How to Do SEO for YouTube in 2024? [An In-Depth Guide]

When it comes to online marketing, video is becoming an increasingly important tool in engaging customers and promoting your brand or content.

In this article, we’ll discuss everything you need to know about optimizing your videos for YouTube. We’ll cover the definition of SEO for YouTube, and explain the importance of YouTube video optimization.

So, whether you’re just starting out with video marketing or you’re looking for ways to improve your current SEO strategy, this post has something for you!

What is YouTube?

YouTube is a video-sharing service where users can upload, watch, like, comment, and share videos. The platform was founded in February 2005 and has since become the most popular video–sharing website in the world, with visitors watching around 6 billion hours of video every month.

The first video on YouTube uploaded on April 23, 2005, was entitled “Me at the zoo” and featured the co-founder Jawed Karim at the San Diego Zoo. Nowadays, there are hours of videos uploaded to the site every minute.

What is SEO?

SEO is the process of optimizing a website for Google search engines. This includes YouTube optimization in terms of video content, structure, and design to make it more visible and relevant to Google users.

SEO is important for helping your website rank higher in search results. When people search for keywords related to your website, you want it to appear as close to the top of the list as possible. This is especially true if you’re trying to promote a product or service, as potential customers are more likely to click on websites that appear near the top of the list.

There are a few different factors that Google takes into account when doing website and video ranking, and we’ll discuss them in more detail below.

How to Optimize YouTube Videos

There are a few different things you can do to optimize your videos for YouTube search engines. The role of SEO for YouTube is to optimize videos’ titles, tags, descriptions, thumbnail images, and more to improve your videos’ ranking and get you more viewers.
Here are eight simple methods to boost your YouTube video and increase its views.

Use Targeted Keywords

When optimizing your YouTube videos for SEO, it’s important to use targeted keywords. These are words people are likely to search for when looking for a video like yours, and by including them in your title, tags, and description, you can improve your video’s ranking in search results.

To find the right keywords ideas to improve YouTube search ranking, think about what potential viewers would be searching for. Then, use a keyword research tool to find potential keywords while making sure the keywords you choose are relevant to your video and have low competition. You can research YouTube’s growth trends to get an idea of what type of content and keywords you should include in your video.

One thing to keep in mind is to put the video keyword into the file’s name first before uploading it to YouTube. While YouTube can’t actually watch the video to determine its relevance to the keyword, it can examine the file’s name and the code it comes with.

Optimize Video Description

Your video description is another important factor in YouTube SEO. This is the text that appears below your video on YouTube, and it’s a good idea to include keywords in it to help your video rank higher in search results. You should also make sure your description is interesting and informative, as this will encourage people to watch your video.

To optimize your video description, start by including one or two targeted keywords. Then, write a short, informative paragraph that tells viewers what your video is about, which you should proofread before publishing to ensure there are no spelling or grammar errors.

Insert Your Keyword Naturally in the SEO for the YouTube Video Title

When we look for videos, one of the first things that catch our attention is the title. That’s generally what decides whether or not your video will be viewed, so the title should not only be attractive but also clear and concise.

Although keywords have a considerable role in your video title, it’s also helpful if the title corresponds to what people are searching for. While using your target keyword in your title may aid your rank for that term, the link between keyword-rich video titles and YouTube search engine ranking isn’t always strong. Nonetheless, it’s a good idea to optimize your title for this phrase, as long as it fits smoothly into the title and explains exactly what the video will show.

Use Tags

Tags are low-competition keywords you can add to your video to help it rank higher. They are yet another important factor when it comes to letting viewers know what your video is about. However, you’re not only informing your audience; you’re also informing YouTube itself since the platform uses tags to identify and interpret the content and context of your video.

To choose the right tags for your YouTube video SEO, first think about what keywords people might use to search for a video like yours. It’s important to note you should only use a few tags for each video, as using too many can actually hurt your SEO, so be sure to only include the most relevant ones.

Categorize Video

When uploading a video to YouTube, you’ll be asked to choose a category, which you can do by going to the “Advanced settings” section of the drop-down menu after you’ve uploaded it. Choosing a category is another important step in discovering how to rank better and organize your videos so they appear in different playlists and get more exposure to your target audience. Adding tags can also help in your video categorization.

