5 Reasons to Try Live Video (and 5 Ways to Make It Less Stressful)

Welcome to Day 3 of our Visibility Challenge for Introverts! How’s it going for you so far? Have you felt more comfortable connecting with your audience, or are you working through any mental blocks around sharing your message?

Today, we want to talk about a medium that’s increasingly everywhere: live video.

Yes, we know. To an introvert, this is, ah…mildly terrifying! But stay with us, here: we urge to consider giving it a try, for the following reasons:

Minimal prep time. You know all that time you spend working on a blog post? Looking for the perfect word, proofreading, rearranging your thoughts? Gone. All you need to go live is an idea of what you want to convey, and you can just talk. In fact, it’s better not to have a script, so it comes across as real and natural.
Bite-sized content. Sure, you can go live for an hour at a time. We’ve done it before, and have had plenty of people watch us chat about marketing ideas for far longer than we intended to go on. But the great thing about a live video is that you can just hop on for a minute or five, share a few thoughts, and go about the rest of your day.
A sense of urgency. We know you’ve gotten a million notifications. “[Person or Brand] is live now!” It pops up on your phone, pings across your screen, urges you to check it out. Those social media algorithms that hide your regular posts so only five of your thousand followers actually see what you have to say? This is exactly when they’re working for you for once, telling people you have something to say right now. What could be so important that you need to go live? Is it an announcement? Is something happening? No one wants to miss out on something new! And, at the same time, there’s…
Lasting impact. Once you’ve finished your live video, there’s an option to post it to your account so people who didn’t catch it in the moment are able to catch up later. And then a week later, or a month later, or a year later, you can re-share those same videos, and maybe even add some new thoughts that have come to you in the meantime.
Instant connection. There’s something very isolating about sending out emails and blog posts. You pour your heart out, and then…push the schedule button or the publish button, and hope that someone reads what you have to say. Eventually. Social media is a little bit better—you know you get that little rush of serotonin when you’re notified of a new like—but there’s nothing quite like having someone say hello in the moment. It helps remind us that we’re real people connecting with real people, not businesses sharing content with faceless potential clients.

We’ll talk more later this week about some tricks for getting over stage fright in live videos, but in the meantime, there are a few things you can do to ease yourself into the world of streaming.

Try the off-hours. Terrified of making mistakes in front of people as you’re figuring this out? Give it a shot for a couple minutes late at night or in the wee hours of the morning. You’ll have a smaller audience as you get used to being in front of the camera, and there’s no rule saying you have to share your live video as a post when it’s over. Not happy with how it went? Just delete it. No one has to know.
Share the stage. If going live on your own feels overwhelming, you might try going live with someone else. It can be easier to share a conversation than to deliver a monologue, and in this world of Zooms and video chats, you might even forget other people are watching at all.
Invite a friend. If you’re worried about your audience, try inviting someone you trust to watch your live video. That way, you know there’s a friendly face out there, and you can pretend you’re speaking directly to that person—no matter who else does or doesn’t show up.
Keep it quick. There’s no rule that you need to talk for a certain amount of time. Have something to say that only takes a minute? Great—share that and sign off before you have time to psych yourself out.
Make yourself feel good. Worried about getting on camera? Put on your favorite outfit, do your hair and makeup (if that’s your thing), and get some great lighting. (We highly recommend a ring light—even a cheap $10-15 one will make a world of difference.) If you feel good on camera, you’re more likely to be able to focus on your message and not worry about how much you need a haircut or what that spot on your chin is up to. Eventually, you may feel comfortable rolling right out of bed and onto a video stream, but in the meantime, a bold lip can be a surprisingly effective piece of armor.

The idea of going live on video might seem overwhelming, but you may very well find that you really enjoy it. There’s a little rush of adrenaline after a great livestream that you’re just never going to get from a blog post—and the possibility of connecting with your Right Person just when they need to hear from you is reason enough to give it a try. Let us know how it goes!

Want a personalized list of topics you might discuss in your upcoming live videos? That’s a thing we do—and at a discounted rate to support our Visibility Challenge, this week only. Just shoot us an email, and we’ll give you all the details.