "small right", which is to "close comments." After closing comments, viewers can still see the number of comments that have been made, but the comment information will be hidden and only the operator can view it.

5. Official account and video account: one-way connection

Currently, the connection between the official account and the video account is one-way. Each video account content can add a public account article link to directly jump to the official account article page. "Uncle Qiuye" also used this function to increase the number of readings of his public account articles by 1w+ with a video.

However, the official account does not have any function that can directly jump to the video account. If you want to use the official account to drive traffic to the video account, it cannot be directly realized for the time being.

The content style of the video account has not yet been finalized, which works are more popular?

As a product that has only been launched for a month, it is too early to make a conclusion about the style of Video Account, and the operators are still in their "stumbling" exploration.

Judging from the content of my personal video account, video account creators are mainly composed of five parts: news media accounts, social celebrities (stars, photographers, writers, etc.), top accounts in the public account field, top short video accounts, and personal video accounts created by WeChat friends.

I have summarized the content that can be browsed on the video account now, which can be roughly divided into the following types:

1. Hot News

2. Moments-style video and Weibo-style picture sharing (commonly seen on celebrity video accounts)

3. Customize original content for video accounts (such as video account operation skills, etc.)

4. Secondary distribution of content published by creators, etc.

The styles of the most-liked videos also vary. For example, Fang Qi Kiki's video "Would you choose to start from scratch with your boyfriend?" tells the story of starting a travel media business with her boyfriend. As of press time, it has received 20,868 likes and 1,355 comments on the video account. According to Fang Qi herself, at the current stage, the content of her video account is all distributed secondary.

For example, the food video "Another Way to Scramble Eggs" posted by "Name is Too Long" received more attention than the food itself because the Mandarin was too plastic. This content received 4,333 likes.

For example, there are also several popular music contents. For example, "Jike Junyi" released a video of herself covering the recently popular "Last Dance", which received 2,847 likes; "Dai Yutong"'s song "That Girl Told Me" received 2,073 likes, etc.

There are also various hot news videos, as well as the video account opening and operation skills mentioned above, which have performed outstandingly in recent data. However, the problem is that high-quality original video accounts are still relatively scarce, and many accounts are still in the testing phase of the new platform, and are more likely to choose secondary distribution.

However, if you publish non-original content, there may be greater risks. This risk comes from copyright disputes with video creators on the one hand, and from the platform’s illegal handling on the other.

An operator revealed that some time ago he used the video account to move Han Hong's interview video, which was read over 20,000 times, but it was deleted by the platform two days after it was released for "violating the video account operating regulations (such as plagiarism, illegal and irregular activities, etc.)".

Based on past experience, although the video account is still in internal testing, the WeChat platform will definitely focus on rectifying the copying of content, especially the behavior of marketing accounts and micro-businesses that take advantage of the platform.

In addition, we have discovered through several consecutive trials and errors that videos posted on the video account should not contain logos of other platforms, otherwise they will basically not pass the review.

Is Video Account a new opportunity for content creators?

For video accounts, what creators care most about is traffic, because traffic = opportunity.

"Uncle Qiuye" used actual cases to prove that the video account can indeed bring more traffic and opportunities to the official account. So where does the traffic of the video account come from?

After a video account content of "MacTalk" received 280,000 views, the account owner Chi Jianqiang speculated that WeChat will currently make active recommendations based on user interests and video account content. There is also a social recommendation mechanism, that is, if a WeChat friend likes or comments on a video account dynamic, then this dynamic may also appear on his or her own timeline.

According to industry insiders, the distribution logic of the video account is very close to Chi Jianqiang's speculation. It is mainly based on user attention and friend recommendations. When there are not many users paying attention in the early stage, popular content will be shown to users.

Such distribution logic will indeed bring new opportunities to creators of all kinds, which is why many operators have conveyed the same message: be optimistic about video accounts.

WeChat creators can gather traffic with high-quality short video content and gain more attention through the connection between video accounts and official accounts. This is a major benefit, especially for small account authors.

Short video creators from other platforms can also find a "foothold" in the WeChat ecosystem. From this perspective, the video account makes up for the shortcomings of the official account in short content, which is also the purpose conveyed by Zhang Xiaolong in his video speech at the WeChat Open Class.

But some long video creators are still watching the video accounts. Vlogger Donggua said that for him, the length of the video account is not enough to post all his video content, so he plans to explore new ideas and use it as one of the release channels for feature film trailers, "such as some columns or programs that are about to be released."

In addition to long video creators, other operators are also currently or planning to develop new content formats on video accounts.

"Shidian Dushu" started publishing content on the video account on January 24, and has updated a total of 16 videos so far. According to Susi, VP of short videos and live broadcasts at Shidian Reading, Shidian Reading initially redistributed the content posted on other platforms, but has recently begun to customize original content for video accounts.

"Our current operating model is: 5-6 articles will be written at one time, and the anchor will shoot them at home at one time, and then edit them in the later stage," Su Xi explained the video account planning of "Ten Points Reading". "We are exploring how to better combine the content of the official account with the video account, and plan to develop a column-like account."

Author: New List

Source: New List