Web video is any video that is played on the internet. These videos can be placed on a website to enhance the site with more content, to show off home videos to friends and family easily and to promote a business – like your website, blog or internet marketing business. Whatever the reason for the videos, the internet has made it possible to show them off.
The term web video covers any video that is on the internet. Most businesses use web videos to train new employees, broadcast a commercial, demonstrate how a product works or even just to speak directly to their viewers about their product or service. With more and more businesses utilizing the use of web videos, this is now the way to go for internet marketing.
Since the internet is used by millions of people around the world, you literally can increase your exposure by placing videos on the internet. These web videos can range from simple and informative to dramatic. It is usually a personal choice as to how extreme a web video to be. In addition, customer response will help you decide how dramatic you should go with the video. If your video does not get you the response you want, then you can easily change the video out to a new video.
You are only limited by your own imagination when it comes to web videos. How dramatic your video is, where you video is shown and what type of prospective customers or clients you want your video shown too are all choices that you can make. Therefore, get as much information as you can on web videos so that you can better decide just what you want your video to look like and how you are going to use your web video.
We will be presenting several topics on video blogging, and video for your website.
As new posts are made, we will add the item here to make it a “one-stop shop” for all your video blogging needs.
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:
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 Blogging or vlogging is the buzzword of the day.
But video blogging is not new. It’s been around since 2005, however as the technology (used to record videos) has improved it has opened the doors to more individuals. You can get high quality digital video records that you can take with you for under $200.00 – combined with the portability a laptop offers plus wireless internet connections and internet cafes everywhere — you can be in constant contact with your blog (or vlog).
So where did video blogging start? Where did it originate from? WHO was the first video blogger?
Significant Events in the Development of Video Blogs
2003, May 22 – Maurizio Dovigi, an Italian journalist, launches No Filter, the first European vlog.
2003, June 15 – Nacho Durán launches the first (known) South American (Sao Paulo, Brazil) videoblog based on soundless loops made out of sequences of pictures daily taken from a portable webcam.
2004, January 1 – Steve Garfield launches his videoblog and declares that 2004 would be the year of the video blog.
2004, June 1 – Peter Van Dijck and Jay Dedman start the Yahoo! Videoblogging Group, which becomes the center of a community of vloggers
2005, January – Vloggercon, the first videoblogger conference, is held in New York City.
2005, July 20 – The Yahoo! Videoblogging Group grows to over 1,000 members.
2006, July – YouTube has become the 5th most popular web destination, with 100 million videos viewed daily, and 65,000 new uploads per day.
2006, July 5 – Host Amanda Congdon leaves Rocketboom over differences with her business partner Andrew Baron.
2006, November – The Vloggies, the first annual videoblogging awards, is held in San Francisco.
2007, May and August – The Wall Street Journal places a grandmother on the front page of its Personal Journal section. In August she is featured on an ABC World News Tonight segment[20] showing the elderly now becoming involved in the online video world.
A Video Blog (or VLOG) can be described, simply, as postings of videos on a website which encourages comments from the audience. Though traditional blogs are designed to encourage comments, with VLOGS participation is required even more since the comments will tell the story behind the video and will encourage other visitors to the site to view the video and participate.
Video logs (vlogs) also often take advantage of web syndication to allow for the distribution of video over the Internet using either the RSS or Atom syndication formats, for automatic aggregation and playback on mobile devices and personal computers.
What do Vlogs Offers than Blogs Don’t?
A vlog helps you to communicate with the audience and they can actually see the expressions on your face and hear the voice. You can build a one-to-one relationship with your audience. Why do you think the TV is so addictive? Someone who is charismatic or even butt ugly will command attention – surely you must remember William Hung who was on American Idol from the third season of the television program?
