YouTube marketing strategies, tactics, and tools for success

July 23, 2013 12:38 pm // Author: David Moceri

YouTube has made some big changes in the last couple of years. They’ve dialed in their efforts to help marketers by offering new tools and features. These awesome tools and features are really only fully utilized if you know how to use them. Luckily, HeyGoTo delivers the latest cutting edge marketing strategies that are designed to get you solid marketing results which leads to an increase in traffic and conversions; not just being on the 1st page of Google and/or other search engines. We are a marketing company that is making huge strides for our clients by integrating SEO Marketing & Social Media Marketing together as one standard service in all of our packages. So if you’re a small business or marketer trying to learn more about YouTube and social media for business, read on and learn from our expertise. You can also pick up some quick tips by checking out our blog 34 Tips for Businesses Using YouTube.

Image representing YouTube as depicted in Crun...

Image via CrunchBase

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The first 2 things to think about when deciding to utilize YouTube or not, is video quality, and quality of content. Video cameras have become relatively inexpensive so don’t hold back when purchasing your video camera. You can even get professional high quality photo and video accessories at affordable prices. Check out CamCaddie.

Okay so now you’ve got a nice video camera…what the heck are you supposed to record? Try thinking of a creative, entertaining way to showcase your products. Here’s a great example of an online jeweler who has found a way to showcase his diamonds without being boring and dry – in fact many of his videos are hilarious, but very informative. You can also make ‘how-to’ videos that explain to consumers how to better use your products. Here’s a great example of how CamCaddie used their video How to use Go Pro w/ iPhone as a Wireless Monitor to explain exactly what the title says.

Have a “subscribe” and “next video” annotation links

You can use YouTube annotations to create links on your videos. You can see this screenshot of WinkCZ’s channel utilizing the annotations. A viewer can click ‘next video’ or they can visit the website. Note: YouTube does not allow clickable links to webpages. The annotation you see below is not clickable. You can only get clickable links to a webpage by using YouTube Ad Overlays.

After a designated amount of time the annotations change:

You don’t want to be ‘spammy’ with your annotations, so putting them out of the way of the video, and having them last for a pre-determined amount of time is the way to go. You may want to keep the ‘next video’ annotation up in a corner somewhere so that if the viewer gets bored they can immediately change to another video. This video has the ‘subscribe’ annotation pop up at 10 seconds and last for the remaining amount of time. By linking the next video, you can guide them and basically get them engaged with more of your content and watch more of the videos. Watch the full video here.

YouTube Promoted Video Ad Overlays

YouTube ad overlay (bottom of video screen) allows for a graphic thumbnail and URL of your choice.

Here are a few reasons why you should use YouTube call-to-action overlays:

Promote other videos in your library
It’s the only way to drive viewers within the video directly to your site (actually there is a special way that you can set up free CTA links for your videos)
You can get it running very quickly because there is no initial approval process from YouTube

Learn more about setting up YouTube Overlay Ads

Post Video Responses

YouTube is just like any other SOCIAL network. It’s SOCIAL! Don’t expect users to flock to your channel just because you have one. Anyone can have a channel. You’re not special, yet.

Be active in searching for videos that relate to your industry and your viewers. Let’s pretend Brand X sells products in the skateboard and snowboard markets. Who’s going to visit their channel? Well, probably skateboarders or snowboarders looking for sweet skating or boarding videos. When Brand X comments on other skateboarding and snowboarding videos the viewers of those videos will see the brand name commenting and engaging in the videos. They might even be having conversations with the viewers in the comments section. Eventually a small percentage of those viewers are going to click on the brands profile to check out their videos. If you’re already set up with annotations and paid overlays, then you convert a percentage of those viewers to view your website. The rest is up to your webpage and its conversion rate.

“Video responses are a great for turning out more content and getting that content in front of viewers, thus giving your YouTube videos and channel greater exposure. Users can respond with their own videos which are good for engagement and serve as a signal to YouTube.” Says Jeff from SMX West.

Create YouTube Playlists

A playlist in YouTube is defined as 2 or more videos that you aggregate, with a unique URL to send people to. Playlists themselves are great for getting your video content in the top section of YouTube video pages, which is either labeled “Related videos” or “suggestions.” To set this up, click on the arrow at the top right and click on ‘my channel’, and then click on playlists on the left side.

Leverage YouTube Closed Captions

When using Closed Captions it’s important to know not to use forced keyword optimization, but instead, use natural language. Forcing keyword optimization will appear unprofessional when what is spoken doesn’t match the text on the screen. So, draft your scripts beforehand and include your keywords for natural optimization

YouTube captions are a text translation that appears with the video and syncs on playback. Some of the benefits of captions include search visibility (being indexed by both YouTube and Google).

Stay Active – YouTube Activity Feeds

YouTube’s activity feed is the only tool that allows you to mass feed with both your friends and subscribers simultaneously. Your activities feed into the YouTube home pages of your subscribers and friends.

You can insert a custom message (called a “bulletin”) with a video. This is just like updating your status on Facebook. It’s common practice to make seasonal bulletins with reference to a product. When you create a bulletin, you don’t have to re-upload a video. Just drop a video into the feed and you’re good to go.

Here are the steps:

Click “My channel”
Click on the dropdown arrow next to the “house” icon.
Click on “Feed”

If you need more guidance, watch this very helpful video

YouTube Tools and Tactic to Avoid

With any new industry or frontier, there is a relative risk attached to them. If you’re pushing in the front of the battlefield, you’d better have a strategy because sometimes you don’t know what’s coming at you until it’s right in front of you. Here are a few things that you should avoid:

Features that try to simulate video watching just to inflate your views or the automated liking.
“Disliking” by using multiple accounts or something that flags third party video that rank about you just to get them removed. That’s bad internet etiquette and is just plain dirty.
Spam comments or auto vote your comment up. That does zero for your site or your video.
Spamming users inbox.

Some final YouTube Video Marketing Tips

Find useful relevant popular videos that you can comment and respond to and actually add some value.
Find engaged users with whom you might actually create a relationship. “It might turn into influences for you, just like on Facebook and Twitter.” Said Jeff. “This also helps you find related channels that you can cross promote with – partners will tell you that is critical now to find somebody that you can partner with that is already in the spaces that you want to get in.
Use YouTube’s Tools and any 3rd party tools for keeping track of your YouTube visibility and engagement levels.

Most companies have failed to evolve or to understand the critical importance of how SEO and Social Media services complement each other! Some still think SEO and Social Media are two different services. Social signals continue to drive organic SEO results by increasing their credibility, customer retention and loyalty all at the same time while increasing their search engine rankings.

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