Using Video To Push Your Website's SEO

I deep dived into a recent article that I found sooo true about video and SEO (Search Engine Optimization). I wanted to share some key points that we too implement with our clients. (They have to do their part but we at least put the tools in place for them) Everyone wants to know the secret to getting their company’s website to rank on the 1st page of Google. While this is a great goal to hit and everyone wants “their” website to be #1, a lot of things need to happen and the fact that Google themselves constantly change their way of using SEO, the battle is sadly always ongoing.  What most of us in the biz of branding consulting do agree with is that video and it’s use thereof is really what can push your content-website up the rankings because video works! Video makes up 76% of all internet traffic, and despite the fact that there are more videos out there than ever, HubSpot states that, “43% of people want to see even more video content online”. In short, if you’re not creating video content then you’re missing out. Here’s why you should be taking advantage of the SEO benefits of video in 2018.

Your customers love Video and Google does too

Google gives higher priority to websites using videos over those only using text. In fact, having a video on your company’s landing page makes it 53% more likely to appear on page 1 of Google SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). Simply put, video is a great way to increase your SEO, because people love to watch videos and Google bots love to crawl them. Sites with video content are also far more likely to rank for competitive keywords, which increases your chances of appearing in a search made by your target audience. A study by Forbes shows that, “65% of business decision-makers will visit a website after viewing a branded video.” Making it pretty clear that relevant and good quality video content can dramatically improve your site’s SEO by driving, not just people, but the right people to your homepage.

Video Improves your UX

User experience (UX) is crucial when it comes to the success of your website. Think of UX as the online equivalent of customer service. If your customers are happy with the service, they are more likely to visit again. If your UX is good people will stay, and return to, your website increasing their chances of buying your product. Having a video on your site increases customer engagement. People prefer watching a video than reading text as we process visual content much faster than written information. This makes videos important to improving the user experience. If your product has lots of complicated features, for example complex technical machinery, it’s tough to explain just using text. If people don’t understand how your product works, then how can you expect them to buy it? By adding video, you can make people understand your product easily and accurately. Improving your UX also leads to improved SEO, as there is a correlation between these two aspects. When users are more engaged with your site, Google sees this as a sign that your website contains high quality content. This helps to get you higher search engine rankings.

Improve your SEO with a sharable video

Video sharing is another way to improve your SEO and expand your reach further, as most people will share a video that they’ve watched with their friends online. Video is the easiest content to spread on social media. Sharing is the 1st step to going viral, and that’s every online marketer’s dream! Make sure that you only produce good quality videos, a bad video ruins your credibility and a high bounce rate will lower your search engine ranking. Before you start your video project, always ask yourself, “Would I like to watch/share this?” If the answer is no, then it may be time to start your project again.

Those Tags, Descriptions, and Titles

Having good quality video content will help to boost your SEO, but don’t forget to make your video SEO friendly too. The title and the description of your video are both important elements that can affect your search engine rankings. Your video title should be SEO friendly but also clickable, remember the title needs to be interesting enough to make people want to watch your video. Your title should ideally have at least 5 or more words including a keyword that you want to rank for. This can also get you more watches on YouTube, spreading your reach even further. The video description is also really important. That’s because Google’s spiders can’t read videos. They rely entirely on the description you give to find out what your video is about. Rather than just throwing a few random words in the description box, try to describe the video content in plenty of detail. This information tells Google, as well as your customers, exactly what your video is about.
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-Roy