Open Up to Closed Captioning

Video is a key part of any social media marketing strategy. Because small businesses are as much about the person running them as the products and services offered, your audience wants to know you and your team in a personal way that can only be achieved with video or in-person contact. 

Whether you’re sharing exciting business news, showing off some of your products, or answering a few frequently asked questions, video is a great way to familiarize your audience with your brand and your personality. It’s no wonder video has 135% higher organic reach than regular image posts and 64% of people say a video on Facebook has influenced their marketing decisions. 

Since video is one of the best ways to connect with your audience, it’s important to make your videos as accessible as possible for all viewers. One of the best ways to do that is with closed captioning. 

Why Closed Captioning?

CC is commonplace with TV, but as more and more people get their information about brands from social media, we need to adjust. 48 million people in the US have significant hearing loss so adding closed captioning to your videos instantly makes your content more accessible. However, you’re not just benefiting your hard-of-hearing audience — you’re benefiting your entire audience. 

Because most viewers are scrolling social media on their mobile device, they can watch your social media video from virtually anywhere at any time. Whether people are scrolling during a work meeting, putting the kids to sleep, or while laying in bed next to their partner, 85% of videos are watched without sound. If your video doesn’t have captions, you may lose a significant number of potential viewers. With captions available, 80% of people are more likely to watch the entirety of your video because it’s easier to consume. Perhaps most surprising, captions actually encourage about 37% of people to turn a video’s sound on because the video has captured their attention. 

Captions can also help your video advertising efforts on social media. Captions can lead to increases in ad memory (10%), ad recall (8%),  and brand linkage (13%).

How to Add Captions to Your Videos

If you’re ready to make your videos more accessible, you’re in luck—Facebook makes it really easy to add captions to your videos. With Facebook’s automatic caption generator, you can easily add CC to every video you upload. All it takes a few extra minutes to manage and verify accuracy, but it’s worth it if your videos get better viewership.

When your video is produced in Element 74’s Content Lab, we can do the work for you. During production, we add the captions of your video so you can spend more time focusing on what you do best: running your business. If you’re interested in stepping up your social media game with high-quality and accessible videos, let’s talk!