Voice Over Video Demos - Get A Cue

I wrote recently about the importance of having a video demo.  Recently I discovered a little trick you can use with YouTube to put a cue sheet at the beginning of your video.  This allows a prospective client to jump right to a specific point in your video.   The only drawback is once they jump, the cues disappear so they would then have to manually move the marker back to the beginning.

Here's what it looks like at the beginning of my video:

The potential client would then click onto one of the product names and it'll jump right to that portion of your demo.

Here's how I did it:

1.  Edit your video to add about 15 seconds to the beginning of your video.  It can be blank or use a title card as I did.  NOTE:  YouTube only gives you two choices for the text - black or white - so choose your background accordingly.  (NOTE:  While you're editing, jot down the start time in the video of each Product..it'll make things easier for you later)

2.  Upload your new Video but mark it "Private" for the time being to allow you to edit.  Soon, YouTube will email you a link to the video and go there.  Now (this is important) click "Video Manager" that's located on the bottom right.  Now you'll see all your videos.  Click the name of the video you just uploaded..it'll take you to it again.  Copy that URL because you're going to need it later.

3.  When you open the video, you'll see some icons under the play time bar.  Arrow over to the "Voice Bubble +" (Annotations) and click.

4.  Now click "Add Annotation" and select "Note".

5.  Type in the Product Name (keep it short)

6.  Now you'll see a box pop up below your video screen and see a box below your video.  That's the new cue you're starting to create.  Now to the right you see "Start" and "Stop".  Set the Start at 0:00:00:0 and the end at 0:00:15:00.

7.  Click the  Link checkbox and, to the right,  you'll see a drop down box.  Click the down arrow and select "Playlist"

8.  Paste the URL to this same video (remember I told you to copy it?)

9.  Now you see a place that says "start linked video at"  Now, I happened to jot down the times of the place each "Product" started on my video when I was editing (that's the best option as you can be a bit more exact).  But, if you don't you can slide that little circle on the play bar to the right to get the start time.  Enter that start time (it's Hour:Minutes:Seconds:10thSecond).

10.  Last step for this Cue is to place the Copy for it on your screen.

You see in the upper right of the picture above the box that says "A Cue".  Just slide it down to a position you want on your title/cue page.







That's it.  As you see I had 9 products, so I went back up to the top, clicked "Add Annotation" again and added the next.  Scrub, rinse, repeat.



Once you're done adding all, click Publish at the top right of the page.  Now go to your Video Manager and make your new "Cues" Video Public.