Nowadays, many of your target audience will browse the web on mobile devices, so you need to make sure every video you create can be viewed properly on any device size.
Why Optimize Video Content for Mobile Devices?
Video email campaigns or landing pages are pointless to someone who opens them on a mobile device only to encounter a poor experience. Optimising video for mobile is something you must be proactive about.
YouTube is critical for video marketing however, it should only be viewed as part of a much larger video strategy. At the moment, YouTube mobile doesn’t help much in the strategic goal of getting viewers to your website where they can convert. In the main, annotations do not work on YouTube mobile and it is difficult for viewers to read comments and look at the videos description. Therefore relying on YouTube mobile to drive viewers into your funnel is not ideal.
That’s why it is a good idea to start embedding videos on your own branded landing pages and promote these instead of just a YouTube channel alone. Here are the three things you’ll need (or need to do) to be mobile ready:
Responsive Video Players
Ensure your videos appear properly on mobile by making sure your video player changes size intuitively to suit the device it is being viewed on. Your video content needs to be visible on both an iPhone (640px wide), a large monitor (1920px wide), and everything in between. After creating your landing page, you can optimise for mobile sizing when you embed your YouTube video asset on the page. Ultimately, the player’s dimensions look appropriate for every screen size.
Bold Splash Screens
A splash screen or thumbnail image is what entices someone to click and watch, so this image needs to be as appealing as possible. It’s important to split test your splash screen images to find the one that your audience actually loves, but for mobile in particular, you’ll want to ensure you pick out an especially high-impact image.
A bold image will work on all device screen sizes and it’s good for search visibility as your videos become easily recognisable.
A play button overlay is the most addictive call to action on the web. Make sure it is visible on your splash screen too.
Make Your Call to Action Accessible
Even if your splash screen looks incredible and your video is responsive, you still need to consider how viewers can actually convert. The smaller screen size on mobile means people will likely watch the video rather than read text, but you can’t ensure they’ll watch right to the end where you’ve placed your call to action. This means you’ll need a CTA outside your video’s actual content for viewers to click on. On an iPhone, for example, viewing video is done full screen no matter what and this CTA won’t always be available to users if that’s the only place it’s located.
On a whole, when it comes to video marketing, don’t underestimate mobile. Your customers often receive your emails with video on their phones or tablets, and no matter where they are, you want them watching you content and then heading over to your site to watch even more. By using responsive players, larger eye-catching splash screens, and CTAs that exist outside the actual player, you’ll be on track for a great mobile video experience.
