Yagua Piru

More than 35 hours of video content is uploaded to YouTube every minute. This means 2,100 hours of video is uploaded every hour, or 50,400 hours of content is uploaded to YouTube every day.

"If we were to measure that in movie terms (assuming the average Hollywood film is around 120 minutes long), 35 hours a minute is the equivalent of over 176,000 full-length Hollywood releases every week." according to Hunter Walk, YouTube's Director of product management. "Another way to think about it is: if three of the major U.S. networks were broadcasting 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year for the last 60 years, they still wouldn't have broadcast as much content as is uploaded to YouTube every 30 days."

So, you will need to learn how to optimize your video for YouTube. Otherwise, the odds that a critical mass of viewers will discover it are slim to nil.

Choose Relevant Keywords

The first step in this process is to think about the words users would type into the YouTube search box to find your video. Choosing relevant keywords can help you get your video content in front of interested users.

You can use the YouTube keyword tool to get new keyword ideas. It gives you a couple of options. You can enter a few descriptive words or phrases, or you can type in a YouTube video's ID or watch page URL. Results can be tailored to more than 40 languages and more than 230 countries.

In addition, the YouTube keyword tool lets you choose the demographic you wish to target. This includes male or female, ages 13 to 65+, applicable countries, and 24 interests from animals to travel.

Although you can use these keywords for advertizing if you want, you don't need to. The YouTube keyword tool can be used to optimize your video for YouTube search, too.

Remember, users are searching for video content, so they're less likely to look for something to buy on YouTube than they are on a search engine. Users search for topics related to what entertains them, so choose your keywords accordingly:

• Names (celebrities)
• Titles (movies, shows)
• Quotes
• Actions/verbs
• Objects in the video (cars, etc.)
• Emotions (funny, hilarious)

When choosing your keywords, think about the trends in online video overall, plus trends on YouTube (hot topics, political awareness, celebrity gossip, and popular videos).

Optimize Your Video Title

The second step is to make sure that your titles, video descriptions and tags actually include your keywords. This will help your videos be discovered in YouTube search results and related videos.

Your video's title can be up to 100 characters long, including the spaces between words. This means your title can be up to 16 words long, depending on the number of characters in each word.

Although you can think of your title as a headline, don't use puns or other word play in this important element of your video's metadata. As Steve Lohr of The New York Times once observed, "There are no algorithms for wit, irony, humor or stylish writing." So, your title should be straightforward enough to be indexed properly and should contain the keyword phrases most important to the message of your video.

If you want to include your brand name in the title, it should always go last. You brand name faces less competition, so put the keywords that face more competition at the beginning of the title, which appears to help in YouTube search ranking.

Your description should be as detailed as possible -- short of offering an entire transcript. It can be up to 5,000 characters, including spaces. This means your video's description can be up to 800 words long.

Include URLs with http:// to other videos, playlists, or your website in your description. This will turn the URLs into a hyperlink.

Optimize Your Tags

Finally, your tags should be as detailed as possible within the 120-character limit. They can include your brand, city, and topics. Consider using your current tags or another user's tags.

If you want to see an example of how this works, examine the video above, "Optimize YouTube videos and 3 key steps on how to do it." It has been found in YouTube searches for the terms "how to optimize YouTube video" and "optimize video for YouTube." It has also been found in Google searches for the term "optimize video for YouTube."

In addition, it has been found after YouTubers watched two related videos, "YouTube Optimization techniques from Greg Jarboe, SEO-PR" and "Optimize YouTube videos and how to share them with Greg Jarboe."

The above video also provides a hint at what I'll cover in upcoming columns. Stay tuned.

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searchenginewatch

I don’t get very excited about many things that are touted as innovation in the Internet marketing space. Why? It’s because everyone wants to hype the newest and freshest updates to their service as a “game changer!” or some other form of hyperbole that always easily out runs the reality of the service. In other words, I am tired of being hyped (am I the only one here on this one?).

