YouTube vs Vimeo: The Best Hosting Platform for SaaS Video Tutorials

Video Content is an almost-essential feature to online courses. While some course creators get by without it, most find that it’s a popular form of content, and one that enhances their credibility and increases the value of their course.
A video tutorial course helps to convert passive potential or trial customers into paying customers. With this type of tutorial, people have the opportunity to try out your product and decide if they want it.

Creating a video tutorial course is an investment that pays off in more than one way. It not only converts potential customers into paying customers, but it also increases customer loyalty and can be used for back-end marketing purposes such as lead generation or SEO.

What is the importance of a Hosting site for your tutorials?

The hosting site is the platform on which the tutorials are uploaded. It is a huge deciding factor for how efficient and effective your tutorials will be.

There are many hosting sites you can choose from to host your tutorials. These sites have different features and functionality which will affect the quality and impact of the content. Some of these features include a hosting company’s customer service, the availability of video and audio formats, and whether or not they offer ready-made templates.

A good hosting site should have easy to use tools, excellent customer support, an active community, and a lot of integrations with other services that are related to it.

Video courses that retain customers

30+ SaaS Co. have produced 700 minutes of product videos with Content Beta

You’re creating a video series for your course. What would be the better option - YouTube or Vimeo

Modern video hosting platforms have evolved from their beginnings as a piece of internet real estate for your videos. Using a video hosting platform allows you to upload your content onto their servers, and then embed it into the relevant pages on your site.

The best video hosting sites typically offer a few features that are indispensable for businesses:
  • An easy-to-use interface
  • Monetization
  • Compatibility with all types of browsers and players.
  • How much control do you have.
  • The viewing experience.
  • Compatibility with mobile devices
  • Basic analytics tools to measure the impact of your videos
  • SEO tools to make your videos search-engine friendly
  • The ability to embed your videos on external websites
The two most common hosting platforms used today are Youtube and Vimeo. While both are verstile and have their own advantages, picking the right one for you might be a bit of a task.
Hosting Platforms Pros Cons
Vimeo Pro Higher Security
Limit viewers
In-depth analytics
feedback
The video player can be customized
No editing and customizable features
Vimeo Pro is a paid tool Not as popular as YouTube and hence has a lower reach
YouTube Completely Free can setup entire Playlists Searchability and SEO Not White Labelled
Less secure and prone to piracy and external downloads

YouTube

Uploading videos on the YouTube platform is free, even when you are creating a playlist. Creating a playlist on YouTube will allow you to upload as many videos as you want for free. You can also edit the order of the videos and add descriptions, playlists, likes, dislikes, and more.

This is not the case with other hosting platforms such as Vimeo or Wistia. The user also has more control over their content, including searchability and SEO. With a major viewership, Youtube also boasts of better reach and accessibility. YouTube commands an audience of over 2 billion monthly users almost half of the entire internet using population.
However, YouTube is less secure than other video hosting platforms and this can be an issue for some companies who have sensitive data to share.

YouTube has better Live-streaming options specially given that it is free, regardless of number of viewers.

YouTube is a great place to share videos with the public but some companies might be hesitant to share sensitive data on such an insecure video hosting platform.

Vimeo Pro

Vimeo is a video-sharing website that is designed to help businesses and individuals share their videos of any length.

Vimeo offers a selection of different account types to which you can subscribe. The most basic type, Vimeo Basic, allows users to upload five gigabytes of video and select whether or not viewers will be able to comment on the video.

The Pro account, on the other hand, allows you to upload unlimited video and provides access to in-depth analytics, customizable player settings, and for $199 per year, a paid tool with lower reach. No matter which Vimeo account type you use they lack editing features so your content must be uploaded before it is published.
Vimeo’s smaller, more community-driven platform might be a better option if you’re hoping to tap into an existing niche. While the number of users are lower, they are much more targeted and their powerful analytics clearly show better rates.

Sound quality is higher on Vimeo because the platform supports 320Kbps. Vimeo also allows a customizable end screen message and CTA button making it easier to target customers and interact with them.

Note: Vimeo also has a free option, you’ll probably max it out pretty fast. The good news is that Pro options start off at a very affordable $20/mo.

Final Words

Video tutorials have become a common way for people to learn new skills. They are also a great way for marketers to showcase their products and services.


Some actionable Tips for Marketing a SaaS Video Tutorial Course Online:

  1. Build a list of potential customers by looking at your current customer base.
  2. Make it easy for people to find the courses with keywords, tags, and descriptions that match what they are looking for.
  3. Create an email list or mailing list so you can stay in touch with your customers about new courses and offers.
  4. Use your existing social media channels, such as Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn to reach out to potential customers on these platforms.
  5. Choose the video hosting solution that best suits your need.
You don’t have to make a choice between just one platform! Having your premium videos hosted on one video hosting platform and other more engaging content on a different one can be really advantageous.

Out of all the options, it’s best to choose one that meets your budget and needs. There’s no one size that fits all, so you may need to try a few before you find what works for you.

It depends largely on what exactly you want to accomplish with your videos. If you’re looking for a community to connect with other like-minded people & gain exposure in an industry of your choosing, Vimeo rather than YouTube will be the place for you to share your video content.

If you’re looking for the best video platform with support for search optimization and advertising, YouTube is your best bet.

FAQs

YouTube is the preferred hosting platform among most B2B SaaS companies because it is highly effective as a search engine, thereby companies to rank their video better. YouTube also offers unlimited storage, free of cost since it focuses on earning through advertising. Vimeo on the other hand offers memberships and limits storage according to the paid plan of the user.

Vimeo does provide not only superior video quality but also supports better sound quality. A video when uploaded on both YouTube and Vimeo will have better quality on Vimeo as it uses a higher bitrate, but to access that the user must be a part of their paid plan subscriptions. Whereas that is not the case in YouTube, where the quality might be slightly inferior but the other benefits are more, and therefore most SaaS companies prefer it.

YouTube is known to be the second largest search engine online after Google. The YouTube platform provides much more options for keywords, hashtags, and key phrases to optimize the video than Vimeo does, making it far more influential for B2B companies.

Yes, Vimeo is a SaaS. This is because they earn their revenue through monthly and yearly subscription plans for individual content producers and businesses.

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