Customer education is critical to the success of products and software. If companies can’t provide users with a clear roadmap on how to use the technology simply and efficiently, they run the risk of losing them to competing solutions that do. An effective way to do this is with video.
Ninety-eight percent of people have watched an explainer video to learn more about a product or service, and 87% say it has convinced them to buy a product or service. However, not every company has the resources to build a dedicatecusromd education team—especially one adept at video creation. So, how can organizations still deliver effective learning experiences that drive adoption and fuel growth?
Aligning Education with Needs
Effective content begins with a clear understanding of the customer and their journey. By framing educational content around real-world use cases, each video becomes informative, relevant, and actionable. This approach starts by identifying common customer roadblocks.
One of the most valuable sources of this insight is the tech support team. These frontline workers have a direct line to the customer and the pain points they face, regularly fielding frequently asked questions and addressing recurring issues. By communicating with this team or person, one can identify patterns and anticipate where users need the most help. Beyond support, it’s important to communicate with the user-experience team to examine the product itself for points of friction. This can be done by asking:
- Where do users drop off during workflows?
- Which features go unused, not because they’re unhelpful, but because they may be misunderstood?
These friction points often represent missed opportunities, not just for the customer, but also for deeper product engagement.
Another means of ensuring the content is effective is by collaborating with the marketing department. Marketing often has a pulse on business priorities and upcoming campaigns and can flag areas of strategic importance, such as underutilized tools or workflows, that deserve more visibility. Aligning customer education materials with these priorities ensures that content not only supports users but also reinforces broader business goals. This can also translate to sales. When customers fully engage with a software or product in the true way it’s intended, they are more likely to see results, remain loyal, and even advocate for the product.
By communicating with tech support, user-experience teams, and marketing, one can identify what topics require the most attention. The next step is to determine how to effectively communicate those topics with the customers.
Matching Message to Medium
According to the 2024 Video Viewer Trends Report (p.5), viewers retain 83% of a message when it is delivered through video, compared to just 10% when reading it in text. Video can be a great tool for creating educational content surrounding new product features, complex or high-stakes workflows, and initial onboarding journeys where first impressions count, but it may not always be the right approach because it’s often a bigger investment of time and resources. Depending on the type of video being created, the expected viewer experience, and the required time investment, can vary significantly. Simple instructions or quick fixes may be better served with a screenshot or short written explanation. It’s important to strike the right balance between time investment and clarity.
Creating a Plan for Your Video
High-impact videos, such as those for product launches or onboarding, should be thoroughly scripted and carefully planned. In contrast, more informal or internal-use videos can adopt a lighter tone but must still maintain clarity and structure. Placing a video into one of these categories also helps inform the choice of distribution platform (e.g., YouTube, website FAQ, internal knowledge base, or email) and helps establish clear content and formatting standards for each channel. The goal isn’t to overproduce, but to match the format to the moment, giving users the help they need, exactly when and how they need it.
Despite the category, developing a script is essential to keep the content focused and ensuring it is delivered clearly and concisely. Regardless of the audience’s educational background, a script should prioritize cognitive ease by using straightforward language and slowing the delivery pace when addressing complex topics. AI tools can assist in this process by enhancing clarity, simplifying complex language, and trimming unnecessary content, but they shouldn’t replace human input entirely.
The script also largely determines the length of the video. This early step allows for testing and refining the content, and helps decide whether it’s better presented as one long video or broken into shorter segments. According to the previously mentioned study, viewer preferences vary depending on the type and depth of the content, but what matters most is keeping the video clear, focused, and efficient, so it holds the learner’s attention from start to finish. Beginning with the script and voiceover helps set the pacing and framework, creating a stronger foundation for a more effective and engaging final product.
Start Making Video
Once ready to record, it’s crucial to prepare the “environment” by clearing the desktop and muting notifications from platforms like Slack or Teams. These small actions help create a distraction-free, professional environment.
Recording can often feel intimidating at first. However, overcoming this initial hesitation is essential. By simply diving in and starting to record and create content, individuals can steadily build confidence and become more comfortable with the process.
Editing doesn’t need to be complex to be effective either. A few thoughtful touches can go a long way to improve clarity and sustain viewer engagement. For example, adding lower thirds can surface key takeaways and break complex information into more digestible segments. To keep users focused, use zoom and pan effects to highlight key on-screen elements, and consider adding annotations or sketch-style highlights to guide their attention. Subtle cursor enhancements can also help direct focus without pulling attention away from the core message. These small enhancements not only improve clarity and engagement but also show that great videos don’t require a big budget or production team.
Providing clear, effective customer education isn’t optional; it’s essential. Even without a dedicated customer education team, an organization can empower its users by transforming static documentation into dynamic, accessible video content. By identifying knowledge gaps, choosing the right format, and leveraging thoughtful planning and production, companies can create content that not only drives adoption and reduces support requests but also builds long-term customer loyalty.