How to Optimise Your Video for Search Engines

It is undeniable that video has emerged as the most sought-after form of content, as 87% of internet marketers are actively producing video content. This upsurge in video production has stemmed from growing consumer demand, with approximately one-third of the time spent online dedicated to watching videos.

To effectively use video SEO, however, you need to do more than post many videos to your website. It would be best if you put more thought into it.

Consider that over 50% of video content is viewed on mobile devices. Nevertheless, according to Google’s research, mobile internet users have high expectations for page load times. Were you aware that if a webpage on mobile devices takes over three seconds to load, more than half of the users will leave the page?

Videos can be a significant bottleneck in the loading process, implying that improper video utilization can negatively impact the user experience. Your user base will decrease if your page takes less time to load. Because Google utilizes the amount of time it takes a page to load as a ranking factor, this can also damage your reputation with the search engine.

Be sure to check out this article about video marketing to learn more. 

Here are a few points you need to be aware of when developing a website conducive to video SEO that caters to the visual trends within the customer base without compromising the quality of the on-site content or the pages themselves so that you may use video effectively.

Uses for Video Marketing

Numerous companies have discovered that video marketing may serve many purposes on their websites. You can engage users in several ways by utilizing video SEO, some of which are included below.

Produce Videos That Offer Advice Or Assistance With The Use Of Your Products And Services.

People are more likely to make purchases after watching video demos of your products in action, which you may provide to them. They can also assist customers in getting the most out of their purchased products. You can make videos that show consumers how to solve common difficulties and continue to provide outstanding customer care even after the sale has been finalized.

People Might Be Excited About Upcoming Products And Services Through Videos.

Create movies that inform consumers about the approaching release dates of the new product or service and show them why they should be enthusiastic about acquiring the new item or using the new service.

Offer Your Customers A Glimpse Of What Goes On In The Company Behind The Scenes.

Give them a tour of the office building, give them a chance to “meet” the employees that they communicate with regularly via email or the phone, or even set up an interview with one of the members of the executive team, such as the CEO or one of the company’s founders.

Motivate People To Get Excited About Upcoming Events By Encouraging Them.

For instance, if your company routinely conducts a conference for the industry, using video to build excitement for the approaching dates is a great idea. You can use an approach similar to this if a representative of your company will be speaking at a specific conference or event; you can urge people to attend and check out the speaker by showcasing prior speeches they have given.

Offer Content That Is Not Associated With Your Brand That Is Meaningful And Useful

Video is rapidly rising in importance, especially in content marketing. Video content that provides helpful information for its intended audience rather than promoting the brand or any of the areas mentioned above is included here. Tutorials, recommendations, authoritative analysis, and market updates are all examples of this genre of writing.

There Are Three Main Ways To Add Video Seo To Your Website.

To correctly use search engine optimization (SEO) for videos, you must first evaluate how you want to integrate the video into your website. You can go one of three different ways.

  • Integrating the video directly into your website’s structure is a definite possibility. This option is used by many websites, for example, when they want to put a background video on their site.
  • You can submit the video to YouTube and then embed it into your website to share it with your audience. This allows you to simultaneously promote your video on the vast YouTube network, which can expand your brand’s reach and improve its reputation while driving more traffic to your website.
  • One option is to use a video hosting service like Vimeo. These hosting providers often give you greater control over how the video shows on your site, which makes this strategy particularly useful for videos that might fail to fare as well on YouTube.

The quantity of resources needed to implement video SEO successfully is one of the possible obstacles it presents. There are practical considerations, such as the need to make financial investments in material tools and editing software, among other things. In addition to that, there is a need for creative input when coming up with concepts that can be carried out for a new channel. Utilizing your other forms of media as a source of inspiration and developing those concepts into video SEO is an efficient method for reducing the originality required to optimize video content.

