Discover A Compelling Social Media Strategy With Video Competitions

BySandy Allain Reading Time: 3 minutes

The power of video is undeniable. Not does it only help your language school to get listed better in search engines if you have relevant videos for example on Youtube with relevant keywords and content that is fun to share – the process of making those videos will provide you with outstanding opportunities to connect with people and their networks as well.

There are many new aspiring video talents who are happy to create video clips to build their own portfolio. While you do not need to take advantage of getting valuable video work done for free – you can offer free language courses in exchange for example – this is one of the best ways to involve young people who love to travel to your location in exchange, for example, bringing their video drone with them and put your language school in scene.
The important point is to create short video clips that are easy to share on social media. Nobody likes to share and watch videos that are 5 minutes and longer. Often people are not aware when sharing videos that they occupy quite a lot of memory space on their mobile phones, especially if using Whatsapp.
Also, the attention span of people is really short. Short videos should be entertaining and show the value of learning a language with your language school. So they should act as a teaser without being a commercial.
The best way to get started is to host and create a video competition where you invite people to create videos in order to win something of real value. All of the following ideas can turn into a competition or can be used as a stand-alone video activity for your language school to profit from.

Here are some great video ideas that can give your language school additional exposure and interesting interactive content for other students to share on social media:

  1. Get someone with a drone to take some videos from your location and preferable with students on some exciting activities and/or outdoor activities that are connected with the location of your language school.
  2. Get someone with a 360ยบ camera to shoot some videos walking around in the language school
  3. Get students from a film school to create little movie clips or episodes as part of their projects. Create fun movie scripts that have to do with how people struggle without knowing the right words and grammar and create fun video clips that are easy to be shared on social media.
  4. Create some events at your language school that are newsworthy and worth to be filmed, such as (see those articles) Door Open Events – The Power of Doors Open Days For Your Language School  and Free Publicity: Host A Fun Game Show At Your Language School
  5. Create video competitions where potential students can apply with a creative video in order to obtain a sponsored or discounted language class or something of real value in exchange.
  6. Work together with local companies for example if some of them offer internships together with your language schools (see also the article Offering Internships At Your Language School: A True Win-Win 
  7. Create videos with points of interest of your locations: museums, art events, anything that potentially interests travelers. Most companies will be interested to gain additional exposure and it will be a good win-win situation. For example, in recent years \”escape rooms\” become popular and some companies offering those game events might be able to offer it in a different language and you might create a \”language-based experience\” together with this.

Using video is no longer a luxury and can be done with minimal equipment, just even using smartphones. When producing some videos they might even work better if they look more amateur than a polished professional video produced that looks more like a commercial in the end.