What do you think about video blogs?

[Agota]

I'm wondering what do you guys think about blogs that consist solely of video entries?

Writing is one of my strengths, so I have never considered having a solely video blog myself, but what should people whose strength lies in video medium do?

I've heard that it's harder to get search engine traffic to video blogs than to written blogs because of SEO stuff. Does that affect the traffic significantly or is it not something to be worried about?

Also, how would you go about marketing a video blog that is completely new with 0 traffic?

I'd say focus on posting in relevant forums, but what else is there, since guest posting is not an option?

Or is it better for person like that to hire a ghostwriter to do the writing while creating videos like crazy themselves and switch to videos only blog once the traffic takes off?

I'm really interested what you think about this guys, thanks!

[Clint Cora]

As you might now, I am very video intensive. I have something like 250+ videos on YouTube and I've released 58 episodes of my Motivational WebTV to date.

From my experience, I have found that unless you are well known, video only blogs are harder to promote because of the lack of content available for Google. So the video blogs like the one called Help, My Business Sucks (which I follow), are always supplemented with text in the same post.

Even for my own posts where I feature a video, I always have at least 300 words of text to supplement the video, which is embedded. This makes it easier for the post to be indexed by Google.

As for the decision to use Google or not, it depends on the individual. Some people do not carry well on video and some do. I don't think you need to have video and this is evidenced by many successful bloggers who just write.

For myself, I'm a speaker so it makes sense for me to do video. Video also allows me to show certain sides of my personality (the goofy side) that doesn't always come across well in text alone. For example, my last video was done poolside in a bathing suit. You can't do this with text alone.

I personally follow two websites that are mostly video intensive. The one I mentioned earlier and I also follow Gary Vaynerchuk.

[MariconesUnited]

In my experience I prefer reading something that mixes multiple media. Video, photo, music, text, whatever. My non-existent non-scientific study shows me that 73% of people feel the same way!

[CoolBee]

I hate 'em!
I get really annoyed when I see an item on a blog that looks interesting and it's only in video format. I find most of them are amateurish - some guy in a tshirt in his bedroom recording himself on his mobile phone - and uninspiring to watch and not only are they consuming my precious monthly bandwidth allowance but it's so much faster to skim through the material in written format and then reread it if it warrants it.
The problem with the video is you can't skim it, you have to waste forever downloading it (and which I don't.)

So I guess, if you want to do video because some people do prefer them, give a transcript (or - better- written version too which may not be an exact transcript).

[DBV]

It's great. Guy like Gary Vaynerchuk built a Wine show Wine Library TV doing 20 minute videos each day. His audience grew to like 85 000 viewers daily.. Here is what he did:

Viddler.com - It takes 2 cents to GROW a wine show - Uploaded by garyvaynerchuk

and

Viddler.com - Details On A Show Idea - Uploaded by garyvaynerchuk

Video is best medium because it engages people visually, mentally and in audio. Writing can't compare but it doesn't mean it's bad either. Seth Godin still writes, cuz that's his strength, he didn't change it even when new trends came up like video, twitter, facebook etc.

Look at how popular TV is too..much more popular then radio and press. So if you want to do video, do it! Combine it with a transcript like Clint said.

[Clint Cora]

Originally Posted by DBV

It's great. Guy like Gary Vaynerchuk built a Wine show Wine Library TV doing 20 minute videos each day. His audience grew to like 85 000 viewers daily.. Here is what he did:

Viddler.com - It takes 2 cents to GROW a wine show - Uploaded by garyvaynerchuk

and

Viddler.com - Details On A Show Idea - Uploaded by garyvaynerchuk

Video is best medium because it engages people visually, mentally and in audio. Writing can't compare but it doesn't mean it's bad either. Seth Godin still writes, cuz that's his strength, he didn't change it even when new trends came up like video, twitter, facebook etc.

Look at how popular TV is too..much more popular then radio and press. So if you want to do video, do it! Combine it with a transcript like Clint said.

Gary is a character and carries well on video. The best thing for anyone considering video is to be honest with themselves to determine whether they are video material or not. Some people are not. I have seen some very popular bloggers who tried to do some videos and they were pretty bad in my opinion. It's not a medium for everyone.

Video works well with the addition of text, but only if you have an engaging presense in front of the camera. Otherwise, it can backfire on you.

