Videos are often used when adding content to websites. They come in the form of presentations, master classes, unpacking and instructions – the choice is yours. Videos not only help make the website more interesting for visitors and complement the main content but also have a positive effect on positions in search results. In this article, we will talk about video advantages and ways to use video to improve website SEO.
Why Are Videos Useful for Website SEO?
Video is a great way to talk about your company, products and mission and share useful information with visitors. In addition, it is an effective tool to promote your website in search results.
Let’s take a look at why search engines like websites with videos and rank them higher.
Search Engines Like Additional Content
A variety of content is what’s needed for successful promotion. Google and Bing crawl a lot of attributes when ranking websites, so the top positions are taken by the most relevant and advanced websites. Search bots take into account not only keywords or meta tags but also the presence of different content: text, images, infographics, charts and videos.
Videos increase relevance because they provide a clear answer to the query that the user typed in the search box. In this regard, video content should be used to promote your website and its content.
Additional Traffic
Images are used in articles (texts) and thanks to this, users can find the website not only through the general search but also through internal services like Google Images. Video works in a similar way; it drives traffic from:
- Social networks
- Search and recommendation feed implemented on video hosting websites
- Google Videos tab (this is most often used by users who are looking for videos in the form of instructions, reviews and tutorials).
The amount of traffic depends on the number of videos: The more videos you have, the higher the traffic will be. You need to choose hot or evergreen topics when creating videos. The latter are searched constantly, so videos will attract traffic for months, even years, to come.
People Spend More Time on the Web Page
Using quality video content has a direct impact on improving behavioral factors. Users spend 2-5 minutes reading text material with 5-15 thousand characters. According to Smallbizgenius, if the website contains text and video, more than 60 percent of users will prefer video to text. This is because of the economy of time and increased convenience. The user will make internal transitions that strengthen the behavioral factors. Google and Bing attach particular importance to them.
To achieve high results, you not only need to create a video but also properly design it. Videos that are over 7-10 minutes are watched reluctantly by users, so you need to be guided by this unspoken standard.
If there is a need to create video content of 10+ minutes, it’s better to record several short videos forming one big idea. This way, your users are more likely to finish watching your videos. You should also avoid too-intrusive advertising or empty content that is of no practical use for the visitors.
Positive Impact on External Promotion
Video content helps improve a website’s link profile because:
- People make reposts, adding content to their accounts on social networks.
- Authoritative websites add links to quality videos on their blog.
All this provides an influx of targeted traffic, as well as increases the volume of backlinks from websites with a good reputation and trust. Search engines record positive dynamics and give the website an advantage during ranking.
Increased Conversion
A steady stream of traffic is good, but it must be monetized. Quality videos that highlight product features or company pros encourage the customer to take a targeted action. For example, a detailed product overview helps the customer understand the benefits they will receive, so they are more likely to place an order or pick up the phone.
3 Ways To Use Video To Improve Website SEO
So, where should you place the video to make it more noticeable and to convince the visitor to view it? Below are the three places:
- On the home page: If you represent a company that offers products or services, take an overview video about your activities and place it on the main page. If you need to advertise a particular product (new products, new line of business), such a video should be placed on the main page so that the visitor immediately sees it.
- On product cards: This applies to online stores with a wide assortment. Several videos should not be posted on the main page, don’t confuse the visitor. But posting them separately in product categories is quite another matter. Don’t forget to link to the video from the home page or make a clickable banner, so the video doesn’t get lost in the depths of the website.
- On the landing page: Since the landing promotes a single service or product, the video should detail its essence. This can be an instruction manual, a video review or feedback from customers who have already made a purchase.
Types of Video Content on the Website
Here are popular types of videos that can be placed on the website:
Video Description of a Product or Service
Showcase your product or service from different angles, describing its qualities, characteristics and advantages. Do not forget to show the benefits for the customer: What will your audience get, buying your product?
Tutorial Video
It is suitable for certain categories of products that are not easy to understand. For example, complex gadgets, appliances, cars, motorcycles, sports equipment and many others. You can make a detailed video or make a series of videos; each of which will cover a subtopic. Keep in mind that whiteboard animations are an excellent format for explainer videos and tutorials.
Product Review
If you sell several products in the same category (for example, women’s clothing, food, children’s toys), choose a few of the most popular and compare them according to different criteria. The main thing is to identify several criteria (price, features, advantages, disadvantages), and don’t forget to highlight each of them.
Entertaining Content
These are funny videos related to your topic or product: your favorite anecdotes or unusual ways to use your product. There are a lot of options for this type of content. Because humor is universal, these videos usually go viral.
How Can Video Content Reduce Website Ranking?
Video content can boost your ranking, but could also worsen it. Here’s what to keep in mind:
- Any video with even the slightest hint of adult content placed on a corporate website immediately brings down the website’s ranking.
- If you put a long or unoptimized video on a website with weak hosting, the website suffers from slow loading speeds.
- Don’t forget about copyrights. Violation of them is a cause for complaints and conflicts.
- If you’re an online store and you put on all product cards a video from a YouTube account of another online store, this is plagiarism. Google and Bing will consider you as an aggregator of other people’s content and will lower your ranking.
Conclusion
Video is a good website promotion engine and useful for all areas of business. It helps attract customers, provides a stream of targeted traffic and improves behavioral factors. But to do this, your videos need to reveal the issues that concern the buyer and demonstrate your product’s solutions to their challenges. All this will lead to increased ranking, stable sales and a high return on investment.
