Is Video An Effective SEO Technique?

Every website owner is well aware of the importance of SEO or search engine optimization.  The search for the secret formula that will enable you to draw traffic to your website has been a competitive free for all for quite some time.   Just when SEO experts thought they were getting a handle on content for websites that would send the crawlers reeling along came web video.  It became clear that no longer would a site be complete with the written word alone.  Web video was the new frontier.  Of course the power of the written word reigns supreme but the value and effectiveness of sound web video SEO technique should not be underestimated.

Although web video is comparably new to the scene the loyalty to it has become immense.  The success of video sharing sites like YouTube has been phenomenal.  YouTube received over 90 million visitors in March 2009 and is easily the most popular video sharing site online.  People are fascinated with videos.  They enjoy creating them and they will stop to watch them.  The 25 to 35 year old age group has proved to be very attracted to web videos.  They just happen to be the age group with an established conversion rate on the Internet as well.  The opportunity to reach them with web videos makes this method an effective SEO technique.

Of course like all SEO methods it must be utilized wisely.  Proper placement and content of videos must be precise.  Recent studies have shown that almost 40% of users find their videos through the search engines.  The major search engines like Google and Yahoo have enhanced their ability to include videos into their search engine process.

Web videos can be SEO friendly on your website or through Video sharing sites like YouTube.  Through video sharing you get your message and your link out there to draw people to your website.  Web videos on your website can draw them further in for the sale.  By properly preparing your videos for SEO they can be picked up in the search engines and drive traffic to your site.  The short, sweet and straight to the point web video can make an excellent SEO tool.

Here’s a second attempt at producing a video through my Vaio’s internal Web cam, using only daylight (minimal). I had to sharpen it a bit in Vegas and I also adjusted the contrast some. The colors are more realistic, though the highlighting (glow) on my forehead and cheeks is a bit disconcerting. My conclusion is that it would be okay to create a quick video using only the Web cam and natural light, or perhaps bulbs which simulate daylight. Still I’m glad the storm has passed and I can go back into my studio and use pro equipment again.

Before I do that, I’ve got to see if I can get rid of the audio timing problem by capturing Web cam footage in Vegas directly.

The only adjustment that I made in post was sharpening (through Vegas). I suppose had there been a better looking subject that the results would have been passable. But passable is generally not good enough. Not for pro work. Still I think I’ll try again (since the storm is lingering) using Vegas to capture instead of Arcsoft