UX Best Practices | Videos

A video is one of the most powerful tools of visual communication. We’re watching it on our desktops, tablets, and phones.

Video content is booming. Videos are widely used on the internet or specifically on websites to ensure the user can easily understand your product or business. It helps businesses communicate better with online audiences, and enables website user to understand easily and quickly. With the rise of video content, it becomes a mandatory part of a company’s sales and support strategies online. So, how can we make sure videos on our website or on our social media pages, help users to understand easily and quickly for better user experience?

Here are a few best practices you can consider for your video user experience.

1)  Know when and where a video is needed on your website. For example

  •    Explanation of product or services.
  •    To share your expertise
  •    To tell a Story

2)  Give Users Control and Know Them

When users come at your website, they don’t like to be surprised by video or audio content that begins playing without their permission. Video and the accompanying audio can upset or confuse users and can interfere with their consumption of content on the page. Users don’t like being overwhelmed by video content that they do not expect. Links leading to video content should show the type of content to which they lead. Users find links lead to pages filled with text and images, not video. Especially not a video that plays automatically.

3)  Make Every Second Count

Videos need more of users’ time than any other piece of content because they don’t continue rapid scanning for information (users can’t skip video content in between). Users are concerned with their time and need to know how much time they need to give to see the content. In the area of video content, even a few moments can feel long to a user. So, try your best to keep the video as short as possible.

4) Tell them what to do Next

Users should know what the video is about before being asked them to see the video. The name or title of the video should be detailed and brief and should be followed by the topic, important information about the person who appears in the video, and the time of the video.Always guide the user, what the user should do at the end of a video.

5)  Don’t count only on Video

There are no usual ways for users when they are watching video on a site/ in-app. Some watch the video immediately, some explore the surrounding text first, and afterward see the video, some have no excitement in watching. As a result, there is really no guarantee that someone will watch video content when it is displayed. Thus, if users aren’t ready to access the content or simply don’t want to, they should have the ability to receive data in another way. And on the other hand, presenting content as a video can restrict access to the data contained in this format for anyone who cannot see or hear the content.

These were the UX Best Practices which I think are really important but are occasionally ignored. If you think that I missed any, drop your message in the comment section.

Team Znbound
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