Adding videos to your website is a fantastic way to engage visitors and showcase your business, products and services. What many business owners don’t realise, however, is that how you add these videos can significantly impact both user experience and your operating costs.
When it comes to featuring videos on your website, you essentially have two options:
- Upload video files directly to your website server (self-hosting)
- Use a dedicated video hosting platform like YouTube or Vimeo and embed those videos
While uploading videos directly to your website might seem like the simpler approach, it can create unexpected problems that affect your entire online presence. For busy business owners who need reliable, high-performing websites, understanding how to properly handle video content is crucial.
In this article, I’ll explain why using a dedicated video host is almost always the better choice for your business website and help you decide which platform might be right for your needs.
The hidden costs of self-hosting videos
Self-hosting videos comes with several significant drawbacks that aren’t immediately obvious:
Bandwidth consumption
Every time someone watches your self-hosted video, they’re downloading the video file from your web server. This quickly adds up, especially if your video becomes popular. Most hosting plans have bandwidth limits, and exceeding them can result in additional charges or your website being temporarily taken offline.
Storage requirements
Video files are large, even when compressed. A few minutes of high-quality video can easily be hundreds of megabytes. This consumes your hosting storage allowance and may require upgrading to a more expensive hosting plan.
Performance impacts
Perhaps the most immediate issue is how self-hosted videos affect your website’s performance. Videos are very resource-intensive and can significantly slow down your entire website, not just the page containing the video. This leads to frustrated visitors and potential customers clicking away before they’ve seen what you offer.
Mobile optimisation challenges
Different devices need different video formats and resolutions for optimal playback. When self-hosting, you’d need to create multiple versions of each video and implement complex code to serve the right version to each device – something that dedicated video hosts handle automatically. Most self-hosted videos won’t have the ability to automatically adjust streaming quality, which means videos can be slow to load, or need buffering time which frustrates users.
Technical maintenance
Self-hosted videos require ongoing maintenance. You’ll need to ensure proper compression, format compatibility across browsers, and potentially update your videos as technology standards change. This creates another technical burden for already time-poor business owners.
These hidden costs make self-hosting videos an inefficient choice for most small to medium businesses, especially when compared to the benefits of using a dedicated video host.
For small to medium businesses focused on growing their online presence while maintaining an efficient workflow, understanding these options is the first step toward making the right choice for your video content strategy.
Benefits of using a dedicated video host
Dedicated video hosting platforms offer significant advantages that solve the problems associated with self-hosting:
Improved website performance
By embedding videos from external platforms, your website doesn’t bear the burden of serving large video files. This keeps your pages loading quickly, which is crucial for user experience and search engine rankings.
Automatic device optimisation
Professional video hosts automatically detect the viewer’s device and internet speed to deliver the appropriate video format and resolution. This ensures your videos look great and play smoothly whether someone is watching on a mobile phone with 4G or a desktop with high-speed broadband.
Reliable playback
YouTube and Vimeo have global content delivery networks designed specifically for video. This means your videos will play reliably for visitors anywhere in the world without buffering or quality issues.
Cost savings
Using external video hosts reduces your bandwidth and storage needs, potentially allowing you to use a less expensive hosting plan for your website. YouTube is completely free, while Vimeo offers free and paid options depending on your needs.
Analytics and insights
Most video hosting platforms provide detailed analytics about how people are engaging with your videos – information you wouldn’t easily get with self-hosted videos without additional tools.
YouTube vs Vimeo: choosing the right video host
Both YouTube and Vimeo are excellent choices for hosting your business videos, but they each have distinct advantages for different situations:
YouTube advantages:
- Completely free to use
- Massive audience and potential discovery
- Excellent SEO benefits
- Familiar interface for most users
- Integration with Google ecosystem
YouTube limitations:
- Less professional appearance with ads
- Limited control over recommended videos
- Branding limitations
Vimeo advantages:
- Clean, professional player
- No ads or distracting recommendations
- Better privacy controls
- More customisation options
Vimeo limitations:
- Costs for business features
- Smaller potential audience
- Fewer SEO benefits
Which video host suits your business?
YouTube might be better if:
- You want to maximise reach and discoverability
- Your budget is limited
- SEO benefits are a high priority
- You’re creating educational or general interest content
Vimeo might be better if:
- Professional presentation is paramount
- You want more control over the viewing experience
- You’re creating high-end portfolio or product videos
- You’re willing to pay for additional features
Best practices for embedding videos
Regardless of which platform you choose, follow these best practices for embedded videos:
Set the correct dimensions
Make sure your embedded video is responsive and fits well within your website design. Both YouTube and Vimeo provide responsive embed codes that adapt to different screen sizes.
Lazy load videos
Configure videos to load only when a visitor scrolls to them. This improves your overall page speed, especially on pages with multiple videos. Pro tip – You can take this a step further and only load the video on user interaction for even better performance (eg a user clicks a thumbnail + play button, which then loads the embed code).
Add useful metadata
Take the time to properly title, describe, and tag your videos on the hosting platform. This improves discoverability and provides context for viewers.
Consider privacy settings
Both platforms offer various privacy options. Consider whether you want your videos publicly searchable or only viewable on your website.
Include captions
Adding captions improves accessibility and helps viewers who prefer watching without sound. Where-ever possible, avoid hard-coded captions and opt for adding captions properly.
Here’s the revised section focusing on the specific use cases you mentioned:
When do self-hosted videos make sense?
While external video hosts are the right choice for most businesses, there are a few specific situations where self-hosting videos might be appropriate:
Small, short videos with limited bandwidth impact
For decorative elements like short background videos or product rotations that loop continuously, self-hosting can be reasonable. These files are typically small, heavily compressed, and don’t require the full features of a dedicated video host. Examples include subtle animated backgrounds or 360-degree product previews that are just a few seconds long. Depending on the video, it can be better for performance to self host these videos than use a third party service.
Strict privacy requirements
If your videos contain highly sensitive information that absolutely cannot be stored on third-party servers, self-hosting might be necessary. This is particularly relevant for businesses in regulated industries with strict data sovereignty requirements or when sharing proprietary information that must remain entirely within your controlled environment.
Complete player customisation
When you need absolute control over every aspect of the video player’s appearance and functionality beyond what Vimeo’s customisation options offer, self-hosting allows for complete freedom in design and implementation. This is rare for most business needs but might matter for brands with extremely specific visual requirements.
Internal training platforms
For employee-only platforms like internal training systems where videos are accessed by a limited number of users in controlled environments, the drawbacks of self-hosting are less significant. Since the audience is internal and predictable, you can better plan for the bandwidth and storage requirements. Some systems are loading videos from internal sources, so the bandwidth becomes a lot less of a concern.
If you do determine that self-hosting is necessary for your specific situation, work with a technical professional to ensure proper setup and ongoing maintenance. For most small to medium businesses focused on growth while maintaining work-life balance, the technical complexity and ongoing maintenance of self-hosted videos rarely justify the potential benefits.
Conclusion
For most small to medium businesses, using a dedicated video host like YouTube or Vimeo offers clear advantages over self-hosting videos. The performance benefits, cost savings, and additional features make it the sensible choice for business owners who want to focus on growing their business rather than managing technical issues.
Whether you choose YouTube’s broad reach or Vimeo’s professional presentation will depend on your specific business needs, but either option will provide a better experience for both you and your website visitors than attempting to self-host your videos.
Need help optimising your website’s performance or building a website featuring video? Book a call today and let me help you create a website that works hard for your business without creating additional stress or technical challenges.
