Part 2 of my Video SEO series (Part 1 is here) deals with what video file format you should use and how to create it for publishing. So while some of this information pertains to  search engine optimization for your video, a solid chunk of it is really a how-to for publishing your web videos online.

Flash (.flv) has overwhelmingly become the posting format of choice for web publishers. All major video distribution sites (like YouTube) transcode whatever format you upload into Flash for publishing. There are three main reasons why Flash has become so popular:

1. Compatibility: The majority of internet users have the Adobe Flash player pre-installed in their browsers regardless if they are on a PC or Mac. Quicktime (.mov) files on the other hand may be difficult for some PC users to view, while Windows Media Player files (.wmv) may be difficult for Mac users.

2. Quality & Size: The Flash compression codec is able to ’squish’ the video file into a small file size while still maintaining a quality picture. How small and how good of quality will depend on your compression settings but generally speaking you will be able to find a compression ‘recipe’ that fulfills your needs. I’ll talk more about compressing Flash files for the web in a minute.

3. Player options: Using Flash gives you a lot of options as far as the look and functionality of the player you want to publish your video in. If you are using a video sharing site like YouTube or Vimeo you are stuck with the basic layout of the player but most have some color, and size customization options. If you are hosting the video yourself, there are even more skins and player options available. In addition to changing color and size, you can add a watermark or logo, add social media features and turn the embed code on or off. A couple of popular player options are FlowPlayer and JW FLV Player.

Their are a couple of drawbacks to Flash worth mentioning. The first is that there is no meta-data (title, description and other information) stored within the actual file. Therefore it becomes even more important to surround the post of the video with keyword rich information relating to the video. Another drawback to Flash is it is generally hard for a viewer to download. If you would like your video to be downloaded, it would be a good idea to offer a download version of the video in a different format like .mov, .mp4, or .avi.

Using Flash also means you will most likely have to export your file first from your video editing software in an uncompressed format and then compress that file to Flash. I recommend exporting a Quicktime (.mov) file using Component Video, Animation or another one of the loss-less codecs.

Next you will need to convert that file to Flash. There are some online FLV converters but you don’t have any options as far as optimizing settings to get it to the size of file and dimensions you need while still getting the best quality. For PC users Riva’s FLV Encoder looks to be a pretty good free option as it allows you to change size, frame rate and bit rate. I have yet to find a good free Mac option - if you know of one please comment below.

As for paid software, you might check out On2 Flix Standard ($39, PC and Mac) or DV Kitchen ($79.95, Mac only). On the more professional side, Sorenson Squeeze is definitely an industry leader and what I use at work.

If you are confused as to how the video player and the video file are used together (and what embed code does) , I cover this topic in more detail inside my free 26 page report “Web Video Is Key.”

Tags: compression, conversion, file format, flash, flv, mov, quicktime, video converter, video file format, video format, Video SEO, wmv

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 12th, 2009 at 6:42 pm and is filed under Strategy, Techniques, Tips, Tools, Video SEO. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.