On Tusday, Mike Sachoff shared some great tips on WebProNews.com on how to optimize your online videos.
As you may know, SES San Jose is going on this week out on the west coast; the tips Sachoff shared in his post came from the SES session "The Next Wave for Online Video." Speakers shared strategies and advice for optimizing videos for popular services such as YouTube and Hulu.
But unlike traditional video optimization tips which focus heavily on optimizing for search, these tips incorporate flourishing elements of the Internet , including social media and mobile platforms.
"Consider all the elements surrounding ranking on YouTube," Sachoff prompts us.
- view counts
- channel views
- subscribers
- frequency
- rating
- sharing
- favoriting
- playlists
- flagging,
- text comments
- video comments
- thumbs up / thumbs down votes
These actions involve human interaction, user-generated content, and other activities that go beyond computer-based algorithms.
Here are the two elements of video optimization from Sachoff's article I find most significant...
Optimize your keywords and tags.
This seems like traditional SEO, but it goes byeond that! You optimize your webpages with keyword-rich content-why not your videos? Spend some time checking out your competition on YouTube - do some keyword research and plan out which keywords you want to pop up for. Optimize accordingly!
Like Google, YouTube has a keyword suggest tool - it's there for you to use, to take advantage of the valuable feedback! If you're content with the Google keyword tool, you can still use it to perform the same task.
YouTube also has a great analytics tool, YouTube Insight [http://www.youtube.com/t/advertising_insight]. Again, this tool is here to help you, so check it out!
Connect with your Community.
This more directly revolves around human interaction. Here's an overview of Sachoff's tips from the SES session:
- Create videos that are interesting and enjoyable
- Subscribe to other vloggers' channels
- Bookmark your favorites
- Leave video response comments on popular videos
- Encourag viewers to vote on your videos
- Use keywords similar to those of your competitors' videos- this boosts the likelihood you'll be featured on the "Related Videos" panel on their page
- Post videos towards the end of the week- weekends are perhaps when most people watch videos
- Share links to your videos on social media platforms and social networking websites, like Twitter and Facebook
- Don't just rely on YouTube- submit your video to other sites via services such as tubemogul.com
- Consider linking your videos together to encourage viewers to keep watching
- Group related videos together in customized video playlists
Like regular content optimization, optimizing your videos requires consistent maintenance, patience, and skill. These are but a few tips graciously borrowed from WebProNews and the experts at SES - if you're passionate and serious about boosting your visibility in video SERPs, I invite you to research more, and check back here for added video optimization tips!