October 2020 | Vidversity

Zoom is an amazing tool to conduct online meetings, presentations and webinars.

It is also an easy way to repurposing your video into course content to train your staff or engage your customers and clients.

You can record presentations, product sessions, team meetings and interviews and then turn them into a learning video. You can repurpose or reuse existing recordings or use Zoom as your own video studio.

But it is equally important to make those learning videos engaging, comprehensive and digestible. Throwing the raw footage at your learners is not particularly engaging. However, it’s a great way to capture video based learning to turn into interactive online learning.

Here we will walk through the steps to learn how to enhance your Zoom videos into engaging learning content using VidVersity platform.

Record Your Zoom Video:

Zoom comes with the “Share” option to let you record screens. Go to the dialog box in which you can see all of the applications and screens.

Choose the screens for recording. Click on recording and choose the option “Record Video during Screen Sharing” and/or “Place Video Next to the Shared Screen in the Recording”.

The sharing options let you record the presenter, record the presentation as a PowerPoint or a screen capture with the voiceover by the presenter and record it with a small thumbnail image of the presenter in one of the corners.

The cloud recording can be found in the “My Recordings” section of your Zoom account. If you choose to record to a computer, the video will be downloaded to the Downloads or Documents section of your PC.

You may already routinely record your Zoom sessions so just make sure the ‘look’ of the recording is suited to repeated viewing.

You can also simply launch Zoom to record yourself like a ready made studio!

Uploading to VidVersity and editing your video:

Once you are done with recording your Zoom, upload it to VidVersity. You can edit it once it’s in the VidVersity platform so don’t worry if you need to cut some parts out.

Once it’s uploaded we recommend cutting the video into shorter chapters. You can remove any irrelevant parts. For example your presenter may mention the weather in the introduction or other ‘small talk’. You can easily cut this out.

Most content will naturally fall into sub heading so for each ‘pause’ in the material create a chapter cut.

This might mean an introduction, 4 or 5 sub topics, a conclusion and some audience questions. Instead of an hour long video you will be created a self paced module of 6 or so chapters which is much more appealing and accessible.

Adding Slides:

Slides make your video more explanatory. VidVersity allows you to add slides to introduce the course, the course chapters plus they can pop up along the way to illustrate the information.

You can source slides from the Slideshow Bank option in the app or use new ones stored on your computer. You can use a slide to pause the video or have the slide ‘pop up’ over the screen as the video runs. This is an ideal way to bring video content to life and highly key information.

Adding Notes:

You can also add notes and make them pop up throughout the videos as well. You can add any other document you wish or a link to other material. All content can be printed. This is a great way to embed learning and create an engaging experience for learners. For example it may be helpful for your audience to print summary notes, a checklist or even some companion notes to refer to as the video progresses. Think about the type of information presented and what would best help your learner.

Deliver to your learner:

Now you are ready to deliver your content to your audience. You can upload to your LMS or if you choose VidVersity you can create a simple share link, click to upload to an LMS or register your learner securely within the VidVersity platform.

Congrats! You have turned your raw Zoom footage into a great learning asset!

What do you think? Let us know by commenting below!

20/10/2020/0 Comments/by liz

Repurposing Content From Seminar/Conference

Samuel Pereira

Use cases

Use Case – Repurposing Content From Seminar/Conference

Repurposing content is the practice of reusing all or elements of existing content in order to expand that content’s reach. Seminars or conferences are among the most compelling training tools around. They let you engage with your audience and teach a large number of people in a group setting. You build a stronger relationship with the people who look to you for training or consultation.

And there is also an equally convincing benefit of recording a seminar—shooting your live event to use it as a video tutorial for your staff or peers further. Recording any event or seminar has become a lot easier than ever before. Just whip out your smartphone to start capturing the event. But shooting the video is one thing and making it engaging for your audience is another.

It is important to make your video presentable. A lot of sweat goes into enhancing those pieces of raw and unprocessed camera outputs. Sure, there are many online tools out there. But not all of them are easy to use and generally require a paid subscription.

Here comes VidVersity. It is a simple app for creating, enhancing and delivering instructional videos.

