Hi Rebecca, 
When I was at SXSW last year I interview a lot of people with a Flip minoHD. It was easy to carry around in my pocket. When I saw someone that I wanted to interview for my book, Get Seen, I asked them for two minutes for an interview. I think that asking for less time makes people more willing to do a quick interview like you mention in your post. Also, using the Flip is less intimidating. You just turn in on to record YOUR interaction with the interviewee. I just started posting my interviews online. I'm putting them on my book site, and I also set up a tumblr site that will just have the interviews. I'm using a blip.tv player with the playlist feature so only video tagged 'interview' will play on the page. It's going to be a one post blog, where new interviews will show up first, and then older interviews will follow. I'm going to post a new interview every weekday in January. See you at hubspot.tv on the 15th! 
--Steve

I was with you, Rebecca, right up until you said "upload to YouTube." Driving people to your content is great, but YouTube is a terrible mechanism for lead conversion. 
 
Instead, I'd recommend hosting your video content on either A) a landing page with compelling calls to action, or B) on your website. And if you choose the latter, you could be super cool and use SWFObject to put searchable terms behind the video, boosting your SEO mojo.  
 
And if you'll forgive me a shameless plug, then... What's that? You won't? Well, then, never mind.

I'll debate you on this, Matt! :) 
 
YouTube is the SECOND largest search engine, after Google. I love other video players; there are a ton that are higher quality, and I've also seen a handful of good proprietary players. 
 
However-- If one of your goals is to drive traffic back to your site through search, why not put your video on YouTube? It's true-- YouTube referral traffic is relatively low, but if your messaging is in the video itself, you can still make the impact. 
 
My mantra is to get found anywhere you can. Don't cloister your content to one spot.  

I won't argue that posting your content on YouTube is a good way to get found. (If, that is, your "buyer persona" is frequently on YouTube.) My point is simply that if this is the only thing you do with your video then, as the meme says, you're doing it wrong. 
 
I know you don't disagree with me here, and I wouldn't have even brought up the point except for the fact that I see it all too often. People pour dozens of (wo)man-hours into creating compelling video content, only to post it on YouTube where it is met with dismal response and immeasurable results. There are far better ways to promote your video content, even if the eyeball-nabbing net they cast is not as far-reaching. 
 
So I'll agree with you that we should get our content out there, but I would caution against spending too much time trying to get people to watch your videos on someone else's site. Optimize video to drive SEO for your site first, and then worry about plastering the internet with your content. 
 
...is what I'm saying.

Sorry Matt, I agree with Rebecca on this. Hosting on YouTube is a positive on two fronts: 
 
1. Low bandwidth on YOUR server. If you are going to be putting up multiple videos, why not keep them on YouTube. Host them on YouTube, embed them on your sites page.  
 
2. Be found in multiple places. As Rebecca says, don't put all your SEO eggs in one basket. As search engines become "smarter", the algorithms will be able to create a solid link between content posted on YouTube and your own site. Also, the fact that Google and YouTube are partners is a good indicator of how SEO and SERPs will behave in the future.  
 
Plus, you can tag your videos and create links in the videos to point directly back to your site. Provided your content is good enough and relevant, others will share and favorite, and you have a full-circle that will generate direct leads to your site. 
 
my two cents...

This is an AWESOME debate. 
 
Chris: Well said! 
 
Matt: We come to an agreement! You should ALWAYS post (embed) your video back on your website after posting to YouTube. HubSpot does this by making a blog post about the video too. 
 
Along with making sure the page where your video lives is properly optimized for on-page SEO (good point!), why not ALSO add extra value to the post that the video on YouTube doesn't have. This further encourages people to visit your blog too. 
 
For example: If it's a music video, I add the lyrics, the cast, maybe a story about how/why we made the video. Add some context. That also adds more content to the blog post, which is CRITICAL for search. :) 
 
Go video! I could talk about this stuff for days!

Chris: Two great thoughts. Regarding bandwidth, you have a point. Having a video hosted on a third-party server is a good way to free up resources. But again, there are better alternatives to YouTube. (My company hosts video in the Amazon cloud, which our clients love.) As for getting found, Rebecca and I agree that there is really no disadvantage to putting general-purpose video on sites like YouTube. My point is that the concept of "getting found" is most powerful when a searcher finds one piece of your video content in the context of all your other content, all in one place. 
 
Also, I'm not a huge fan of the overlay links and buttons and hotspots on YouTube videos. I'd much rather have the video posted on a landing page where I could watch my videos uninterrupted, and then click links (if I wanted to) after the fact. 
 
Rebecca: Yes -- video content on a search-optimized page is great for SEO, but I'd take it one step further: with recent technological advancements, it is possible to optimize the video itself for SEO. (And for obvious reasons this gives a marketer a distinct advantage over using YouTube.) 
 
Let's never fight again!

Thank you for a wonderful and simple set of suggestions! I am VP for a direct sales company and these ideas are absolutely wonderful. I greatly look forward to sharing them with my sales force!

These are great tips for creating videos with some personality! We do production and sometimes over think what were shooting. Thanks

Hi, Thanks for this great post. I really like it. I even talked about this on my blog. Hope you’ll keep posting more awesome stuffs.

Create a mash-up video consisting of really old (creative commons) footage in the style of Ed Wood. You can see some mash-ups on our blog if you so desire.

Rebecca, don't forget Screenflow for screencasts on the Mac.

How about video book reviews? I think that video reviews are much more effective than something written. It adds personality (people can see you when you speak and that builds/adds trust).

Thanks for the discussion. It's nice to read a trusting debate between knowledgeable, enthusiastic contributors of this movement.

Rebecca, great list of quick/simple video projects. It's never been easier to dip your toe into video production. Once comfortable with the process I have outlined 42 different types of video projects that any company consider here: 
http://www.onemarketmedia.com/blog/2009/12/42-ways-to-use-video-to-grow-your-business/ 
As I indicated on the list, I believe content marketing video and mobile video are going to see explosive growth. 
 
cheers,

Really feel good to know about this HubSpot's Inbound Internet Marketing Blog.It's really nice blog about internet advertising. Online marketing is really gaining rapid popularity. To promote our site or product we have to do advertising so that people should know about it. Even i used to promote my site and sell my product online through fullservicead and my business is really growing.  
 
posted on Thursday, January 07, 2010 at 7:17 AM by Pallavi  
 
 
 
 
 
--youre right, HubSpot's Inbound Internet Marketing Blog is really great. I always talked about the posts here on my blog because their posts are very good, uptodate and latest.

I am a newbie to the world of social media and viral marketing. Hubspot has been a great resource. On that note, I think te most difficult part is finding a message and a means that best matches your audience. We are an older consumer brand. we recently did a video "Thank You". It is posted on Youtube but we have also sent it to our online consumers and our vendors, suppliers and retail partners. It has been very well-received. I believe this is true because the video is sincere, genuine and shows our corporate personality. I have include the link so you can see what I mean. 
 
 
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ORZ4dZU28Y

Video marketing is very strong. It is by BIG GUN when going to win the first page search engine battles and win everytime, multiple pieces of organic content for my clients within days, not months...always a first page listing, organically in 24 hours, or less!