After Google, YouTube is the world’s biggest search engine. And, as it’s also owned by Google, YouTube videos feature prominently on the search giant’s result pages. By creating quality videos that are engaging and useful, and by optimising them well, you can see excellent results.
Note: This beginner’s guide to SEO for YouTube will specifically cover tips for optimising your YouTube page and videos. Although I’ll touch on some good practices for video creation too, I won’t be going into any great detail about filming and editing a video.
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What is YouTube SEO?
YouTube SEO is much like Search Engine Optimisation on your website in that, when done properly, your videos and channels should be more visible in search (both on and off YouTube). It differs from traditional SEO in that you have less control over what you can do, because you don’t run the site yourself.
However, there are still lots of techniques and best practices to follow to boost your channel subscribers and video views. Let’s take a look at those now.
How to Optimise Your YouTube Videos
1. Keyword Research
Before you even pick a topic and start filming your YouTube video, do some keyword research. Not only will this help you identify topics that users are interested in (so you can record relevant videos), it will help you write a script that uses those search phrases. By identifying keywords at this stage, you’ll be able to hyper-target your content so that it reaches and appeals to the right audience.
When undertaking keyword research, select a primary keyword that will be the main focus of your video, and then choose a number of secondary keywords relevant to the topic. You should use these within the video itself, and in the description, title, and even file name of your video, where appropriate. Remember to incorporate these naturally to avoid keyword stuffing.
You can also incorporate keyword research into your channel directly by using them in channel descriptions.
Dive deeper into this topic with my guide to keyword research on YouTube.
2. Optimise Your Script
Once you’ve completed some keyword research, use the results to influence your video script. Chances are that you’ll naturally incorporate a number of relevant keywords anyway, but by being more deliberate, you can make sure you don’t miss any key phrases.
Using keywords to influence your script can also help you build a structure so that the video is easy to follow, is comprehensive, and doesn’t miss out any important sub-topics.
Finally, while Google can’t (yet) fully understand video content, it can understand accompanying data such as closed captions and transcripts. When you come to create these elements, a keyword rich script will ensure that Google knows exactly what your content is, and so will show it to an appropriate audience.
3. Pick a Relevant Filename
Like for images on your website, the filename of your YouTube video is more important than many people realise. Select a name that’s relevant and descriptive, and ideally incorporating a primary keyword. Separate words with a hyphen and be as specific as you can without making the filename too long: four or five words should be enough.
4. Optimise Your Title and Description
Refer back to your keyword research to write a relevant title and description.
As always, avoid keyword stuffing, but make sure your target phrases and variations are used enough so that the context of your video is clear. Both your title and description should be unique, relevant to your video, and engaging.
YouTube’s own guide describes a description as having two parts. The first is the most important because it’s what users see in search results and also on your video page before clicking “read more”. This section is one or two sentences (100-150 characters) that should explain what your video is about, utilise keywords, and encourage a user to click through.
The second part goes into much more detail and can include links, hashtags, timestamps and more. This not only helps search engines better understand your video, it gives your users more information and encourages them to take next steps.
A YouTube description has a generous 5,000-character limit (that’s about 2.5 times the length of this guide), so make the most of it. Just keep in mind that your description should:
- highlight your topic,
- include relevant keywords,
- use natural language, and
- avoid irrelevant keywords.
5. Hashtags
Hashtags help users find content relevant to a certain topic.
When you use hashtags (which take the form #topic) in your description, they will be highlighted and linked. Don’t overdo it, but pick a few that are relevant to your video. YouTube will stop linking them when you have over 15 hashtags, but you’re usually best using just four or five anyway.
Hashtags can be particularly useful if your video covers a trending topic.
6. Tags
YouTube tags are specific words or short phrases that are relevant to your video. They can provide YouTube and Google with extra context around your video and can be particularly useful for new or smaller channels.
Tags are added when you upload your video, under Details > More options. Pick ones that are relevant and descriptive, and include them in the order of importance: the most important tags go first. Your keyword research will be a big help here, and you have up to 500 characters to use (though you don’t have to use the full character count).
