My video creation process currently includes 4 steps. Research, plan, execute/review, and post.

Research. I always like to research the latest trends on all social media platforms before creating a video. Analyzing everything from the trend of the video, trending captions, hashtags, and the comments. This gives me a good idea of what I can do as a creator to help my video succeed.

Plan. After researching what I can do to help my video succeed, I take the information I learned and start to plan out the template of my video. The angle of certain clips, the order of actions, and much more. Everything from the opening second to the closing second of the video is planned out during this step. I also like to analyze what I will put in the video that I can connect in the caption or hashtags.

Execute/Review. During this step, I condensed two actions down to one. When taking my video, I find myself taking the video and immediately reviewing the clip. Looking at everything from the angle, the motion, the contrast of colors, comparing it to my plan, and making sure I can accurately take the next portion of my video with the content I already have.

Post. Lastly, after all the planning, executing, and reviewing, I post the video. Although, the work does not stop there. After posting the video I will analyze the time it takes to take off, the views, the comments, the engagement, and much more.

My inspiration for videos comes from my own mind or straight from social media platforms. A lot of times if I have a prompt or prop, I can imagine the video I want to make in my head and how to execute it. Although, I also stay up to date with trends across all social media platforms so I can "grow with the times" and capitalize on current trends.

When asked about a piece of content that got more engagement than I expected, I think of one particular post. During my senior year of high school, I managed and self-ran an Illinois Section Instagram and Facebook page. Meaning, anything that happened in the FFA organization over a span of 19 schools was my duty to post on social media. At the beginning of the year I made a very quick post while on the road, introducing myself and the new Section officers. The post was not a super thought-out or designed piece of content, but it received the most engagement out of any other post I made all year long.

To me, I still am not super sure why it was so successful. The election of new officers is an anticipated and exciting time for lots of people, but when it comes down to it, the banquet hall during elections is only open to students and agriculture advisors... almost as if the elections aren't a sought out event to attend. Regardless of the election of new officers, I think the post got so much engagement because it wasn't super "over the top" or thought out. The average viewer could look at the picture of smiling individuals and instantly know that the post was the introduction of a new officer team. The viewer did not have to read, think, or spend more than a second looking at the post to know what it was about.