Wednesday, August 15, 2018
Monday, June 16, 2014
Video Promotion Tips
Getting your video noticed is the most important step to expanding your business and/or product. Here at Keywest Video we would like to provide you with some tips for online video promotion.
YouTube Channel
Start with video promotion directly on your YouTube channel – using your #YouTube account, create a channel for all the videos you post. The more videos you have on your channel, the better. Once the video is uploaded, inform everyone to watch it and include links on the video to your social media outlets as well as your website. Ask people to subscribe to your channel – that way every time you upload a new video it will be added directly to their feed.
Social Media
Always remember that social media is your best friend. Utilize all the resources you have in front of you to virally promote your latest video. If you have a Facebook Page created for your business and/or product, upload the video’s link and share it around amongst your followers and friends. Post to LinkedIn, Twitter, Foursquare, MySpace, Pinterest, Reddit, LinkedIn, Google+, and Tumblr about your latest video. You could #Instagram a photo of your video with a link included. Just be sure to use different descriptions every time you post so the audience doesn’t get the feel that you’re just copying and pasting. The more you utilize these free services for video promotion, the better your online traffic will be.
For SMEs with limited resources, social media has been a blessing. Free social networks like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and YouTube have been adopted enthusiastically by businesses for marketing, publicity, customer relations and market research purposes.
Just make sure you are able to keep up with the social media you put out and stay interactive with your followers. If you can’t handle running every social media outlet, then stick to the ‘Big Four’ aka Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+.
Blogs/Email Blasts
Does your company have a blog connected to your website? If so, then post the video on both your website and blog, making sure that your video has a link to your website. Adding a little description about the video or why you have chosen to make one can also help, and including hashtags are an easy to way to micro-promote.
A number of businesses have an email blast that goes out to previous costumers as well as business associates. This is the perfect place for video promotion as you are able to directly send your video to your clients and keep them updated on what is up and coming in your business.
#Hashtags
Hashtags are taking over the internet and more and more are being created everyday. So jump on the bandwagon and start hashtagging. The best way to utilize this simple method is too include keywords that are associated with your business and/or product and what audiences you want to reach with it.
Also, keep an eye out for what is currently trending online. If your video can relate to anything that is currently popular, add that hashtag in to your description.
http://www.hashtags.org/ is the best place to find out what’s trending each day, popular hashtags, upcoming events involving social media, and the latest news online.
If You’ve Got The Money
Our final tip for successful online video promotion is to allocate a budget. Google AdWords, Facebook Advertising, etc. allow you to control where you video goes, locally, nationally, or globally. Pay per click ads allow you to control how much you pay per day per click. They also make sure that they show up on the right websites and connect into mobile apps. Remember that having thousands of views on YouTube looks better then your video only having one or two hundred.
Do you have more tips on video promotion? We’d love to hear them. Feel free to share your tips in the comment section below.
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
YouTube Optimization: Top 7 Techniques
7 Simple Ways to Optimize & Increase Your Businesses YouTube Presence
With YouTube being the second largest search engine after Google, it is no wonder why a company’s YouTube channel is an integral part of their overall marketing strategy. As with anything online, the clutter and chaos can be overwhelming, so here are some tips and techniques on how to break through the crowd and get your channel noticed.
1. Customize Your Channel
Ensure that the branding of your channel is done in a fashion where visitors will be certain whose channel they are viewing. It should be cohesive with your other branding strategies, not only in the look and feel, but throughout the content as well, be it the video itself, the video’s description, or even your comments on others videos. As every point of contact with your audience is another opportunity to convert them into customers.
2. Engage with your audience
While some may think of YouTube as a place where businesses can simply upload and distribute their content, it is so much more than that. YouTube, just like other popular social platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter, is also a place where you can actively engage with your audience. Through the comments section, your playlists, channel subscriptions and ‘favorited’ videos, you will be able to tell the story of who you are as a company, and in return understand who your customers, or potential customers are as well.
