Instagram Live: How to Create and Repurpose Live Content

Want to grow your audience with Instagram Live?

Looking for tips on creating Instagram Live videos?

To explore how to create and repurpose Instagram Live videos, I interview Todd Bergin.
More About This Show
The Social Media Marketing podcast is designed to help busy marketers, business owners, and creators discover what works with social media marketing.

In this episode, I interview Todd Bergin, also known as Todd.LIVE. He's a live video and Instagram video expert. His course is called Instagram Live Podcaster. He's also the host of the 'Grammer School podcast and the Entrepreneur Live podcast.

Todd shares tips for improving your content, video, audio, and lighting.

You'll also discover tactics for building your audience and repurposing Instagram Live videos.

Share your feedback, read the show notes, and get the links mentioned in this episode below.
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Here are some of the things you'll discover in this show:
Instagram Live
Todd's Story

Todd started his first business and developed a taste for entrepreneurship when he was 13 years old. Someone stole his bike, and his parents couldn't afford to replace it. To make money, he started knocking on doors and making deals to mow lawns, rake leaves, and other lawn care jobs.

After college, Todd tried a few different careers and businesses. In South Carolina, he owned a fresh market with 14 employees, but quickly realized that type of business wasn't his calling. While he was in law school around 1998, he started selling items on eBay and Amazon, and followed the news cycle to determine what would sell well.

By 2009, Todd had been practicing law for several years and started his first Internet-based business outside of eBay or Amazon. After he became interested in firearms, he needed aftermarket parts for a gun that didn't work very well and found someone to make parts for him and his friends. That effort turned into a business that he still runs himself, sending things out about 2 days per week.

Because that business has done well, Todd was able to quit practicing law and try other things. His wife was able to quit her six-figure job, too. Todd started other online businesses that didn't work out but were good learning experiences. In fact, around 2015, one of those businesses, a business coaching company, naturally led him to live video and teaching people how to do it.

In the live videos Todd made to market his business coaching skills, he found himself talking more about how to do live video than how to become a full-time entrepreneur. He also realized teaching people how to set up a studio is easier. You can build a studio in a weekend, but a successful business can take years.

A few live video pioneers further inspired Todd to pivot to live video coaching. When Todd was sick in bed with the flu, he watched Gary Vaynerchuk do a Super 8 (going live on eight platforms at once) for 8 hours to promote his book, Ask Gary V. Todd watched the whole thing and was inspired by how Gary reached people all over the place, had a lot of fun, and changed lives quickly.

Vincenzo Landino was another source of inspiration. Early on, his live videos displayed lower thirds (text in the lower third of the screen). He also used a split screen to bring people on his show.

Todd taught himself how to set up a studio that allowed him to go live on multiple platforms and use multiple computers using Wirecast and Switchboard Live. He also took a class to begin building his audio production skills. By the time Instagram Live showed up, Todd found it refreshing because Instagram makes it so easy to go live as a broadcaster and for viewers to find you.

Since Todd began doing live video, he found that people spend more time on Instagram than YouTube or Facebook. People check Instagram while they're in line at the grocery store or wherever they go. Also, Instagram has done a brilliant job of making it easy for everybody involved to cr...