Video contents is trending in marketing. There are plenty of places where you can post your videos for your target audience to see them. Alongside this, there are certain features that limits your ability to make captions for your videos, right?
Are you having a hard time making the right captions for your videos? If that’s the case, you’re in the right place! We’re going to tackle the ins and outs of video captioning. Make the most out of your video captions to boost your engagement and sales.
Why caption matters to video production?
First of all, there are many distribution channels to your videos. That can be YouTube, Vimeo, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and more. Each of these platforms have their own rules on how you can insert captions to your videos. That said, it’s best if you incorporate your captions during your video production phase.
Why so? Not all channels allow you to add a caption inside their platform. For instance, Instagram doesn’t allow it. But you can add closed captions on YouTube. That’s why adding your captions during video production is critical.
Whether it’s your first time to make your explainer videos or case study videos, it pays well if you add a caption before posting them.
Closed Captions
Have you seen those white text captions enclosed inside a black box? I think you’ll see them most on YouTube and in televisions. That’s right, this is a closed caption.
Closed captions vs Subtitles
Many people think that closed captions and subtitles are the same. But actually, they are not. What’s the difference? Closed captions are created in the same language as the audio. Its main purpose is to assist deaf or people with low hearing abilities to understand the video. Closed captions are also associated with background sounds to give a holistic experience to the viewer.
On the other hand, subtitles are the translation of the video’s language. It’s not the same language as the audio of the content. Subtitles don’t have any background sounds or audio notifications.
Also, you can watch a video without looking at the subtitle, and still, you can understand it. But in terms of marketing, closed captions is the best. It reinforces the experience of your viewers. Making them more engaged with your content.
What are the benefits of using captions?
Not all people have excellent hearing abilities. Around 20 percent of Americans are losing their hearing ability as they age. That said, adding captions to your videos will greatly help user experience.
Some institutions, particularly schools, are required by the American Disabilities Act (ADA) to add captions to video contents. This helps users to learn about the content even when they have difficulty with hearing.
On the other hand, in the world of social media marketing. Muted videos with captions are trending. Many people prefer them since it’s not as disturbing as those with loud background music. Even when you’re on the bus or street, you can still understand the video by reading through the captions. Therefore, video captions is really helpful in making your contents more friendly to viewers.
Closed captions on your video production process
Here are some of the basic steps in creating your closed captions:
- Grab the approved script of your video and convert that to .SRT file. A “trigger” is the timeframe of which the caption will be shown. Each caption will have their respective trigger.
- Once you are done with video editing. You need to prepare the .SRT file of your captions. When you upload your video, you also upload the .SRT file.
Open Captions
This kind of caption will always be viewable to the audience, unlike closed captions which you can turn off. So, will you use open captions? The main benefit of open captions is that it can be delivered to a wider audience. This kind of video captioning is used in theaters and televisions. Oftentimes, they don’t have the equipment to add closed captions, that’s why they’re using open captions.
Let’s Wrap Up
Video captioning is a hot issue in the world of marketing. Many people argue if it’s necessary to add captions to videos or not. If you’ll ask us, there are benefits to adding them.
First, it makes your content friendlier to various viewers, especially for this with hearing impairments. Secondly, you can incorporate keywords into your captions, making them more visible to audiences searching for that keyword.
