What Happens to Text in the Age of Video Consumption?

Good writing starts with a piece of roulade and a glass of apple juice. What does this have to do with writing you might ask. Believe me, I’m just about as confused as you are. But I tell you what, I feasted on a piece of roulade and a glass of apple juice while I pondered how best to tell you that text is not dead and it isn’t about to. You might want to read that again, text is not dead and text isn’t about to die. I will try to convince you about that.

Credit: Revolution Productions

The relevance of text has been a major concern to content creators for a while now. A lot of us wonder if there is still a need to create content in a text format. This concern is quite understandable as research shows that 65% of the population are visual learners. Half of all mobile traffic is in video format and this is more than any other content format. It was predicted that this number would increase to 75% by the end of 2021. However, this doesn’t mean the end of text as a content format.

Why Use Text?

You might ask why one would still bother with text, given the statistics above. Let’s consider the following:

• Text is Easier and Affordable: This will be stating the obvious. Although the production of video content has become easier and more affordable; it is still easier and much cheaper to produce text. Video content production most times require a lot of hand. This makes production take longer time and money. As a content creator, the target is to produce great and affordable content that will generate good ROI. With text, you can achieve that.
• Text is Easy to Scan: No one creates content (text or video) in hope that the audience will scan through and not consume every bit. Being realistic is understanding that this will happen as your audience comprises people with various needs. A well-written text is easy to scan. This allows the reader to pick only what information is relevant to them. With a video, a viewer might struggle to scan through and then abandon the video completely.
• Your Audience Might Prefer Text: Young people who are between the ages of 18 and 24 prefer video content. But this is not the same for older generations, who mostly prefer text-based content. First, you need to understand your target audience. Then you have to understand their most preferred channels and form of communication. Otherwise, you might miss out on a large audience that might prefer text.
• Text Ranks Better: Texts tend to rank better than videos. Search engine optimization works with keywords to pull results during a search. If you produce only videos, your content might not be picked up as much by search engines. Except you rely solely on the text descriptions of your video contents.

Content Consumption Psychology

As a content creator, it is important to understand that reading a text and watching a video requires distinct cognitive functions. This helps you to make a better decision about writing text or making a video. Reading a text requires more brain workouts and a longer attention span than watching videos. One needs to give full attention when reading. This might not be so when watching a video. Reading a text might require more thinking and sometimes, forces the reader to form mental images to aid understanding. Watching a video, on the other hand, is more of an emotional process that draws the viewer in and allows them to feel emotions they may not have felt while reading.

The choice to read a text or watch a video might also depend on the state of mind of the audience.

The Decision: Text or Video

This has never been an easy decision to make and will never be. But I will say this, ignoring video at a time like this is a big risk. Video content generates 1200% more shares than text and images. Idea Rocket reported that search engines are now taking videos into more account and ranking them higher. This reveals that there are lots of untapped opportunities with video content. However, if you have read this piece up to this point, then you must have seen reasons to believe the relevance of text as a content format. I wish I could be there always to tell you when to use text or video. As a content creator, you have to be mindful to realize when best to use text, how best to use text and most importantly, that text works hand in hand with video to achieve the desired goals. Get on board, use text when necessary.