How to Plan and Write TikTok Videos

As a screenwriter or filmmaker, I'm sure you have familiarized yourself with the video content on social media platforms. Have you considered creating content for TikTok? It seems like pretty much everyone else is!

Crafting work on a popular social media platform can help get eyes on your brand that you may otherwise struggle to get. Creating work for TikTok means creating something unique for the platform rather than simply repurposing videos you've already made.

How to Plan and Write TikTok Videos

Writing and filming a TikTok video is not the same as writing and filming a short film or even writing and filming a YouTube video. However, you can still use SoCreate for scripting! Today I'm talking all about how to plan and write TikTok videos.

Decide what you want to showcase

When creating videos for TikTok, you should consider what about yourself you want to showcase. Do you want your TikTok videos to demonstrate your great editing skills? Do you want your TikToks to show how funny you are? Do you want your TikToks to tell a story? The possibilities are endless; however, it's important to understand what does best on the platform. Spend some time familiarizing yourself with TikTok and pay close attention to what videos are trending. When you're ready to make videos, don't be afraid to try different things. Keep an eye on your likes and views and see what types of your content does best on the platform.

Plan to post frequently

Due to how TikTok's algorithm works, posting more frequently affects how your video is distributed on the platform. TikTok recommends posting anywhere from 1 to 4 times a day! Committing to TikTok is not for the faint of heart! It's important to devise a posting schedule that you can stick to. Consistent posting is the name of the game when it comes to TikTok. When you're planning to film your videos, it can be best to film 10 to 20 individual TikToks in one go. Filming a lot of content at once can help you distribute that content over the coming weeks. When making TikToks, it can be easy to feel like you're falling behind on your schedule, so having a significant amount of content just waiting to be edited or posted helps make you feel on top of things.

Write your TikTok videos to be brief

When TikTok first started, videos were limited to a scant 15 seconds! This limit then leaped to 60 seconds, then three minutes, and now there's even a feature allowing TikTok videos to be 10 minutes! While you can create longer videos, that doesn't necessarily mean you want to. A Wired.com article reports that the sweet spot in TikTok video length is between 21 and 34 seconds, which makes sense! Have you scrolled through TikTok and noticed that you're more likely to watch shorter videos rather than longer ones? When writing for TikTok, it's important to consider short jokes, stories that can be quickly explained, or skits that are best executed briefly.

While writing your TikTok scripts in SoCreate, use the handy screen time stat to see how long the video will take to play out on screen. You can find this by clicking on the chart icon in your Title Card, which is in the upper left-hand corner of your screen in SoCreate Writer.

Try storyboarding

Since time is of the essence when it comes to TikTok, try storyboarding videos out before you film. Storyboarding doesn't have to be fancy. It can be done on a post-it note or index card. What's important is to sketch out what will be in each shot. Don't worry if that means drawing stick figures; storyboarding isn't an art contest. In your storyboarding, be sure to capture the camera angles, camera movement, sound effects, narration, and other effects in a shot.

Frequency over perfection

Consider that TikTok is a platform that prefers frequent videos rather than perfected videos. If you are a perfectionist, TikTok might not be your platform. The need to post so frequently often means that videos might be somewhat rough or imperfect. You have to decide whether this is something you're willing to live with or if it's not worth it. Keep in mind that there is a learning curve to everything, and TikTok is no different. At first, you might not be pleased with how your videos turn out, but practice makes perfect!

Final Thoughts

That's my overview of how to plan and write TikTok videos! There's a lot to consider when launching yourself on a new platform, so do as much research as possible. It's important to understand what works best on YouTube might not work as well on TikTok. Since TikTok requires a lot of posting, it's best to plan many videos ahead. Good luck, and happy writing!