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For my customers

This video tutorial shows my EVP subscription customers and clients — as well as those who own their own copy of Easy Video Player — how to easily make html that you can place in your blog or website so that your web videos appear in a lightbox effect.

In addition to showing you how to easily generate the appropriate html for lightbox code, I’ll also show you one of my favorite features of the central dashboard.

That is, even after your video has been embedded on one or multiple sites, you can actually make changes to video player parameters in the central dashboard and then see those changes automatically propagate to the embedded videos — wherever they’re embedded.

New addition to my “Recommends” list: Video Traffic Academy

On the recommendation of a friend, I took the opportunity to review James Wedmore’s YouTube video traffic course.  After just one module, I found myself jonesin’ to revisit some of my published videos in my own YouTube channel.

I wanted to apply some of the tactics James reminded me about when I analyzed some of the higher-traffic’d videos in my channel and see where it all came from and what keywords people used to find those videos.

In the video above, I focus specifically on revisiting the YouTube Annotations video I posted a while back.  I’ve all but forgotten about it.  So you can imagine my surprise when I saw that, as it turned out, it generated over 4,000 views so far.

But, I have to say, the better lesson for me was in comparing my optimization technique with those of other video producers.  (You’ll see a bit of that in this video.)  I’ll concede, there’s more I could’ve done — more I will do moving forward! — to optimize videos I upload to YouTube so I can more effectively use the views I generate from YouTube for traffic to my other site(s).

Anyway, check out the video.  The path you’ll see me reverse engineer will likely give you some ideas for optimizing your own videos.

Also, it’s worth saying that what you see me trace in the video is just one of many techniques you’ll learn in James’ course.   It’s a good program.

Obviously, I’m sold.  As a matter of fact, I bought James’ course myself.  And, I’m now comfortable recommending it to you.  And, since you know that I only affiliate with, and recommend products and services that I’ve personally vetted, you can be sure that I’ll be adding James’ course to my Mel Recommends library.

I need your help.

It won’t cost you anything, except maybe the 5 minutes (or less) it’ll take you to give me a little feedback.

Here’s the deal.  The subject of me conducting a workshop about creating web video and screencasting content has come up on more than just a few occasions.  Mostly, I’ve hemmed and hawed, preferring instead to blog about the techniques and tactics I use.  But, I’m relenting.   I’m putting actual elbow grease to making the live workshop a reality.

The thing is, I don’t want to go in cold with topics that I think are important. So, I’m reaching out to you.  I need to know what topics other (non-Mel Aclaro) people think are important topics.  

So, can you help me with this 4-question feedback form? Thanks!

The point of this article is about how to do the same thing — skip to a YouTube timecode — for YouTube video that’s embedded on YOUR site.

If you click the video above, and you’re doing so from a desktop or laptop (this technique doesn’t seem to work for iDevices), then you’ll see that it doesn’t start at the beginning of the video.  But rather, it starts you off at about the 38 second mark in the video.  (That actually solves an annoying problem where the first 37 seconds of the video kept stuttering, for some reason.  Using the parameter setting I’ll show you below, I’m able to skip the annoying part.)  But, all that isn’t really the point of this blog post.  What is the point, is the syntax you’ll want to add in your embed code.

(Click to enlarge.)

When you grab the embed code from the YouTube video (using the “old” embed code method), there are two places in it that have a source URL reference to the video.  Those parts are highlighted in yellow above.  (You can click the picture to enlarge it.)

What you want to do is add the text below

;start=99

to the part of the URL that is just prior to the last set of quotes.  And, you’ll need to replace the “99″ in the sample above with the actual timecode you want in units of seconds.  (Note also the semicolon.)

So, in my snapshot above, for example, we’re starting the video at the 38 second timecode into the video.  Meanwhile, in a previous article I wrote about the 10 Commandments of Screencasting, I included an embedded video that starts at the 15 minute point.  Accordingly, the parameter setting I used for it was ;start=900.  (i.e., 15 minutes x 60 sconds per minute = 900.)

So What?

You can obviously use this technique to focus on a specific part of a video that you want to bring to the attention of your readers.  In the example of the video above, I simply fast forwarded you past a segment of the video that would otherwise make people simply want to “click off.”  Essentially resurrecting a video that I otherwise had left for dead.  (Unless, of course, I simply re-compiled the video and re-uploaded it.)

You could also use this technique when you use someone else’s video.  As in the example of the 10 Commandments of Screencasting video, rather than have you sit through the first 14m:59s of a 30-minute long video, I’m instead able to simply take you directly to the part of the YouTube video that was most relevant to the topic.  It keeps the article relevant to the topic of discussion, and shows your readers that you respect their time.

All in all, what this allows you to do is keep your visitors on your site longer, rather than bouncing them away to another website.

Did this help?  What other examples can you think to share for when you’d use this parameter?

I started this little project to help answer a question that frequently comes up in one of the professional meetup groups I regularly attend, and which is hosted by the venerable Bob Watson (@TopBrokerOC).

Because each video was created by a different author, I tried to sequence the playlist according to a logical progression from basic topics related to signing up for Google Analytics, and Google Analytics login to more advanced topics about: Google Goals and Google Visualizations.

