Using Video to Engage Your Readers
Adding video to your blog is a great way to engage your readers. Or, should I say viewers? As Fred R. Barnard once said, “a picture is worth a thousand words.” How many words is a moving, talking picture worth?. Priceless!!
There are many ways that you can incorporate videos into your articles. Here are two ways I particularly like:
Video Tutorials:
Video tutorials are great tools for educating your readers on how to do something. By creating a video, you walk and talk them through the tasks that you are trying to teach, providing them with much more information than you could provide by writing alone.
There are many great video tutorials already posted on YouTube. If you think that one of these videos would help you make your point, think about incorporating it into your article.
One of my niche blogs discusses massively multiplayer online role playing games. I love posting and discussing the latest game trailers and developer articles. These videos are very entertaining and provide the latest information being released about upcoming new game titles. Your readers will love the new media of video tutorials.
Video Monologues:
Video monologues recently have become popular around the blogoshpere. Darren Rowse at Problogger.net has started doing them, as well as John Robinson at SiteFever.com. Yaro Starak at Entrepreneur’s Journey has a permanent video monologue on his front page introducing his readers to his blog.
These videos are an awesome way to connect with your readers on a personal level. There is something about watching these video monologues that make you feel that the blogger is talking directly to you. There is no doubt in my mind that these create more loyal fans.
Another great thing about videos is that it keeps your readers on your site for longer. There is no better way to reduce your bounce rate than by creating a 5 to 10 minute video. While someone might skim your writing, videos tend to capture your viewers and make them stay until the end.
So, I challenge you this week to add video to a post on your blog. Your readers will appreciate it!!
Written by Fred Peters from Newest on the NetPosted on September 13th, 2007 and filed under Video Blogging
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22 Responses to “Using Video to Engage Your Readers”
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Great idea, thanks!
I really need to get into doing some video, there is not just the technical side though there is the actual “presenting”. For a forthcoming course I need to do some video walkthroughs and the few tests I have done have been slow with most of the time mostly in editing out my ums and ahs
Great article, found this via the forum digitalpoint, will be reading more of this blog.
At first I didn’t get the video thing on blogs. Infact I still don’t really like to watch people talk and if I put it in the background to just listen I get side tracked with something else. I find it is the opposite for me as far as staying on a site longer if the video is long too, I just don’t watch it.
But what I have found that I like is a video that shows something other than just people talking, like the videos at http://www.mynewhustle.com where he goes over websites and just adds his voiceover while showing you exactly what he is talking about.
I have tried using video for a while and love the medium but don’t seem to have the nack to make them go viral.
I have been using a similar system which works very well but I would like to get the video thing pumping.
I may try the monologue like you said.
Quentin
I might just try making a video this weekend
I am glad that you like the article. I definitely think that my readers like the videos I use in my blogs. Some also spread around the net pretty quickly.
I have thought of doing a weekly video post on my blog. I wrote an article yesterday about how you can use video to fill in times of writers block. I think we will see more use of this in the future.
this might be a stupid question, but what does everyone think of youtube videos? I actually posted one right before I read this article for the first time but then wasn’t sure what sort of reaction youtube gets as opposed to producing your own.
So I decided to find some videos with just a person talking to watch and I was actually sort of engaged and I totally liked how they weren’t “news” reporter style, but real people talking. I guess I’ll eat my own words. Only thing I have to say is if you do post videos with just you talking, try to describe what you will be talking with so that you can get stubborn people like me interested in watching so we stick around long enough to press play.
@HairySwede: I think youtube is okay, you can than post it on your blog too with the embed option. I’ve seen this done on a lot of blogs, plus you can gain extra traffic from youtube to your blog.
yeah the embed option makes it really simple
There is always a chance of getting link bait as the videos generally go viral in the blogosphere.
I could really use this to integrate into my blog. I have wondered about how videos could integrate into a blog for awhile and although kind of new to this, your explanations make it easier to understand. Thank you for the time and the service.
Good idea. Especially, when you can promote the video through channels that normal web sites or blog cannot be promoted — e.g., YouTube.
It has been quite a while since I have done a video post. I really need to sit down and get back at it…
I’ve just put up my second video. It was really fun to do and process. All i did on this one was show a treasure map being made….:)
Great idea! I have tried podcasting, which is fun, and my readers seem to like to hear from me in a literal sense, so I suppose a video is the next logical step.
Thanks, it is really great idea.
lont time i wanted to add video in my blog, and now i know that it is so easy.
I will start a new blog and will play mt guitar there.
Thanks!!