Did you know that approximately 5 billion pieces of content are uploaded on YouTube every day? This is equivalent to about 300 hours of video per minute. Does this seem like a lot to you? These data were obtained in 2022, so they may even be higher figures, since it is indicated that there are more and more users.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is mostly famous thanks to its application on Google and websites, which does not mean that it cannot be applied on other platforms and/or social networks, such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. Particularly, YouTube is the company that presents the most traffic after Google itself, standing out for its wide variety of multimedia content.
In this article, I will be in charge of entrusting you with the main tips for doing SEO for YouTube, what its importance is and how you can increase the visibility and positioning of your content in 2024.
What is SEO for YouTube?
Doing SEO for YouTube refers to the strategies and techniques used to optimize the content of videos and channels on the platform with the aim of improving their visibility and positioning in search results.
At a certain point, you have to understand that SEO for YouTube, for all practical purposes, works the same way as it does with Google . The idea is that you can tailor content so that it is more easily discovered by users when they search on YouTube and other search engines.
On the opposite side of the SEO objective (which consists of boosting the organic appearance of your content) are ads, which can boost them through payment. If you want to learn more about this, I invite you to visit our article on how to create and optimize your video ads on YouTube Ads in 2024.
The importance of SEO on YouTube
I can tell you that SEO for YouTube is necessary for your videos and channel to grow , boosting the number of views and subscribers. Now, I remind you that all this will not be possible if you do not focus on optimizing the content of your videos, ensuring that they focus on a specific audience and that they stand out on a platform that is saturated with content.
Differences between SEO for Google and SEO for YouTube
The truth is that there are not too many differences between SEO for YouTube or Google, since YouTube belongs to Google, and many of Google’s search results come from the same platform. However, it is worth clarifying that, within the details, there are some differences that separate it from, for example, an ordinary website:
- Focus on visual content – While traditional SEO focuses on text and links, SEO for YouTube focuses on visual and multimedia content elements, such as videos, thumbnails, and video-related metadata.
- Optimizing video-specific metadata – Although basic SEO principles such as keyword research and content optimization are applicable to both Google and YouTube, SEO for YouTube involves optimizing video-specific metadata. Examples of this are titles, descriptions and tags, in a way that is attractive to viewers and also relevant to YouTube’s recommendation algorithms.
Basic principles of SEO on YouTube
The SEO that you can apply to your YouTube channel has several key elements to improve the visibility and performance of your videos, which I will share with you below:
Attractive and optimized titles
Video titles should be attractive, descriptive, and optimized with relevant keywords. They must capture the viewer’s attention and clearly convey the content of the video.
Sensational or misleading titles tend to attract a little more attention, but, in my experience, I would recommend not doing so, as it can negatively affect the engagement that users have with your content, which is highly taken into account by the platform.
Detailed descriptions and keywords
Video descriptions will give you the opportunity to provide more context about the content and improve SEO. They should be detailed, informative, and contain key keywords that help search algorithms understand what the video is about, especially those contained in the title.
In this case, I recommend placing links, calls to action or useful resources in this sector, but for SEO purposes (for example, establishing a link building strategy). If you want to write or leave a link that you need the public to enter, a featured comment works best in my experience.
Tags are keywords or phrases that help classify and organize content on YouTube. It is important to select relevant and specific tags that accurately describe the content of the video, again, they have to be minimally those contained in the title and meta description.
SEO tip 1: a practice that I usually use a lot is to repeat a keyword 3 times between the title, meta description and tags. In this way, the algorithm will interpret the importance of said keyword on your video. Do this with a maximum of 3 or 4 keywords.
SEO tip 2: Do you see that tags section that I marked in the image? SPOILERS ! It is not native to YouTube, it is thanks to the YouTube Tags extension. I’ll explain it to you in more depth when we get to the tools I recommend having.
Advanced SEO strategies for Youtubers
So that you are able to take SEO on YouTube to the next level, I will share the following advanced strategies for the SEO of your channel:
Analysis of the competition on YouTube
Conducting a thorough competitor analysis on YouTube will allow you to gain valuable insights into what works in your specific niche (e.g. what type of sports car to review, whether your channel is about racing cars) and what strategies other successful creators are using.
But it doesn’t end there, as a YouTuber, your work extends to analyzing and investigating which videos are causing a positive impact on the audience, such as titles, descriptions and tags, among others. By better understanding the competitive landscape, you will be able to identify opportunities to differentiate yourself and improve your content strategy.
Do you see the vertical videos that appear at the bottom of the previous image? These are YouTube Shorts. It is known that this type of content began not being monetizable and that today it is already monetizable, but that is not its true importance. The relevant thing about these contents is that they are much more spontaneous, and I recommend using them to discuss brief and quick topics.
Until not long ago, several content creators used them to upload short fragments of their videos that were already on the platform. But beware! Now YouTube penalizes for duplicate content, so I (personally) no longer recommend this.
Optimizing content for search intent
Going back a little more with SEO, it is crucial that you create content that responds to the user’s search intentions. This involves understanding what type of information users are looking for when they make a query on YouTube and making sure your content meets those needs and urges.
This includes: creating tutorials, product reviews, step-by-step guides, among other types of content that directly address viewers’ questions or problems.
