YouTube has devoted massive resources to make sharing videos online as easy as possible. In most cases if you want to share video on your website it makes sense to use a free service, like YouTube, built exactly for that purpose.
If it’s a very short, looping clip without sound then maybe you do want to host it. Think about if it’s worth the SEO hit you’ll take for a slower load time, and viewers not necessarily being able to play video on mobile devices. Is that video element really worth it?
If you are going to add video to your website here are some things to keep in mind.
Steps to upload videos in YouTube
- Sign in to your YouTube account
- You’ll want an account associated with your website, not your personal one
- In the top-right corner, click CREATE and then Upload videos
- Select the file you’d like to upload
- Fill out the title and other info as it uploads
- A good description will help your video get found if that’s what you want
- Copy the SHARE link under the live video to add it to your website
Drawbacks of YouTube
- Advertising
- YouTube loves to throw ads in whenever they can and it can take some extra steps to not bombard your users with advertising.
- Tracking
- YouTube and Google love to track everything that comes close to them. Depending on your user’s privacy concerns this could be an issue.
- Branding
- YouTube, and to a lesser extent Vimeo, have very distinctive interfaces and branding that your users will recognize. This may not work with your brand.
YouTube vs. Vimeo
- Vimeo has higher quality video while YouTube is faster loading
- Vimeo offers more control over the interface
- It is easier to find videos posted to YouTube. If you’re using it to embed on your website this isn’t so important though.
There’s plenty more to dive into when it comes to putting your videos on YouTube. If you have any questions about this, or if there is something I left out, please let me know. I’d love to talk more about it if you do :)
Best,
Chris