Solution Overviews » Marketing » Website Videos

Website Videos

Author: TechShortcut Staff | Article updated: June 13, 2008

1. Overview

A video presentation can be much more compelling than just a static website describing your business. Besides marketing, you can also include videos for other areas like customer support, employee training or supplier management. Ideas for videos include:

Direct
Promote your business directly by creating a video profile about your businesses selling points.
Indirect
Promote your business indirectly by creating a video about your industry or providing tutorials about something in your industry. Wacky and witty videos that may become popular—also known as viral videos—may also be used to generate some buzz and lead people to your business.

Benefits

Get the word out about your business in a more compelling manner

Considerations

Choose the Playback Option
Decide whether to (1) embed the video within a web page for viewing or (2) to allow visitors to download the video file for later playback. Embedding a video to play within a web page is usually the best option unless you intend for visitors to download a video to another device.

There are 3 main types of video players:
- Web Server Player
  Web servers control the video playback. YouTube.com and other sites allow you to embed videos from their site using their own player.
- Web Browser Player
  Browsers will usually include a plug-in to play some types of video files for video files embedded within a web page. There are free plug-in players for Flash, QuickTime and Windows Media. Viewers will have to ensure they have the browser plug-in to view the video.
- Computer Player
  Most computers come equipped with standalone software to play videos like Windows Media Player.

Implementation Options

1. In-House Video Playback	2. Internet Video Sharing Service
Upload the video file to your website and provide a video player if needed.	Upload the video file to a video sharing website. You may have the option of linking to the video or being able to embed the video into your web pages.

2. Option Comparison

	1.In-House Video Playback	2. Internet Video Sharing Service
Cost	Most web hosting accounts include limits on data transfer. Video files can be large and if your video becomes popular you could be facing increased hosting bills. You will need to check with your web host about data transfer costs.	There are both free and paid video sharing websites.
Control	If you are hosting your own video on your own website, you have total control on how your video is presented.	Some web sharing sites maintain the option to place ads during your video playback.
Bandwidth	You will need to ask your web host about performance related to video playback. If your web host cannot support video or if it is cost prohibitive you may need to turn to paid video web hosts to host your video.	Web video sharing sites are in the business to play video so they will typically have the infrastructure to support it but it is always wise to test.

3. Next Steps

	1. In-House Video Playback	2. Internet Video Sharing Service
General Advice	Use when you want total control over your videos and you don't mind paying for it.	Use when you want to reach a wide audience outside your website to generate buzz. Since there are free options, it may be a good choice when you are on a limited budget and you don't mind the possibility of advertisements placed in the video during playback. Of course, it can also be a good choice if you don't want to deal with adding videos to your own website.
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