5 Tips to Have Your Recruiting Video Standout
When it comes to the soccer recruiting process, there are a ton of different tools out there that you can utilize to help you find the perfect college for you! One tool that has become increasingly popular over the last few years is a recruiting highlight video. It doesn’t matter if you are playing in ECNL Showcases, MLS NEXT showcases, GA games, Highschool games, or youth league games, unless you are at the top of the top for your recruiting class it will be on you as a player to be proactive in your college search.
Most aspiring college soccer players understand they must be proactive, so leading up to a showcase college coaches get bombarded with emails about game schedules. If you don’t want to be just one of the other emails adding in a recruiting highlight video to spark their interest is a great idea. So how can you be confident in the highlight video you are sharing with the hopes of getting a coach out to your game? Here are 5 simple tips that you should follow when creating your recruiting video to give you the best chance at making an everlasting impression.
HIGHLIGHTS NEED TO GO FIRST
When you create a highlight video you are fighting to grab the coach's immediate attention. A good rule of thumb would be to start with 2 to 3 of the best highlights that you have. A variety of different variables go into your “best” highlight. Of course, it needs to be an outstanding play whether it is a goal, clearance, recovery run, or save. But you also need to take into consideration things such as the quality of the video, the level of competition, and the field conditions.
The look appeal to picking your best 2-3 highlights goes well beyond the actual play. if the highlight is against an elite team, on a well-maintained field, and is of high quality a college coach is going to be more included to continue watching, compared to a great play but the video looks like it was in a school play yard.
HAVE KEY PLAYER PROFILE INFO AT THE START OF THE VIDEO
Let's take one step back. Before you even include your best highlights you need to make sure the coach knows at the very least your recruiting class, position, team, and grades if applicable. Think about it from the college's perspective. If they decide to click on a highlight video via email and immediately notice the player they are watching; fits an immediate positional need, has great grades, and is in the recruiting class they are currently searching for, what do you think their response is? They will be more intrigued to watch the entirety of the video as you can quickly identify you fit their recruiting needs.
SEGMENT OUT YOUR VIDEO
The next tip is to segment your video. You’ve identified yourself, and have got their interest, now you've got to highlight your best skills. Instead of having your highlight video created in chronological order, pick out a handful of skills that you believe showcase you at your highest level. For each segment include 3-5 videos of you. This makes it extremely clear for college coaches to follow what they are looking for and know what to expect to see from you in each clip.
NO DOWNLOADS
This might be the biggest tip out of the 5. You could do all of the previous things we mentioned to a T but if you send out a video and the college coach has to download a video file, you are only shooting yourself in the foot. Colleges get plenty of emails they need to be efficient with their recruiting. If a video takes 15 minutes to download to their computer by the time it has finished they have already moved on to other emails. Make sure the link you send is a direct link to something that doesn’t need to be downloaded!
KEEP IT SHORT
Piggy backing off the previous tip you should keep your video short. You have segmented out your video and identified who you are, make sure the video is short enough that a college coach can comfortably watch the full video in a 3-5 minute window. 3-5 minutes is long enough to adequately showcase who you are.
GET YOUR OWN HIGHLIGHT VIDEO STARTED
If you can create a recruiting highlight video while applying these 5 tips you are only giving yourself a higher chance to gain the coach's interest and increase your chances of seeing them on your sidelines come the next showcase.
With Eveyrone having unlimited access to game film we understand it can be difficult to figure out what clips and what segments should be highlighted in a video. If that is you and you need a highlight video check out Tekkers Media recruiting highlight video services. Tekkers Media was created to offer a personalized experience with each client to make you confident sharing your highlight video with college coaches.