How to Deal with Video Critics

If you’ve ever made a video for social media, you’ll find that you get nice affirmation. Whether that’s in the form of a “like”, comment, share, or most rewardingly someone telling you face to face that they really enjoyed watching your video. It’s a great feeling, and a great way to keep making more great videos for your business. Sometimes you won’t hear too much praise, or not many “likes” and that’s totally alright. Not everyone is going to resonate with every single video you produce. 

But then there are the critics. The people that may compliment some part of your video, but then have suggestions on what to change. Then there are the haters, trolls, and losers that have nothing better to do than rip you apart for making a free video for their entertainment. 

So how do we deal with them? Do we listen to what they have to say, or do we completely disregard them? I have some insight and personal experience that I think is important for anyone who makes video content.

And before we dive into this, I want to note that this article isn’t just for video content people. This can apply to podcasters, writers, graphic designers, photographers, you name it. We all have haters…

The Benefits of Listening to Feedback

When it comes to getting feedback on anything, especially things that we are proud of, we always have some form of apprehension. We brace ourselves to have our work trampled on in the name of improvement, which is scary. And most of the time, it’s not nearly as bad as we think. When we seek out feedback or constructive criticism, we usually seek it from a colleague or someone whom we respect. While it still may be a little nerve racking, we know that their feedback is coming from a good place. 

But what happens when our work gets put out into the world? What happens when everyone and anyone has a voice, and can tell you their opinion of your work? That’s where we need to figure out how to deal with that feedback. Because ultimately, as daunting as it is to hear, your videos could be improved based on some of the audiences’ feedback. We are not objective to our own work. There are things that only an outside perspective can see. So after receiving practical feedback, it may be worthwhile to take it seriously. 

A good example of this would be if you received multiple comments about how your message is good, but the audio is a little hard to understand. This is a great indicator that it’s time to invest in a microphone so that more people can consume and digest your message easier.

This type of feedback is a win win for everyone. You get some good advice on how to improve, and your audience feels like they’ve been listened to and heard. BOOM!

A not so clear example would be if you made a tutorial style video, and a majority of the video was of you talking to camera, instead of showing the thing that you were making a tutorial on. While it may make sense to some people, it may not resonate with you. You may ask yourself- What if my face is my brand? Wouldn’t I want the video to be more on me than the product? The question then becomes- do you listen to some random person, or do you listen to yourself? It’s a question that we have to ask ourselves, and really sit on to find the answer. I have some ideas on how to do that, which I’ll talk about later on in this article.

The Trolls

Ahh yes, the wonderful trolls of the internet. The people that will comment nonsense at best, and hurtful, defamatory projections at worst. Eventually, we all get them. But actually, as I’ve heard from a lot of people, when you start getting trolls commenting on your videos, that’s when you know you’ve “made it” as a serious voice in your industry. 

It’s funny in a sense. You, as an expert in your field, are explaining or demonstrating something in a video for others to learn from. Then comes along a troll, who claims that you’re wrong, but then doesn’t articulate in any way how you’re supposedly wrong. To boot, they may also call you a name or say something hurtful to you. 

While we all instinctively know that this isn’t a serious critique, after a while, it could take a toll on us. Sadly, this is what the trolls want so they can feel better about themselves. Just know that they have a bigger problem with themselves than they do with you. You’re just the punching bag that they chose to attack instead of having an honest conversation with themselves. It may not be the most comforting advice, but it’s the truth. 

Now ultimately you can make your own decision whether or not to listen to a troll comment. Sometimes they are mild enough to consider. My rule of thumb is, if they don’t offer any sustenance as to why I’m wrong, then I don’t even give it the time of day.

Balancing Your Vision with Others’ Feedback

This is the tricky part. Because as a business owner, marketing director, or creative producer, your work is your vision. How you choose to do things is special, and it’s the reason that you’re doing what you do. How could it be “your baby” if someone else is telling you how to do it? 

This is where balancing your vision with others’ feedback is difficult, but so important. 

As I mentioned earlier, there are great benefits to listening to your audience’s feedback. It could seriously grow your audience, lead-gen, and client list much faster and more effectively. But on the flip side, if you cater to your audience 100% of the time, is it your vision anymore? Are you just a server, taking people’s orders and delivering it right back to them?

You be the judge of that. And if you’re looking for some advice, here’s my take. Keep doing what you’re doing. Find your groove, and a formula that works for you. Then, introduce a little bit of that feedback into your next video. Take it slow, and try things gradually. Keep it your own, with a small spin on things. 

For example, to address my commenter’s feedback who told me to do more product shots instead of having my face on camera- sure, I can do that. But my face is still part of my brand, and I want people to recognize who I am. So I’ll add in a couple more product shots, but I am still putting an emphasis on my talking head bits, because it’s important to my brand. My business is not just product shots. My business is me, performing my craft to the best of my abilities.

Wrap Up

Like I said before, once you start creating video content, you will receive comments that are good, bad, helpful, and useless. It’s up to you to determine if you want to utilize them for the future videos that you end up creating. Whatever you choose to do, just know that the comments will just keep coming!   

If you’d like help dealing with a specific troll comment or confusing piece of feedback, send me message! I’d love to help in any way I can.