Building Traffic to Your Site with Web Video

Traffic is the lifeblood of every web business.  After all, it doesn’t matter how good your site’s content is if no one ever shows up to read it!

If you’re struggling to get enough eyeballs on your page to justify the time and energy you’ve invested in building it, one of the fastest ways to get traffic to your site is with a well-executed, well-optimized web video.  If that sounds intimidating, don’t worry – it’s never been easier to promote your site with web video, and I’ll show you how to do it in this article.

The first step – as you might expect – is to create your web video in the first place!  This is easier than it sounds if you take advantage of any of the following tools:

• Animoto – Animoto is a fun utility that allows you to upload pictures and text to the program and set them both to music.  Once your content is uploaded, Animoto automatically creates the slideshow-style animation and spits out a complete video ready for upload to Youtube and other video distribution sites.  Best of all, the program is free to use, although there are paid account options that include additional features and upgrades.
• Fiverr – For just $5, you’ll find plenty of Fiverr providers offering to put together a simple video advertising your website.  These vary wildly in terms of quality and style, so be sure to read the descriptions of each “gig” thoroughly and check the provider’s feedback rating before signing up and buying a video through this service.
• Jing – Jing is a free screen-capture program that allows you to videotape what’s happening on your computer’s desktop.  Produced by Tech Smith – the company behind the popular Camtasia video production program – Jing is a great option for recording simple tutorials on the fly.

Alternatively, if you have a webcam or camcorder, you can experiment with creating videos of yourself speaking into the camera.  But don’t feel like you need to have this advanced equipment (or be comfortable speaking on camera!) in order to benefit from the power of web video.  Any of the options above can be used to create reasonably good video content that will help drive visitors to your website.

Once you’ve chosen a web video production method, the next thing you’ll want to determine is the type of content you’ll generate.  You don’t need to be the next Steven Spielberg, but you will want to choose the right topic and optimization parameters before you start shooting willy-nilly.

For example, although your web video doesn’t need to be on any particular topic, it should be built around a good keyword phrase that’s optimized to benefit your website.  You’ll also want to ensure you’ve chosen a topic that people actually want to watch videos about (though as web video is ingrained further and further into our society, the number of topics that don’t meet these criteria is getting much smaller!).

Here’s what to think about when planning your web video…

Web Video Optimization

The first key to building a successful web video is to choose a keyword phrase that gets enough search volume without being too competitive.  Although your specific tolerance for these parameters may vary, it’s generally a good idea to look for keyword phrases with at least 2,000 monthly exact match searches each month and fewer than 200,000 competing pages in Google.  (Keep in mind, these limits won’t apply if you’re trying to create a piece of content to go viral.)

Once you’ve chosen your keyword phrase, don’t be shy about sharing it in your web video!  Your target phrase should show up in all of the following places:

• In the file name of the video file you upload to each video sharing site
• In the title tag and description you write for your video
• In the tag section of each video site
• In the video content itself

In addition, you’ll want to include a link back to your site in both your video file itself and in your video description.  For best results, type out your full URL and include it as the only content on the first line of your video’s description when listing your video in Youtube.  This will make your link clickable and will ensure that it isn’t hidden in the “more info” section.

Video Content Direction

To some extent, the keyword phrase you choose will determine the type of content you create.  For example, if you’ve chosen to create a video around the search phrase, “dog training tips,” you aren’t going to put together a goofy stand-up comedy sketch about My Little Pony (at least, I hope you aren’t…).

However, if you do have some flexibility – say you’re targeting a general keyword phrase like, “concert tickets” – the easiest way to plan your video’s content is by looking at the most popular related videos in your niche.  There’s no reason to reinvent the wheel – if you see a certain type of video getting more views than another, then by all means, create your own version (just don’t plagiarize other content scene-for-scene).

To get even more of a boost, consider listing you video as a response to another popular video in your niche.  If the video’s owner approves your request, you’ll get a nice link to your own video appearing directly underneath the more popular content.

Distribution for Web Videos

Once you’ve produced your web video according to the keywords and content topics you’ve chosen, the final step – and the most important part of the process for getting traffic back to your site – is how you distribute your web video.

Obviously, you’ll want to submit your video to Youtube.  Because it’s owned by Google, links back to your site from the web video giant are hugely beneficial in terms of SEO.  Videos submitted to this site are also the most likely to snag coveted spots in the Google SERPs as a result of the company’s recent focus on providing blended results.

However, don’t stop there.  Vimeo, Dailymotion, Veoh and Revver are all similar sites with substantial audiences that can funnel additional traffic to your site when you share your web video on them.  You can submit your site to these and other web video directories manually, or you can make use of a web video submitting tool that will automate the process for you.

After your videos have been uploaded, you’ll still want to do a little work promoting them.  The world of web video can be competitive, depending on the keyword you’re targeting, so sending a few backlinks to your video listings can help them get noticed.

In addition, you’ll find that the search algorithms on these directories rely heavily on video popularity and viewing trends to determine which videos to show first in their internal SERPs.  Embedding your video content on your own site can be a good way to get your video the views it needs to get bumped up in these video directory search results pages.

Although these distribution steps add a small amount of work to the process of creating and distributing web videos in order to boost the traffic to your site,  you’ll likely find that it takes much less effort to attract visitors and earn rankings in the SERPs through web video compared with traditional SEO.  If you haven’t produced a web video before, give it a try – it’s easy to do and the results might just surprise you!

Image: chelzdd