While keyword optimisation and quality written content are excellent strategies to boost your SEO, video content could be the X-factor that drastically enhances your ranking in organic search results and yields higher search volumes. After all, videos are easily consumable compared to written content and tend to keep users engaged for a considerably longer time.
Videos help explain concepts in a more illustrative and stimulating way. More importantly, most users prefer video content over written instructions. Websites displaying video content also tend to rank higher in search results and have higher user engagement and better conversion rates.
Videos are becoming an important part of content marketing, and their presence on your website can make or break your SEO efforts. In this article, we are going to talk in detail about how video content can boost your SEO strategy.
What is Video Marketing?
Video Marketing is about more than merely adding videos to your website; it’s about strategizing, which begins with setting goals and buyer personas. For instance, if you’re selling baby clothing, your audience does not want to see a corporate setting in your videos; instead, they want to see actual babies wearing your products in nurturing, warmly lit homes.
YouTube is one of the biggest e-learning platforms and the second largest search engine in the world because users find it easier to watch a video explaining the details of a product than to read about it in an article.
Just as you optimise your articles and blog posts, you should optimise videos as well. If you neglect VSEO, your video will get fewer views and your ROI will eventually suffer.
How Can Video Marketing Improve Your SEO?
Search Engine Optimisation forms the basis of your online presence and has a direct impact on your bottom line by increasing traffic, engagement, conversions, and, ultimately, ROI. Video marketing brings new and exciting opportunities for you to improve your SEO:
1. Google Likes Video Content
Video tends to have a positive effect on user experience for several reasons we mention below, so it tends to be viewed favourably by search engines. It is important to note that Google values relevance to search terms and quality of the content above everything. To determine these, it doesn’t just look at the text on a particular webpage but scan for other types of media to analyse everything you have to offer through content.
If your website contains a mixture of infographics, helpful videos, and text, this means your website presents information in varied forms, which gives your SEO a boost. Apart from this, Google shows the top search results from YouTube videos in their top search results as well. Most importantly, Google offers a dedicated video search option for individuals looking for video content. This goes to show the value placed on video content and the importance of incorporating it into your content marketing strategy.
2. Generate Traffic:
Google considers the amount of organic traffic to your website before determining your ranking in the search results. If your website gets many regular visitors, they are likely coming because they find your content insightful. This sends a signal that your website offers valuable content, which in turn helps it rank higher in search results so that more people conducting similar searches can find your high-quality content. All this drives more organic traffic to your website.
If you incorporate video content into your marketing strategy, there is a high chance that individuals watching your videos on YouTube or Facebook are going to visit your website (which counts as referral traffic). The more video content you put out there, the more quality traffic you can attract to your website, which in turn, will boost your overall SEO. This is also one of the biggest reasons why so many B2B and B2C businesses have launched their own YouTube channels and are investing heavily in creating video content for their website and social media.
3. Better & Longer User Engagement
Google pays attention to how long a typical user stays on your website. If you have a large number of people coming in and a majority of them leave after a few seconds, this generally signals that users do not find your content insightful, and they are probably exiting the site or jumping to another website to find the answers. In either case, it indicates that the experience on the site is not satisfactory to visitors, which overall is a factor that can negatively affect your SEO. Video content increases user engagement on your page and keep people hooked longer.
As mentioned earlier, most people would rather watch a video than read text, even if both are communicating the same information. Therefore, by introducing video in your marketing strategy, you can significantly increase the amount of time a user spends on your website. As a result, this improves your bounce rate and helps search engines, such as Google and Bing, boost your organic ranking in the search results.
4. Effective Communication with Enhanced Conversion
A good SEO strategy brings a high amount of traffic to your website, while a great SEO strategy converts these visitors into paying customers. Video content presents a 360 overview of the products or services you offer and compels your visitors to convert. Therefore, using video in your website content will help you boost your conversion rate. However, it is important to note that the videos on your website should be engaging, informative, and interesting.
Studies show that nearly 52% of customers find product videos insightful and that it compels them to make a purchase. That’s because video content helps you to effectively convey the message you want to communicate to your audience, or for them to envisage how they’d use your product or services, thus leading to higher conversions. If you want to attract people to your video, make sure to design an eye-catching and interesting thumbnail to gauge the user’s attention. Present the video content in an attractive and engaging way to maximise conversions.
5. Easier to Get Backlinks
Quality backlinks are one of the most significant factors used to determine a website’s ranking in search results. As more people link to your content and to your domain, your website gains authority and, as a result, gets higher rankings in the search results. Publishing video content on social media, or video hosting platforms, such as YouTube, Vimeo, etc., brings an excellent opportunity to earn referral traffic and boost your ranking.
Most importantly, the great thing about video content is that people (or other websites) are more likely to link to videos in comparison to regular text-based blog posts. This means producing video content increases your chances of getting natural backlinks and boosting your SEO. Apart from this, it also creates a positive ripple effect across your social media platforms.
It is important to note here that Google refrains from disclosing the exact architecture of its ranking algorithm to prevent people from gaming the system. However, despite this, there is a very clear and strong correlation between high volumes of social shares and higher position in the organic search results.
Tap Into the Upside of Video Content for Your SEO Strategy
If you want to take advantage of video marketing to get better search results, you need to devise a solid strategy, and if you don’t have the relevant skills, you may need help from a professional SEO agency.
Pure SEO is one of New Zealand’s most recognised agencies, offering SEO and Content Marketing Strategy services to clients. Whether you need to incorporate video marketing in your SEO campaign or are looking to revamp your entire SEO strategy, you can rely on us. Our team of experts and professionals will devise a targeted SEO strategy for your business to help you achieve its true potential. Get in touch via our Contact Us page or simply drop us an email to arrange a free SEO check or schedule a meeting.