It has come to my attention that some of my readers are unfamiliar with the term “watermark”. I figured I should clarify it in detail, since it is a crucial aspect of YouTube marketing. We’ll also get into how to properly implement a video watermark.

Those who are less hip with this whole internet marketing thing may have a different (yet still correct) idea of what a watermark is. The most common use of the word I’ve heard offline in my lifetime is when describing the fancy pattern or logo impressed into currency or paper checks to prevent fraud. However, as far as online marketing goes, watermarking has a different, yet similar purpose.

Basically, when you create a video that you intend to use to promote your website, you are going to want to display your URL (or logo that should contain your URL) within the video. Some sites use watermarks to brand their video and prevent it from being redistributed. For us independent internet marketers, the watermark is simply a way to drive the URL of your site deeper into the minds of your viewers and hopefully provoke their interest enough for them to type it into the address bar of their browser.

Now, Sony Vegas is by far my favorite video editing application. I use it for just about everything when it comes to creating/editing videos (I do use Adobe Audition for some advanced sound tweaking on rare occasions). However, you don’t necessarily need it. Windows Movie Maker usually comes bundled with Vista (as well as XP) and can be used to effectively watermark your videos. If you don’t have it, you can download the Vista version for free here, and the XP version here. For Mac users, iMovie will also do the job. However, if you don’t mind paying for a much more advanced program, you can pick up a copy of Sony Vegas here.

At the risk of coming off as lazy, here is an excellent video tutorial by YouTube member badenglish1984 demonstrating how to add a watermark using Windows Movie Maker for Vista. (XP Movie Maker watermark tutorial can be found here).

One VERY important thing I’d like to add is that the positioning of your watermark for your YouTube videos is key.  Many video creators make the mistake of putting their watermark in the lower right hand corner. Why is this a bad thing? Take the above tutorial video for example. What do you see in the lower right hand corner of the screen when you play that video? That’s right, YouTube automatically watermarks all embedded videos (those placed on external sites like this one) with their very own watermark. This means that if your watermark is in the same place, it will be partially eclipsed by YouTube’s own watermark when your video is embedded, potentially rendering your watermark useless.

For this reason, your watermark should be placed in either the top left, top right, or lower left hand corner. Personally, I prefer the lower left hand corner.

Another trick that I implement is removing the watermark shortly prior to the frame that I know I will be using as my thumbnail images. Thumbnails of your video are created from the 1/4, 1/2, and 3/4 frames of your video, and you can choose which of those three to use. So, let’s say you have a video that is 2:00 in length, and you want to use the frame at 1:00 as your thumbnail. You would then end the watermark (I prefer to fade it out) around 0:58, so that it isn’t present in the thumbnail image. You can then bring it back shortly after (1:02 or so).

The reason I do this is because people naturally don’t like advertisements, and some YouTubers will stray away from clicking videos that appear to have an obvious advertisement placed in them. By removing your watermark at the correct time, your video will not appear to be promotional, and therefore likely receive more views.

That’s all for today! Good luck!