It is the trend nowadays to use videos to connect and engage with your audience.
However a lot of people struggle with creating videos, including myself. When I say “creating videos”, I mean specifically recording yourself on camera talking. Yes, I used to be terribly afraid and I still am sometimes if I was asked to be interviewed on the spot. However, through a lot of trial and error, I have discovered these tips along the way which have helped me to overcome my fear in creating videos.
But before you dive into it, if you wanna know why video is super important for your digital product business, you can read this post here.
Okay, let’s do this now.
Here are 11 Excellent Tips to Overcome Your Fear of Doing Videos
- Just do it!
- Hide behind your camera.
- Start first and then tweak it later.
- Done is better than perfect.
- Nobody thinks like you.
- It is all in your mind.
- Focus on helping others first.
- Write it down!
- Practice, practice, practice!
- Do it often!
- Replay and observe
1. Just Do It.
One of the ways to overcome your fear in doing videos – especially if you haven’t done it before is to bite the bullet and just do it!
If you are still afraid, that is okay. It is absolutely a normal feeling to have. Trust me, I have been in your shoes too. You’re human after all and it IS scary to do new things. Instead of ignoring this uncomfortable feeling, I just want you to take a deep breath and allow yourself to feel the fear. Accept that you’re not going to be perfect and just reach out for that phone or video camera and start recording. That’s it. Don’t think twice about it.
Eventually, I do recommend you start recording and reveal your beautiful self, speaking. This will help you get higher engagement and it allows others to see your facial expressions, your unique personality, your quirks and all of that and that will help connect you with your audience better.
2. Hide Behind Your Camera
If you’re still scared about recording yourself, then just don’t do it. It’s okay to start slow. Just hide behind your camera and voice over your videos for now.
3. Start First and Tweak Later
The point here I’m making is to START first.
Get your video out there as soon as possible and you can improve and tweak it later. And when you’re ready to reveal yourself to the world – then, you can face your camera and say, “Hello world!”
When I decided to do videos, I started doing video tutorials. I was basically hiding behind the camera the whole time. So believe you me, I was terrified of showing myself to the world. However, it wasn’t so bad recording my PC screen and talking behind the scenes because I can easily edit the parts that I’m not so happy about.
But then when I decided to do my first actual manual recording (using my phone) to show others how I use and put together my planner, I was seriously terrified. It is just so different doing a manual recording from doing video tutorials (with my tutorials – you only need to record your PC screen and start talking).
With manual recording, I can’t control the view of my surroundings digitally… so if your desk looks messy.. you can’t simply just edit that out.. a lot of preparation needs to take place before you manual record something – especially if you want to make it look all nice.
4. Done is Better Than Perfect
But you know what? I recorded it anyway.
My first manual recording was imperfect. Well it actually kinda suck. That day I had a cold. My hands were shaking so much during recording, I stumbled on my words a lot and I was sniffling all the way through my recording. I felt like it was such a bad video and was actually embarrassed to upload it but I did it anyway. One of the reasons behind it was because I just had my baby (4th child) then, so I did not have the time to edit or improve the video at all. I just wanted to quickly record it and get it out there.
Here is my first manual recording – Although I’m actually REALLY embarrass to show you, I think it is important for you to see where I’ve started. So I hope this video will encourage you to start recording your first video as well (manual or not). No more excuses, guys! If I can do it, so can you!
And so, as time went by, I visited that same video again. I was pretty shocked to see that I had like 7 likes with only 132 views (at that time I checked). I just checked today and it’s gone up to 9 likes and 236 views. I didn’t even have THAT many likes on my initial video tutorials.
I mean in my mind I was thinking – who the heck would want to watch this video right? It totally suck and I can barely hear myself, I was having a cold that day, my hands were shaking so much while holding the phone, I was clumsy with my words, I didn’t sound professional, my environment doesn’t look great, but guess, what?
5 & 6. Nobody thinks like you do. It is ALL in your mind.
So don’t underestimate your videos. Just because you think your video looks stupid or ridiculous – doesn’t mean it’s true. Some of you probably didn’t think that my video was that bad, right? You see, I told so.
I mean clearly my video had helped someone right? If not, why would they even bother liking it?
Which brings me to my next point –
7. Focusing On Helping Others First
If you focus on helping others by creating content that will help them get results, instead of focusing on how well you speak or look on video, maybe it wouldn’t be so scary anymore. If you make the videos more about them than about you, it will encourage you to make more videos so you can help and reach out to more people. So shift the focus to the message or the content of your videos rather than yourself.
8. Write It Down!
Once you’ve decided on your message or your content, then write it down! I used to just ‘wing it’ or come up with my own words as I record my tutorials. But when I do that, I noticed that words doesn’t really come out as naturally as I like and I feel like I’m all over the place.
And if you’re anything like me, I’m REALLY not great with words – at ALL!
At times when I’m confident about some things, I can speak well and get the message across nicely. But most of the times, I can’t. I usually must plan what I want to say first, sometimes in bullet points and other times, word for word. Then once they’re done, I record the video.
I noticed that when I do it this way – my video sounds smoother and so much easier to listen to. So don’t be afraid to write it down, especially if you find it difficult to come up with your own words to say.
9. Practice, Practice, Practice!
Once you plan your message or content of your videos and write it down, then you can start to practice at least once or twice before hitting the record button. This will help give you peace of mind and courage to deliver your message more confidently.
10. Do It Often
The more videos you do, you get better at it. It will also help you to gain more confidence in yourself as you speak. You would also get better at delivering your message in a way that helps your listeners/viewers absorb your content more effectively.
11. Replay and Observe
As you do more videos, you can start improving and perfecting them. I encourage you to replay your videos to see how you can further improve your message and how you deliver them. Start listening and observing yourself. Start by asking yourself these questions:
- Am I articulating my words clearly and slowly?
- Do I sound boring or monotonous?
- Should I add different video angles to make it more interesting to watch?
- Should I add different images and video screenshots for my voice over clip so it helps my viewers to absorb my content better and make it easier for them to understand?
- How can I make my videos more interesting or engaging or eye-catching?
- Is my content simple enough for my viewers to understand? Can I understand it myself?
- Is the background music too loud that I can’t hear myself?
- How can I deliver my message/content more clearly?
- How can I make it simpler for people to understand my content better?
By asking these questions, you will soon create videos that are interesting to watch, which in turn will help to grab your audience’s attention and engage with them better.
Conclusion
I hope these 11 excellent tips will help you to overcome your fear of doing videos. I have also created a free lovely printable for you with these 11 tips, so you can put it up on your wall to serve as a reminder for you.
If you like these tips and want to learn how to do videos, specifically on creating your first promo video for your printables, I have created a special course specially around this topic which is the Create a Printables Promo Video Course where I will teach you how to create your first promo video to promote your digital products to your audience.
To your amazing, fearless self. I know you can do this!
Printables, design elements, graphics and any digital products provided on this site are for personal use only. You may NOT modify them or redistribute them for free or monetary gain without the written agreement from the author, Janice Banks. You may share these with your classes or co-workers (educators/teachers/tutors) as long as they are not modified in any way. Please share the link to the blog post if you want to share these digital resources with others.
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