Remember, if you like this playlist or any of the individual videos, show your appreciation and give props by liking and/or sharing them with your network.  Why?

Because mindsharing rocks!  

I first saw Dan’s 10 Commandments of Screencasting last year during an interview I did with Techsmith’s The Forge online channel.  Dan’s piece comes in after my interview–at exactly the 15 minute point in the video.  (If I did it right, then the video should just start playing at the correct spot when you push play.)

I think you’ll enjoy this.  If not for the great tips Dan packs in there, then watch it for its entertainment value.

Highlights: 10 Commandments (more or less) of Screencasting

Since I found myself smiling and marveling at Dan’s segment pretty much all the way through it, I can’t honestly say I caught where one commandment left off and the other picked up.  But, I think this is pretty close:

1. Hide the goods
2. Consider using a user login that you use exclusively for your screencasts
3. Consider what to put behind you when using camera video
4. Choose the right desktop background
5. Honor your resolution
6. Don’t stay thirsty
7. Plainly state your intentions
8. Give your video an appropriate name
9. Shamelessly plug yourself
10. Get some rest

White labeling is the practice of slapping a different company brand for the same product.

The name derives from back in the day when they used to make vinyl records.  Before records were to be publicly released, promotional copies were sent to DJs, often without any branding.  Plain white label promos were sometimes produced for certain well-connected DJs to distribute as demo discs.  I wrote a short list of examples in the section under the video.

In this video you’ll learn about the profiles feature in the video player I use in a lot of my self-hosted productions.  Profiles let you create and display different video players that have different behaviors while they share the same underlying video.  In addition to helping you with white labeling your screencast or web video projects, you can also define different behaviors, depending on your audience.

Here are a few real world examples of where you could use the profiles feature in Easy Video Player:

• White label your videos.  You could create a series of web videos or screencasts that you license to different companies while showing each company’s corporate logo even as they each access the same video.

• Membership sites.  Present the same video one way to your public while presenting it another way to your members.  For example, you might allow members to download your video, while denying the same feature to the general public.  Similarly, you could display hotspot buttons, buy buttons and newsletter sign up forms in the public version of your videos, while removing the same buttons and forms from the members’ side.

• Business Development.  Overlay different company logos on your video proposal or video demo when you send the same video along to different customer prospects.  Additionally, you can:
• Define different profiles that redirect prospects to different landing pages.
• Define different profiles that display different contact information for each sales rep while using the same video.

I think you get the picture, right?  What other examples can you think of for video profiles?

I sent this video to past subscribers this week.  But, I thought it wouldn’t hurt to open this invitation up to the general public, as well.  I hope you consider it.  :)

For my past subscribers:  If you no longer want to be subscribed to my updates, no hard feelings.  You don’t have to do anything; the update list you were on for all of 2011 will be deactivated Sunday night, January 22, 2012.  But, before you decide, consider some of these titles.  They’re representative of the themes you may be missing out on in 2012:

• How to add call to action buttons and opt in forms in your web video
• How to encode video and screencasts optimally for the web
• The poor man’s wireless microphone
• How to remove the YouTube logo from your YouTube videos

If you’re NOT currently subscribed to my updates list:  then I can only assume that you’re here because Google or a friend sent you a link that interested you.  Welcome!  If the topics you find here match your interests, then you’ll want to subscribe in the form below.  (Or the one at the end of the video.)  Thanks for visiting!  :)

In this video you’ll learn how easy it is to embed a hotspot button inside your EVP software.

Hotspot buttons are powerful in-context video objects that can help you trigger calls to action at certain cue points in your web video or screencast.  In fact, if you choose to, you can make any image appear at designated cue points.  They don’t have to be buttons at all.

Here are some ideas for hotspot images:

• Business development professionals:  Place your client’s or prospect’s company logo at a timed cue point in order to add a personal touch to a video proposal.  Associate a hotspot to it that navigates your prospect to your contact page.  (Tip:  Create different video display profiles for different clients or prospects.  With video display profiles, you can show different images or calls to action to different audiences while using the same video.  I’ll show you how to do that in an upcoming training video.)

• Real estate agents:  Make one generic pre-listing presentation that introduces your services to prospective listing clients.  Then, through the video display profile feature, customize your pre-listing video for your prospect by overlaying a picture of their property; associate a hotspot with the picture to navigate prospects to your user voice website or online CRM lead capture page.

• Small practice health care professionals:  Personalize a welcome video for visitors to your website while overlaying a hotspot button at a certain cue point that navigates visitors to your appointment scheduler or contact page.

• Trainers, authors, speakers:  Publish a free training video teaser series that uses a sequence of “Next” and/or “Previous” buttons linking each video in the series to one another.  (Note: You can even limit public sharing of your training videos via the Security feature.  This feature allows you to designate only certain website domains in which your videos are authorized to play.  I’ll show this feature in a future training video.)

The possibilities are limited only by your imagination and business sense.  Take a look at the video and see how to easily make a web video with an embedded hotspot button or image.

Outside of the three examples I listed above, what other ideas for hotspot video buttons are you willing to share?