WordPress is an excellent tool for sharing content whether it’s text or imagery. While it can store these files in its own folder, there may be other places you have media stored online. For instance, what if you want to incorporate YouTube videos into your website? In such a case, you may want to set up a WordPress external media library to use.
Although many sites let you embed media files, sometimes it’s just easier and more efficient to use an external library instead. Don’t worry, it’s not as difficult as you might think.
Today, we’re going to show you how to set up this external library and connect to some of the most popular platforms on the Internet.
How Are External Libraries Useful?
Mobile Apps
The Internet is full of places where you can save and share content like pictures and video. What if you wanted to add some of those elements to your website? For example, a lot of people use the Flickr app to keep their followers engaged by taking pictures. Sometimes those images may be ideal for use in your site.
Social Media Marketing
Why don’t you just use WordPress to store all of your images and videos instead of saving them elsewhere? Because it creates a method of social media marketing. Here is an example of how this works:
You create an amazing video on YouTube to promote a product or service for your business.
That video is available through YouTube’s search engine specifically for YouTube users.
Now you can use the same video on your website in order to engage your visitors as well.
Instead of purely relying on your site’s search engine optimization to share the media, it will benefit from YouTube’s own search at the same time.
In this example, a single video can be used to promote the business on several online platforms other than your site.
Adding a WordPress External Media Library
In this tutorial, we’re using the Remote Media Libraries plugin to connect our media. To do this, simply go to the “Plugins” area of the WordPress dashboard. Select “Add New” at the top of the screen and search for “Remote Media Libraries.” Once you find the plugin, click to install and activate it.
Upon activation, this plugin will add a new function under the “Media” area of WordPress. It will be called, “Remote Libraries.”
Setting Up a Remote Library
Once you have Remote Media Libraries added to WordPress, it’s time to set up your connection.
Go to the “Remote Libraries” area located in the “Media” control for WordPress. 
Click the “Add New” button on the top of the screen.
Enter a new title name for this library. You may want to use a name that will make it easier to find later on. For instance, use a name like “YouTube Videos” if you plan on connecting YouTube.
Select the service you want to use. This is a drop down window of several of the most popular media libraries. As of this tutorial, Remote Media Libraries only supports five. These consist of Vimeo, YouTube, DailyMotion, Flickr and Instagram.
Set the User ID of the account you are connecting. This is the username that is used on the site you’re connecting to.
Click the “Validate” button.
If a green check mark appears, then the connection is good. If it’s a red “X,” then the connection will not work. You’ll need to troubleshoot this to discover why. Usually, this happens when the username is not typed in correctly.
Click the “Publish” button when you have completed all of these steps and your connection is good.
Inserting Media into WordPress from External Libraries
Inserting media from a WordPress external media library is really no different than using the built-in library. In fact, the plugin in this tutorial will add a new feature for using images and video.
Go into any old post or page or you can create a new one. Place your cursor where you want the image or video to appear. Click the “Add Media” button in the WordPress content editor. On the left, you’ll see the new connection you made when setting up the library. When you click on its link, it will pull all available media from that particular source.
When you import images from your external libraries, you have access to default WordPress gallery settings. This includes the ability to change:
Image Title
Caption
Alt Text
Description
Alignment
Links
Image Size
This means you have access to various settings for SEO and functionality. For example, selecting the thumbnail size of your Instagram image may serve to fit your post or page much easier.
Will Remote Media Libraries let you import into Featured Images?
Unfortunately, you are unable to use external libraries in this fashion for featured images. This is partly because of how WordPress uses the featured image control in the fist place. The external source simply cannot be utilized in WordPress the same way that a regular image can.
Can you edit images in external libraries like you can in WordPress?
WordPress has the built-in ability to modify images on a small scale. For example, any image in the Media folder can be cropped and slightly modified. This is not possible with external libraries. WordPress doesn’t have access to those root folders and is unable to make permanent changes in this way.
Does this import the image directly to the WordPress Media folder?
When you use plugins like Remote Media Libraries, images and videos are pulled form external sources. This means the files stay on those websites and are only accessed when someone visits your pages or posts. No additional room is necessary in your WordPress image folder.
What if the image or video is removed from the external location?
If a video or image is removed from the site of which you’re linking, it will be removed from your WordPress website as well. For example, let’s say you have a great image saved on Flickr that you’re using in one of your posts. If that image is deleted from Flickr, it will also be deleted from the post.
Other Plugins of Interest
External Media
The External Media plugin works similar to the one in this tutorial. However, it focuses on Cloud storage services such as Dropbox and Google Drive. It also allows you to connect to Instagram, though.
External Media Upload
If you simply want to use an external location to directly upload media to your website, External Media Upload may be of interest. It supports a large number of file types, bulk uploads and is able to set an external graphic as a featured image.
Using external libraries can expand what you can do to your website while engaging others on those platforms. It’s a useful way to integrate those materials into the site and create a web of visitor interaction. The next time you snap an amazing pic in Instagram that would look great on your site, set up an external media library. It may save you a great deal of time and effort.
What kind of plugins do you use to integrate media into your website? How often do you use video from other sites into your posts and pages?