A third option that some people do especially for more technical topics is video via slide presentations. These are basically Powerpoint presentations or computer screens with voiceover. These are quite effective for certain niches. I personally don't like them as much but again, many have been very successful.

[WarrenG]

Agota,

If it's going to be you in the video then I think it's a great idea!

But as CoolBee said, consider putting a transcript of the video up too, so that people can skim and just dip in on the bits they want.

Also eye-tracking research has found that "Talking head" videos are boring, and people get distracted by other parts of the web page. I don't think this will be much of a problem with your particular head, but just in case you might want to throw in some animations, bullet points, photos, shoot from two or more angles and switch throughout... stuff like that. Check out Jay Uhdinger for a great example of that - he does it brilliantly.

Oh, also, some benefits of videos are that it allows people who talk about your post on their blogs to embed something. Bloggers like embedding things, so that could be an additional draw to get people talking and linking to you. And if you make a product, a video pitch is a pretty popular and presumably effective technique for getting some more sales -- Clint Cora might know more about that since he uses videos to get email addresses. So it'd be good for you to get some practice in front of the camera and in editing, so that if you do release a product you can make a sharper video pitch.

[Clint Cora]

Originally Posted by WarrenG

Clint Cora might know more about that since he uses videos to get email addresses. So it'd be good for you to get some practice in front of the camera and in editing, so that if you do release a product you can make a sharper video pitch.

Yes indeed. Instead of a regular impersonal website, I try to get in front of the camcorder whenever I can so that my website visitors can see that I am a real person behind my website, rather than a faceless name. Hopefully, by seeing my face on video, my visitors will relate to me better so that I can start building a longer term relationships with them. That's one of the huge values of using video - you can build a connection with your visitors much better since they can see you - your personality, warts and all, on video.

[WarrenG]

Clint I love the bit at about 1:00 where you turn your head to look at the camera. It's cheesy but I love it!

By the way what style of karate did you do? (apologies for tangent...).

[Aminka Ozmun]

I share CoolBee's reaction towards them, and I think WarrenG's got good advice about how to do them right.

Just last week I had to go print out some arm-toning workout information as a personal favor to a friend of a friend, and it seems like no matter what keyword I tried I kept getting all these sites with people doing exercises in the gym! Maybe that's what sells in that industry, but after the umpteenth site with nothing but ads and a few embedded videos I thought to just copy and paste some stuff out of a few books on Amazon instead!

[Agota]

Thank you for replies, guys!

I'm planning to do videos in the future myself, but the reason I asked was that I've met a person who seems not very strong in writing, but wants to create a successful blog and use it as a platform from his personal development business (coaching, books, workshops, etc). I really liked his video, since although there's loads of polishing to be done, guy clearly has a spark he needs to engage audience and video might be his strongest medium. I'm crazy about the development of online businesses, blog in particular, therefore it was an interesting puzzle for me from a business perspective: how can someone who is weak in writing as a medium, but strong in video as a medium, turn his blog into a business? This is the reason I asked for your input, since I'm not very familiar with running video blogs as such

[Agota]

Originally Posted by WarrenG

Agota,

If it's going to be you in the video then I think it's a great idea!

...awwww, thank you (*blushes*)..

[danthony]

I like a little of video and writing as long as the content is good.

[Clint Cora]

Originally Posted by WarrenG

Clint I love the bit at about 1:00 where you turn your head to look at the camera. It's cheesy but I love it!

By the way what style of karate did you do? (apologies for tangent...).

Yeah, I started doing different angles after watching a few others do it. Gary Vaynerchuk also does this now in his more polished videos. It breaks up the videos in parts better.

As for martial arts, I have two dedicated webpages that cover my martial arts background. I invite anybody interested to check them out.

[Clint Cora]

Originally Posted by Agota

...awwww, thank you (*blushes*)..

Judging from your photo (if that's really you), I think you have a good chance of being a real hit on video!

[Agota]

Originally Posted by Clint Cora

Judging from your photo (if that's really you), I think you have a good chance of being a real hit on video!

Thank you, Clint!

Thank you guys for your input, your perspectives were definitely valuable for me

[splok]

Anyone that does video entries should also post text transcripts of the video below imo. It fixes the "lack of indexable content" problem, and it lets people who would just prefer to read the text do so (like me!) .