Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary Says You Have 90 Seconds… Or Else!

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According to Kevin O’Leary, there are

3 things every successful entrepreneur needs.

1. You must articulate your idea in less than 90 seconds

2. You need a business plan

3. You must be a leader

Our favorite is Kevin’s number 1.

You have 90 seconds to get someone (investor, potential customer, etc) interested in what you’re selling, says Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary. If you don’t say what you need to say and get people excited about you and your product, you’re dead in the water. And dead to Kevin.

Many times we have talked to clients that started off by saying they want to tell their story in a “short and quick way”. By short and quick they think 3 to 4 minutes. It’s understandable. Businesses believe instead of the 10 – 15 minute talk about their company, 3 to 4 minutes is short enough while keeping as much detail in as possible.

We have to face it. People’s attention spans these days are not long at all. In our last blog post, Grab Your User At The First Click By Adding An Explainer Video, we learned that our attention spans online average out to less than that of a goldfish. Because of high speed internet and modern technology, we want things as fast as possible. This holds true to pitching your business as well. The quicker you can tell your story while maintaining clarity, the better off you will be! As the old sayin’ goes “Keep it short, sweet and to the point!”

Keep Your Explainer Video Short

And to help drive it home, here are some pretty hard-hitting stats about how “short and sweet” your video should be.

20% of your audience will stop watching within the first 10 seconds.

44% of your audience will stop watching within the first 60 seconds.

58% of your audience will stop watching within the first 90 seconds.

Source: Visible Measures
In fact, viewer abandonment is even closely linked to the duration displayed on a video player. So if your video is :45, you’re way more likely for someone to even click play on your explainer video then if it’s a 1:45 video.

And that, my friends, is why Explainify does not make videos over 90 seconds… Because you’ll have close to nobody watching. And we can’t have that.