It’s been 25 years since Bill Gates penned his now-famous essay “Content is King”. The sentiment remains true to this day. Creating high-value content is still one of the most effective and consistent ways to make money online.
The question marketers now find themselves asking is what kind of content is king? The answer to that question is surprisingly simple: video.
In recent years, video has become the go-to form of content for consumers. In 2021, video accounted for 81% of all consumer internet traffic. That’s a massive traffic pool and marketers are beginning to notice. For the first time in history, video is the primary media form used in content marketing strategies.
To stand out from the competition and capitalize on this enormous pool of consumer traffic, you need to understand the basics of video SEO. Read on to discover how you can optimize your video content for search engine visibility.
What Is Video SEO?
Before you can master video SEO, it’s important to understand what it is. Video SEO is the process of optimizing your video content in a way that makes it appealing to Google’s indexing and ranking algorithms. The ultimate goal is similar to that of written SEO: to achieve a high-ranking position on search engine results pages (SERPs) for target keywords.
“What makes SEO so hard is that Google doesn’t tell you their algorithms, but what we do know is that they really are optimizing for rich content,” says Sean Braacx, Chief Product Officer at StoryTap. “So, whenever possible, Google is trying to show people not just links but also relevant content – and one type of content they really promote is video.”
With video SEO, which section of a SERP you try to rank for is an important question. Videos can be ranked on either the universal tab (i.e., Google’s ‘All’ tab) or the video tab. Generally, your best bet is the video tab.
How to Harness the Power of Video SEO
With that background out of the way, it’s time to go over some tips for successful video SEO.
1. Don’t Skip Keyword Research
You probably won’t be surprised to learn that keyword research forms the foundation of good video SEO. It’s so important that it bears repeating in the context of video SEO.
Before you go about creating a video, you need to think about what keywords the video will target and whether or not there’s a good chance the video will be able to rank well. There are tons of online tools that can help with insights into search volumes, clicks, and competition for different keywords.
The importance of doing your keyword homework before creating the video is hard to overstate. Video SEO – like all flavours of SEO – is about generating ROI. If you blindly create a video that doesn’t rank and gets little-to-no views, you’re wasting time and money that could have been put towards a video that generates revenue.
2. Include Keywords in Titles, Tags, Descriptions, and Metadata
Once you’ve done your keyword due diligence, it’s time to put those keywords to use. There are several ways to feature primary, secondary, and tertiary target keywords.
One is through site-specific information you enter on whatever website or platform you use to host the content (i.e., YouTube, Facebook, etc.):
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- Titles: Almost all hosting sites will ask you to title your video. If you want search engines to index and rank your video correctly, aim to include your primary target keyword.
- Tags: Tags are short descriptors used to help search engines deliver content that’s relevant to users. Different sites will have different rules about how many tags you can include, but you should be able to include all your target keywords here.
- Descriptions: Video descriptions should be written with SEO best practices in mind. Aim for a high-quality, relevant description with good keyword density.
- Transcripts: A video transcript (in essence, a text version of all that is said within your clip) lets Google “crawl” the content and show it more often when it’s relevant. It’s an important tool for improving views, engagement and search engine rank.
- Metadata: Metadata is essentially text-based information attached to a video. Within a video’s metadata, you’ll be able to enter a title, tags, and a description.
Adding keywords to all the sections mentioned above will give your content the best chance to rank well in SERPs. With StoryTap, our expert human team will curate and optimize every video with rich metadata to give it the best chances of being showcased on page one of Google search results. Plus, every one of our videos includes a transcript (verified by a real person), so your content is given the best possible chances of being showcased at the top of search engine results.
3. Take Advantage of Social Media
One final thing you need to consider when implementing video SEO is the power of social media. Combining video SEO and social media comes with tons of benefits, especially when you consider the potential ROI of video shares on mega-platforms like Facebook, Reddit, TikTok, and Instagram.
Video SEO isn’t a practice that should be done in isolation. It goes hand in hand with your brand’s social media presence and engagement efforts. If you create videos that people want to share, you’re increasing your reach exponentially.
Video marketing is quickly becoming a necessary piece of a brand’s overall marketing strategy. Taking the time to understand and implement video SEO will allow you to take full advantage of all that the medium has to offer.
Video SEO with StoryTap
Looking to inject video SEO into your marketing strategy but not sure where to start? StoryTap is a patented video creation platform that helps brands create authentic, engaging videos starring customers and staff – product reviews, testimonials, self-service FAQ videos, and more. Video doesn’t have to be time-consuming or budget-busting: Our automation tech makes it easy to create volumes of content at a fraction of the cost of studio production. All videos include SEO metadata (added by our savvy team ( and are fully owned by you to share across multiple channels and add to your site (with light code and ultra-easy integration). Schedule a demo and we’ll show you how StoryTap can turbocharge your brand growth online.
Looking for more information about video SEO? Download our ebook: Improve Search Rankings With Video SEO.
