Nowadays, we want a visual for everything. Reading? Psh. Just go to YouTube! Virtually everything is on YouTube, from news on the latest medical research to the lowest forms of mindless entertainment. YouTube videos, just like websites, also need search engine optimization (SEO) to draw viewers. Here are a few pointers to boost your views on YouTube.
Title
When people search for the videos they want to see, the first thing they lunge at is the title. The more relevant the title is to your audience, the more like it is to show up in search results and the more likely it is to be watched, liked, and shared. Keep the title concise – about 60 characters or less. The point of YouTube is to not have to read about it, after all!
Descriptions
Longer videos running 20 minutes or more rely more heavily on descriptions than shorter videos. No one is going to watch a 1-hour lecture based only on the title; it’ll be important for viewers to know a bit more than a title can offer before investing time in a video. Just like the title, though, descriptions should be concise and relevant. An outline or a couple sentences of to-the-point explanation is fine. Remember to include the keywords you think viewers will be searching.
Tags
Tags are important for YouTube videos. The tags specify what the video is all about and what categories it fits into. Try entering some of your keywords to see if any related tags are already in use. This will help associate your video with other videos of the same kind so more interested viewers will watch yours next, even if they don’t find it through their first YouTube search.
Up Votes and Comments
Viewer reactions weigh heavily into the ranking of your YouTube videos. If your video if information, content-rich, entertaining, or whatever viewers want to see, you’ll accumulate upvotes; the more of the those you get, the more the video ranking improves. If your video generates discussion in the comments section, even better. The more views these generate, the more subscribers you get and on the cycle goes!
Length of the video
The length of the video depends heavily on the genre. Radio shows and lectures do pretty well from 30 minutes to an hour or longer. Top 10’s and funny videos are primed for viewers with short attention spans: 3 – 7 minutes. With the right title, description, and tagging, the length of your video should be taken into account with respect to what your audience is looking for.
Subtitles and Closed Captions
A little-known secret in YouTube video promotion is the text embedded as subtitles and closed captioning. You can upload text scripts for this function, and not just YouTube, but other major search engines can pick on the clues therein.
Video Links
End screens are a great opportunity to boost your content through the network effect: each view on one video offers a chance to gain a viewer on another video and so on. With on-screen links, users can go directly to another YouTube video relevant to their interests.