Best Practices for Optimizing Your YouTube Videos

Your company made a super YouTube video. It’s funny, relevant to your industry, motivating and concise. You put it on your channel and wait for the likes and shares to roll in. One problem — nothing’s happening.

Here’s the rub when it comes to YouTube. Making an outstanding video is only half the battle. To engage your audience and connect the video with the people you want to see it, you also need to optimize. What does that mean? It involves deploying a slew of best practices that will boost your video higher in searches, improve your conversion rates and bring in all those likes and shares. Here are a few tricks to help you with video optimization.

Use a YouTube Keyword Tool

People find videos, along with other information online, by using keywords. You want to tag your video with keywords your target audience might use in their searches. So, for instance, if you make a video about dog food, you will want to see what sort of keywords related to dog food are the most popular.

If you have an AdWords account, you can use a Google tool to find these. Otherwise, just look for a YouTube keyword tool on Google and search for the best keywords using it.

Include a Call to Action

Your video may be fun to watch, but it’s not effective if you aren’t telling people what to do when they finish watching it. You want to have a call to action directing them to your site or to specific product pages. When you provide this information, you give your audience directions that can help them further down your sales funnel.

Use Video Overlays

A video overlay essentially lets someone watch two images at once. Video ad overlays pop up during your video and can help with marketing and branding. Your click-through rates will rise when people have a chance to engage directly with this type of advertising.

Create Playlists for Your YouTube Channel

YouTube wants to keep people on its site for as long as possible, hence the appearance of related videos on the side and after the first video has played. You can ensure YouTube guides people to videos you have posted by creating a playlist for your channel. Be sure to use descriptive text in your playlist listing so as to grab greater search engine optimization benefits.

Publish Videos on a Regular Schedule

People will grow disinterested in your YouTube site if you do not publish new content consistently. The best way to foster your audience is to post regularly and create expectations and excitement for your next video. You might choose a day of the week to put up new content or start a series to keep you on task. Plus, the more your channel gets updated, the more the YouTube algorithm will favor you. Google sites love fresh content.

You can use these tips for optimizing video to increase your audiences and improve your conversion rates. Need more guidance on video? Contact PixelFish today to set up a consultation.