When sharing videos online, regardless of whether you’re promoting a new product, creating brand awareness or just being all-around funny, there are certain things you can do to make your video more visible to the public. This post will share basic SEO strategies that anyone can do to optimize their YouTube videos for Google.

Why Optimize your YouTube Videos for Google?

Currently, Google is largely dominating its competition when it comes to being the lead search engine. If you are choosing to only optimize videos for YouTube, you are missing out on a large audience that you could reach! When a YouTube video ranks well on Google, it takes up a large amount of real estate, making it hard to ignore. For example, if you are looking up “How to make a tie-dye t-shirt?” This is what pops up:

Notice this SERP (search engine result page) showed the video first and did not show a single how-to guide because the public found this to be the most useful.

5 Elements that are a MUST for Optimizing Videos

1. Title

Arguably the most important element and the one you want to pay the most attention to is the title. The title for a YouTube video should be descriptive, use keywords and be under 60 characters. When starting to think of a title, it is important to consider the main idea of the video and how people might search for it. At this point, you can begin to gather keywords and figure out which ones best fit your video. This step is not only essential for the title but other elements of the video.

When starting to put the title together, it is important to not “stuff keywords” but to make it sound genuine and straightforward. Lastly, it is important to consider the length. If the title is over 60 characters, part of your title will be hidden. This is a major problem if the “big idea” is not visible because people are less likely to watch a video if they do not know what it is about. Relating back to the tie-dye example, the title includes the big idea of the video. Placing the word “tutorial” at the end lets people know it is a how-to video and acts as an attention grabber.

2. Thumbnail

Other than the title, there is one other element that makes up a viewer’s first impression of a video: a thumbnail. The thumbnail is the image that appears before the video begins to play. Thumbnails should be clear, high-quality images that give the audience some insight as to what they are about to watch. To some, this may seem like a nitpicky detail, but ask yourself are you more likely to click on a video that has a professional and informative image, or a blurry image that gives no information? The thumbnail selected for the tie-dye tutorial is professional and has words explaining what the video will be about, so viewers are not left guessing.

3. Description

The description is an extremely important piece of the metadata that Google can read. This is where you can provide more detailed information about what exactly your video is about. When writing the description, think about the audience you are trying to reach and optimize for them. Choose your terminology wisely and try to put your most valuable keywords in the first or second sentence. Those first sentences will be the only visible part of the description unless a viewer interacts and clicks into your video.

The bottom of the description can include links to other platforms such as social media or even your website for more information. The length of a description varies based on the content, but a good description has a minimum of 150 words. The description for the tie-dye tutorial is lengthy, but some of the information included was where to buy the materials, music selection and the personal hashtag that she would like her users to use and interact with her.

4. Tags

Tags are another way for search engines to gain a better understanding of what the video is about. These “tags” are the same keywords that you have been optimizing for in your title and description. There should be a mix of short general terms as well as some specific long-tail keywords. This way, you can reach audiences that might know exactly what they are looking for and some that might be browsing the internet. Aim to have a minimum of 10 tags but be sure not to stuff useless keywords into videos just to rank better because there are strict rules against that. Unfortunately, tags are hidden to viewers, so we are unable to see what specific tags were used.

5. CC & Transcripts

Not having closed captioning and a transcript is a rookie mistake that is often overlooked. Making your video accessible to all is very important, and search engines such as Google include accessibility as a ranking factor! YouTube makes it quite simple to add closed captions when uploading or editing videos. Here is a link on how to add closed captioning on YouTube. Uploading a transcript improves accessibility purposes and makes it easier for Google to crawl the video and get more information about the content! When watching the tie-dye tutorial you could click the CC button and get closed captions and open a transcript under the other options button.

These 5 simple elements can help your video rank well on Google. Completing these steps does not guarantee you a top spot on a SERP, but it does increase your chances. If you have any questions on how to optimize your YouTube videos or any other digital marketing needs, please contact us and a team member will get back to you.