Web Video Tips - by WebVideoZone’s Joe Chapuis

Part 1: Choosing the right video format for your web site

Let’s take a quick look at the most popular internet video formats:

WMV - Windows media viewer format
Will play on Windows reliably. On a Mac, it will not play if the video was edited using Windows Movie Maker. On a Mac, requires Windows Media Player for Mac.

AVI Video format
Introduced by Microsoft in 1992 - not actually a format, but a container that can hold many different formats. On the PC, compatibility is excellent. On the Mac, it can be hit or miss. AVI files tend to be HUGE (as they are usually uncompressed) and therefore take forever to download and play. Not recommended for streaming video.

MOV - Apple QuickTime Format
Plays very well on the Mac (it better, since it was developed by Apple). Plays well on the PC if the Apple QuickTime Player for Windows has been installed. Important file format for video podcasting.

RM - Real Media Format
Requires Real Media Player - which some consider to be spamware (or worse). Despite good quality at high speeds, not recommended.

SWF - Small Web Format
A proprietary vector graphics file format produced by Adobe/Macromedia Flash software and other applications. Plays well on both PCs and Macs. Not recommended for videos longer than 30 seconds, as video will not start playing until the entire SWF file has been downloaded.

FLV - Flash Video
Compatible with approximately 98% of all computers. Created by converting other video formats to Flash using (using the Flash authoring program, or other conversion tools). Very good quality at high speeds.

If you are presenting short clips in small display sizes, consider providing the video in just the flash SWF format. It’s fast, easy, and most people will be able to quickly download and watch them without any difficulty.

However, if you are presenting longer video clips where quality is more important, you’ll probably want to provide visitors the option to view the video in one or both of the following formats:

1. Flash Video (FLV) - FLV files are played in your visitor’s browser via a Flash player (an SWF file). It estimated that 95-98% of web users have a Flash player installed on their computer. Flash is currently the most compatible video format, requiring the least amount of file space and bandwidth.

FLV files take advantage of the "pseudo-streaming" or progressive download capabilities of the Flash player. This means that the FLV will start playing once the player (the SWF file) has loaded.

The user does not have to wait for the entire FLV to download. This is crucial for longer videos, as it is unlikely most people would otherwise wait around long enough for the file to be downloaded.

The most recent version is Flash 8, which utilizes the On2 Flix Video codec. Improved video compression in Flash 8 results in a smaller file size and greater video quality than for previous versions. To view videos created using Flash 8, web users must have the Flash 8 player installed on their computers, and download it if necessary.

Flash video is our format of choice at WebVideoZone.com, which is why we offer our members a web-based Flash 8 FLV converter. But don’t just take our word for it. Flash video has been chosen as the default video platform by the big boys on the cutting edge of web video technology, heavyweights such as Google Video, YouTube and Amazon.com.

The tools needed to create Flash video are very affordable and quite easy to use. If you’re serious about web video, you need to take a closer look at the Flash FLV format.

2. QuickTime (MOV) - Mac users and techies love QuickTime. Quality is good, file size is reasonable, and player compatibility is high (but not as high as that for the Flash 7 player). In addition, the QuickTime .mov format is a good choice for video podcasting.

A newer codec known as H.264 is showing promising results. QuickTime videos created using H.264 have stunningly high quality, considering the small output file size. Unfortunately, to be able to view movies created with H.264, the user must have the QuickTime 7 player - a large and not-so-easy installation.

The future of internet video may very well be H.264 (or some variation of it). But until more people have upgraded/downloaded the most recent QuickTime player, I would hesitate to rely on it exclusively.

Part 2: How you should add video to your web site

You basically have three main options to consider:

Do-It-Yourself - Host the video yourself, and find, develop or hire someone to create your own video player solution.
Freebie Site - Rely upon the services of a free web video hosting site (e.g., Google Video or YouTube).
Web Video Service - Subscribe to a service that will host and serve your video and provide you with a video player.

In this section, we’re going to take a closer look at the pros and cons of each one, and help you decide which option is right for you.

First, ask yourself these questions…

Before we get into the choices available to you, there are three important things you should ask yourself. The answers to these questions will help you choose the right solution:

1. "What am I trying to accomplish by putting video on my web site?"

What is your goal? Do you simply want to entertain your audience? Or, will you be using your web videos to encourage your visitors to take action and buy something?

2. "How much time and effort am I willing to put into this to get it to look right?"

How involved do you want to be in this? Are you a "do-it-yourselfer" who likes to get your hands a little dirty? Or, perhaps you’d rather just have a fast and easy solution, and leave the complicated programming and technical stuff to others?

3. "Is quality and professionalism important to you and your audience?"

