4 Reasons Video is Critical for Every Search Engine Optimization Strategy
Kerry Guard • November 1, 2013 • 3 minutes to readMore than 2 BILLION Google Searches Display Video Results Every Day: Is Your Brand Involved?
Earlier this year, we began providing more value to our clients by expanding our search engine optimization capabilities and experience. A large portion of that expansion included writing long & short form articles as well as producing infographics.
But in our opinions, static content wasn't enough
We not only wanted to expand into producing and marketing high-quality video content, we HAD TO expand to deliver more value for our clients. Even though video content is more time consuming and expensive to create, here are four reasons why your brand should invest in video SEO:
1. 62% of Google searches include video
This represents more than 2.2 billion searches every single day! To put this into perspective, there are more Google searches that display video results than the entire population of China ... IN ONE SINGLE DAY. Additionally, take a look at the image at the top of this post: Would you rather see a video about the best diving spots in Hawaii or read about it in plain-text form? Source: Marketingland.com
2. Video is 50x more likely to get organic page ranks compared to plain-text results
Forrester pulled together a list of the 40 most heavily searched keywords across Google. This research found it's 50x more likely to land a video asset on the 1st page of a Google search compared to plain-text results. Additionally, an average of 1.5 video results appear on Google's 1st page, making up an average of 15% of all first page results.
3. Video results have a 41% better CTR than plain-text results
A study performed by aimCLEAR found that video results generated a 41% better CTR than plain-text results. Digging deeper, their research found that the visual element of thumbnails present in the listing were a key factor that improved CTR.
4. Articles that include video assets generate 3x more inbound links
Casey Henry of Moz found that video content is the perfect piece of content to create & market because it fits the mold of both a) valuable, and b) sharable. Given the choice, wouldn't you want each one of your articles to generate three times more inbound links? Source: Moz
Keep in Mind: Quality over Quantity
According to YouTube, more than 100 hours of video content is uploaded to YouTube every minute. That's a lot of clutter to get lost in, so make sure the video content you produce is both a) valuable, b) sharable, and c) optimized for your audience.