All you need to upload your footage to the VidVersity app or platform and follow the simple steps to make it appealing to your target audience.

Here we will walk through how you can repurpose content from the seminar using VidVersity.

Create Video Using Your Device or VidVersity App:

You can use your own device to shoot the event. Or use the VidVersity app that lets you capture large video files on your mobile device and quickly import them to your VidVersity account.

If you want to make your training videos crisp and clear, take care of important factors such as audio, lighting and the position of the camera.

Once you tick all these boxes, you’re ready to shoot. That means framing each shot so precisely that it can clearly tell a story or show the skills you want your audience to learn. If you want to take your learning videos to the next level, learn about the shot sizes and camera angles.

Upload to VidVersity App:

By this point, you must have recorded the video. It’s time to upload to the VidVersity platform or app. This is a simple process.

For more information, click HERE to see how VidVersity works.

Edit Your Videos into Chapters:

To make your training video more presentable and appealing, make sure to break it down into chapters or a summary.

This lets your audience locate the important points out of the seminar across the video. Besides, it helps you label the important moments such as the demonstration shared by the host or an attendee asked a critical question.

Add Slides and Links:

To make your video more explanatory, add slides, links and questions using the dedicated features in the app.

You can publish it securely in your LMS or use the share link. Besides, you can link the video to documents and websites and printable notes.

The Bottom Line:

So you must have understood how VidVersity helps you repurpose content from a seminar in style. It not only simplifies the video editing but also keeps your data secure (it is hosted on AWS).

Want to see how it works without paying a single cent? Opt for our 7-day free trial now!

20/10/2020/0 Comments/by liz

Use cases

Use Case – Mandatory Training

Mandatory training is a key focus for organisations and it is essential for compliance and for staff and customer safety.

But mandatory training is often not engaging for learners. In fact, safety training is time consuming and takes staff away from day to day work. How can organisations ensure staff take mandatory training including safety training seriously? And how can learning and development teams create training that is engaging and effective?

Using video to create training is an ideal mode for creating training quickly in a way that engages staff.

Video based training can be accessed anywhere, anytime and is therefore ideal for a dispersed workforce. It is also ideal for staff who may need to watch training on a mobile before attending a worksite. It is also highly effective for staff who may not access a laptop or traditional workstation as part of their day to day work.

However, using video alone is not enough to hold your audience’s attention and interest. Long and boring training content, whether live or online, means key details get lost in the sea of information.

As a result, your audience may feel bored and fast forward the video to find the desired detail or leave it halfway.

At VidVersity, making online learning effective and engaging is our key focus. The platform is designed as a total solution to training creation and delivery. Let’s look at the key ways VidVersity overcomes the problems with mandatory training.

Create your own video:

First things first, decide how to create a mandatory training video. Do you want somebody from your organization or hire a professional speaker on safety? You also want to make sure that your training video covers all essential points. Just take a tour of your facility to make the training video more specific to your workplace.

You can use a professional videographer. But don’t forget, you can also create great training videos using your iPhone or your laptop.

Once you are done with capturing the training session, upload it to the VidVersity platform. You can use the VidVersity app to capture video on your mobile device and then upload to the platform with just one click. You are then ready to start creating.

Breaking It Down into Chapters:

Research indicates that maximum concentration spans for learners are between 6 and 9 minutes. If online training content is too long, learners might lose interest or skip important details. That’s why it is important to break your long training videos in chapters. These chapters normally form the natural sub topics covered in a presentation. VidVersity comes with a highly intuitive editor to arrange your videos into meaningful course chapters.

We recommend cutting your video down into shorter chapters of no more than 5 minutes each. This is not difficult as most speakers will move from one topic to another and each will naturally last around 3-5 minutes. This creates a natural ‘pause’ in content. Use this to create a chapter break.

You can use the editor to remove any unwanted content such as overly long pauses or interactions in the recording that are irrelevant. For example, you may wish to reuse a Zoom recording but remove introductory comments or audience questions that are not relevant.

Providing the Notes to Print:

Once you have created your chapters, it’s not time to add some elements to really engage your learner.

