Consumers expect convenience and accessibility when it comes to content.

Transcription is a frequently overlooked area of content marketing. However, it can have numerous benefits when it is done right. When you pair online transcription with videos, podcasts, and other types of media, you can increase visibility of multimedia content and make it accessible to individuals with disabilities or for those who would rather read a transcript than watch a video. With these clear advantages, the question surrounding transcription becomes “how do I transcribe audio files?” rather than “is transcription worth the time?”

Reach more potential customers by using professional transcription services from Pennington Creative.

We can transcribe videos, podcasts, and advertisements so that more people will be able to hear your message. These services can also help boost your SEO and make it easier to repurpose your content.

Continue reading for a more detailed look at the value of transcription. Additionally, we cover the potential pitfalls of choosing the wrong service to transcribe your content.

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What Transcription Can Do for You

Videos and podcasts are both great ways to improve brand awareness, encourage readers to share content, and increase search engine visibility. However, these types of content are a significant investment. So, you will want to make sure they work as hard as possible for your organization. Transcribing audio to text allows you to get more out of multimedia content. It can broaden your potential audience, create SEO markers, and make it easier to restructure and repurpose the content later on. Here is a closer look at how transcription accomplishes these key tasks:

Boost SEO – Search engines have become very good at “reading” text to identify markers of quality that ultimately rank a websites’ worth and position on search engine results pages. However, they have not yet become able to accurately interpret audio. Transcription puts the audio into plain text that is easily picked up by any search engine.

Increase AccessibilityThere are nearly 50 million people in the United States alone who are deaf or hard of hearing. For these individuals, transcription is essential for interacting with videos and podcasts. Depending on the nature of the video, transcription might also save you from a disability discrimination lawsuit. While online videos do not have the same strict captioning and transcription requirements as broadcast television, the threat of facing a lawsuit is very real for resources like e-learning videos. For example, Harvard and MIT have both faced legal battles for neglecting to provide captioning for educational videos and audio resources.

Improve ComprehensionLooking to the general population, there is a great need for transcription that you may not have previously considered. Individuals who speak English as a second language may have an easier time understanding a video that is paired with a transcription. Additionally, those who are visual learners may better absorb content that is read rather than heard.

Repurpose Content –If you want to create a compilation of videos or previous podcasts, it will be much easier to sort through a text file—especially if it is timestamped—than it will be to re-watch videos to find the clips you want. You might also want to create a blog post based on a video, and this will be a faster process when there is already written text to accompany the media.

Illustration showing how audio input is transcribed, from headphones to pen and paper.

Why Our Approach Works

There are automated transcription services readily available, including automatic captioning directly through YouTube. Unfortunately, this type of software often creates inaccuracies, even with the clearest audio files. That’s why it is common to outsource transcription to writers.
An experienced digital content provider, Pennington Creative has a team of in-house writers dedicated to a high standard of quality. We can provide transcription services to accurately detail the contents of your online videos or audio podcasts.