Updated August 13th 2020.
In this post, I list different ways you can display your videos using the tools from Thrive Themes.
Videos often help to communicate your ideas and the solutions in a much better way than text does.
This post was created using using Thrive Architect and Thrive Leads, two plugins available for WordPress. There are probably other plugins that could achieve some of what you will see, but the Thrive Themes plugins and themes makes it easy to do this.
I will cover :
- Choosing from the two types of video displays.
- Choosing the right video size.
- Choosing the right style of video players.
- Adding more ways to view your videos.
- Engaging your audience with a Call to Action.
Let's get to it.
Choosing between embedding or popping up
There are 2 ways of displaying videos.
The first way is to embed it directly on your page.
The second way is to have it on a lightbox (popup box) that is triggered by an action, like a click, or through an automated way, like a timer or reaching a specific place on a page.
You can mix and match both ways and see what converts better for you.
There are some reasons to choose one over the others, here are some examples:
Embedded Videos
Pop Up Videos (aka 2-step videos)
Choosing the right size for your video
Sizing your video
300px wide (Embed)
800px wide
1400px wide
If you are planning a layout with multiple small videos, it's often better use pop ups instead of embeds. Here is an example.
Video Options within Thrive Architect
Basic Embedding of Videos
Pop Up Videos
You choose your source and simply paste your video URL. Thrive Architect will handle the display of the video, so you don't need to get video embed codes manually from your video hosting platform.
Styling Up your Video Embed
with Thrive Architect
1. Adding thumbnails
Thumbnail get help you get a better CTR (clickthrough rate).
Thrive Architect supports custom thumbnails. Here are a few examples:
With Thumbnail custom static thumbnail
With Animated Thumbnail
With Wistia's Video Thumbnails.
With a Youtube Video.
2. Adding Shadows
You can add drop shadows to your embeds easily. Thrive Architect supports multiple layers of shadows, giving you lots of options to match your branding.
Here's an example with dropshadows on all sides.
3. Templates
There are 15 ready-made style for your embeds. You can see the list of the left-hand side, and an example below, the Black Monitor style.
4. Animation
You can put your Video Element into a Content Box and use animation to draw attention to it.
Add more ways to view your videos
1. Sticky Video Preview with Popup
You can see in the lower right corner a video preview that triggers a popup (built in the lead group as a second state). Videos can be a powerful addition to your Lead Magnets.
This was built using a Vimeo video in a content box background. An icon as placed on top, and a trigger was created.
2. Seamless Video Popup on Click
Here are a few elements that can be clicked on to trigger a video.
Examples include buttons, icons, content boxs andcolumns.
Sometimes a video embed is not practical, and a simple text link. It can be this common clickable information icon, ? when it makes more sense as well.
Embed a button directly withing some text as well
Or have a mini thumbnail like this one
3. Sticky Video Embedded
In the lower right corner, you can see a slide-in showing a permanent videos that will stay on the screen as people scroll down. You can use this in some creative ways, for example to explain what is on the page.
You can easily integrate a button or link below or above the video as a Call to Action.
4. Exit-Intent Video Popup
When you leave the site, as you scroll outside of the viewable area of your browser, Thrive Leads can trigger a popup. This light box can be a video. It's very good to engage people that might have fallen through the cracks.
.
Offering more to your visitors.
Our clients hire us for lead generation. Thrive Leads is a great plugin to display buttons, forms on or around videos. Using videos is a great way to engage with clients. Giving the opportunities to opt-in or send a message during or after watching the videos is doubly fantastic.
Here are some examples:
1. Email Form Under the Video
To watch Watch Part 2. Fill in your details below
2. Button with Popup with simple opt-in
3. Video Popup with Calls to Action
If you want to show a call to action, or more text around the video, you can create a Thrive Leads ThriveBox and surround it with various elements.
Here's an example with 2 call-to-action buttons:
Thrive Leads allow for A/B testing directly in their tools. So it's a great occasion to try different options.
4. Lead Magnet made with a video background
Promotion boxes can be made of static images, but with Thrive Architect and Thrive Leads, you can have more visually striking, attention grabbing boxes.
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Comes with a series of 4 videos
5. Locked Videos
Locking video is another idea to engage your visitors. A free membership plan is one way to do it. If you are starting, and don't want to invest in a membership platform, you can create a page in WordPress, set it as non-indexable with Yoast, and put the final video on that page. You could drip a series of videos as well through your auto-responder campaigns.
Unlock this Video
Other Ideas: Selling your videos
If you want to sell some of your videos, here an example of a video background element used as a sales-tool to sell a video.
Buy this course, Only $9
Other Options: Video Backgrounds
Video Backgrounds are great. They can be but subtle or have real videos in them.
They don't play sound as they load with the page. However you can insert a icon on top of the background, and have a pop up box with sound when clicked.
Vertical Videos and other aspect ratio
You have more space on the side of a vertical video. This could be interesting to display more information about an offer.
Here's a 21:9 embed done by setting the height and width manually.
A/B Testing your videos opt-ins
Find out which video converts more
Thrive Leads comes with A/B testing.
So you can test multiple videos, or a video against an image or text-based content and see what works better.
A/B
Other Considerations
Videos and SEO
If you are interested in the SEO value of video embed, you can have a look at this Post from Moz,it is from 2012, but i would think the general principles still apply.
SEO
Using videos after you get the lead
LEADS
Once those visitors goes from Visitors to Lead, you can still continue to use Videos to interact with them by sending them to private pages where you can explain in more details your product offering. You can see this in action by showing your interest in our website design service. I have written this post on the tools to produce videos cheaply and fast.
Thrive Leads has the already subscribed state as well to display different content to subscribers.
Speed Consideration
SPEED
Test your page for speed to make sure load time is good. But it could also decrease it, you can convey a lot from a single videos and not having to insert images manually.
This page is slower than normal pages, as we load a lot of different players from different platforms.
Using Live Videos for additional reach
LIVE
You can consider going live, on facebook or youtube. Those 2 platforms are competing for eyeballs, and videos can go viral by using them.
You can embed your live videos on your website as well, and get opt-ins for it.
Using Live Videos for additional reach
CAPTIONS
Consider adding subtitles to your videos, and showing them on your embed. Lots of people do not have sound enabled. Chrome 2018 updates removes sound by default as well, subtitle allows to start to "read" the video until the sound is turned on by the user.
Autoplaying Videos
AutoPlay
Auto-playing with sound still works in most major browsers, except for Chrome. A recent updates they made allows for auto-play, but with the sound Off.
Make sure you set captions on your videos if you want to use auto-play.
Embedding Third-Party Videos
You can increase your own trust and brand by linking to other brands directly from your own blog posts are pages.
Here's an example of a video from Marketing School that supports what is being said in this post.
There is always a chance that people will click on the Youtube logo, and move off to Youtube. Something to be aware of.
Video Sequences
SEQUENCES
Instead of having one long video, you can break a video in multiple parts. If a topic branches out, you can tell in the first video which video the visitor should watch next based on their situation.
It may allow your visitors to listen to exactly what the need
Conclusion
In conclusion, the video tool built in Thrive Architect is great. If your layout makes the video small, use a image instead and use a popup under Animation & Action.
And with Thrive Leads, you can use the Video Embed on most types of opt-ins, so it's worth the time investment.