This time, however, I am pretty interested in the Google Moderator integration into YouTube that is being introduced. At first glance this looks like it gives the world of video a new level of interactivity that can actually create a better experience for the end user. How about that! The YouTube blog tells us more:

That’s why, starting today, we’ve integrated the ability to use Google Moderator into every single YouTube channel. Moderator is a versatile, social platform that allows you to solicit ideas or questions on any topic, and have the community vote the best ones up to the top in real-time. We previously used Google Moderator as part of our interviews with President Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

Here’s how it works: You set the parameters for the dialogue, including the topic, the type of submissions, and the length of the conversation. Watch as submissions get voted up or down by your audience, and then respond to the top-voted submissions by posting a video on your channel. The platform operates in real-time, and you can remove any content that you or your audience flag as inappropriate. You can also embed the platform on your own website or blog.

Nice. Features like this help everyone from a content development standpoint because now you can get feedback and input from your users. As any good marketer will tell you, the longer (or dare I say, more intelligently) you can engage your customer or prospect the more likely they are to see you in the kind of light you wish: the kind that makes them want your product or service.

Here’s an example of the YouTube and Google Moderator that come from the post and features the New York Times’ Nick Kristof.

So what’s your take? Is this a real “game-changer” or is it just another hyped feature that will gather dust in the future?

marketingpilgrim

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One of the topics of discussion in the last post, 5 Ways Small Businesses Can Succeed on YouTube, was the importance and challenge of creating a call to action (CTA) in your video that engages customers and stands out from the other CTAs in the YouTube interface (such as watching additional videos).

A video without a strong CTA is a missed opportunity for a small business looking to create new business from their video marketing. This is an important difference between video marketing for big brands and video marketing for small businesses. A large brand can post a video and use “softer” measures of success such as reach, brand recall, and impressions, but small businesses have limited budgets and success is measured in terms of ringing the cash register.

So let’s look at a few ways you can create a compelling call to action that works for your business.

Offer a Unique Discount to Video Viewers

Perhaps the easiest way to measure the effectiveness of your video at driving sales is to provide a unique offer that isn’t available anywhere else. If you’re a restaurant you could offer a 2-for-1 special, a free appetizer or drink to people who watch the video and mention it to their server when ordering. You can measure whether the video is helping your business by tracking the number of discounts redeemed.

The keys to making this type of offer work are:

• It has to be memorable and valuable. It takes effort to remember a special offer or discount. People will only remember the offer it if it’s worthwhile. If you’re not sure what your customers like or want simply ask some of them. Then use that feedback to create the offer in the video.
  
  
• It has to be unique. This should go without saying, but if you make the discount in your video 10% off your services and you have 10% off coupons in the YellowPages and elsewhere you won’t be able to track sales from your video.

• It has to be easy to redeem. The offer should be simple and straightforward to redeem. If you complicate things by requiring multiple steps, or put excessive restrictions and redemption rules around your offer you significantly decrease the likelihood of response.

• You need to close the loop. To continue the restaurant example, you want to give that offer a special menu code or provide some other way of measuring the redemption rate. If you’re not having your servers, bartender or hostess track mentions or redemptions you won’t have any idea whether your video is working for you.

Create an Ongoing Relationship

Another powerful way call to action is to create an ongoing relationship with the viewer – transforming a onetime viewer into an engaged potential customer. There are a few simple ways to do this on YouTube. The lightweight way is to ask them to subscribe to your channel. This is a great option if you publish video content regularly and have an audience that tends to visit YouTube frequently. Once they’re subscribed they’ll be notified when you publish new videos. You can also use the new YouTube bulletins feature to post news messages and video URLs to their home pages reminding them to come back to your channel page or latest video.

The more involved, but perhaps more valuable way, is to encourage them to sign up for your email newsletter, Facebook Page or other database marketing system. If you choose this call to action it’s important to make the link to your sign up form easy to remember and accessible.

The keys to making the email sign up call to action work are:

• Make the link easy to get to. Put the direct link to the sign up form in the description of your video. YouTube will automatically change it into a hyperlink that users can click to sign up. You should also add it to the Website field of your channel’s profile information. You can also put the URL in an annotation in the video so the viewer is bound to see it while watching the video.

