We need more journalists producing great social media videos. Good news: You only need your smartphone and to follow a few easy steps.
I always thought I was too late for social media. I’m a science journalist by training, a news anchor, a documentary producer. For many years, I worked for the biggest public and private TV channels in Germany. But when I saw other people gaining huge audiences over the years on YouTube, Instagram and finally TikTok, I became convinced that I should have started building my online identity years ago. I was sure that I had missed the social media train, that the boom was over, that I couldn’t become big on social media.
Until I tried.
In spring 2024, I started my first professional Instagram channel, focused on cooking, nutrition, and health, topics I had covered as a TV journalist as well. I started with nothing and was soon stuck at 238 followers. For weeks, nothing changed. It didn’t matter if I published any videos or what kind of cooking content I produced, my audience stayed the same. It was frustrating and I thought that I had been right: I was too late for social media. But before I gave up, I decided to try one more thing. I told myself to concentrate on the things I had learned as a journalist — to produce original content, produce critical reporting, and do so with an authentic presentation.
I took another look at a documentary I had produced in 2017 for the biggest German public TV channel ZDF. Back then, I had investigated the alcohol industry and how it influenced German politics and science. I used my prior reporting, including internal documents and sources, to produce a 90-second Instagram version of my investigation. The first shot was of me sitting in a bathtub full of alcohol and water, popping a bottle of champagne. The video took off. More than 16 million people watched it. And it brought me almost 250,000 new followers.
This video — and a couple of other less splashy ones afterward that got hundreds of thousands or even millions of views — showed me that people want to connect with journalism online, if your presentation is good enough.
The best thing about this is: You don’t need a big production company, expensive cameras, or your own studio. I produced my best videos in my apartment, just with my smartphone and free editing software. You can do that, too, and to make it easier (and avoid the 238 follower plateau) I’ll let you in on some of the most important ground rules.
The “pope in the pool” technique
If there is one thing I learned about successful social media videos, it’s a storytelling hack that stems from Blake Snyder’s screenwriting book “Save the Cat.” Called “the pope in the pool” technique, in essence, it’s about how to keep people watching while giving them potentially dry information. The pope tells his stories not while sitting at a desk, but while swimming in a pool. You’re confused, you want to know what happens next, so you stop scrolling and stay focused on this image in a sea of other social media videos. I used exactly that in my alcohol video: Sanaz in the tub, if you will. I also try to do something with my hands in most of my videos, just so my viewers have something that keeps them visually interested a bit longer and, through that, engaged with my story. In one video, for example, I start by assembling Duplo bricks, hopefully prompting my viewers to ask themselves: Why Duplo? What is she building? Where does this lead to? It’s not about confusing your viewers, it’s about keeping them watching your video. In my Duplo case, I used it to write certain arguments on the Duplo towers — and at the end of the video knock these towers (and arguments) down.
When I started to do my own videos, I wasn’t sure if they would be interesting enough for a wider audience and if I had enough things to talk about. But it didn’t take long for me to realize that as journalists, we already have a huge advantage. We work with stories and often with specific beats that we know a lot about. The more obsessed you are with an issue, the longer you can talk about it, and the more engaged you are talking about it, the better!
There are people who have become famous because they bake good croissants, are great at jumping rope, or are huge bee nerds. Maybe you know everything there is to know about the German professional soccer league in the 1980s. The nerdier the better. Your individual knowledge, your experience, your stories, your familiarity with these topics, your excitement and your snark — no one else has what you have. You always have to ask yourself: What is it that sets me or my stories apart from others? That's what you need to talk about. That's also what will come most easily to you. In my case, I was very deeply involved in my alcohol industry research and was therefore able to present this topic with conviction. And I think my viewers saw exactly that. And that's why so many of them did not only watch my videos, but stayed as followers as well.
Mistakes are great
One more thing that I learned almost by accident: Mistakes are great (and authentic). I am a perfectionist and it was really hard for me to start recording these videos, even after almost two decades in TV and lots of hours in front of cameras or as a moderator on panels. I really wanted to do a great job and tried to produce every shot as planned. But the longer I worked on my social media channels, the more I saw that viewers really like moments of truth, little mistakes, things that make you authentic. When you slip, you step out of character. You start laughing or get annoyed or do something unusual. These are precisely the moments when your followers get to see your personality, get to know you better, and learn to appreciate you. That's why outtakes are so popular. I usually include mistakes in the videos. Sometimes I edit the outtakes into an additional video or use them for my Instagram story. This creates a closer relationship with viewers. They feel like they're there when you're creating content, which makes you approachable and also sets you apart from AI-generated videos.
Tips for good video (no fancy equipment necessary)
Now, two years after I started, I have hundreds of thousands of followers. And I’m still recording (and sometimes even editing) my videos on my phone. It’s just an easy way to create natural content that looks great, but not overproduced. If you follow a few simple tips, you can do this too. First, use a lot of natural light or, if you’re filming at your desk, use an inexpensive ring light. Don’t sweat over big professional lighting equipment. After two years, I now use a bigger light sometimes, but for regular videos you don’t need any of this. Just film outside or in front of big windows. Second, make sure it’s really quiet. Close the doors or, if you’re outside, wait for cars, trains, airplanes to pass. Solid sound is important. It makes it really hard to edit if you have loud background noise. Third, choose easy-to-use editing software. There are several apps out there that are free and that are more than good enough to start with, like TikTok’s “CapCut” or Instagram’s “Edits” app. Sometimes, I still use these free options.
I’m convinced that we need more journalists out there producing authentic videos on their subjects of expertise. People want to follow reliable sources of information. If we don’t go out and tell them directly about what we’ve found and know to be true, other people will continue to capture that space.
Sanaz Saleh-Ebrahimi, a 2026 Nieman affiliate, is a Berlin-based science journalist, host and presenter.
