Video SEO (vSEO) is the process of improving the ranking or visibility of a video in video search engines including YouTube, allowing it to show up on the first page of results. It involves creating video metadata that is relevant to what people are searching for as well as building video content that generates traffic for a specific website.
People spend 2.6x more time on web pages that include video, and convert 80% more often if a landing page includes video – Video SEO makes it possible for consumers to find your video content online.
Video SEO is an underrated way to drive traffic, boost conversion, outperforming the competition and driving ROI. 91% of businesses say that video is an important part of their marketing strategy. Video SEO is a necessary element when implementing a high performing robust SEO strategy.
Video can increase overall engagement on your website, which is critical for success in the search engines.
The benefits of Video SEO
Video increases your website’s core SEO KPIs
Great content and time spent on your site translates to increased traffic, decreased bounce rate and hence higher rankings.
Video results in SERPs increase click-through rates
Search engine result pages (SERP’s) with video links drive a 157% increase in organic traffic, and landing pages with a video on them are 53% more likely to show up on top.
Video can lower bounce rates
72% of people would rather watch a video to learn about a product or service than read about it in text. Lower bounce rates translates into positive experience and higher rankings.
Video SEO reinforces keyword strategies
A video transcript gives Google an extra body of text to index boosting the likelihood that your content will ‘show up’ and in turn boost organic traffic.
Great videos earn backlinks
Backlinks are hugely important to a high-performing video SEO strategy which is a primary ranking factor in itself when ranking content thus increasing the traffic to your site.
Embedding a video on your website is a great option if you want people to experience your video within your website, however, there are video hosting platforms you could leverage to improve your video SEO including YouTube and Vimeo.
- YouTube: YouTube is the second-largest search engine in the world, after Google. When you host on YouTube, your video is also more likely to show up in Google search results; 82% of all video results in Google are pulled from YouTube.
- Vimeo: While Vimeo isn’t as popular as YouTube however has a more professional reputation.
Video SEO is part of an integrated marketing plan, and when implemented successfully can boost rankings significantly. Having the right metadata, tags, video thumbnail, descriptions and titles in place is the tip of the Video SEO iceberg so search engines can find, understand and promote your content boosting your ranking.