Link and collaboration strategies
Make friends with your competitors! If you can create collaborative videos with other creators, you will be able to position videos that another audience will be able to see (more so if the other content creator has more subscribers). This will help you create links and backlinks to increase your authority and visibility.
Essential tools for SEO on YouTube
So that you can increase the efficiency of your channel and its reach to more people, you can use some important tools to analyze keywords, track performance and optimize your content, in addition to analyzing your competitors. Below, I share with you some of the ones that I recommend the most:
Keyword analysis tools
When analyzing keywords , I can tell you that these are some of the best tools :
- Ahrefs: Although it is mainly known for its SEO analysis for websites, it also offers you specific features for YouTube. It allows you to perform keyword research to find relevant terms with significant search volume and analyze the competitiveness of the keywords you find, such as their competitiveness.
- SEMrush: This is another comprehensive SEO tool that offers YouTube-specific functionality . With this plugin you will be able to perform keyword research, track keyword performance, and analyze the competition.
- VidIQ: this platform has a free and paid version (I have used it a lot, even for free) and I can say that it really works well to find and analyze the difficulty and competition that keywords and long tail keywords have. long) to rank for a wide variety of search terms. It also provides a dashboard that is colored to the right of the main search engine, indicating clicks per hour, per day and per week, among other values.
Platforms for performance monitoring
Some of the platforms that allow you to perform analytical monitoring of your channel data are:
- YouTube Analytics: This is YouTube’s own analysis tool, which provides you with valuable data about the performance of your videos and your channel. You can see metrics like views, watch time, subscribers, and more. This helps you understand what type of content resonates best with your audience and how to improve your content and SEO strategy.
- Social Blade: It is a very good complementary platform that, although I did not have the opportunity to try it, I can confirm that it is very good thanks to multiple reviews that I have seen. Provides detailed statistics on YouTube channels, including revenue estimates, daily views, subscribers, and ratings. It can be useful to monitor the growth of your channel and compare it to others in your niche.
In this section, I will take a second to tell you that I do not recommend anything other than the same analytics that allows you to use YouTube. I’m not saying Social Blade is bad, far from it, it’s a great tool, but no one will be able to expose your channel data better than the very platform you’re trying to crack.
Resources for content optimization
Some of the resources and extensions that I recommend using for your YouTube channel are:
- VidIQ – I swear I’m not a spy sent by this extension! But beyond all jokes, it is a very useful tool that provides you with keyword analysis, performance tracking, tag suggestions and much more to optimize your videos and increase their visibility on YouTube.
- TubeBuddy: very similar to VidIQ (in fact, it is its competition), it offers everything the same as this other one, but with a different interface, naturally. I have had the opportunity to use it and it is very good. It includes keyword analysis, rank tracking, tag and description optimization, and thumbnail A/B testing. It is useful to improve the SEO and visibility of your videos.
- YouTube Tags: I mentioned this extension before, do you remember it? It is useful to be able to see at a glance below the video the tags it has (between the title and the description).you to know what position your video is in for a certain search criteria.
Common YouTube SEO Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
SEO is not a path of victories or immediate success , you will make mistakes along the way. Without going any further, I have lost several channels due to poor performance and penalties for making mistakes with the content. You learn from your mistakes, and for that reason I can recommend:
Not doing proper keyword research
Not searching for keywords for your videos is a very big mistake. It is best to use tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, Google Keyword Planner or VidIQ to find and use them, or those used by the competition.
Failure to properly optimize these key elements can make your videos less visible in YouTube search results. Be sure to include key keywords in your titles, descriptions, and tags, and make them descriptive and engaging for viewers.
Ignore content quality
It is also not ideal that you focus solely on SEO without paying attention to the quality of the content, and this can result in low audience retention and lower engagement.
Maintain an inconsistent publishing strategy
Posting inconsistently can negatively impact your audience engagement and the visibility of your videos. One solution is to create a kind of publication schedule, for example: Monday, Wednesday and Friday; normal channel videos, and Tuesdays and Thursdays; shorts, etc.
Do not promote videos on other platforms
Limiting yourself to promoting your videos only on YouTube can limit their reach and visibility. The solution to this is to create social networks that function as “satellites” that prolong your reach to other users. This way, you will reach much larger audiences.
Always maintain the same posture
The YouTube platform constantly modifies its algorithms, that is, the way of generating content presents certain periods of stability, and then changes. This is so, since the tastes and needs of users change.
Abuse clickbait : Free beer!
I’m sorry to tell you that there isn’t any, but that deception is usually similar to what many thumbnails or video titles convey. A little sensationalism is fine, but it’s important not to go overboard, because users will leave after a while.
Conclusions and next steps in your SEO strategy for YouTube
Was this article useful to you? I understand that establishing an SEO strategy for YouTube is not easy, you have to have a lot of time, patience and the ability to generate audiovisual content, which, personally, I consider to be the most complex and dense to achieve.
Are you looking to improve your YouTube strategy and haven’t achieved good results? At Enjoy Minder we have a team of professionals specialized in all areas of SEO on various platforms and social networks, including, obviously, YouTube. Contact us and let’s start working together on growing your clicks and views!
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