A Basic Guide to Using Video Content For Your Site

By now, you probably know that video content has become massively popular  —  in fact, videos have become most consumers’ favorite type of content to see (especially on social media). To ignore this massive trend would be unwise, and to tap into this trend could lead to truly enormous site growth  —  and site revenue.

But how do you smoothly incorporate video content into your site? Do you need a team of video editors, cinematographers, computer programmers, and social media coordinators to make it all fit together? How can a publisher begin using video content, especially if they’re not a “natural” and don’t have much video content yet?

Ezoic has our very own video tool

In this blog, you’ll learn why video content has become so popular, how to begin creating your own video content, and how to effectively use this trend to maximize your revenue and traffic.

Why Is Video Content So Popular — and What Do Publishers Need to Know?

Video content isn’t new  —  YouTube has been around for almost 20 years, and before that there were countless smaller video platforms each host to numerous viral videos. Ever since the dawn of the internet, millions of people have flocked to the internet to view funny, helpful, and entertaining videos. In the mid 2000’s, experts were already forecasting an influx of video content, but even then the popularity of video content was hard to imagine. 

But why has it become so popular now? What helped video content go from a popular form of the media to perhaps the most popular? 

In the words of Digital Marketing Institute, “Consumers like because it’s easy to digest, entertaining and engaging, and marketers like it because it can give a potentially huge return on investment (ROI) through many channels. Video is also very accessible to anyone with internet access, both to watch and to produce.”

Video is extremely easy for users to watch (they can even watch in silence with subtitles), and thanks for high-tech user interfaces, scrolling through videos has become the most convenient and simple method of digesting content  —  far easier than swiping through blogs, podcasts, articles, and other popular forms of content.

Thanks to smartphones, videos are also extremely easy to make. In the past, you might need a whole team to wield cameras and lights, another team to cut and edit the videos, and still more to actually publish them online (not to mention video marketing and driving traffic to the content!). Now, smartphones and social media platforms have simplified every step of the process. 

Apps like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok have become a haven for video editors, offering extremely high-level services like filters, captions, audio/visual effects, cutting/editing, and direct sharing to audiences. In addition, there are a plethora of third-party video tools that enhance each of these steps, depending on how in-depth you’d like your videos to appear.

Now that you’re seeing more about why video has become so popular, let’s discuss how you can use the current video content trend for your site to maximize revenue, traffic, and influence.

There Are Too Many Benefits to Incorporating Video Into Your Site

There are countless benefits of each kind of content  —  video, audio, written, etc. But video content has become the #1 most popular form of content for a reason; for both content creators and their audiences.

According to Social Media Today, “Videos keep people on your website longer and engage them with your content,” with users staying on sites with video “60% longer than sites with just text and pictures.” If you think of sites through the lens of search engine algorithms and SEO, these search engines are seeing more people spend more time on sites with videos, which signals to search engines that these sites are more popular  —  and thus appear more often in organic search results. This trend may change, but for now, the current trend of video content popularity is king among content.

There are a few basic ways you can begin creating video content for your site and incorporating it into your webpage.

Short Form Livestream 

Live streaming video is probably the easiest form of video content  —  and among the most popular. If you analyze the top video trends for some of the internet’s most popular content creators, you’ll invariably see an abundance of short-form live streamed video, usually with captions so anyone, anywhere, can view these videos. 

These videos are easy to make (they don’t require much editing), easy to digest in today’s low-attention span world, and a low-hanging fruit for content creators just beginning to enter the world of video content. 

No-Face Content

Not every content creator feels excited to suddenly be on camera and showcase themselves to the world. They may prefer a more subtle approach, jumping on the video content trend while remaining off-camera in the background.

That’s where “no-face” video channels come in, where content creators showcase stock footage, teachings, and messages without actually appearing on camera. There are countless ways to monetize video channels through no-face marketing strategies, which might be the perfect fit for camera-shy content creators. 

At-Home Training and Tutorials

Not every piece of content needs to showcase you with millions of dollars, partying on a yacht. In fact, the vast majority of video content creators can simply be described as “teachers,” guiding and training users through their topic. 

To do this, you can simply record yourself at home, using your smartphone or webcam. You can even hire freelancers to do any video editing/formatting work for you (which I’ve done countless times), leaving you to focus entirely on your message and content instead of getting lost in video editing software tutorials. 

How to Earn Revenue and Increase Traffic From Video Content

This current video content trend may convince content creators that posting a few simple videos will attract a massive amount of new traffic. Not so; like every other part of being a successful publisher, this process takes time to blossom. You’ll need to be consistent, focused with your message, and open to learning new skills.

Knowing where to place videos on your page is crucial, as well. If you put videos too high on your page, it can’t be monetized. If you’re incorporating videos into existing text content, be sure to place insert the video placeholders and any other videos you’d like to promote a bit farther down the article.

Still, there are some simple ways you can begin this process today, so that your video content will help you earn as much revenue and attract as much traffic as possible. 

Add Videos To Your Most Popular Content

There’s a reason your most-viewed and most-read pieces of content worked; there’s probably a high chance they’ll perform well as a video, too. Sort through your existing content and find your most popular pieces of content, create a video about it, and publish it within the post to help optimize it and make it fresh for old and new audiences alike.

Transfer Your Social Media Followers to Your Site

In most cases, it takes a long time and high metrics on social media to become eligible for ad revenue on the platform (for instance, you need at least 10,000 Facebook followers and 600,000 total minutes of view-time in the past 60 days to become eligible for ad revenue). 

If you’re not hitting these minimum requirements yet, you can simply encourage your social media followers to view your content on your site, where you are eligible for ad revenue. Social media platforms don’t make this easy (obviously, they want the ad revenue), but you can make a consistent, strong call to action on social media to your followers: “Come visit my site!”

Advertise Your Products/Services

There are plenty of income ideas that lend themselves really well to video vs. other forms of content  —  like online courses, training programs, and coaching services. These may be a harder sell as a big wall of text in a blog post, but much easier to advertise as a short-form video.

In Conclusion

Video content, like past content marketing trends, has massive potential for site growth and audience influence  —  if you’re willing to do the work. You can’t just expect to slap a few videos online and double your traffic in a week.

However, there is undeniable evidence that video content works, especially when paired with social media and trendy video types like short-form live streams. If you work hard to incorporate video content into your site, you might not see a massive influx of traffic overnight  —  but it’s highly likely that if you keep at it, you’ll see some incredible benefits from it very soon.