Customize Your Thumbnail Image

The video thumbnail is the first image visitors see as they scroll through a list of video results. That picture, along with the video’s title, sends a signal to viewers about the video’s content and can increase the chance of you getting paid for reaching 1 million views. Create something that stands out and gets people’s attention so your video is noticed.

While you may always select one of the auto-generated thumbnail options from YouTube, one of the strongly advised YouTube SEO tips is to create your own unique thumbnail. However, note that attaching a custom thumbnail requires your YouTube account to be verified.

Use an SRT File to Add Subtitles and Closed Captions

Like much of the other elements we’ve discussed, subtitles and closed captions are a great way to improve YouTube search optimization by highlighting important keywords. Closed captions are text versions of the spoken words in a video, and while video subtitles are meant to convey video dialogue to viewers who can’t understand the language, closed captions are for people who can’t hear the audio for different reasons.

To add closed captions to your YouTube video SEO, you should first transcribe the audio using a text editor (like Microsoft Word). Then, add timestamps to each section of text so that viewers can easily find the part they’re interested in. Finally, save your transcript as a .srt file and upload it to your video.

Add Cards and End Screens

Have you ever seen a tiny white, circular icon with an “i” in the center appear in the corner while watching a video, or a translucent bar of text asking you to subscribe? These cards show up on both desktop and mobile YouTube platforms and are one of the YouTube SEO best practices to promote your brand and other videos on your channel.

End screens, as the name implies, display similar data to cards, with two main differences: they don’t show until after a video is over, and are a bit more visually sophisticated than cards. There are certain instructions you’re obliged to follow before you add end screens to your video, depending on what type of content is allowed on Youtube. What’s also important to remember is that YouTube is constantly testing end screens to discover how to rank YouTube videos appropriately and improve the viewing experience, so your chosen end screen may not show at times. Take these factors into account while deciding whether to use cards or end screens.

How to Rank YouTube Videos on Google

Knowing how to rank YouTube videos on Google is very important because it helps your video appear higher in search results. The more people interact by watching and sharing your video, the more likely it is to rank higher. By combining the two platforms’ strengths, you will exponentially increase the organic traffic to your website.

Here are 5 steps you can follow to reach this goal:

1. Find Topics With “Traffic Potential”

For a video to attract many viewers, it must have a topic people frequently search for on Google and one they prefer to watch videos rather than read about. The right YouTube keyword research tools help you identify high-ranking topics people are interested in, as you may examine the results for videos to determine “search intent.”

2. Create an “Optimized” Video

You can improve your Google rating by SEO-optimizing your YouTube video. This means including keywords in your title, description, and tags. In order to create an optimized YouTube video, make use of all the tips we provided.

3. Fix the Closed Captions

Closed captions are automatically added to videos by YouTube. The problem is that these aren’t always accurate, as misspelled words and grammatical errors are quite prevalent. By knowing how to create your own captions, you’ll rank YouTube videos fast and more successfully, as this can give an enormous boost in SEO rankings and interaction.

4. Upload an Enticing Thumbnail

Google prefers videos with enticing thumbnails because they’ll receive more clicks. That’s why it’s important to create a custom thumbnail with the correct aspect ratio (16:9) and a descriptive text.

5. Add Timestamps

Google will most probably show “key moments” in your YouTube video if you mark the important points in it by adding labels and timestamps. This will really help in achieving your goal of how to rank YouTube videos fast, and enable people to easily scan a video and find the relevant content section.

Why Optimize YouTube videos?

As YouTube is the second largest search engine, it’s important to do YouTube SEO for several reasons. First of all, it will improve your video’s rank on Google. Secondly, it increases the chances of people watching and sharing your video. Finally, it can help you build a larger and more engaged audience, which is probably what you’ve always wanted to achieve.

Wrap Up

As you can see, there are a few ways to optimize your YouTube videos for SEO. By including keywords in your title, description, and tags, transcribing your video, and adding closed captions, you can rank it higher in search results. In addition, promoting your SEO YouTube video on social media and other websites can also help increase its ranking.