Aside from enjoying increased engagement and shares, there are three powerful reasons for including multimedia content on your website.  It increases the time spent on your site, benefits your SEO and enables you to optimize your branding.

Multimedia increases time spent on your site

We expect instant gratification. As our attention spans continue to shrink, and the content we consume reflects that. Writers, journalists, and bloggers have adapted their writing to compensate for this shift. No matter how brilliant you think your video or blog is, if it’s too long, or lacks engaging multimedia to aid in breaking up the monotony, visitors will spend less time on your site. 

Multimedia optimizes on-page SEO

When crawling your content, search engines look for keywords and key phrases that can increase your ranking. It’s vital to add metadata for every element you upload, including images and video. You should always optimize your image size to ensure optimal page load times and make sure video loads.  Otherwise, it will affect your ranking in search results. Be certain to name your files, using a naming convention that is both relevant to the file and also works to promote your page or post. Include descriptions on every element you upload to contribute to your ranking.

Multimedia yields stronger Branding

Adding multimedia to your website is an effective way of drawing in more viewers and building your brand. People have become extremely visual. It would be nearly impossible effectively position your brand today without including audio, video and supporting images to build brand recognition. Put simply, building your brand requires the use of every multimedia asset available to you.

Multimedia Equates to Better Branding: Adding multimedia to your website or blog is an effective way of drawing in more viewers and building brand… period. These days, people have become extremely visual. While video is one of the most popular multimedia choices, websites and blogs offering an even broader variety of digital media, like audio and slideshows, enjoy even higher engagement rates.

Types of multimedia

Images:  They are easy to share and can spice up your content. Imagine a cooking blog without images…that’s almost impossible to visualize! Tutorials are also always better if they contain images that provide clear visual direction for people navigating their way around a product or service.  If you have high-quality images included on your website, you can guarantee they will be seen, and possibly shared.

Slideshows: Slideshows enable you to feature multiple images, video and even audio. A well-organized slideshow generates a storng visual impact and can keep visitors fully engaged. Don’t include a slideshow for the sake of it, however, and make sure it is well done. Viewers have become so accustomed to seeing slideshows that it has to be unique and eye-catching in order to make an impact.

Videos: Video content is more likely than text to appear on the first page of search engine results. Additionally, just having the word ‘video’ improves click-through rates by an estimated 55%. This is the easiest way to make your content more appealing and shareable.

“People will always choose an online video tutorial over reading the manual.”

However, in order to be SEO optimized, don’t forget to attach proper meta-data and all the specifications Google needs, in order to determine what your video actually contains. If you want to go the extra mile, you can even add transcripts of your videos for indexing and usability.

Podcasts: These are another engaging option that can serve as a complementary resource. Creating a weekly or monthly podcasting event can provide you with a database of fans that will return for your product.

Be warned – try to be consistent with your multimedia branding, as good SEO optimization takes constant effort and a sustained editorial strategy.