Top 10 Video Optimization Techniques for Maximum Outreach

With the vast amount of content available today, breaking through the clutter and grabbing people's attention has become more challenging than ever. Smart marketers are leveraging video content to do just that. 

Over 92% of internet users consume online video content at least weekly. However, it's not good enough to just put out high-quality videos. Your video content strategy must focus on optimizing video to boost visibility and engagement.

How Video Optimization Boosts Visibility and Engagement

Video optimization can take your video marketing from good to great and provide many benefits, including the big one: helping people find your content.

Think about this for a moment. How many videos are on YouTube?

More than 14 billion.

Sitting down to watch all the videos on YouTube would take more than 260,000 years. Even if you somehow managed to stay alive for that long, you'd still need much longer because another 500 hours of video are uploaded to the platform every minute. And that's just YouTube.

Optimizing videos is crucial for discovery. 

Other benefits of creating optimized video for the web include:

• Attracting more views from your target audience
• Improving user experience, engagement, and view time
• Driving more traffic to your website or landing pages
• Enhancing your brand's authority

Essential Techniques for Optimizing Your Videos

So, ready to get started? Let's discuss 10 proven techniques for video optimization that can improve your outreach and engagement.

1. Ensure High-Quality Audio and Video

Regardless of the video format, video streams, or video size, one thing is clear: The video you associate with your brand reflects on you. You need quality videos that represent your brand well. Failing to create high-quality audio and video can detract from your message and leave a bad impression.

Research shows excellent video and audio quality significantly boost engagement rates, too.

Make sure you use:

• Good quality microphones to capture crisp audio
• Proper lighting to avoid grainy visuals or shadows
• Top-quality cameras to produce HD video
• Editing software to remove background noise and adjust footage

2. Conduct Thorough Keyword Research

When we think about keywords, we typically think about search engine optimization (SEO) for text. However, SEO for video optimization is essential as well. By incorporating relevant keywords and optimizing metadata, your video is more likely to be seen in search results on your platform and search engines like Google and YouTube.

Keywords should reflect your content and search intent, as well as how your audience searches for the content you produce. Integrating keywords into your video titles, descriptions, and tags helps viewers find your content. 

Regardless of the different types of video content you produce, video SEO is crucial but often overlooked — even by professional video makers.

3. Craft Compelling Titles and Descriptions

Sprinkling keywords in your titles and descriptions may help you get found, but they won't necessarily get someone to click and watch. Use titles and descriptions to hook people in.

Don't overhype or over-promise, though. Your titles and descriptions need to accurately represent your video content. Otherwise, you run the risk of frustrating viewers and creating a negative impression.

Also, don't be caught keyword stuffing. Always prioritize readability and remember user experience.

4. Optimize Video Thumbnails

Video thumbnails are small preview images that appear in search results and video platforms. They play an outsized role in clickthrough and view rates. Google says 90% of the best-performing videos have custom thumbnails. To optimize videos for YouTube, you can't just grab a still frame and hope it looks good. 

One challenge for video marketers is that videos often appear on multiple platforms or websites for desktop and mobile. Optimizing your video file, format, and thumbnail size for where and how they are viewed in video players is essential. 

Tips include:

• Using high-quality, eye-catching visuals
• Includer clear, concise text that relates to your video
• Maintain brand consistency with visuals

5. Ensure Mobile Optimization

More than 60% of content viewed on the internet is through a mobile device. The rapid adoption of 5G is accelerating that trend. Video optimizer strategies must focus on creating and formatting videos for viewing on mobile devices.

At the same time, be aware of the vast number of mobile devices in the marketplace. There are dozens of different screen sizes and even more different resolutions. You need to use a responsive video player that will adapt to whatever device a video is on and provide the highest-quality resolution possible to fit the device's format. 

This is especially critical in live video streaming. Fuzzy video and buffering due to format conversion drive people crazy.

Where your video player lives can also matter. Google's core web vitals analyze a website's environment for key factors. Video players on websites not optimized for core web vitals can hurt search engine rankings.

6. Improve Video Load Times

S-l-o-w loading videos lead to high bounce rates. It's true for websites and when you optimize video for the web. Years ago, an Amazon study found that a 100-millisecond delay in loading could cost them 1% in sales — over a year, that cost the company $1.4 billion.

Akamai, one of the world's largest content delivery networks, reported that a two-second delay can increase bounce rates by a whopping 103%, and a tenth-of-a-second delay can hurt conversion rates by 7%.

You can often improve loading times by:

• Choosing the right video format that balances quality and file size
• Utilizing video compression tools to reduce file size without sacrificing quality
• Uploading videos directly to different platforms to make them native to each platform

7. Use Closed Captions and Transcripts

Closed captions and transcripts provide greater accessibility for those with hearing impairments and play a greater role in optimizing video. Search engines can't crawl video (yet), but they can crawl text. By adding closed captioning and transcripts to your videos, you provide the text Google needs to note.

Several studies also link captions and transcripts to increased engagement. For example, one such study showed captions increased viewership for Facebook video ads by 12%. A study by  Discovery Digital Networks revealed YouTube videos with close captions have 13% more views in the first two weeks and more than 7% more lifetime views than videos without captions.

Captions help users watch videos in noisy environments or places where they can't turn up the sounds, such as in workplaces. They're also excellent tools for the deaf and hard of hearing.

8. Embed Calls to Action

Videos provide multiple ways to embed CTAs. Rather than waiting until the end, you can use calls to action in context, asking viewers to act at specific points in the video or using video overlays. You can also include CTAs on your end screen, encouraging people to act or showcasing additional video content.

Remember to include contact information and CTAs in your video descriptions. People often look there for links.

Effective CTA strategies include:

• Clear, concise copy telling people the action you want them to take
• Creating a sense of urgency or immediacy
• Aligning CTAs with your video's purpose
• Varying CTAs 

It's okay to use multiple CTAs throughout your content — just don't overdo it.

9. Leverage Social Sharing

Encouraging your viewers to share videos on social media platforms can expand your reach. 83% of users say they share videos that align with their interests, which is huge for marketing video creators. Quality, optimized videos that provide relevant and valuable information don't just get seen — they also get shared.

Embedding videos in social platform's native video players allows users to use the platform's native sharing tools. Because social platforms make it simple to share videos with groups and individuals, social video generates 1200% more shares than either text or images. 

10. Analyze and Adapt Based on Performance Metrics

Business consultant Peter Drucker often said, "You can't manage what you can't measure." We believe you can't optimize what you don't measure. Regular analysis of your key video metrics will identify areas for improvement.

Key metrics to watch include:

• Views and watch time duration
• Clickthrough rates on CTAs
• Conversions attributed to videos
• Engagement metrics

Pay particular attention to audience metrics to ensure you reach your target viewer and to help focus future video creation. You also want to identify areas within your video where audience levels drop off. This can help isolate problem areas that cause people to stop watching that editing may resolve.

From Concept to Implementation: We've Got Your Back

As you can see, there's so much more to do than just cranking out a video and hoping it will be successful. With today's competitive — and cluttered — online environment, video optimization is absolutely essential. It begins with creating high-quality video, adding SEO, and following these video optimization techniques.

Charter & Company is here to help. 

A group of experienced filmmakers, creatives, and marketers that connect the dots between challenges and goals, we deliver strategic, creative assets that drive ROI and look amazing! You get high-quality, optimized video from conception to completion.

View our services or contact our creative team to discuss taking your video content to the next level.