Apparently every newspaper that has a bad Web site got some sort of memo that said, “if you just put video on your Web site, you’ll get tons of traffic and be a modern newspaper. It’ll be totally bitchin’.”
But here is the thing: Doing video poorly will only hurt your newspaper. It will cost you money, waste your staff resources and cause viewers to find other, better Web sites. Look at this video from The Morning Call of Gov. Ed Rendell (D-Pa.) announcing he is endorsing Hillary Clinton (I know, riveting).
It was shot on a cheap camera with an internal mic and without a tripod. The video doesn’t sound good, doesn’t look that good and — this is rich — someone walks in front of the camera at some point.
Real professional.
Plus the video is just plain boring. This event was not something made for Internet video, especially a clip that is almost two minutes of just press conference footage. It’s not a remotely important or exciting press conference.
I only watched the clip because a reader tipped me off to the bad video and how he felt it hurt the Morning Call’s image. The Morning Call, by the way, is the third largest paper in Pennsylvania with 100,000+ circulation.
Newspapers, don’t do video that isn’t shot well or by someone who knows how to shoot video. You don’t need the fanciest camera, but you should know when to use a tripod and what is worth shooting. Both of those judgments were clearly lacking in this video.
Long before I’d invest in video, I’d do these things: audio clips to add to print stories, photo essays, photo galleries, audio slideshows, databases, flash infographics, blogs, twitter feeds, social features and microsites.
And, of course, I’d make sure my Web site had a good user interface and that all the content was easily searchable.
With video, you are competing against established content providers, like the local news. And that video The Morning Call posted was worse than most of what is on YouTube. When high school and college kids can provide better quality and content, you should really reconsider what you’re doing.
Honestly, what advertiser is going to want to sign up for poor video? We can’t complain that no one wants to pay for our content when we produce content that is worse than what is on free sites like YouTube.
You could have a totally modern news site without video, and video will not suddenly transform your site into something modern. Be smart with your resources, because the industry doesn’t have a lot of room for error.