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Editing Best Practices
Here’s a run down on some best practices that I follow while editing ads!
This is tips for making ads. It’s not a how-to-edit (like how to make J cuts, or L cuts, or match cuts, or eye line matches). If you’re looking for some basics like this, I highly recommend (that I didn’t make).
There will be some nuances that differ when editing organic videos vs. ads, so take these recommendations with a grain of salt.
Here’s what the below will cover:
Editing using Native Tools
Contrast Clip to Clip
Edit with Fast Pacing
Focus on the Beginning
Fixing Errors
These aren’t always applicable! Open to discussion for these.
Focus On The Beginning
This is a bit obvious, but many more people will see the beginning of your ad vs. the end. This is why hooks are so important, but it’s also why editors need to focus on the beginning. Really nail the beginning with fast editing, your most engaging visuals, your most engaging editing effects. We want our ads to be engaging throughout, but focus your efforts on the beginning!
I would much rather have an incredible first 7 seconds, and bad last 20seconds, than a video that is “meh” throughout.
Editing Using Native Tools
CapCut is a free/inexpensive video editor that is integrated with the tools, transitions & effects that are native to Instagram, Facebook & TikTok. I highly recommend you use CapCut’s desktop app to edit video, or if you’re more comfortable in other editing tools like Premier or DaVinci, design with the intention of making your ads look like organic social content.
The majority of my editing experience was in DaVinci Resolve (which I love), but switching to CapCut made my ads just feel so much more native to the platforms. CapCut has improved a lot in the last few years, so I really do think the CapCut desktop app is the best tool to use, especially for captions and text callouts.
Adobe Premier or DaVinci is much better for complex effects, and if we go in that direction with our editing style than those platforms for sure should be utilized. But we’ll still need to make sure the text and captions look native to instagram and TikTok, so we may need to finish the edit within CapCut to achieve this.
Contrast Clip To Clip
One of the strongest ways of retaining attention is to find contrast from clip to clip, so that the video isn’t repetitive, predictable and boring. I encourage creators to find variety with shot selection, but editors need to adopt this concept as a north star as well.
Put very simply, always have something happen in your clip. Some sort of action, some sort of reaction, some sort of movement. And then in the next clip, show something different happening.
Here are some ways to find contrast from clip to clip:
Each visual should contribute to a dynamic flow that enhances storytelling and holds the audience's attention.
This also includes music & sound effects. Including changing the music to match different feels. Obviously, play with music switches sparingly! Switching the music too much would be distracting.
Edit with Fast Pacing
25 clips per minute: I have found that the my highest performing ads average about 25 clips per minute, which means there’s a new clip every 2 seconds or so. Organic content is as fast paced...put it is still fast pace.
This is skewed by the fact that some clips need more time to be understood, other clips can be very cycle through quickly, so use your best judgement but air on the side of using a new clip every 2-3 seconds.
Cutting Dead Air: Cut out pauses, filler words and moments where nothing happens! Dead air is a signal to keep scrolling, so prevent this as much as possible with editing. I’ll do my best to send over clips that don’t
Fast Text: Use trending caption styles that show a single word or just a few words at a time. This makes the pace of the ad feel faster, as new text is appearing every mili second or so. Capcut has a lot of these styles.
Fixing Errors
We want our ads to be clear, easy to understand and free of distractions. This means the ad is easy to watch, and void of audio issues that make it hard to hear, video issues that make it hard to watch, and other issues. Here’s a run down on some of the common ones.
Fixing Audio: Bad audio used to drive me crazy. The most common issue I used to deal with is audio that’s hard to hear due to being filmed at a distance, in a room with too much reverb, or outside with background noise. Now it’s not a huge issue, because I’ve discovered a free tool that uses AI to drastically clean up and correct audio issues. It’s the Enhance Speech tool from Adobe Podcast. It’s a free tool, simply upload your audio and download the results.
Flipping Clips: You might encounter clips that are flipped, meaning text and logos are flipped horizontally and read backwards. Easy fix with a transform tool, but keep an eye out.
Matching Eyeline: An editing rule that makes videos easier to watch is to keep eyes consistent, meaning your creators eyes are in the same part of the video from clip to clip. It’s more difficult to watch a clip that forces you keep tracking the subject’s eyes around the screen, so keep this trick in mind.
Exposure & Saturation: Exposure determines how bright or dark your video is. Lots of information is lost of a video is over-exposed, so it’s sometimes difficult taking a bright video and making it darker, but it’s easier to make a dark video brighter. Regardless, keep an eye out for consistent exposure from clip to clip and fix any issues that are making the video hard to watch.
Saturation is how vivid the colors are in your in your video. iPhones tend to record with muted colors, so it’s typically helpful to jack up the saturation a bit as a regular step in your editing. Brighter colors are more engaging than darker colors.
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