Are you concerned about how the video player will look on your site? Would you mind having distracting advertisements displayed before, during and/or after your videos? Are you concerned that your visitors would click on these ads and abandon your site to visit a potential competitor?

Choosing a Solution

The Freebie Sites
YouTube accounts for 60 percent of all videos delivered online. And now that Google owns YouTube, 75% of all web video delivery now goes through the GooTube juggernaut. And there are a few good reasons for their immense popularity:

They host and serve your videos for free.
They make it easy for you to add videos to your site. Simply create an account, upload your video, add the code they give you to your site, and you’re in business.
Videos added to these sites can result in some extra traffic finding its way to your web site.

For more on YouTube, see this article:
How to Add Your Video to YouTube - http://www.webvideozone.com/public/308.cfm

But despite some of the apparent benefits, many businesses are making a big mistake by relying too heavily upon these freebie sites. While uploading videos to YouTube to grab some extra traffic can be smart, if you’re counting on these free services to also host and serve the videos for your own web site, you may be asking for trouble. Here are five reasons why…

1. Web Video Advertising
These video sharing sites need to make money to pay those enormous bandwidth bills. We’re going to slowly start seeing advertisements popping up in, after and/or next to videos hosted by the freebie sites. These ads are going to distract viewers, likely leading them to visit another web site.

2. Poor Video Quality
Videos uploaded to video sharing sites such as Google or YouTube are compressed and converted to the Flash 7 FLV format. While compression itself isn’t a problem, these video sites are not overly concerned about the playback quality of your video. In order to keep bandwidth costs down, they shrink the videos to the smallest acceptable size, which affects the quality of your presentation.

3. Free Advertising (for them)
Embedding a video hosted by a video sharing site into your web pages is the equivalent of free advertising for the video site. Clicks on these branded video players takes your visitors away from you. When this happens, what you’re doing is trading your hard-earned web site visitor for some low quality free video hosting.

4. Downloading / Display Problems
As these sites struggle to keep up with the heavy loads placed upon their servers and resources, it is not uncommon to experience choppy, slow-loading or even non-loading videos. The amazing popularity of these sites may actually be their Achilles’ heel. When millions of people visit a new, growing web site every day, you can expect problems.

5. No Control
Because these are free services, you have limited control over how your video and the player itself appear on a web page. For example, these sites don’t let you choose what displays in the video player before your video starts, or what happens once it’s done. They control everything.

You should look at video sharing sites such as YouTube and Google Video as important tools in your internet marketing arsenal. But you need to be careful how you use them. I recommend you upload any videos you have to these sites, as their traffic is phenomenal, and you stand to gain extra exposure by making your videos available there.

However, if professionalism, quality, and control are important to you, GooTube is simply not the right solution for displaying videos on your own site. In this case, you may want to go the DIY route. But keep in mind, this can be a frustrating, time-consuming and costly process. That’s why you may want to take a closer look at the next option…

Web Video Service Providers
There are several web video service providers who will host your videos and provide you with a variety of additional services (e.g., video player, viewing statistics, etc.) for a fee. The costs for these services vary, depending upon factors such as bandwidth allowance, storage space, and player features.

When you use a third party video player/hosting solution such as the one we offer at WebVideoZone.com, the ability to quickly add high-quality, customizable, interactive video presentations to your site is a near-effortless task.

Web video doesn’t have to be difficult or time-consuming if you choose the right tools and solutions to help you get it done.

Using Web Video for Business – Summary

Here are a few other important points to keep in mind when deciding upon how to incorporate video into your web site:

Correctly implemented, video can be an essential part of a web site’s success. Think: video tutorials, "how-to’s," and even a "video tip of the week."
To make video work for your web site, make sure you keep the video clips short, sized for optimal viewing (e.g., 320×240), and you provide video in the right format and size - taking your audience into consideration.
Unless absolutely necessary, never set a video clip to run automatically, as doing so will probably annoy your visitors - especially if they do not have the proper video viewing components installed.
When preparing video for the web, start by using the right tools - preferably a video editing program that can render the video into the various formats you need.
Watch your bandwidth usage - if thousands of visitors link to your video, it can bring down your site as well as your hosting service. For that reason, use video minimally, or rely on the services of a good web video hosting provider.

Remember, the main reason for having video on your site is to get your viewers to take action (e.g., buy, subscribe, click, etc.). You want your videos to get a result. Whether it’s to educate, motivate or close the sale - web video should help you accomplish something.

And it’s never been easier to make it happen.

About the Author: Joe Chapuis is the founder of WebVideoZone.com, which offers “tools, tips and tutorials to help you profit from web video.” The WebVideoZone is for business owners, entrepreneurs, internet professionals - and anyone interested in quickly adding high-quality, profit-boosting interactive videos to any web site.