Video SEO

Video SEO describes the process of optimising video content such that it ranks higher on video platforms such as YouTube. Techniques are similar to those used in conventional SEO.

Research shows that YouTube is the second-largest search engine in the world after Google, with over 4 billion video views per day and users watching over 6 billion hours of video per month. According to Forrester, video content is fifty times as likely to appear at the top of Google's search results pages than static content. That is because search engine users want to view video content. And Google, being the user centric search engine that it is, aims to give people exactly what they want.

The cost of uploading video content is manageable thanks to YouTube and other video-sharing websites, which negate the requirement for expensive multimedia hosting solutions. Investing in video SEO is important because it gives website owners an opportunity to compete for the top search positions on Google. The results of video SEO can be invaluable.

A successful video SEO campaign can substantially increase on-site traffic and although video content may be hosted on YouTube, video clips can also be embedded on the target website directly.

As with static content, Google rewards video content that is likely to be of genuine interest to users by increasing its search rank. That means a video could rise to the top of the results only if it is relevant to the target audience. Optimising for relevance involves adding tags (when uploading the video to a website such as YouTube) that include keywords and phrases that are likely to be searched for by those who wish to view such content.

The title and file name of the video are also important, as these provide Google with an indication as to what the content is all about (after all, Googlebot cannot view and understand videos as a human can. At least not yet). Writing a short, keyword-rich description of the video is arguably just as useful.

Videos should be embedded on pages that include plenty of optimised content. Ideally, the content would include written information about the video. Adding a transcript of the video can not only improve search rank, but it should also help disabled users access and understand the media. A video sitemap should also be submitted to Google to ensure that Googlebot finds and crawls the relevant content.

The best videos go viral, with the most popular videos tending to last no longer than five minutes, so content should be kept short, interesting and relevant. Long videos ought to be serialised to encourage repeat visits and improve the overall viewing experience for users. There are numerous ways to implement SEO for your video content, but remember that quality should be the starting point for any strategy.