How To Optimize Videos For Your Dental Marketing Strategy
by Arron George
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in 2015 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.
Video marketing is growing as an integral part of most businesses’ social media strategy, with YouTube as the major sharing platform.
YouTube is the largest video sharing website, with more than one billion users each month. It’s also the second largest search engine only behind Google. Every day, users watch hundreds of millions of hours of video and generate billions of views.
These numbers are mind-boggling and might prompt the question, “Why would I want to use YouTube for my dental marketing if it’s completely saturated?” It’s a fair question with a simple answer: video optimization.
How to use video optimization for SEO
By using YouTube’s video optimization options, your video can stand out to the massive audience on YouTube and more importantly, your audience. Therefore, this blog post is going to look at how to optimize your uploaded YouTube videos so your specific target audience sees them.
Title. Tags. Description.
Title: Your title needs to explain what your video is about. Think of a compelling title that reveals the content of your video. Also, use keywords related to your business, audience, industry, and video content. YouTube (and Google) will match your video with relevant searches based on these keywords.
Tags: These are keywords and categories that will make your video findable. Tags should represent your video and relate to popular searches you want your video to be listed in. For example, for a video about teeth whitening, include tags such as dental, teeth, whitening, smiles, dentist, and so on.
Description: Use this section to summarize what your video is about and compel people to play it. Use keywords, but do not overdo it. The main aim is to explain why people should watch your video.
Bear in mind that only the first 160 characters appear above the fold, so keep it simple and to the point.
Thumbnail
The thumbnail of your video will appear in a variety of places on the web, so make sure it is optimized to adjust to various devices. YouTube recommends a high-quality image, 1280 x 720px (minimum width of 640px). Ensure the image is visually compelling and clearly identifies what your video is about.
Annotations
These are clickable text overlays you can add to your YouTube video. Adding annotations can motivate your audience to take action (such as visiting your website, subscribing to your channel, or engaging in another way with the video). Include a call to action in your annotation and keep it short.
TOP TIP: Avoid placing the annotation along the bottom in the center of your video, as the ads banner may block it.
Analytics
YouTube analytics can help you optimize your future videos. Regularly check these (weekly or monthly) to see what is working, who your audience is, how they interact, and where they are coming from. This information can help you to make more videos your viewers want to see.
Conclusion
YouTube has a number of other tools and features you can use as a part of your dental marketing strategy, but the aforementioned methods are a great place to start. Using these simple video optimization tips can help more people to see your videos. Try them out for yourself and let us know what kind of results you get!
Leave a comment below: Do you currently include YouTube video optimization as part of your dental marketing strategy? What types of videos do you share?
Great article!
Great Stuff. On page seo is not enough. We need some off page seo also for better rankings.