At some point in the last couple of years, someone started spreading a “best practice” that it’s good for websites to automatically play videos once people click through to them. This is not a best practice. It’s annoying at best. At worst, it can prevent people from visiting your website ever again. One of those people is now, officially, me.
As much as I tend to dislike the moves that Facebook has made over the years, one thing I like is they way they handle video. Once a video is visible on the screen, it starts playing to get your attention, but it doesn’t blast your speakers or earphones with instant sound. That requires a click and that’s the way it should be.
Autoplay advertisements are the worst. They’re often hard to find on the page when you visit them, especially if you’re in the middle of reading an article and suddenly your sound pops on with some ad featuring Mr. Clean. This is the only reason that I started using Adblock Plus. I have no problem with ads and I believe that websites have the right to make money, but if you’re going to make money with video ads that automatically start playing when I enter a page or at some point in the middle, I’m done.
The second worst is the autoplay news pieces that pop up on sites like Bloomberg, NBC, and The Hill. When I click through to an article, I want to be able to choose whether or not a video plays. I will often open several links at once on a page and if the videos start playing as soon as I click through, I close the tab immediately.
Now, let’s talk about the practical application of this for those who have been misguided into making their videos autoplay. Some guru probably told you that it was a good idea or you noticed that other news sites, blogs, or company websites do it. This is not a best practice from a marketing perspective. It can hurt your bounce rate and eventually your clickthru rate, making Google and Bing less likely to serve your site on search results pages. It even has an effect on social media sites, particularly Facebook. The social networks are starting to look at bounce rate as well, so if someone clicks your link and they instantly bounce because of autoplay, your pages will be served to fewer newsfeeds.
Regarding the gurus/spammers who told you it was a good idea, they probably told you that it’s a good visitor experience to save people from having to click the play button or touch the screen. Think about that statement for a moment and don’t be too hard on yourself when you realize how stupid the idea really is. One click. Play. People are not going to be offended if they click through to your website and then have to click the play button. They may, however, get offended if a video starts playing at an inopportune moment.
People may visit your website while they’re at work. Nothing says “I’m messing around instead of working” better than an autolplay video. People may visit your website on their mobile device while in a quiet place such as a restaurant. They may have just wanted to read the latest news but you’re blasting audio at them, making other diners turn to see and embarrassing your website visitor who may then choose to never visit your website again.
In fact, that’s my hope. If you are like me and prefer to not have videos automatically play when you visit a website, bookmark this article. Then, when you come across a website that is so obnoxious and uncaring that they are willing to force sound from your device, contact the website and send them this article. I don’t know when this terrible practice was added to everyone’s best practice handbook, but it needs to stop.
You can help. Share this with others. I never ask people to share any of my articles, but this time I believe it’s a worthy cause.
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