Adding subtitles to your videos is one of the most important things you can do. You’ll be able to connect with a larger audience, increase interaction, and raise your search engine results.
Reaching a Wider Audience
One of the most effective marketing strategies is video, but it’s crucial to remember that not everyone can hear what you’re saying. If your videos don’t include subtitles, you can miss out on a sizable audience because around 28 million Americans have hearing loss. Adding subtitles to your videos is the best way to make them accessible to deaf viewers. The text counterparts of spoken language in your videos are provided via subtitles, also known as closed captions, which may be toggled on or off with a button. Professional subtitling services from providers like Sonix ensure high-quality, accurate transcriptions and translations and perfectly-synchronized text to enhance the user experience. A video’s transcript can also be translated into other languages to expand your reach and grow your global audience. It is especially helpful for non-native speakers who may need to learn nuances and colloquialisms in your original video content.
Moreover, some social media users prefer to watch videos with the sound muted because of noisy environments or a lack of available headphones. Including subtitles allows those users to understand your content still and engage with it. Additionally, search engine results are more likely to show up for subtitled videos first, which is another aspect to consider. It means more visibility for your content and increased traffic to your website.
Boosting Engagement
A lot of marketers and video content creators forget that not everyone will be able to watch videos with their sound on. It is especially true for those commuting, working, or just scrolling through their phone social media feeds. Adding subtitles to your video content allows viewers who can’t or don’t want to listen to the audio to enjoy your video. A study found that 80% more people watched videos to the end when subtitles were added. Facebook reports that captioned videos have 16% more reach, 26% more reactions, and 17% more call-to-action click-throughs than non-captioned videos. Adding subtitles makes it easier for your audience to engage with your content, and more engaged audiences are more likely to like, share, comment on, and subscribe to your videos. Subtitles also make your videos search engine friendly, as Google indexes the text they contain (unlike automatically generated caption files, which can be tricky for SEO). Including keywords in your subtitles and transcript will improve keyword density, which in turn helps boost your video’s visibility on Google search results in pages. It is a great way to increase traffic to your website and videos and ultimately grow your business.
Boosting Search Engine Rankings
As we know, video is a powerful way to connect with your audience, but the need to add subtitles should be noticed. Studies show that videos with captions are viewed 80% more than their uncaptioned counterparts. In addition, videos with captions receive more likes, shares and call-to-action clicks. Captions also help people understand a video when they are on the go and don’t have access to audio. It can be especially important for medical or law enforcement videos with many technical languages or industry jargon, as well as fictional shows that use names that may be unfamiliar to viewers. Subtitles make the content more accessible to everyone, even when they aren’t listening or watching with headphones on.
Aside from making your videos more visible to a wider audience, the added text on the screen also helps search engines find them and rank them higher in results. It is because Google views video transcripts (and closed captions) as more valuable than just a regular blog post and indexes them accordingly. It is a great reason to take the time to script your videos and add subtitles, as opposed to relying on YouTube’s automatic transcriptions (which are indexed but not necessarily for SEO). Adding your captions also gives you more flexibility regarding how you include keywords in the title and description of the video.
Boosting Conversions
Studies have shown that subtitles help viewers learn new words and concepts more effectively. For this reason, they’re especially helpful when producing videos with a large amount of technical language, industry jargon, or brand names. Subtitles allow you to include all the necessary information without interrupting your viewers. Subtitles and closed captions are also important accessibility tools for your audience. Many of today’s video watchers cannot hear, and others prefer not to listen to audio. Reaching out to this demographic is made simple by adding subtitles to your videos, boosting the keyword density of your content’s SEO. Captioned videos are watched 12 percent more often than those without them. In addition, captioned videos receive more likes, comments, and reactions than their uncaptioned counterparts. The benefits of subtitles and closed captions are clear: they increase engagement, reach, search engine optimization, and conversion rates for your videos. To make the most of your investment in video production, consider including subtitles or closed captions for all your future videos. To get started, upload your video and choose the desired languages.