If you’re new to online marketing, SEO might sound a lot like jargon to you. And no matter how intimidating acronyms can be, SEO simply stands for “Search Engine Optimization.”
What sometimes creators forget about YouTube is that it is also a search engine — actually, the second biggest search engine in the world with 50% more searches than Yahoo. Users all over the world, nowadays, look for tips, how-to guides, and content on YouTube when they have a question they need an answer to. By following these simple tips below, you’ll be able to bubble up to the top search results on YouTube’s homepage and smash your competition.
So, if you’re asking your self where to promote YouTube videos for free, YouTube’s website is your very first option. Here’s a mini how-to guide:
1. Find the keyword
In SEO, everything starts with the main topic and translating it into a keyword.
If you don’t know what keywords are, think of it this way: When you’re looking for content on YouTube and use a specific term to type into the search box, you’re basically typing a keyword. So, the first thing you want to do to promote your YouTube channel is to identify user intent and create a list of potential keywords you believe searchers will use while searching for content.
There are hundreds of SEO tools to help you identify what users are looking for and what keywords they use. For beginners, we’d suggest simple tools like AnswerThePublic and Ubersuggest. They’re both easy to use, intuitive, and really really helpful for promoting YouTube videos for free.
2. Craft your headline
After’ you’ve identified your main keyword, you need to put it in your video title. And this is where SEO gets kind of hard for beginners because you have the data, but you need to add them to your content.
Put your main keyword, preferably, at the beginning of the video title, and don’t forget that your title has to be catchy, compelling, keyword-optimized, and natural.
3. Add a description
Some might believe that creating content and uploading it on YouTube with a catchy title would be enough. Wrong!
A video description is where you share information with your viewers and a great place to add more keywords so you can rank higher on YouTube search results. In your description, you need to add your main keyword and some related ones.
If, for example, you want to post a video about a new video game coming out, you’d probably have to mention in the description the game’s title, and some extra keywords like “new video game,” or even the company that is releasing it.
4. Use tags
YouTube tags work as guides for the YouTube algorithm to get a sense of your video so it can deliver it as related content next to videos from other YouTubers. Of course, they play an essential part in YouTube search results and how high your videos are going to rank too.
However, there are many cases where YouTubers tried to trick the platform and rank high by using irrelevant keywords. Don’t do it! This is spammy, and you might even face a penalty. And Google rarely forgets!