Why Should You Use Closed Captions Today?
Even if you have never used closed captions personally, you should have some idea of where you can find them on a video. These captions also have several benefits beyond merely describing what is on the screen. Here are 3 reasons why you should use closed captions with your video content.
Accessibility
First and foremost will always be accessibility. You need to make sure that your content is as accessible as possible so more and more people can find it. The more people you can reach with a video, the wider the demographics that will be able to access your content.
Closed captions were designed to help those who are hard of hearing. They will be able to properly access your content with the help of closed captions, and they otherwise might have had to miss out. However, closed captions can also benefit those who might be accessing your content with English as a second language. Closed captions can help them access your content if the English in it is very fast or heavily accented.
SEO Indexing
Search engine optimization is important for any type of content. You will always have an aim to make sure that your content ranks in the best possible way. This means that you will need to give search engines as much text as possible to crawl.
Most crucially, search engines are not able to crawl video. However, they are able to crawl any text that might be with the videos. This includes closed captions, tags, and other additions made with live captioning software that you might attach to the video. Therefore, for search engines to be able to find videos and other content you might make, you need to make sure you have all the information they need in place!
Improve Average Watch Time
One of the most important parts of making video content is ensuring that people watch it all the way through. You have just 10 seconds to capture an audience member’s attention or risk them clicking off to look at something else. This gives you a very short window to work with.
However, one way to get around this is to use closed captions. Though you might not think of it initially, closed captions are a great way to capture someone’s attention. If they have the option to turn on captions, you are more likely to see people engaging with the content and sitting all the way through.
Closed captions are required as standard by many video publishing sites, but it is also very easy to apply captions to your videos. If you want to produce video content in any way, you need to think about how to make it accessible and interesting to all who will watch it. Closed captioning is just one important step you can take in making sure that all aspects of the video are of the highest quality. Take the time to create high-quality videos with closed captions in place, and you should notice more people interacting with them.
