How to write a script for a video

Start with one point, write it as a plain sentence, and build the script around it: a hook, the point, one example, one ask. Write short sentences you could say out loud, read the draft aloud, and cut what trips you up. Then check the length against about 150 words for each minute of video.

That is the whole method. The six steps below show how each part works and what goes wrong when you skip it.

Decide the one thing the viewer should know or do

Before you write a line, finish this sentence: “After watching, the viewer will ___.” Put one idea in the blank. If you need “and” to fill it, you have two videos.

This matters more on video than in an article. A reader can skim back up the page. A viewer who loses the thread keeps scrolling. One point means every line has a job: it either sets up the point, proves it, or asks for the next step.

Say you are a coach and the point is “price the outcome, not the hour.” Everything in the script serves that sentence. A story about how you got into coaching does not, so it goes.

Open with a hook in the first line

The first line decides whether the right person keeps watching. Skip the greeting and your name. Open with the problem they have, the result they want, or a claim they will want to test.

Compare two openings for the same video:

• “Hi everyone, welcome back to my channel.”
• “If you charge by the hour, you are capping your own income.”

The second tells a coach, in nine words, whether this video is for them. You can say hello at the end, or not at all.

A hook has one job: make the next line worth hearing. It does not need to be loud. It needs to be specific.

State the point, then show it with one example

Give the point in a sentence or two, straight after the hook. Do not make the viewer wait.

Then prove it with one example. One, not three. A short story, a number, or a before-and-after works. “Say a client charged for ten hours a week. She priced one outcome instead, and the first outcome paid for the whole month.” The example is what makes people remember the point a day later.

If you have three examples, pick the one a stranger would understand fastest. Save the others for the next video. For a 1 to 3 minute video, one example fills most of the time.

End with one ask

Close with a single next step: reply, book a call, watch the next video, try the idea this week. Name it in one short sentence. Two asks split attention, and the viewer does neither.

Keep the ask in the same voice as the rest of the script. “Try it on your next client and tell me how it goes” works. “Don’t forget to like, subscribe and hit the bell” tells the viewer you stopped caring about the point.

Write for the ear, not the eye

People will hear your script once, at your speed. They cannot reread. So write in a way that is easy to say and easy to follow by sound.

Use these rules:

1. One idea per sentence. If a sentence has a comma and a “which”, split it in two.
2. Short sentences. Aim for under 15 words. Mix in a few very short ones for rhythm.
3. Words you would say. Write “use”, not “utilize”. Write “so”, not “consequently”. Contractions are fine; they are how people talk.
4. Say numbers the way you speak them. Write “twenty percent”, not “20%”, if that is how you will say it.
5. Break lines where you would breathe. Put each phrase on its own line. When you read from a screen, those breaks tell you where to pause.

See the difference in one sentence

Written for the eye: “Pricing by the hour, which many coaches default to, limits earnings because income is bounded by available time.”

Written for the ear: “Most coaches charge by the hour. But you only have so many hours. So your income stops where your calendar does.”

The second version is longer, yet it is easier to say and easier to follow. Each sentence holds one idea, and each one lands before the next begins.

Read it aloud and cut

Reading aloud is the real edit. Your eyes forgive things your mouth does not. Read the draft at the pace you would use on camera and mark every place you stumble, run out of breath, or feel silly. Rewrite those lines or cut them.

Do it twice. The second pass usually finds half as many problems as the first, and by then the script sounds like you.

Check the length before you record

Convert minutes to words. At about 150 words a minute, which is the figure most often given for conversational American English (VirtualSpeech reports it as the National Center for Voice and Speech figure), a 60 second video is about 150 words and a 3 minute video is about 450. Your own pace may differ, so time yourself to be sure.

Count the words in your draft, then divide by your pace. If the result is over your target, cut the weakest example first, then the weakest sentences. Do not talk faster to fit.

Leave a little room. Pauses between ideas are part of the video, and a script that fills the time exactly leaves no room for them.

Reading it on camera is the next step

When the script is written and the next question is how to say it to the camera without it sounding like reading, go to how to read a script on camera. If you would rather learn it than read it, see how to memorize a script.