Video Is The Future Of The Internet
The TV isn’t called a “boob tube” for nothing. It captivates the audience – you and I. It keeps us entertained through slick productions, fancy sets and a whole lotta money spent on the advertising and promotions of movies and other programming.
TV can also be a detriment if you are trying to build your internet business – you have better things to do. But regardless of how I feel about it, it is one of the easiest ways to capture a readers/viewers attention. Through video they can’t jump to the end because they don’t know what they will miss in the middle. It’s like watching a DVD, and jumping to the last chapter to view what happens. Everything is taken out of context.
A few weeks ago, I wrote about how Vlogging Will Revolutionize Blogging. Here is even more proof that video will be the next medium of choice for bloggers.
According to a report I just read – http://www.websiteoptimization.com/bw/0804/ - 57% of US homes now have broadband connections. Canada was close behind. Can you guess who was the leader? Hint – they are all in Europe: Luxemborg, Germany and Ireland. They are three counties leading in broadband penetration. Following them, though not far away are Greece, France, New Zeland and the UK. At the bottom end, and one of these countries really surprised me is Japan, Poland, Korea, Portugal and Mexico. I was surprised to see Japan at the bottom end – for a country that leads the world in innovation it is odd that their broadband use is not very high.
There are a lot of reasons why you should consider video in addition to your regular blog posts:
- Videos Build Trust
- Video Keeps The Users Attention
- Inexpensive To Get Started
- Search Engines Are Getting Smarter
Derek Salyers has written a guest post over at The University Kid that discusses “Why You Should Use Video“. His post provided inspiration for todays post.
Here are 7 Golden Ways To Use Videos In Your Blog-Posts Effectively, written by Abhinav Sood at Inspirit Blog.
- Video Inline to the Post: Do not link to a video and expect many of your readers will visit them. The time of any reader is precious and most of them will not like to digg too deep for watching a video. Remember, something about anything from nothing to everything is available on the internet
. You have to take care of how you are going to make the visitors to you blog stay.
Always offer the juicy content right in the hands of your visitors. Embed the videos inline to the post instead of placing the video somewhere else and linking to it with some hypertext. Chances are that people will overlook the link to the video in order to save themselves a few extra clicks and a lots of time. - Quality of Video: This is a very obvious, yet much overlooked point that you should always bear in mind while adding a video to your post. They should run without pauses. Good quality videos should be used so that they do not stress the eyes and brains of the viewer.
- Dimensions of Video: I have seen many blogs with videos of such large sizes that they literally break the frames of content block! Resize the dimensions of the videos before you use them in a blog post such that they fit well inside the content block. Smaller dimensions also mean quicker loading and thus, save your readers valuable time.
- File Size of Video: Smaller is the file size of the original uploaded (and embedded) video, the lesser is the bandwidth consumption. So try to convert your video to a smaller bit-rate (and hence smaller file size!) without compromising on the quality. Various video converters are available which can be used for the purpose (Some of the Open Source Video Converters are available for Free.)
- Textual Description: Always add a brief textual description about the video you are posting. This is the most effective way of using videos in your blog posts effectively. This will make the visitors stick to your post by developing and holding their interest in your video till it loads.
I have explained this aspect in detail in my guest post: Adding Textual Description to a Video in your Blog Post at Another Pointless Blog, and I really recommend you to go through it once. - Vertical Alignment of Video: Try to align your videos properly relative to the text contained in the post and also relative to the layout of the rest of the blog.
When you are using a distinct introduction and an end-note for your post, align the video in the middle of these two parts. Also, when you are going to post a brief textual description about the video, its a good practice to place the video on the top of the text. - Horizontal Alignment of the Video: The left, right or centered placement of the video depends on the layout of your blog. If you use a 3- column blog that has the content block in the center then center-aligning your videos is the best idea. In case the content block is on the left and the two sidebars are on the right, left aligning the video in the post is the most effective placement strategy. In these ways, the videos will not mess with the sidebars and will be easily viewable, without any distractions.
Finally here are a few tips of my own to help you with branding your videos:
- Watermarks – Add watermarks to your video, such as your company logo. This will let viewers know that the video is yours. Several MMO bloggers watermark all their screenshots. Not only will this provide safety for your videos (so they don’t get hijacked for someone elses blog) but it helps in branding you and your site.
- URL – Include your URL in the video – you see comments added to videos shown on TV, you know – the bar along the bottom of the screen? You could do the exact same thing. This way the viewer knows where the video originated from and has the opportunity to visit your site.
- KISS – Keep It Short Silly! You’re not filming a blockbuster, eventhough you think you are – keep it short and to the point.
- Series of Videos - StarWars ran how may episodes? Each one captivated the audience and had them coming back for more. Horror flicks have done equally as well. Most recently great sci-fi shows like Heroes, Battlestar Galactica and others have run in series. Creating a series of videos on a topic will bring viewers back to your site or channel.
Do you have any other tips you can share? Just comment on this post!
Video Is The Future Of The Internet
So I was surfing the web, and came across 
With OVER 12,000 tubes created so far, you better head over there RIGHT NOW and stake your claim. Because you get a sub-domained name off of StartYourTube.com a lot of the cool names will get taken QUICKLY!
