There are many web video hosting sites, and it can be hard to differentiate one from another. However, each offers unique features that makes it attractive to distinctive users and audiences.
Once you've found some web video hosting sites that offer the technical features you need, you can narrow down your choices by looking at the audiences and aesthetics of individual sites.
Audience
Different sites have different audiences. If your video focuses on a niche topic, choose a web video hosting service that serves that niche.
If you want everyone to see it, go to one of the mega-popular sites like YouTube.
Payments
Some web video hosting sites offer you the chance to make money off of your videos. You won't necessarily get rich, but it might be nice to make a few bucks off of your work.
Revver is one popular web video hosting site that embeds advertisements in videos and pays the creator when those ads are viewed.
Video Sharing
Where can you share your video after it's uploaded?
Most web video hosting services allow you to embed your videos in blogs, on personal web pages, and on sites such as Facebook and MySpace.
Make sure that your chosen web video hosting site offers this service if it's important for you to be able to share your video around the web.
Video Privacy
Maybe, though, you don't want to share your video. Maybe you want to keep it private, and only let it be seen by selected family and friends.
If this is the case, be sure to choose a web video hosting service that allows you to set a privacy option for your videos.
Video Player
Do you like the look of the video player?
Some sites will include advertisements next to the video player, or will place a watermark of their logo over part of your video. This may be fine, but it doesn’t look so professional if you’re sending the video to clients and it has a big “YouTube” logo on it.
The Neighbors
Check out the other videos on the site. Are they high quality and in good taste, or a little raunchy and inappropriate?
It's best to choose a web video hosting site that displays other videos you can feel good about being associated with. Some sites, like Drop Shots and Phanfare are designed specifically for family friendly videos.
Video Review
Many web video hosting sites review all videos for appropriateness and copyright infringement before they get posted on the site.
This kind of review can help ensure the quality of the videos on the site, but it also means that it can take a while (sometimes up to 24 hours) before your video is displayed.
If it's important to access your uploaded video right away, choose a web video hosting service that doesn't review videos.
User Agreement
Finally, be sure to read the user agreement associated with whatever web video hosting site you choose to use. You want to make sure that you retain all rights to your video even after it's been uploaded!
