TIPS FOR DAILY VLOGGING

After a month of daily vlogging; filming, editing and uploading every day, I thought I’d share some of my learnings and advice for any of you thinking of doing the same. It’s hard but completely worth it… stats aside, it’s incredibly rewarding on a personal level. I find it really helps you get to know your audience better and of course let them into your world to get to know you better. So here’s what I learnt from Every Day May.

Be Prepared //
When you commit to daily vlogging, I think it’s important to try your very best to meet that daily deadline. You don’t want something stupid like a dead battery to ruin your routine so stock up on all the equipment you’ll need for the month. I purchased a spare battery from Amazon, a spare memory card from My Memory and I was fully prepared to have to repurchase a camera if something were to happen to my current one. I had an “on the go” kit ready at all times that included my laptop, laptop charger, headphones, memory card adapter and external hard-drive. Daily vlogging isn’t like doing weekly videos, you need to be flexible and be prepared to edit and upload on the go wherever you are. The more flexible you allow yourself to be, the easier it is. Purchasing an external hard-drive is a good idea as you’ll have so much more footage than you’re used to and you don’t want it to clog up on your computer space.

Get Confident //
Vlogs just don’t work with huge gaps in between “scenes” so you have to just get used to vlogging in public. It’s embarrassing at first and people look at you like you’re a) really strange b) an over keen tourist or c) trying to be like one of those internet people they’ve heard of. I really struggled with this at first and sometimes still do, but I find reminding myself of a few things helps. This is my job, this is what I love to do, lots of lovely people like to watch it and if that person looking knew all those things they probably wouldn’t think it was that weird. If you’re not sure how your friends/family feel about being in videos just ask them outright – “do you mind being in my video, it means that X amount of people will see you?”. I always assumed my friends and family didn’t want to be in my videos, but Every Day May actually made me realise a lot of them love being a part of what I do and getting involved.

Think In Video //
Although my daily vlogs aren’t planned out I find it helps to think in video format. I know that my vlogs are usually 10 minutes long and if you think about it, that really isn’t that long when you have 24 hours to play with. Film snippets that you want to include, but also feel free to have breaks and gaps as it’ll make the whole process a bit less exhausting. Try and be considerate to yourself by filming clips that are easier to edit together i.e, lots of non-talking clips in a row or an intro segment before a montage.

Create Order //
During Every Day May I made a playlist on my YouTube channel for all the vlogs and I think that it was helpful to a lot of people who can’t watch daily, but like to catch up in bulk instead. I also had pre-made thumbnails so that all I had to do every day was change the photo and text, without having to re-insert the text etc.

I could probably go on and on but for now those are the tips I feel might be able to help any of you thinking about daily vlogging. Thanks for all your support and kind comments during Every Day May, I couldn’t have done it without you!