How to Embed Video on Your Squarespace and WordPress Websites, and Boost Traffic.

Written by Andrew Goldman

It’s well known that videos not only bring visitors to your website, but those lasting impressions you create can keep them there for as long as you need. Videos supplement your product or service, providing a compelling experience for your audience.

This article will explore the benefits of adding video, and then show step-by-step, how to embed them on Squarespace and WordPress.

Boost Engagement and Reduce Bounce Rate.

Audiences can have short attention spans. They scroll at breakneck speed. Big blocks of text put them off, so being imaginative with your presentation, grabbing attention with colours and movement can boost engagement. A piece of research showed that 60% of people stay on websites with videos, when compared with just text and pictures. This is known as ‘dwell’ time, which Google happens to like, and can boost your rankings.

High bounce rates are bad. This is when your visitor leaves without interacting with your site. Imagine that they’re in your shop, but you don’t even go over and talk to them. They’ve left and slammed the door shut before you’ve even said ‘hi.’ Bounce rates are 34% lower on websites that use video, and the landing page is a great place to put one. For example, you could use an overview of your business. A sales pitch.

You’ll have complete control of your website files and data. You won’t be tied down to a web hosting company, and you can move the website to wherever you want.

Make it Interesting.

Not only does a video highlight your service, it’s an opportunity to showcase your personality. Videos are a great way to capture moments, or to explain something in a more interesting way. It’s a chance to reinforce your tone of voice, captivate your ideal customer, and enable them to learn more about your business in a short space of time. By improving the user experience, this can lead to specific actions, i.e. sales.

Keeping Your Website Efficient.

Nobody has time anymore. So when you do get someone to visit your site, you want them to hang around for the right reasons, not waiting for pages to load. Adding a video from sites such as YouTube maintains your site speed as it does not take much loading time. For example, Squarespace can hold up to 30 minutes of video. By using the full allowance, it’s possible that your site could get a bit glitchy with all those videos trying to load. Embedding, for example, a YouTube video, does not eat into any of that time or storage. You’re giving that time back to your audience.

Building Trust and Credibility.

Video can help to bring your audience to informed decisions. They can work as great convincers to show that your product or service absolutely meets their needs. It’s like having a toolbox of evidence-bases. Text and video backing each other up to reinforce credibility. So no red flags. Earning trust at an early stage will most likely bring them back again in the future.

Be wary of uploading a video without permission as this could result in infringement issues and a copyright claim. Once discovered, these can get taken down very quickly. However, by embedding, you can attach almost anything as the right remains with its original owner. No permission is required.

Drive Visitors to Your Social Profile.

A great way to improve your search engine optimisation (SEO) score is to embed your own social profiles. You’ve already done all of the above. And it’s not even cheating. It’s another chance to engage, build trust, and even sneak in more calls to action. The audience may even visit your social profile first, and you direct them to your website from there. Very clever.

How to Embed a Video on a Squarespace Website.

The following will only work with YouTube and Vimeo for direct URLs. Here are step-by-step instructions for how to do it.

Copy the URL of the video you want from YouTube or Vimeo.
On Squarespace, add a new page, which will initially be a blank section.
At the page break, click on the ‘plus’ sign.
Select ‘video.’
Having already copied a URL, paste it in.

It’s as easy as that. Squarespace also gives the option to add a custom thumbnail, and a caption of your choosing.

To embed a video from an alternative site, for example, an Instagram reel, follow these instructions:

Go to your desired Instagram reel, click the three dots and select ‘embed,’ then ‘copy embed code.’
Back to your Squarespace site.
Click that plus sign again on your page break.
Select ‘code block’ or ‘embed.’ then ‘</>.’
Paste the code, and save.

How to Embed a Video on a WordPress Website.

Here’s another step-by-step guide, using a YouTube video for this example:

Copy the URL from the desired YouTube video.
Click on ‘posts’ and then select the specific post that you want to embed your video on.
Click ‘type/to choose and block. A cursor appears, but so does a ‘plus’ sign to its right.
Click ‘plus.’
Type ‘YouTube’ into the search box which has appeared.
Select the ‘YouTube’ symbol and paste in the URL.
Click ‘embed,’ ‘update,’ ‘view post.’

If you did want to upload your own video:

In the search box you open at number 4 above, type ‘media’ or ‘library,’ which will depend on where you’re uploading from.
Choose your desired video from your collection.
Once uploaded, always remember to embed, update and view post, so that it saves to your page.

Remember from our previous article about WordPress that there are many plugins that can be used instead to embed your video. Please follow guidance from individual plugins for how to do it.

Written by Andrew Goldman

Follow him on Instagram here and LinkedIn here.

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