# YouTube - The Holy Grail of Marketing



## codyjoe (May 6, 2013)

I've come across too many posts/threads in these forum(s) in regards to people looking for marketing ideas, selling tips, start-up tips and there's one site that can fix all of these issues for us all. YouTube.

Now don't get me wrong, YouTube isn't an easy place to gain notoriety. It can be inherently difficult to get attention on that site and gain traction. But that's what I'm here to try and help with.

Just a background of myself on YouTube. I've developed 3 of my own channels over the past few years, uploaded 350+ videos in the past 1 1/2 years and I'm a producer for local businesses that want to develop their own following(s).

When it comes to SEO, I haven't found much that can make as much of a large impact as YouTube videos can. Websites that consistently post their own videos and continue to add news ones have been found to be upwards of 50x more efficient in their SEO on average. The other benefit to YouTube video SEO is that Google often features YouTube videos at the top of many web searches, above all website links. Which means its possible for you to stand on top of all your competitors with just one well managed video. One example is that you could create a video with the title "Cleveland Screen Printing" or "Cleveland Custom T-Shirts" and it's almost a given that you would shoot up in results thanks to your video.

*Video SEO Tips*
So here's where you need to be careful and where you need to be dead on. Your video's title needs to be essentially the exact SEO term you want to gain notoriety in. After you place the keyword you want in the title, you're then free to place anything you want after that like your shop's name or product specialty.

Now with your title taken care of, we need to sort out your description. There are two things many people do WRONG in this area and it just kills your video's SEO momentum. First is including links before anything else. You want users to see information about the video so they know what they're watching, not your website's link. Always include links at the end of the description. The second bad practice is not creating a description at all, this is just plain stupid on the part of any user out there.

Your best bet with the description is to treat it like a blog post. Type out 1-2 paragraphs about the video and include the keyword(s) you're wanting to target. only AFTER you write out that description are you free to place your links.

The final bit needed to fill out is the tag field. Now I will say this area isn't really of great importance but I would never avoid this section as it will, though slightly, help your SEO efforts. Also, DO NOT use one word tags in this field. One word tags are SEVERELY over-saturated and typing those in is just a lost effort. Only bother typing out full keyword terms, much like the keyword term you used for your title (ex. Cleveland Screen Printing).

*Video Content*
This is perhaps the most difficult part, as creating a video people will actually watch takes a bit more than just hitting record on your iPhone. I can tell you that no, your video will NOT go viral and that there's two types of videos that people are *guaranteed* to watch and _potentially_ share. That would be educational/how to's and comedy videos. So unless your a natural funny boy or girl, skip out on the latter of those two and stick to strictly creating educational stuff. Show people how your shop works, how the industry works, and teach them how to create their own shirts. I wouldn't worry about showing people your processes as people on the web will always search for ways to do things on their own so you may as well show them how and when they screw it up, you're the one they come to.

Now I'm going to end this post here before it gets too long. Of course there's A LOT more data in regards to YouTube out there so if you have any questions then feel free to leave a response and I'll help you out the best I can.


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## kotan (Jan 28, 2012)

Nice one. An additional idea towards this is how one can also do promotional videos for releases if it runs around a certain theme  If one does sponsorships of events, then do a good video of it, showcase the event and your line in it.


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## debiak (Apr 30, 2013)

Thanks for the tip!


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