Adding subtitles to published videos is part of our professional standard at Around the Corner. Captions add many benefits that lead to a more accessible, more effective final product. Let’s take a look at three key reasons why you should be adding subtitles to your video content.
1. Accessibility & the Law
The most critical reason to add subtitles is to ensure that it is viewable by all audiences, including people who are deaf or hard of hearing. For many, captions aid in understanding dialogue, music, and sound effects. Simply, creating captions for your video content is the right thing to do.
While you should provide subtitles for that matter alone, it can also be a matter of law. The Americans with Disabilities Act ushered in changes to employment, infrastructure, and telecommunications. The 1990 landmark legislation lessened or eliminated discriminatory barriers faced by people with disabilities in the United States.
While most associate the ADA with accessible sidewalks, parking, and infrastructure, the law also established guidelines for telecommunications. In regards to captioning, § 36.303 requires open or closed captioning for videos or films that meet the definition of a public accommodation. This applies to TV and streaming services, and it also applies to any video content produced by a public entity. These entities include public universities, publicly-funded agencies, and government institutions.
In short, if your content screens in a public space or reaches a large public audience, you are often required by law to provide equitable subtitles.
2. Comprehension & Retention
When publishing a video, the content should be clear, concise, and engaging. As multiple studies show, adding same-language subtitles increases viewer comprehension and recall. Captions allow the audience to more fully understand the details presented in the content. Additionally, subtitles can assist people with learning to read and can be beneficial for people attempting to learn a new language.
Adding subtitles also allows viewers to understand your content while muted. This can be most helpful on social media, where a video may begin playing in a muted state by default. If subtitles accompany the visuals, viewers are more likely to stay on your video and increase watch time.
3. Search Engine Optimization
Captions also improve the searchability of your video across search engines. Google and other popular search engines sift through text captions to increase your SEO. Ensuring that captions are correct and proofread also helps with boosting the searchability of keywords, people, and other proper nouns. So, not only is adding accurate captions the right thing to do, it can also pay dividends by improving the likelihood that viewers will find and watch your video.
As an additional strategy, generating subtitles for your video allows for the video to be converted into a blog post or article. Most video captioning programs generate transcripts that provide the basis for text posts on websites or social media.
Conclusion
Subtitles are an important tool to implement into your video publishing strategy. By making your videos accessible, viewers more easily understand and retain your message. And by staying within the confines of the law, you’ll protect yourself from ADA-related lawsuits or fines that arise.
If you have questions about integrating captions into your video marketing strategy, contact us at info@atc-p.com