He spent a week researching and came out with forty facts: dates, names, proportions, figures. He was proud of them, so he put all of them into the script, because gathering them had cost him effort.
In the edit he watched the first cut and knew something was wrong without knowing what. The viewers told him after publishing: "the video is full of information and I remembered none of it." And the curve dipped at minute three, exactly where four figures arrive in two sentences.
The problem was not that he researched too much. The problem was that he moved the research into the video as it was.
A number is not information, it is a sensation
People do not retain numbers, they retain what they felt at them. "The distance was eighteen kilometres" leaves nothing. "We walked from dawn until noon and still did not arrive" leaves everything.
That does not mean dropping numbers. It means a number's job in a video is to create a size in the viewer's mind rather than to record data. Data belongs in an article that can be read and returned to; a video is heard once.
The one-number rule
One number per idea. If you have three numbers for one idea, pick the strongest and drop the other two, or put them on screen without saying them.
The reason is practical: a viewer needs two seconds to take in a figure, and you do not give him those two seconds if you follow one figure with another. Numbers in a row all fall away; a single number left to settle is retained along with the idea attached to it.
Five ways to present a number
| The way | An example |
|---|---|
| Compare to something familiar | "a wall as tall as a five-storey building" |
| Bring it back to a human unit | "that is one person in every three on this street" |
| Comparison | "double what it was ten years ago" |
| Gradual reveal | state the idea, then the number, then what it means |
| Put it on screen | a drawing or image carrying the figure while you talk about its meaning |
The strongest are the first two, because they turn the number into something the viewer sees in his head. The weakest is saying the number and then repeating it.
Rounded numbers are more honest than you think
"Thirty-four point seven percent" is a precision nobody needs in speech, and it makes the viewer suspect you are reading from a page. Say "more than a third" and the meaning arrives whole.
The only exception is when the exact figure is itself the surprise: a price, or a small difference that settles something. Otherwise, round the number to the nearest shape people use in their own lives.
How to cite a source without breaking the rhythm
Citing is not a luxury, but it does not need a paragraph. Three forms are enough:
- In speech, in four words: "according to the ministry's report", "in a study from such a university". Said and not explained.
- On screen: the source's name and year in a small line at the bottom of the frame at the moment you say the figure. This is the cleanest form, and the on-screen text rules are in On-Screen Text and Subtitles: Why People Watch With the Sound Off.
- In the description: a list of links in the order they appear in the video. That is for people who want to verify, and they are few but they are your most important viewers.
Anyone who collected sources while researching finds them ready at this moment, and the method of collecting and verifying is in Research Before Writing: How to Gather Your Material and Verify It.
Numbers you never say
- A number whose origin you do not know. Even if ten sites publish it, the ten may all be quoting one.
- A number in an article quoting another article. Follow the chain to the first source or drop it.
- A percentage with no base. "It rose by two hundred percent" without saying what it rose from is words with no meaning.
- An average with no context. An average hides the spread, and can produce an entirely wrong picture.
- A figure an AI assistant gave you and you never checked. This is more common than all of the above, and the reason is explained in How do you use AI for research without it handing you a mistake?
And if a number matters and you cannot find a trustworthy source, you have a professional option: say it with its limit. "Estimates differ, and the lowest says this" is an honest sentence that raises the viewer's trust in you.
Names, dates and terms
What holds for numbers holds for names: one difficult name per idea. If your subject has five names, present two in the voiceover and leave the rest on screen or in the description.
And any term you use needs one sentence explaining it at the moment you say it, rather than a paragraph or silence. This is among the biggest spoilers of an instructional video, and the rest of them are in Seven Common Mistakes in YouTube Video Scripts.
The screen carries it for you
Anything that is a figure, a name or a date is better carried by on-screen text than by the voice, because the eye reads faster than the ear and can go back to a line if it needs to.
So make your voice's job the meaning and the screen's job the data. Every time you find a sentence in your script crowded with numbers, ask: do I say this sentence, or write it?
A test before filming
Read your script out loud and put a question to every number: do I know where it came from? Does somebody new to the subject understand it? Can it be turned into a picture?
Then a day later, read it again crossing out every fact that does not serve the idea carrying it. You will find you delete half of what you gathered, and that the video got stronger. That is the stage described in Revising a Long Script: Trimming Your Own Work With a Critical Eye.
Three facts remembered
Before you publish, ask yourself: what are the three facts I want the viewer to leave with? If the answer is ten, he will leave with none.
Research that does not appear in the video is not wasted. It is what lets you speak with confidence, and what makes one sentence of yours worth a page of somebody else's.