You can leverage video across different marketing channels by generating shorter movies summarising blog content or product content you are releasing on your website. Do you have a video explaining a recent blog post you published in under a minute? Embed it as rich media within the blog post itself, post it on your social accounts with a link to the original post, and cross-publish it on your YouTube account with in-video cards pointing to the post and other products or offers mentioned in the content. All of these should be done simultaneously.

Optimizing For Video SEO

Make Sure Your Video Is Built Directly Into The Site and as Small as It Can Be.

Keep in mind how important it is to have a fast-loading page. If you want your videos to be easily found by search engines, focusing on reducing buffering times and optimizing mobile browsing for low data usage is essential. For this reason, any films you embed directly into your website should be compressed, and you should steer clear of having background videos that play on an unending loop.

Take Into Account Mobile Devices and Videos That Play Automatically

Give your users the option to choose whether or not they wish to watch the video. When an attempt is made to coerce a customer into playing a game or otherwise consuming content, they typically react adversely to it. 

Therefore, if you are confident that you want movies to start playing automatically, you should provide users with a pause button so that they have the opportunity to turn the feature off if they so want. Keep in mind that mobile devices will frequently block autoplay. Consider replacing autoplay background videos or other films that aren’t necessary with another form of content on mobile versions of your website.

Determine Where the Video Should Be Located on the Website.

The location of the video on the page affects not only the user experience but also the video search engine optimization. If the video is the most significant type of content, you should position it in a prominent location near the top of the page. On the other hand, if the video only serves as a supplement or an afterthought, it may be placed to the side of the page or a little bit farther toward the middle.

Ensure That The Video Is Still Visible During The Process

The video should be viewable by all viewers, irrespective of the device they are using. You can exercise control over this by examining the frame that you choose for the video. Regarding video quality, a ratio of approximately 640 pixels wide by 360 pixels tall produces the best results.

Make a Video Transcript or Other Content Available For Video SEO

Search engines are not yet able to understand the content that is included within a video. Some users can only watch your video or listen to your audio if they’re in a public place with low noise levels or to avoid the volume turned up. To consider all of these aspects, you must ensure that you not only offer a transcript but also convert your video footage into text-based content in some other part of the page.

Users and search engine optimization for videos can both benefit from giving even just a quick description of what the film is about. This also gives you a fantastic opportunity for relevant keywords, which is essential for optimizing the SEO of your video content.

Insert The Video Code Into The Footer.

The footer is the appropriate location for any video code. You want the video to load after everything else. This will make it feasible for your users to start interacting with your site as quickly as possible and provide them with the best possible user experience. The remainder of the website will load more quickly due to placing the code in the footer.

Check To See That Your Video Is Html5-Compatible

HTML5 has taken the role of several different video formats. At this point, virtually all websites provide HTML5 as an option, even if they primarily offer the video in another format. Because the web appears to be heading a certain way, your movies should also be compatible.

Video Marketing KPIs

Establishing success metrics for your video initiatives is important, just like any other marketing channel. You need to identify how you’ll measure success across these metrics.

The platform on which you store your video content significantly impacts the tracking you can perform and the locations in which you can do it. YouTube is frequently an excellent place to start since it provides a powerful combination of built-in reporting, essential editing tools, and a distinct search ecosystem that can be utilized for organic discovery and brand equity development.

Once you have decided where to host your video content, you can begin measuring metrics based on the capabilities that are accessible to you once you have made that decision. Some common key performance indicators for video marketing are:

  • Traffic on the landing page, impressions on the video iframe, bounce rate, and exit rate make up the top funnel.
  • Video playtime and the number of stops and plays come in the middle of the funnel.

Conclusion

Video may be an excellent tool for communicating with your audience, allowing you to provide a more personalized experience for the user while also assisting them in more effectively assimilating information than they could by reading lengthy articles. However, if you can configure your videos on your website correctly, you can take advantage of search engine optimization for videos while preserving the user experience’s quality. We have plenty more helpful SEO articles available, so feel free to check them out here.

Lark Begin is a digital marketer from Ottawa, Canada. Lark is an SEO Master, PPC expert and content writer. She helps many small businesses get ranked on Google each day.