William Hung Commands a Cult Following
Hung rapidly gained a cult following. A William Hung fan site, set up by realtor Don Chin and his wife Laura, recorded over four million hits within its first week. Hung subsequently appeared on several television programs including Jimmy Kimmel, On Air with Ryan Seacrest, Entertainment Tonight, The Late Show With David Letterman, Countdown with Keith Olbermann, The Howard Stern Radio Show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Dateline NBC, Arrested Development and CBS’s The Early Show. Hung was featured in several national magazines and newspapers; he was parodied on Saturday Night Live and appeared on Celebrity Deathmatch. He was reportedly invited to perform at MTV’s Asia Awards held in mid-February. Remixes of Hung’s audition performance topped song request lists at a number of radio stations. An online petition to get Hung back to American Idol included more than 100,000 signatures by late February. Hung was brought back to American Idol as part of a mid-season special titled Uncut, Uncensored and Untalented, airing March 1, 2004. The special documented what it was like to experience the audition process and, in Hung’s case, emerge as an inadvertent celebrity. Hung has become more famous than many American Idol contestants, being arguably one of the worst singers to grace the American Idol audition stage.
William went on to get a record deal, and appearances in television, commercials and movies!
That’s the power of TV and that’s the same power that vloggers are looking to cash in on.
Lets look at another viral video that can be found on YouTube – I’m sure there are many other examples, but this one always sticks in my mind – the infamous “fat guy sings Numa Numa”. The Numa Numa video has had over 13,000,000 (yes, that 13 MILLION) views and over 74,000 ratings!
Here’s the video, for your enjoyment:
That’s the power behind vlogging.
Before you jump into vlogging, are you sure you can easily convey your feelings? You need to appear natural when vlogging. With blogging you could “fake it” — but you can’t with a vlog. So for a general blog, you can write about a topic using keywords to draw attention while for a video blog the video does it all – but it’s not just the video, it is the person behind the video.
I’ve seen some very entertaining videos, and others that are trying — but are faking it… yes, I know I said you can’t but these enterprising individuals certainly were able to! They were dry, and lifeless. The text was obviously scripted — which might be fine, but they spoke in monotone. Boring. I left the site as quickly as I arrived.
Video Blogs are ideal for news journalism. It is wonderful tool for delivering content like television content, and the list is never ending. Video Blogs help you to share the enthusiasm present in the content. This is revolutionary as before it was a quibble with words but now it is reality in the making.
John Chow, who is currently in China vlogs on his traditional blog on a regular basis. The posts are entertaining and give you insight into life in another part of the world first-hand.
Video Blogs help you to keep close to your family when you are away from home. You can share your infant’s first babble or the first steps with your parents. Nowadays reaching out through video blogging is easy and hassle free. Forget sitting down the family to watching slides, or videos at home – post them to your personal website and let friends and family from around the world view them when they want.
Although we are getting a bit ahead of ourselves here – you really need to know what is a good camera and microphone to use plus some other neat tips and tricks, we’ll go over some Free Places to Host and Post Your Videos. Videos can eat up bandwidth pretty damn quick – you certainly don’t want to host them on your site. The most notable places to host are YouTube, and Yahoo Video – but there are many other solutions out there and we’ll present you with some great sites.
Video blogging is not new. There are many blogs out there… er sorry, VLOGS out there. But how do you get into video blogging? Just what is video blogging all about? How is video blogging different from podcasting?
I’ll be answering these questions, and then some over the next few months with an exclusive series on video blogging.
As part of the series, my goal is to interview video bloggers to gain insight into their tools and processes.
I will be posting the excerpts of the entire series on the blog here, BUT the full-post will be password protected. In order to view the content, you will need to register for my blog alerts.
In preparation for this series, I’m asking YOU – what pressing information or questions do you need answered on the topic of video blogging? Who do YOU feel we should interview? Simply comment to the post!
We will be presenting several topics on video blogging, and video for your website.
. You have to take care of how you are going to make the visitors to you blog stay.
Video Blogging or vlogging is the buzzword of the day.
