A guide to enriching your website by uploading your existing company videos

Is your website static, or does it lack visual, spoken or written information that could help lift your message off the page and help your visitors connect with your business goals? Many companies struggle with the question of how to best communicate their core values, key products and services, or their vision for the future on their website.

But perhaps you already have the answers to the questions, if you could just use the video, audio and photo files that you have created in the last year. With broadband internet technology and cloud-based media services this is more possible than ever. A webcast provider, photo sharing sites and cloud-storage can take those materials, put them on the internet, supporting you to display them on your website.

So how you you take the video of last year’s AGM and get it online?

The simple answer is via a webcast. Webcasting uses the internet to take a video or audio presentation and make it available online. Webcast companies process your video or audio files to optimize them for online broadcast, and then provide you with a link to the file that you can share on your website and through your business networks. This process is called encoding. Once encoded, your videos can be viewed on any internet-enabled computer that has broadband. Typically this applies to all computers built in the last 2-4 years, and many webcasts can be viewed using Windows Media Player, Real Player and Flip for Mac; software that most people already have installed.

If you don’t have your own in-house I.T. team then choose a webcast provider who offers additional support. Several companies can create lobby pages, branded players and registration players. It’s even possible to show slides such as a PowerPoint presentation, and ask questions of your audience. In a live webcast you can have question and answer sessions and surveys.

If you are concerned about your content being available at all times it may be necessary to arrange website hosting. Telus can actually host your content on their own servers using a secure system called mirroring, which ensures that if one server goes down a fully functioning copy, or mirror, of the website, hosted on another server, will take over.

Other photo sharing services, such as Flickr and Picasa provide similar support for photo images. These actually include social media components where your staff, clients and other interested people can interact with your photos, commenting and sharing with their friends or colleagues. This social activity can help expand the reach of your business into new networks.

Multi-media presentations on your website help you convert more visitors into clients. Virtual greeters, videos of your production facility, or how you serve your customers help make your business real to online visitors. Even something as simple as a powerpoint presentation can bring your services to life. Don’t miss out on the opportunity to add media to your website, it is shown to dramatically increase user engagement.