3. Provide awesome video content
On the WebSEO Analytics Blog, Tina outlines her top 10 tips for optimizing YouTube videos. In there, her number one tip is to create original and interesting videos. Along with numerous other lists I checked out, content was always a priority. As it doesn’t matter how many tricks and techniques you can employ, if the content is not engaging there is no reason to attract people to it. You want each video you post to be a positive representation of your company and help your company’s overall marketing goals.
In order to do this your video content needs to be engaging for your audience. At Keywest we suggest that videos going on YouTube or other social media avenues are short and sweet. Another priority is trying to create content that your customers can’t find elsewhere. Whether it is a great tutorial on how to use your product, secrets of behind the scenes at your organization, or simply funny stories from your staff. Think out of the box, and whenever possible think big!
4. Don’t forget a call to action
Once you have created your preliminary content there are several ways to optimize your video to further encourage viewer engagement. One of those techniques is provided right within YouTube and is called annotations. Annotations are a free and easy way to share additional resources and add an element of interactivity into your video. Annotations allow you to simply embed a link within your video which will then bring viewers to your website, a fundraising campaign, your YouTube channel or other videos you have posted. This is an excellent tool, as if you already have someone’s attention, you might as well steer them towards other content of yours that they may be interested in.
There are other avenues which will provide similar results. Creating a call to action or next steps can be done right within the video as well. In many of Keywest Video’s video blogs we incorporate a call to action within the video content itself, by getting the host to say things such as ‘tell us your thoughts in the comments section’, or ‘email us at info@keywestvideo.com for more information’. This way, the call to action cannot be ignored as it is just as much part of the video as the rest of the content.
5. Make sure to cross-promote
Maybe you can write a blog post about a recent video you posted on YouTube. Or you can link to your other social media channels at the end of your YouTube video. There are many ways to integrate your company’s various marketing outlets within one another, so ensure that this is done. It will not only help promote your various content, but it will ensure that your brand is being consistent throughout their different promotional avenues.
Another important avenue, cited by the Search Engine Journal, is by embedding your YouTube videos on your website. Depending on content and relevancy, posting videos on your website can be a great asset for your company, and aid in a variety of ways from simply explaining your product or service, providing an overview of your company or employees, or highlighting event coverage. In return, this will be a great way to gain more views on your videos, which will in turn aid your YouTube profile. So it’s a win-win!
6. Be SEO Friendly
When uploading your content to YouTube always ensure that you are taking the few extra steps in order to optimize your content for search engines such as Google. Ways to do this include; writing a title that utilizes relevant keywords related to your business, providing a clear and detailed description of the video, including keyword rich tags, making sure the appropriate category is selected, and adding closed captions for the hearing impaired. All of these techniques are beneficial as they make the video more searchable and therefore easier for your audience to discover. Brian Honigman writing for KISSmetrics, clearly lays out why these SEO techniques, or rather the technical term MetaData, are so important. He also provides some in-depth analysis of well-known companies’ channels and their hits and misses in this department.
7. Invest in your content
YouTube is a great place for cost-effective promotion, as getting an account set-up and your content online is virtually free, minus your time and investment in the video. However, there are ways to guide those who may be interested in your content directly to it, and that is through paid video advertisements. There are numerous categories you can select from in order to target your key market. Including things as specific as age, race, gender, economic status, and as useful as online habits and likes and dislikes. If you are wondering about how useful online video advertising is, check out Keywest’s recent video blog which discusses some important statistics about the growing marketplace.
As you can see from this list, there are a variety of reasons why YouTube optimization is important, and now your are equip with some techniques to ensure that you are maximizing its true potential. If you follow these simple steps you are sure to make progress in getting your brand out there, and encourage your audience to engage further with your company. Check out Keywest’s YouTube channel and let us know what you think.
YouTube Optimization: Top 7 Techniques