Do Your Videos Auto Play?
here has been a lot of talk about the obtrusive nature of autoplay videos. From a marketer’s perspective, videos are a great way to showcase a product or service. Videos can explain a complex idea in a time efficient manner. But, the flip side is that autoplay videos have been abused by some marketers, where they overtly intrude into a person’s web browsing experience and have us reaching for the mute or stop button.
Because of this obtrusive use of video, Google are now seriously thinking about banning autoplay videos. I have to say, that even from a video producers perspective, I don’t blame Google for trying to do that. Videos are a great way to express yourself but marketers have to know when autoplay videos are appropriate. Here are five ways to use autoplay videos without getting the ire of your target audience.
1. Autoplay should always have the sound off
2. Autoplay video should not be always be at the top of web page and should let the text and other content load first. This means that sometimes video at the bottom of the page has more click throughs than at the top
3. You don’t always have to use subtitles to grab a viewer’s attention, the use of video should fit into the look of the webpage and add a valuable visual cue so you don’t have to force feed a message to the audience
4. Autoplay videos are more expectable when the user clicks through to a site from a search engine and if the videos are in line for what they user is searching for
5. Keep your autoplay videos short, don’t just play the video in whole, let the user decide if they want to see the whole video
