The team at NewsWhip, which created the Spike discovery platform for newsrooms, has discovered five characteristics of  Facebook videos that are the most engaging and widely shared.

“Although it’s still early days in figuring out what’s working on Facebook, it’s clear that there’s a lot of confusion out there about what works best in video. Some of the most successful publishers see the overwhelming bulk of their engagement on a handful of clips, while others might feature similar content, but wind up with a fraction of the engagements,”  the NewsWhip’s Liam Corcoran recently blogged.

NewsWhip set out to”explore how publishers can make the most of their footage in the news feed.” Mining its data, NewsWhip discovered five features in the most viewed and shared videos on Facebook. The NewsWhip team shares its findings, provides examples and offers tips about how to make successful videos.  Here are brief highlights:

• Keep the video short
• Use a square image
• A video needs action!
• Going soundless can work
• Include calls to action