Rand Fishkin talked about Video SEO at Mozinar, here’s what I gleaned.
Why bother with video for SEO?
It’s much easier — some reports say 50 times easier — to rank for a video within a blended SERP (results pages with images and video results blended in) than a text page.
Also, video results have a higher click through rate (CTR) than text pages.
Lastly, video has a higher branding impact than pure text.
What should my video be about?
You can more easily rank for how-to queries and tutorials queries with your video. Use keyword research techniques to find out what people are trying to learn how to do in your niche.
If you see videos that aren’t SEOed in the SERPs, go for that query. Clearly Google wants to show videos but no one’s taking full advantage of the opportunity.
Check out Reddit.tv to find out what kinds of videos take off. Generally quality/relevance is not as important as uniqueness/funniness.
Remember:
- You don’t have to host the video yourself.
- Implement a video XML sitemap.
- On-page SEO is very important for video results; get your titles right, get your keyword in the page’s URL.
- CTR is a more important ranking factor in video search than text results.
