Video camera
Lately, I’ve been spending a great deal of time learning about video and how video can benefit you as an Internet marketer and as someone who wants to do SEO. While video isn’t searchable in the same way that traditional text is searchable, it is actually one of the most powerful SEO tools you can use. Here’s why:
Short Attention Spans
As I’ve mentioned previously, I still love reading the New York Times each morning. I also will often spend an hour reading various news sites and blogs while I wake up with my morning coffee each day. However, I am the exception that proves the rule. These days, most people have short attention spans and won’t sit around reading a long blog post or other long winded material.
They will however look at a funny video, whether it’s posted on YouTube or on your own website and this in turn can lead you to earn more click throughs for your advertising, thus earning you more money. Here are five ways to use videos to make that happen:
Search
As I said, while video isn’t searchable the way text is, it can be searched based on the tags and description you give your video. It is also worth noting that an increasingly large number of people do not turn to Google when they need to search for information but instead log onto YouTube and search out a video which will show them what to do.
SEO
This might sound like the same thing, but it’s not. If you put up a video on YouTube which has a link back to your website and it happens to go viral, not only will you get flooded with clickthroughs, but you will also find that your rankings go up because the rank of your video goes up in the Google search rankings.
Free Advertising
There are a mix of opinions regarding whether or not you are entitled to embed videos from YouTube, even if the owners of said videos have left the embed option available. However, one thing is clear – if you make a high quality video which grabs attention and makes people want to visit it and tell their friends about it, it will get embedded on other sites.
As long as you made sure to include your URL in the video (at the end is a good choice), you will then in effect earn free advertising from the other websites that embed your video for their viewers to take a look at.
Facebook
Got a Facebook fan page which isn’t attracting all that many visitors? Spruce it up with some fun videos from your website.
Send it Into the Wide World
There are a number of websites which, similar to places like Ping.fm and HelloTXT will send your video far and wide, allowing it to reach the maximum audience and possibly even go viral. Tubemogul for example offers a free version for those with only a handful of videos to distribute.