The short answer to this question is YES. Video content has great potential to improve your website’s ranking on the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). The simple reason for this is that Google is using increasingly sophisticated algorithms to identify good content and positive user experience. And, video content can definitely score high here. In fact, some experts even say that a video link is all you need to promote your website not just to your target audience, but also to the search bots.
How & Why Does Video Content Help
The two primary reasons for using high quality video content is that, firstly, it increases brand awareness, and, secondly, it drives conversions. According to the statistics published by Lemonlight, videos help increase the click-through rate, such that including video content on your site can lead to a 157% increase in organic search traffic. It also helps lower the bounce rate, with people staying twice as long on pages with video content than those that don’t. In addition, videos help create high quality backlinks, which are great for SEO.
The reason videos work so well is that they create a strong emotional connect with the viewer, much more than text or even images can. It, therefore, has the ability to hold the viewer’s attention for longer. Moreover, if they say a picture conveys a thousand words, videos would probably convey in the millions because it is much easier to provide information, convey a concept or explain how a process works through video. In fact, statistics reveal the video content leads to 41% higher click-throughs than text alone.
The undeniable reality is that YouTube alone boasts more than a billion users, with content in 76 separate languages. Research by Hubspot revealed that 62% of internet users thoroughly consume videos, while 53% today expect more video content, regardless of the platform. In fact, video traffic is expected to see huge growth, accounting for 81% of all consumer traffic on the internet by 2021. So, not only do search engines love videos, your target audience is looking for such content too.
The problem is that gaining SEO benefits from video content isn’t just about embedding a YouTube link on your webpage. It requires investment, not just in terms of money, but time and effort too, such that you can ensure that it is viral-worthy.
How to Use Video Content to Boost SEO
1. Make it short & sweet
The sweet spot here is about 1-2 minutes. Today’s viewer has a short attention span. They want everything here and now. You could make longer videos, but you would lose your audience after about 2 minutes.
2. Cross-Platform & Social Sharing
If you aren’t visible on social media, you might not be visible to your target audience at all. So, make sure you upload your video on the various social media platforms, including YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Natively upload to different platforms. In addition, allow viewers to share your videos too on their social media profiles. The more platforms your video appears on, the better it will be for SEO.
3. Transcribe the Script
Google bots might be able to index videos for context-based search. However, when you transcribe the texts, it helps the bots crawl your content with more accuracy. This way, you stand a better chance of being featured across a larger variety of searches.
4. High-Quality, Custom Thumbnails
The way to catch your target audience’s eye is to create high-quality, custom and topical thumbnails. While click-bait thumbnails might get you instant views, they will negatively impact your reputation in the long run. You can also include some text to provide the view some context.
5. Optimize the Video
Ensure that you have relevant metadata that is regularly updated. So, add titles, descriptions, subtext, tags, subtitles and transcriptions to help the search bots effectively crawl and index your content.
6. XML Sitemap
Lastly, don’t forget to submit the video’s sitemap to Google, accompanied by information on it, using a webmaster tool. This will again help with the indexing of your content.
Videos are a great way to make an emotional connect with your target audience. This is something that an effective marketing strategy cannot ignore these days. The only caveat is that the content should be high quality and compelling.