Video learning content isn’t just a passing trend in the learning and development industry. And if you want your organization to remain competitive in the years ahead, you’ll want to make sure to include video content in your training materials right now. Keep reading to learn more about why.
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By Next Year, Most Content on the Internet Will be Video Content
According to a Cisco study, 80% of all Internet traffic will be video content by 2019. So, if you don’t offer video content in your training materials, your learners will seek out or encounter video content from other sources, sources you can’t be sure are reputable or accurate.
And chances are high that your competitors will be offering video training content to their employees and stakeholders too. Ultimately, you will forfeit your reputation as being a viable resource for learning content inside and outside your organization if you don’t offer video content.
Video Content Is Simple to Access and More Popular on Mobile Devices
Currently, over half of all video content (so nearly half of all content on the Internet) is viewed from a mobile device. Video content is so popular on mobile devices because it’s become so easy to view and access at any time of day from anywhere.
And as more and more organizations begin to implement bring-your-own-device (BYOD) and work-from-home policies, more and more employee learners will be accessing videos from their mobile devices, too, for work and workplace learning purposes.
Currently, 59% of organizations allow employees to use their own devices for work purposes, and this number will only increase as BYOD policies and video content become more prominent.
Video Content Is Easier to Curate, Share, and Repurpose
With so much video content now available, it’s easy to curate video content inside your learning management system, which makes it easy to rely on because you don’t have to always create your own video training content—there’s already a lot of video content out there that’s easy to access.
And it’s easy to share hyperlinks to video content with learners too. Learners no longer need to spend minutes or hours downloading video files. Instead, they simply click on a link, and they can instantly view videos.
Additionally, it’s easier to edit and repurpose video content for your training programs too. If you have the right platforms and tools, you can edit your videos and repurpose video content multiple times for multiple training modules or courses.
Videos Can be Better for Knowledge Retention
Research indicates that video content can yield better knowledge retention for learners. According to research parsed in the Huffington Post, 1 minute of online video equates to approximately 1.8 million written words. And 90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual, and visuals are processed 60,000 times faster in the brain than text, which indicates that visual education aids like video can improve learning styles and increase the rate at which learners retain information.
As you audit and fine-tune your learning content and training materials this year, keep the information above in mind about why you must include video content too.