• Make the link easy to remember. Create a link that makes sense and is easy for people to remember. A link like www.yoursite.com/signup is much easier than www.yoursite.com/forms/contact/email/signup.aspx?source=youtube. If you use Facebook make sure you use a custom URL. www.facebook.com/turnhere is ours for example. Keep it simple.

• Show it and say it. You’ll make your call to sign up more memorable if you mention it and show it at the same time. Consider showing your URL in an annotation at the same point you mention it in the video. The audio and visual cues will help viewers register it as an important take away from your video. Also, point out where they can find the sign up link after the video ends.

• Tell them what to expect. If you ask someone to join your mailing list make it clear what benefit they’ll receive by joining. Will they get special offers, latest news or free content? Will you protect their email address? How often will you email them? Try to address some of these questions upfront to maximize signups.

Ask Them to Spread the Word

Perhaps easier than subscribing to your channel or email list is enlisting your viewer’s help in spreading the word to their friends online. YouTube makes this easy with their “Share” button located right below the video player. Ask them to post the video to their Facebook page, Tweet about it, blog about it or email it to a friend who they think could benefit from seeing the video. Because sharing a piece of content is a tacit endorsement of you and your content viewers will only share it if they think it is valuable enough to do so.

Those are just three ways to create a call to action in your video. By using an effective call to action you can track the success of your video at creating new business for your business. Have an effective call to action that works for you? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

reelseo.com

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YouTube is really on a roll lately.  The player page redesign, the makeover on the player itself, and now Unlisted Videos.  What are Unlisted Videos?  Well, they’re private videos… in a sense.

Previously, YouTube users could only allow up to 25 other people to see a video uploaded as “private.”  There are many, many situations in which that number becomes inconvenient or downright annoying.  Case in point:  Melinda, a teacher profiled in YouTube’s blog announcement regarding Unlisted Videos.  Melinda wanted to share a video of a school project with the students of the school and their parents.  That would amount to far more viewers than YouTube’s privacy settings allowed.

It’s an interesting side note to this awesome new feature that Melinda actually contacted YouTube about her dilemma, and that’s what prompted them to create Unlisted Videos.  You have to love the move by the teacher to try and do something about it, as well as YouTube’s classy reaction.  The service is already live, but here’s a look at a screenshot YouTube shared:

Unlisted Videos is a way to get a private URL for your video.  It won’t be in YouTube’s search results and it will not appear on the site for people who are just browsing .  Essentially it’s hidden.  Then, as the video uploader, you are free to share that link with whomever you please.  And it will function and look  just like a normal YouTube video… only people won’t be stumbling on to it without having first received the link.

The glaring and obvious asterisk is that anyone you share a link with can share that link with someone else if they choose.  They can publish it on their blog or Facebook wall.

This is not a password-protected video or one with added security features.  So, in other words, this is not a tool that you should use to upload naughty videos.  Or videos of you and your friends committing a crime.  This is not intended for use with private shareholder information or trade secrets.  If you want a video to truly remain private, this is not the service for you.

That being said, this is a service that is going to be huge.  Here are just a few of the groups that will become the core users of this thing:

Businesses.  Share ideas, mock-ups, training materials, and presentations with a coworker or client without worrying about it becoming widely public.

Families.  Spotlight-wary parents can now upload videos of their adorable toddler doing something hilarious without the fear of them becoming the next David After Dentist.

Schools.  As in the sample scenario YouTube mentioned, teachers and administrators can now share important or entertaining videos with students and families without creating an argument at the next PTA meeting.  I’m guessing colleges and universities will find all sorts of creative applications for this service.

Shy People.  There are all kinds of singers, musicians, speakers, and other talented people in this world who are also surprisingly shy about performing in public, typically preferring to share their gift with only close friends and family.   Those people will be much more likely to upload a video for private viewing now that they can be relatively certain they won’t become unfairly famous overnight.

Churches.  Churches will be all over this thing, using Unlisted Videos for everything from sermons to youth group videos, from children’s musicals to prayer requests.

