As the Easter break ends it is time to get back to it with your video content, so grab a cuppa, one of your many chocolate eggs (that you promised yourself you wouldn’t eat) and learn all about video captions.
In this blog, we will show you not only why you need captions on almost every video you make, but also what to avoid when you make them.
‘Accurate and expressive captions help everyone — whether they be deaf or hard of hearing; in a quiet space without their earbuds; or watching a video in their second language — experience what you created in the way you intended.’
Feb 2021 thinkwithgoogle.com
Why Captions?
1. Viewing Numbers
According to Cisco, by 2022 online videos will make up over 82% of all consumer Internet traffic which is 15 times higher than it was in 2017.
PLYmedia’s recent study found that captioned videos have 40% more views than uncaptioned content and video engagement increases from 66% to 91% with them
Therefore, a video with captions will harness more of this growing market.
2. Google crawlers
These little bots crawl the internet updating web pages to add them to Google index.
Although your videos are not web pages they do have information attached to them – metadata
The crawlers line up for this information like Texans at a BBQ and the captions serve it up with relish because they offer a transcript of your whole video.
This is why captions improve your website performance and SEO.
3. Accessibility
Verizon Media and Publicis Media report in 2021 that 69% of consumers view video with the sound off in public places and 25% in private places.
Facebook and Twitter videos also auto-play without sound.
A failure to add captions means cutting off from 25% to 80% potential viewers.
Don’t forget that for those who are visually impaired captions are crucial for accessing content and they are the reason why captions and subtitles exist in the first place.
4. Dwell time
Verizon Media also report that 80% of consumers are more likely to watch an entire video when captions are available. The more a video is watched the more likely it is going to be liked and shared with a 26% increase in call to action click-throughs for videos with subtitled content
Facebook also ploughs in here advising that adding captions to your video can boost view time by 12%.
5. What did you say?
Captions aid comprehension of what is being said because people can read and hear the content.
Also, for the international market, captions are a great way of repurposing your videos into another language. After all, English is only the first language for just over 25% of the planet.
6. Recycle
Captions provide the video with another layer, but the written content can also be refashioned by you into other content such as a blog post
How to do it
Closed or open captions?
This depends on what platform you are publishing too.
For example, Youtube uses open captions which can be uploaded via a caption document known as an .srt file or added to the video within Youtube itself. This is the same on Facebook but for Instagram, no such feature exists so captions and subtitles have to be ‘burnt’ into the video i.e. exported as part of the video
Captions can then be turned on or off by the viewer
Some rules of thumb
· Identify speakers if it’s unclear
· Separate speakers with a line for each person and different coloured text
· Describe and identify the music (if you can). Don’t just add ‘music playing’
· Aim for brevity where possible - three lines of text is a reasonable limit
· When producing videos for social media, think of the keywords that your video is trying to convey. Add keywords into your subtitles to aid SEO.
· Start and end your subtitles with the speech they represent and edit them to an appropriate easy to read length (Maximum 250 words per minute).
· Producing foreign as well as English subtitles will boost your target audience and make your videos more accessible.
What next?
When checking out your current videos, consider which you think would benefit the most from captions, should the viewer not be able to hear the video. Not all videos need subtitles but, for some, adding in those precious words can pay real dividends when it comes to dwell time, viewer engagement and website SEO