The importance of video content is becoming increasingly clearer to SEOs. Websites with video content are 53% more likely to gain Page 1 status. The CTR (click-through rate) on a video is 41% higher than on simple text content.
Videos are easy to share and therefore great tools to increase visibility and allow us to squeeze a big amount of important information into a small, entertaining space. Videos make natural linking possible. And to be honest, we are all more likely to simply hit play on a shared object and watch it relaxed, than read through lines and lines of informative text.
There are suggestions that Google is going to rank videos not for their views on YouTube, but on the minutes they have been viewed and whether a person returns to the search page after opening the video.
Why is video not being used more?
Five years ago having a video was enough of a novelty to get you noticed. Nowadays literally millions of videos are uploaded every day, most of them of poor quality. You now need something really special to stand out from the crowd.
But, despite the increasing presence of videos in search results, a lot of SEOs are still scared of proposing videos to their clients. This might be due to the fear of potential high production costs.
Jamie Donoughue, director and owner of Left Eye Blind, said: “It costs less than you think. Most people fear going to professional video companies to create their videos, mainly due to the preconception of cost.
“However, the fact is that that these companies are experts at saving money and know all the tricks of the trade to create a high quality product on limited resources – 99% of the time it will prove more time and cost effective than trying to produce the video yourself on your mates DSLR cameras.”
The trick is to approach a production company with a set budget. This is how most professional production companies work, whether it is a commercial, TV drama, corporate or music video; everything in film works to a budget.
How do we include video in SEO?
It’s important that both SEO and video production work hand in hand with each other. When researching the market they want to host their video in Content & Online PR Executives must ask themselves:
- Who is going to share it?
- Who are my customers?
- What age group are they?
- What do they like?
- What are they most likely to share?
- Do I want to share information?
- Do I want to entertain?
- Do I want to instruct?
After these questions have been answered, the film production company should be contacted and asked to pitch an idea. Of course an SEO should bring ideas along, but also let the production company do its job and come up with the best working solution for a video. They know exactly what to do to amend a video to all the needs of its viewers.
Once the video is finished, the SEO needs to start video optimization, to make the ranking as easy as possible. This is just as important as the production of a video and a part that should be taken seriously.
Whats the future of SEO and video?
Including videos in strategies will make an SEO executives job easier and more enjoyable, due to people linking back to the video content naturally.
SEO for video has not received enough attention yet, but as video content on the internet grows, the competition to be at the top of Google, YouTube and co. will only increase.
The marriage of SEO and video is inevitable but it is going to take some brave parties to take the initial risk to prove how it can work
Insights
