So you didn't miss an episode of Whiteboard Friday from the king of SEO himself, Rand Fishkin? You have website SEO down to a science. But what about video SEO? It's not quite the same now, is it? You've also spent all that time and money strategizing, producing, and editing your video, but it just doesn't rank. What's going on? First of all, it is true that video SEO is not the same as regular SEO. Video SEO has also changed dramatically in recent years, which is why I asked Wistia video SEO expert Phil Nottingham to share his tips.
What is Video SEO?
Video SEO simply optimizes your cell phone number list to get indexed and ranked on search engine results pages for relevant keyword searches. There are many optimization strategies to give your videos a higher chance of ranking, which this article will describe.
How Has Video SEO Changed?
Over the past few years, video marketing has become increasingly popular with businesses. Once marketers started getting their hands on DSLR cameras in the late 2000s, it became easier to produce videos and upload them (thanks to YouTube) without having a degree. in videography. Now, we can't browse the internet without seeing a video, and we all walk around with cell phones in our pockets that have the ability to shoot decently high-quality videos anywhere. With the explosion of video, it has become much more difficult to rank in universal search results, according to Phil.
“All websites can rank in the video tab, but not all can rank in universal search with a video,” says Phil. "It's gotten a lot harder to get whitelisted than it was about 3 years ago, but getting your video indexed on the video tab (shown below) is easier."Ranking with your video on universal search has a lot to do with your website's authority, how video-focused it is, and how it ranks for video-related queries. Phil recommends not putting so much emphasis on universal search, and instead aiming for higher ranks in video search.
If you're less concerned with traffic to your website and more focused on general brand awareness, YouTube and Vimeo may be options worth exploring. The problem with platforms of this nature, if once your video is indexed most of the traffic goes to them rather than to your own website. This can cause potential visitors to your site to get lost in a sea of competing traffic (like suggested videos appearing after yours on YouTube).