Last year the number of views of videos uploaded directly to Facebook reached one billion per day.  If you are a regular user of Facebook or Instagram, you know how eye-catching the “start arrows” are on videos — it’s very tempting to watch one as long as it is short.

Creating a video with music and titles is certainly easier than it ever was, but still a somewhat time-consuming process. But now there is a shortcut that allows you to create a video from photos in just a couple of minutes. The app for this, Flipagram, came to my attention when our neighbors at Hilldale Mall here in Madison created one to promote their Farmers Market.

The basic concept of the program is that you can combine up to 30 of your photos with any music to create a video up to 30 seconds long.  The beauty of this is that sample thirty seconds of any music is allowed without a license.  And music is what makes this a video rather than just a slide show — but be careful to choose music that won’t end awkwardly after the 30 seconds is up. You can do this by going with instrumental music, or carefully choosing the starting point of the audio clip.

Flipagram is a free app, but I’d suggest that you spring for the $1.99 paid version so that the Flipagram logo doesn’t appear on your photos (you can in fact substitute your own watermark).  After downloading the app it’s easy to get started creating a montage on a certain topic (or a tour of your store), with a title and theme music. You can choose 15 or 30 seconds in length, and even add your own narration.

Sharing your new video directly to your store’s Facebook and Instagram pages is an option, but it is probably best to store download it and post it yourself.  (You can also upload it to YouTube.) If you have fun with Flipagram, check out Now Marketing Group blog post, which also recommends 4 other apps that you might find useful in making your social media posts more lively.

Happy Retailing,

Carol “Orange” Schroeder