If you want to improve your YouTube SEO then look no further than getting Closed Captioning for your YouTube video. Youtube indexes your transcript/closed captioning files on your YouTube video and uses this meta-data as another way of finding your content. Adding closed captioning to your video helps the video be found, makes the content accessible to people with disabilities and allows people to use the new Interactive YouTube transcript feature.
Once someone is on your YouTube page they can click a little icon and access an interactive transcript. They can scroll through the transcript and click on any of the text and the video will jump to that point in time and start playing.
The primary benefit to having your video closed captioned is complying with the Americans with Disabilities Act or ADA. As a government agency the ability to post your videos to YouTube is another great way to have people find your content, but it probably is not the first place that stakeholders are going to search for official agency information.
Social media is another fantastic way to reach out to your constituents and increase engagement, but don’t forget or neglect your primary information distribution channel, your official website. The value of being able to post your video directly to your website or to embed it in your site from YouTube is that your constituents are able to view your video without having to leave your website. That allows the site visitor to see all of the additional information around the video and links to other valuable resources that your agency or department provide. Of course YouTube has places for information, but it is easy to overlook.
We have produced videos for government clients, only to have them not get their videos closed captioned, so they were unable to post them to their website and were only able to link to them on YouTube. It seems like a shame to go through all that effort not to be able to have such dynamic and interesting content directly on your website. This also leads to you traffic going to YouTube instead of your agency website.
Another important thing to remember is that you have to do more than add closed captioning to your video on YouTube to be in compliance with the ADA and be able to post the video to your website. You must also post low resolution, open captioned versions of your videos on your website as well. Open captioned videos have the captions overlaid on the video just like subtitles.
Here is an example. It is a little hard to spot, but just below each video is text that says
“Download Video: mp4 (47 MB)”. Clicking that link downloads an identical version of that video, except that it has the open captions/subtitles on it. To comply you would have to create that same downloadable open captioned version of any video that you want to post to your agency or department website. The link is highlighted below in the picture.
Puritano Media Group has produced a large variety of content for the DLA, DoD, USDA, GSA, USCS, DOC, NIH and many more. If you need need anything from having a video produced to captioning for your YouTube videos then look no further than PMG.
Please contact our Production Manager Alan Bezet:
Alan Bezet
Production Manager
Puritano Media Group
www.puritano.com
703.490.0040 office
alan@puritano.com
About PMG:
Since 1996, Puritano Media Group has been creating productions that have engaged viewers around the world. For years PMG has been creating award-winning programs for Fortune 500 clients such as Northrop Grumman, Fannie Mae, Newsweek and The Washington Post and federal agencies such as DLA, DoD, USDA, GSA, NIH and many more. PMG has won numerous awards, including the Aurora Award, the Summit Award, the USA Film Festival, National Communicators, the Telly, the CINDY, and ITVA Award of Excellence. PMG creates some of the finest in corporate image video, marketing video and training video.