I have people ask me all the time to rank their video or how to get their video on the first page of Google.  Well it isn’t a magical thing where you just tag the video and you show up on top.  Even more than with regular SEO, video ranking for competitive terms requires a following from your video. Search Engine Land just published a great article on YouTube Ranking factors that everyone should read.

Firstly, YouTube should be a strategy if you are going to go after video rankings.  You should establish a channel and get subscribers. These are factors in getting your video seen so putting one video up there without going through the work of building a channel limits your chances as it is.  As with any ranking concept, if the competition is low, you may be able to sneak in there without putting in a lot of work, but if you are in a competitive arena, ranking in video takes work and consistent good content that you provide for your audience, building links, likes, and shares to your videos.

 

Below is touching on this stuff at a high level, but the article linked above really goes in to the details and I highly recommend you read it.

What you need to do to get videos ranking:

1.  Get yourself a YouTube channel and build a following.  You need 500 subscribers to get a custom URL and start to develop a brand.

2.  Build that channel and target the meta-data toward your keyword phrases with titles and images and link it to your website, which hopefully has some search strength itself.

3. Optimize your videos

YouTube Video Ranking Factors

  • Meta Data: Targeted keywords need to be in titles, descriptions and tags of the video.
  • Video Quality is important: HD is better than SD
  • Most importantly, views, likes, shares, and links to the video matter. You have to get it out there and get some traction.
  • Thumbnails, annotations, closed captioning,and more

As you can see, much like you can aim a page for SEO but with no strength from links, it is hard to go anywhere, you can aim a video, but without the strength from likes, views, and links, it will likely not really rank that well.  Make sure you know what you are doing before investing in a lot of video with the expectation that it will just magically make you rank.  Video and be a very good and effective tool for you business, but you have to do it right and you have to use it intelligently.

Summary
Article Name
Ranking in YouTube isn't Magical
Google Certified Partner and SEM Specialist
I have people ask me all the time to rank their video or how to get their video on the first page of Google. Well it isn't a magical thing where you just tag the video and you show up on top.
Jeremy Skillings