How to Convert Articles Into Videos

When you use screen capture software for rapid video creation and record Camtasia videos with PowerPoints or MindMaps, the presentation process becomes super simple.

A video presentation reduces the reading time of a blog post from 5 to 10 minutes, to three minutes or less. That means you get a wider audience, more comments and more exposure.

To get more mileage out of an article, convert into a video using this very easy method that requires less than one minute of preparation per article. It relies on PowerPoint’s ability to import text files.

In just a few seconds, you can take your article, apply a couple of simple search-and-replace actions, import the individual sentences as individual slides, record, and dictate. Here’s the exact procedure:

Step 1: Copy and paste your article (INCLUDING the title on the first line) into a text editor like EditPlus that allows for a multi-line search and replace.

Also copy your article title as the LAST line of the article so people will remember what you just told them.

Step 2: Search and replace the end of each sentence to force a new line so that every sentence appears on its own line. Replace “.” (a period) with a period, and a newline.

In EditPlus, go to Search -> Replace, then click the “More” button to show the multi-line search and replace boxes. In the “search” box, type that period. In the “replace” box at the bottom, you can simply type a period, hit Enter, and it will add the newline for you.

Now you should have an article where every sentence is on its own line.

Step 3: Save this list of sentences as a text file. Then open PowerPoint and choose File -> Open. You won’t see the file you need at first.

Go to the dropdown that says “All PowerPoint Presentations” and change it to “All Outlines.” Browse to the folder containing the text file you saved, and double click it. This will set each sentence as one slide.

Step 4: Select all slides by hitting Ctrl+A, right click and change the slide layout to “Title Slide.”

Want to change the layout of the slides easily? Go to View -> Slide Master to change the appearance of all the slides in that presentation. Then click “Close Master View” to switch back to the presentation.

If you want to knock out a bunch of article videos at a time, simply place seven of your articles (with each article title at the beginning and end) in one big text file.

Start the PowerPoint presentation, record your presentation in Camtasia. Stop, save, and start a new presentation once you’ve reached the end of the article.

Don’t have the article written? That’s no problem, just use my mindmap technique to create the presentation. But if you only want to convert a text article into a Camtasia video, this is the fastest way to do it.

About the Author

Robert Plank is a computer programmer and Internet marketer. Even master copywriter Michel Fortin quadrupled his signups by adding Robert's simple exit pop-up email form to his blog. How many more subscribers and sales will it get you?