THE HOOK: GRABBING THE VIEWER'S ATTENTION
Okay we lied. There is one other thing that all successful viral videos have in common, and that is that they grab the viewer's attention within the first few ten seconds. A common saying regarding movies, "If nothing interesting happens in the first five minutes, nothing interesting will happen in the rest of the movie, either". Well, if your video's only two minutes long, then you've really only got about ten seconds to convince the viewer to keep watching.
Think of the whole internet video thing as MTV after a few energy drinks, the audience wants something short, fast and immediately gripping.
There are millions and millions of videos out there, and the fact is that most people will just click on something else if they don't think the one they're watching will be worth the time.
There are a lot of ways of hooking the viewer right away, and it really does depend on what kind of video you're making, but essentially you just don't want to take the viewer's attention span for granted. In short, viral videos are the pop song of the iPod generation: Start with a something catchy and don't overstay your welcome.
THE FIRST TEN SECONDS
If you're doing comedy, make sure there's a laugh in those first ten seconds and then keep them laughing for the next two minutes. If you're doing an advertisement, the viewer should know what you're selling right off the bat; show the product or service right up front and spend the rest of the video explaining what makes that product or service so great.
Not to say that there's no room for subtlety, but subtlety is a tricky thing to pull off in those first ten seconds. Start with a bang and spend the rest of the video getting a little more in-depth.
An excellent example would be The Angry Video Game Nerd, James Rolf. He makes a good living reviewing bad video games on Youtube, regularly getting over a million views per video. His videos are insightful, humorous and nostalgic, really getting into the whole philosophy of game design and why the one he's reviewing stinks, but before he gets into all that, he spends the first thirty odd seconds of the video using very imaginative curse words to describe the game in brief. Crude, sure, but it's turned out to be an incredibly catchy hook for his viewers.
We're not saying you need to start swearing like a sailor in all your vids, but within the first ten seconds, you should let the viewer know what you're all about, and then spend the rest of the video getting a little more in-depth about it.
TRIAL RUN
Now, before putting your video online, show it to some friends. Make a note of how they react. Tell them to be brutally honest with you and ask... was it funny? Did it make sense? Were there any boring parts?
The main thing is cutting out the parts that are boring or confusing. When you're just starting out, that may leave you with a pretty skimpy video, less than a minute in length, but you know what? That's a good thing. The shorter the better. If it's possible to get all the information across in five seconds, then go ahead and make a five second video.
People tend to share the shorter videos via social networking sites and iPod texting more often than they do the longer videos, so you really do have a better shot at going viral if you cut out everything that's not needed. So, in short, just trim it down to the best parts and leave everything else on the cutting room floor.