You can also allow the audience to print the notes that pop up throughout the video. This way, you can create a hand-out for a learner. You can also link to other documents. Think about the type of hand-out that will be useful. This might be a checklist, summary or overview. It’s a great way to embed learning and provide the learner with a few different modes of absorbing information.

Adding Slides, links and questions.

By adding slides including images and text, you can highlight key points. This can really bring training alive. You can keep the learner engaged by pausing within a chapter to ensure a learner reads some additional information or clicks on a live link before returning to the course.

Plus, you can add questions and quizzes to keep your audience engaged throughout the training session. For example, you can ask what percentage of occupational injuries happen a year along with the options (answers) to choose from.

Now you have completed the training, what’s next?

The training video can be published securely in your LMS. If you don’t have an LMS, there is a secure system to register learners and give access to content within VidVersity with full tracking and reporting.

You also have key control on such things as percentage pass rates and turning off the ability to fast forward videos. In addition, you can control if the learner has to proceed through all the chapters or move around as they wish.

Finally, you can also create a simple share link to email content directly to learners. This is ideal to share quick updates.

Wrapping Up…

VidVersity has been designed to make your training videos or learning videos more refined, more comprehensive and more engaging. The tool comes with several easy-to-use features to treat your video.

To find out more, book a 15 minute online demonstration or join our complimentary online workshop.

Register for our workshop here https://vidversity.com/creating-video-learning-workshop/

To set up a time for an online demo, contact toni@vidversity.com

20/10/2020/0 Comments/by liz

Use cases

Use Case – Creating Videos For Your Students

Educational videos make learning more engaging and fun for students—even when classes are held remotely. Learners increasingly expect online content to be accessible. However it’s important that it is easy and quick for teachers to produce without adding to the workload.

Creating engaging educational videos shouldn’t be that challenging. In fact, with the use of the right tools and a bit of expertise, it can be simpler to create effective, interactive videos that can help students learn things easily.

Here we will show you how to make great educational videos to keep your students engaged without compromising your natural teaching style.

Choose the Right Length for Your Educational Video:

Because you might be used to an hourly-long class session, this won’t necessarily be the best approach when creating online training. There are a few options to adapt the existing content to an online format.

Firstly, record your usual content but then cut this into short bite sized elements. If you are lecturing, your content will naturally fall into a series of short subheadings. This may be between 5-10 minutes. We recommend each of those elements are cut into distinct chapters. This gives the learner an opportunity to pause between chapters and means learning can become a self-paced process.

Create a Script and Storyboard:

A script will let you determine how your video will go and how it will sound.

Create the list of points you want to cover, and then write the script based on that list.

However if you are confident with your material you may wish to speak as if you are speaking to a class. Don’t be afraid to speak in your usual, natural style.

If you feel stilted on camera, create a series of questions and have someone ‘interview’ you. This is a great way to capture content.

Record the Video:

From an average smartphone to a professional camera, there are many tools to create an educational video.

Whatever device you choose, make sure it gives you a quality output.

Consider shooting in a location with good natural lighting during the daytime, or you can use a special light to give your educational video a bright feel.

A quality microphone is also required to help your lessons come through clear and loud on the video.

One of the simplest ways to record is to launch a Zoom meeting (just for 1!). Make sure your background setup looks good, the room is quiet and your face is well lit. Zoom has some great inbuilt features to create a good quality video.

Then simply present your material as if you were presenting to a room full of students. You can share your screen or launch a PowerPoint presentation if you wish.

Edit Your Video:

Admit it. This step must be sounding intimidating to you if you are not a pro. Don’t worry. There are many tools to refine your video.

And one of them is VidVersity. Available as both a desktop tool and a mobile app, VidVersity helps create interactive videos to keep your audience engaged.

All you need to do is upload your video to the VidVersity platform. Then, you can edit your educational video by using the following features —

Categorize your video into chapters so that your students have a nice overview of the topic and they can locate the important points as well.
Add slides, notes and links to make your video more explanatory and engaging.
Add true/false, multiple-choice questions and fill in the blanks to keep the audience engaged throughout the video.
Add your own slides or PowerPoint. These slides can be updated, edited or stored in the dashboard of VidVersity.

