From time to time you are undoubtedly going to need to convert your marketing videos to other formats. At times you may need to optimize the video for a specific platform or to ensure it can be viewed on certain devices.
In some cases, you may even just need multiple versions of the same video so that you have fallback options when you publish it as an HTML5 video.
The fact that you may need to convert your marketing videos into many different formats makes it all the more important that you follow a few vital tips that can help you do so more effectively:
Do not make the mistake of converting and discarding the original marketing video at any point in time. Instead, that video should be stored safely, and possibly backed up using the 3-2-1 backup rule to ensure that it isn’t accidentally lost.
The original video is the best quality copy of the marketing video that you will have, which is why you should keep it safe. It is a fallback that you can use should anything affect the quality of your video in the future.
The one golden rule when you’re converting videos is to never convert the same video file repeatedly. For example, if you need to convert the original MP4 with H.264 video to MKV with H.265 and MPEG-2, you shouldn’t convert it first to MKV then the MKV to MPEG-2.
Every time you convert the video codec (with lossy compression) some data is discarded. It may not be that obvious initially, but sooner or later it will start to pile up and the quality of your video will deteriorate.
Instead of converting the same video file repeatedly you should always convert videos from the original that you have (ideally) stored safely.
Always check the audio stream after you’ve converted your video, and make sure it doesn’t have any issues. At times you may find that it is missing, possibly because the container that you’re converting to doesn’t support the format that the audio is in.
In short, you may need to convert the audio format as well. For example, you could extract WebM to MP3 online and then convert it to a format that is required. It should be noted that there could be other issues that affect the audio during conversion as well, such as the sample rate or audio bitrate.
At the end of the day, these tips should help you to not only safeguard your marketing videos but preserve their quality when you’re converting them. As you can see the tips are especially vital when you’re going to be converting videos to multiple formats on a fairly regular basis.
All said and done your goal should be to ensure that you’re able to convert your marketing videos to the format that you need while retaining their quality at the same time.