You can also easily and quickly generate some relevant tags with a free tool like TimeSkip.
7. Cards and End Screens
Cards can be placed throughout the video and appear as a little encircled “i” in the top right corner of the video and in more detail under the video description. When clicked on, they provide the user with further information and direct them to take an action such as navigating to another video or to a webpage. You can use up to five cards per video and can place them at any point of time.
If, for example, your video is a tutorial for knitting a hat, and you mention knitting a scarf at 45 seconds in, you can have a card appear at that point directing the user to your scarf tutorial video.
End screens, on the other hand, appear for 5 to 20 seconds right at the end of your video and encourage the watcher to move onto the next thing. This could either be your channel, another playlist, a different video or an external link. You can also include a call to action to subscribe to your channel.
When putting your video together, it’s worth leaving some blank seconds at the end so you ca
8. Closed Captions
Although video is usually more engaging and more popular than written content, it’s often watched without sound. Just think of people watching videos on the train on their commute, or in a crowded room. They may be interested in your content but, if they can’t watch without sound, they may not watch at all.
Using closed captions not only makes it easier for people to watch wherever they are, it also makes your video more accessible to those who are deaf or hard of hearing.
A third benefit to using closed captions is that search engines, although they can’t watch videos, can crawl the caption text. If you’ve written a good script, the additional text from the captions will provide Google and others with keyword-rich information about your video, helping improve your rankings.
While YouTube will automatically generate closed captions, they’re often not very accurate, and nonsense captions can actually harm your SEO. It’s better to replace or edit these with the correct text. You can do this either by editing the auto-generated captions directly, uploading your own SRT file, or using a professional video transcription service.
9. Include a Transcript
Including a transcript of your video provides yet another opportunity to highlight your target keywords and to make your video more accessible. A transcript allows users to skim through the topic if they need to, and you can make it easier for them to find relevant information by using timestamps to link sections of text with sections of video.
If you have a script for your video already, then your work here is almost done.
Like closed captions, a transcript can boost your SEO because search engines can read and understand it (unlike video).
You can also use the transcript to create repurposed content such as blogs, website copy, and infographics.
10. Include Timestamps
If your video can be segmented into shorter parts, then consider using timestamps. These are links in your description that help users skip to content they’re particularly interested in. As well as making for a better user experience, Google can use these timestamps to show searchers more specifically relevant answers to their queries, which leads to higher engagement.
11. Engage With Users
YouTube is a social channel, and user engagement is one of the factors that tells the platform how your video should rank. Encourage likes, shares and comments by asking for them, either directly or indirectly.
You should also try to stimulate discussion and respond to everyone who takes the time to comment. You can further increase engagement by asking open-ended questions that prompt further discussion.
12. Pick a Publishing Time
The time of day and week that you publish your video can affect the amount of engagement you receive. This can take a bit of experimentation, but try and discover when your target audience is online. Use the Analytics tools in YouTube Studio to see when users watch your videos, and adjust your posting schedule to suit.
Take this a step further by considering the time of year that you’re posting too. If you’re posting that hat-knitting video we mentioned earlier, what time of year are your target audience likely to be looking for it? Is it in the middle of summer or is it when autumn temperatures are starting to bite? Coordinating your posting schedule with trends (use a tool like Google Trends) can help you reach more people more quickly.
13. Promote Your Content
You don’t have to solely rely on search to get your videos noticed. If you already have an audience elsewhere – such as on a blog, newsletter, or social media – make sure you share newly posted videos with them. People who have already shown an interest in your content by following you or signing up to a newsletter are low-hanging fruit. They’re more likely to engage with your content and will help boost your engagement rate.
Summary
As the world’s second largest search engine, YouTube provides a lot of opportunity for engaging current followers, building new audiences, and making sales. By optimising your videos, you can reach relevant users and make use of one of the most engaging styles of content available. Make sure you give your video the best chance by using descriptive and relevant text, implementing calls to action, and engaging your audience.