by Farraz Khan | 2 Apr 2019
When the overwhelming trend in online video is towards brevity, live video is a format that favors length.
That length – while not perfect for every situation – is eminently well-suited for content that needs to breathe and that calls for a natural flow, rather than a ruthlessly enforced time limit.
Educational content is a case in point.
In planning content for LinkedIn Live, tutorials and demonstrations are a way to serve appropriate content to a community that emphasizes professional learning and growth – in a format that works best, given live video’s propensity for length and its opportunities for engagement.
Tutorials and demonstrations allow you and your organization to explicate an idea, product, or process, in a way that generates awareness, understanding, and interest in an audience.
You can provide context and incidental information about an innovation, prototype, or finished product, elucidating its purpose, applications, operation, and so on. Also, you can present a story to ground your presentation.
All of this adds dimension, approximating a relaxed human conversation about an idea or item, rather than a condensed marketing-style pitch for it – allowing for more persuasive communication.
In the big picture, live tutorials and demonstrations allow you educate an audience, spur interest around your current and future offerings, and underline your expertise.
Live video gives you the time to accomplish all that – while preserving the watchability and engagement of a shorter video, through the urgency of its real-time nature as well as by unlocking a two-way dialogue.
Picture-in-picture layouts
The Socialive platform facilitates more compelling, multifaceted broadcasts of real-time tutorials and demos, by allowing you to show two sources on-screen at once.
With picture-in-picture layouts, you can keep a speaker or instructor on-screen, while also displaying the product or service that is the subject of the tutorial or demo. As you present, you can easily flop the videos in the small and large screens, or switch to different live camera sources altogether.
This generates a dynamic, pro-style broadcast that enhances the viewer experience and boosts watchability, while also helping humanize the brand by emphasizing the people associated with it.
It’s easy to apply picture-in-picture layouts. Simply click to select a layout, then drag & drop your chosen video sources into the picture-in-picture boxes.
In conclusion, LinkedIn Live marries the live-video format with LinkedIn’s B2B and professional platform.
As a content type, tutorials and demonstrations are ideal for both: justifying and making fruitful use of live’s long-form format and delivering the sort of educational material that produces value for a professional community.