The news that Facebook’s future will likely be all video, all the time has caused more than a few small business owners to feel anxious. Creating great video content that attracts customer attention and drives engagement and sales can seem like an overwhelming challenge, particularly if you’re not comfortable with technology.

Facebook is making it easier to create video content with a new feature called Slideshow. Currently available only through the iOS Facebook app, Slideshow compiles photos you’ve uploaded into a short video, complete with music, a title and a visual theme that ties all of the images together.
It’s a simple, easy way to beginning experimenting with video storytelling. The Slideshow themes and music currently available are oriented toward personal, rather than business, use, but it’s a good starting point. If you’re looking for a way to familiarize yourself with the basics of video storytelling Slideshow is worth checking out.

Here’s how it works:

If you post five or more photos within 24 hours, the Slideshow app will put them together in a video for you. This is only a preview at this point – you can change the order of images and remove any images you don’t want to appear. The next step is to add a theme. The current theme offerings are Playful, Birthday, Nostalgic, Night Out, Thankful, Epic, Amped, Bollywood, Inspired and Tropical; more themes are expected to be introduced. Then you add a title, hit publish, and voila – you have made your first video!

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The Android Alternative to Facebook’s Slideshow App

Because the Facebook Slideshow app is currently available only for the iOS operating system, it’s useful only to people who have an iPhone or other Apple device. If you’re working on an Android device, Google’s Movie Assistant is a viable alternative. The process of making movies is virtually the same but you will have to save your video and then upload it to Facebook manually.
Becoming a proficient video storyteller takes time and practice, but you may find you enjoy the process the more you do it. Video definitely captures customer attention in a way no other form of content does, making mastering this form of storytelling imperative for every small business owner.