I think this is a lot more important a service than YouTube’s casual announcement indicates.  It’s going to drive new users to YouTube, and get current users even more involved with the freedom that this kind of thing affords.  Simple, obvious, and powerful.

reelseo.com

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We all know that YouTube is the number 2 search engine on the Web in terms of query volume.  It sounds impressive, but what does that mean for local businesses trying to reach customers? After all, aren’t most of the 13+ billion clips watched each month on the site Lady Gaga videos?

It turns out that while many views are purely for entertainment, a substantial number of videos are watched by people seeking help and information.  In fact, there are more than 35 million searches each month on YouTube for “how to” videos.  That’s at least 35 million opportunities for businesses to reach people that may need their product or service.  (Not to mention the opportunity to show up in parent-company Google’s search results.) But how do local businesses capitalize on this trend?  Here are 5 easy ways small businesses can make YouTube work for business.

Create Content that Meets a Need

To reach people that need help you need to create content that satisfies their need.  Simply uploading your existing cable TV ad or shaky footage of a walkthrough of your shop is not going to capture any attention or create any interest in your business. It helps to keep the old marketing acronym AIDA in mind when making and using video for your business.  AIDA stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action.  Capture attention and create interest by meeting the information need of your audience.

For example, if you’re a plumber, a how-to video on fixing a leaky toilet is a great way to get the attention of someone with that problem. You create interest in your service by not only showing how to fix their problem but also providing some additional tips that the viewer might not have considered.

Pay Attention to Production Value

You don’t have to be the next Spielberg, but your videos should be professional and easy to watch.  Shaky hand-held camera work, poor audio quality, bad lighting or lack of coherence in the story all lead to viewers changing the virtual channel.  Pay attention to the lighting. Use a tripod to create smooth viewing experience. Use microphones and pay attention to the audio.  Try to tell a story or clearly walk viewers through the video and what you’re doing.  By paying attention to these basics you’ll standout from the massive amounts of poor quality content on the site – earning you more attention and more interest from viewers.

Optimize for YouTube Search

Nearly 24 hours of new video is uploaded to YouTube every minute of every day.  In order to be found you need to optimize your video so that it can be found on the site.  Here are just a few things to think about when adding your video to YouTube.  Include important keywords in the title and be sure your tags include those keywords as well.  Choose an appealing thumbnail that clearly depicts what your video is about.

To continue the plumber example, you may want to title your video “How to fix a leaky toilet. XYZ Plumbing top tips for fixing a leaky toilet.”  Your tags might be “how to, toilet, toilets, leaky toilets, running toilet, plumbing, DIY” etc.  The thumbnail could be a shot of you holding the flushing mechanism (assuming that YouTube gives you that as an option). Your title, keywords and thumbnail all gives your viewers the information they need to decide whether your video will help meet their need and solve their problem.

Give the Viewers a Follow-Up Action

Following the AIDA model you want to create a desire for viewers to take a follow up action.  If you’ve created an informational video about fixing leaking toilets you want to give the viewer a compelling reason to follow up with you and a clear path to do so.  One way to do this is to provide a special offer and a unique web address in the video.

For example a call to action such as “Print step by step instructions and receive 10% off our in-home evaluation by visiting MySite.com/youtube,” gives your viewers an actionable next step with clear value. The unique URL and discount will also provide you one measurable way to determine how successful your YouTube video is.

Let them Know Who You Are

Don’t be afraid to create awareness about who you are and what you do; it’s important to let people know who they’re getting this valuable information from.  You should encourage users to take a step towards a relationship with your company by having them subscribe to your YouTube channel or company email newsletter (if you have one).  By building your YouTube subscriber base you’ll automatically reach a built-in audience of potential customers who have opted-in to seeing your latest videos.

Our plumber in the above example could say “Subscribe to our YouTube channel for more moneysaving tips on how to eliminate leaks around your home,” and include that call to action graphically in the video. Alternatively, driving people to a newsletter is another way to form the start of a relationship with that viewer.

Those are just five quick ways local businesses can take advantage of YouTube.  There are dozens more, but starting with the basics will put you in front of potential customers who need your help.  What tips do you have for making YouTube work for business? I’d love to hear about them in the comments!

ReelSEO

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