It is easy to edit your educational video using VidVersity. Or you can send the video to us so that we can edit it for you.

We hope that these tips will help you create a great educational video while keeping the process streamlined for you. What do you think? Let us know by commenting below!

20/10/2020/0 Comments/by liz

Use cases

Use Case – Software Training

If you have introduced any new software to the workplace, the next thing to worry about is to train your staff.

Whether it’s MS Excel, accounting tool, or complicated team collaboration software, getting staff trained in the software being used by your business is important for workflow and productivity.

While videos can be the effective and fastest way to train your staff upon any software, it might not be a feasible solution for all businesses. After all, not everyone can afford quality cameras, lighting equipment and video editing tools.

Video is ideally suited for software training and the good news is that you can create all your own training in house.

Screen recording is the process of recording your screen device and recording your own voice to explain the process.

Later, you can turn that recording into an effective learning asset using the VidVersity tool.

HERE’s HOW…

Choose a Screen Recording Tool:

To record from the screen, you need to choose screen-recording software.

With plenty of options available, both free and paid, it is up to you to decide the right one for you.

Make sure to choose the one that is easy to use and fits your budget. Another important consideration is to look for the audio features. Can the tool record the audio from your microphone? Or can it import an audio file?

Many Apple products will have a built-in screen capture tool such as QuickTime. We also recommend Screenpresso and Loom. These tools enable you to easily capture content using your screen.

Test the sound when recording on your own device. Remember, that a simple lapel mic can really improve sound quality. These are inexpensive and easy to use. It’s worthwhile investing a mic if you regularly record training content.

Record from the Screen:

Make sure to learn how the chosen recording tool works before getting started. Save the footage as MP4.

Upload it to VidVersity:

Once you’re done with the recording from the screen, upload it to the VidVersity platform or app. You can easily edit the video. Remove any parts you don’t like using the intuitive VidVersity editor. This might be lengthy pauses at the start and end of the recording or cut out any errors. Once you have a video you are happy with you can now start adding some additional material for your learner.

Cutting the Video into Chapters:

You can also break your software training video into chapters so that your learners can easily navigate through the training. Remember that software training is often something learners will need to return to a few times. So making this easy by creating bite sized chapters is key.

For example, your training video on MS Word can be arranged into chapters like Saving File, Inserting Images, Setting Page Layout and Mailing. It will help your audience pick the important parts from the sea of information as well as streamline their training.

And remember you can always add additional chapters to your training at any time so each time you get a question on how to carry out a particular task, simply create an additional chapter. This makes your training dynamic and you will only ever need to answer that question once. Next time you can simply direct staff to the online training.

Adding Slides:

Creating a series of slides (PowerPoint is fine to use) will really bring your course content alive.

If you are creating a series of ‘how to’ videos on how to use your company’s finance software, you could create a title slide for each short chapter. For example, create a slide entitled “Creating a client invoice”. You might also add a second slide to give the learner an idea of what they might expect. For example a slide with a short summary of the content such as “In this video you will learn how to create an invoice, select the correct invoice codes, how to send and how to check if the client has paid”. The learner can then click to launch the video.

Adding the Notes, documents and other links.

VidVersity allows you to add notes that can serve as the key takeaways. These notes pop up throughout the video at the relevant points and your audience can print them. You can also link to other resources such as websites or upload articles, summary sheets and checklists.

Updating, editing and sharing.

VidVersity allows you to easily edit or update your content at any time. Add new chapters or remove ones that are no longer relevant. Plus you can duplicate existing content to repackage for another audience. For example, create software training as part of induction training or as a resource for staff to access at any time. You may even wish to create content for your own customers.

Once your content has been created, you are now ready to share this with your audience.

You can publish it securely in your LMS. If you don’t have an LMS, you can use VidVersity Share. Generate a simple share link or register learners securely in the standalone VidVersity platform for fully tracking and learner data.

We hope this information will help you create an amazing software training asset out of your screen recordings.

What do you think? Let us know by commenting below!

20/10/2020/0 Comments/by liz