The value of digital content for your website’s SEO
Photo by Max Nelson on Unsplash
Most of us now understand that videos are powerful and effective advertising or marketing tools. What’s also evident is search engines take note of engaging, useful content posted to social channels and uploaded to your website. Useful, engaging content is of value to your users and your website will be ranked accordingly on search engine results pages — maybe not immediately but it in time your organic ranking will improve.
On-site and off-site SEO is a multi-faceted process with results you should expect to see over time. SEO is a slow cook, it’s not instant. It’s work — and it works. We hear so much about posting to Facebook and Instragram as part of your off-site SEO strategy. Don’t forget your LinkedIn, YouTube and your Google My Business profile — posting and sharing engaging digital content to these platforms is particularly helpful for marketing and for SEO. More about posting to these platforms further down in this article.
Here are some ideas for your next promotional video production focus.
Marketing, promotional and corporate videos
Making a statement about your brand in an engaging short video clip is an effective way to publicize and promote your business. Informative, Instructional and/or demonstration videos about your products and services will get noticed — we all find watching videos that explain and demonstrate really helpful when we’re researching something we want to buy or use.
There are various ways you can approach your social media video content to make it work, to deliver value for your business and your audience. Understanding your audience is a good start, along with knowing your own strengths. Use a video to spotlight your strengths which could be any or all of the following:
your staff
the wholesome investment you put into training your staff to be their best
your products and services;
your great customer service
what your customers say about you
how you produce quality products with a low-carbon footprint.
One of eight social videos created by Sure Shot Film by editing the over-arching corporate video produced for RIX Specialist Contracting.
The footage took one videographer two hours to film, including drone shots, gimbal shots and interview. Editing took less than a day making it one of our most affordable types of corporate videos. It is also a great way to value-add on the content once it has been filmed.
Engage a good videographer and communicate your ideas. Talk about your business’s attributes. Together, come up with a production plan to make the most out of the shoot. Enjoy the process!
Videos need to engage, they don’t need to be a masterpiece but there’s value in a professional, thoughtful production. An audience engages with content when their interest is piqued by good imagery and communication, entertainment, and useful information. The message needs to be honest, cohesive and convincing. Impressing your audience doesn’t need to be complex, but a good video does come with preparation, choosing the right location and talent.
Interviews and dialogue can be powerful. If you’re lucky they can be captured in one take but generally it takes time to get the audio right. Edit the footage and dialogue to get the best, concise message across. Nerves can take time to settle especially if the if the interviewee is inexperienced. It helps to have a clear approach with clear questions, and responses thought out.
Captions, transcripts
Providing closed captions with your video content offers excellent user experience. Captions enable content accessibility for people who are hearing impaired and for the average user during times were sound needs to be down low or turned off.
Providing captions with video content provides users and search engines with a rich understanding of your content. If audio is muffled or the speaker’s accent is strong and unusual, closed captions could be used to use to make sure the message is understood by a wide audience as possible.Captions and transcripts are good for search engine optimization. But don’t rely on YouTube’s automated captions which invariably are not accurate and generally an embarrassingly poor interpretation of the script.
Having a relaxed videographer who is also a ‘people person’ will be an asset to your video project by helping break the ice or tension that many people feel when they’re in front of a camera, especially if they need to speak to the camera.
LinkedIn is a business-to-business network. Posting and sharing videos to and from your LinkedIn profile will reach other professionals, not just in your field but businesses and industries who are looking for products or services like yours.
Short videos up to three minutes work well. You need to make the most out of the opportunity and capture your audience’s attention with something clear, coherent, honest. People are clever. To appeal to an intelligent audience, great imagery and excellent communication will deliver a message that convinces with its honesty.
From LinkedIn information about marketing solutions and lead generation.
Depending on your industry, your products and services, LinkedIn works effectively to get your business noticed, as an advertising and promotional platform.
Tell your story: Linkedin is great for relationship building so telling your story via video will work to get your brand, style and values across.
Promote products and services: Consider using instructional videos or a series of frequently asked questions delivered by video format to strike a chord with many people on LinkedIn.
Google My Business
Getting a Google My Business profile is free. It literally puts you on the map, a Google Map, with the opportunity to get picked up by people doing a Google search for business like yours or those in your locality — you’ll get noticed by a huge number of internet users. Once your profile or map marker is clicked, your profile and other information that you upload like videos will be available to view. It’s easy to understand the value of having short videos of your business: what you do well, your staff, products and services, to get wider audiences interested once they click on your business marker on the map. Upload short, off-the-cuff videos of your business produced easily on your phone to your business profile. Google also allows customers to upload videos to your GMB profile so it’s important to regularly moderate your content. When a customer offers a great review, respond to the reviewer.
Your GMB profile enables helpful details like your contact numbers, opening times and location to present on a search engine results page (SERP) when your business is searched. Posts to your GMB profile present effectively as free advertisements for your products or services — depending on what your post is about — and render on your profile listing on the SERP.
Google specifies guidelines for videos uploaded to your page: 30 seconds (or a bit longer); 100mb maximum file size; 720 resolution or higher. Short explainer or infographic videos, tours of your bricks-and-mortar business or office also work to demonstrate the look and feel of your business.
Youtube
Post videos to your Youtube channel. Youtube is a subsidiary to Google. It’s not hard to understand how, or believe that, a Google search will likely present the website with embedded Youtube clips, or an active Youtube channel connected to your website, higher on a search engine results page than a website without any video content.
How does video content help SEO?
The Google search engine is very sophisticated and notices audience engagement. Google knows the value of video content to users. As a search engine, Google’s job is to present the best websites to match a search query and it notices websites with onsite and offsite optimization. Action on your website and social channels — sharing content, contributing to and networking on social platforms, does highlight your business as an industry player in online engagement and Google will give you the thumbs up.
