==content_digital==

Tourism Videos - Why and How?

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In August 2008 YouTube beat Yahoo! into 2nd PLACE for total US search queries, and that makes for one fairly compelling argument to get a video of your tourism product up on YouTube.

YouTube also happens to be owned by Google, so the higher your video ranks on YouTube, the likelier it is you'll also appear in Google search results, which of course now include videos.

But remember, although a professionally produced, high definition, TV advert-style production would be every tourism operator's dream, a video doesn't have to be all that; it could simply be a presentation of stills photographs of your tourism product saved as a .mov (movie) file, an AV clip, YouTube will still "see" this as a video!

You can create an AV clip yourself, by creating a PowerPoint presentation of stills photographs of your tourism product and choosing to "Save As Movie". Then simply upload the video to YouTube - rough and ready, but it gets you up there!

So you've uploaded a video - how do you get your video ranked highly on YouTube & Google?

  • Make sure your video is short and engaging.
  • Create a clever or provocative title, along with appropriate tags (optimisation as below) to match.
  • Launch your own You Tube channel which you can then add future videos about your tourism product to, or include other related tourism product videos. For example, if your video promotes your lodging, include videos on local activities on your channel. You can also link your YouTube channel back to your website, which you can't do from individual videos.
  • Choose your video tag keywords carefully: optimisation of your video (video SEO) is as important as optimising your website.
  • Ask your video viewers to comment and/or rate your video, and/or ask them to post it on their Facebook page.
  • Subscribe to other people's channels, and comment/rate other people's videos, including links back to your own video within those comments.
  • Build a community of followers and people you follow; interact with them as much as possible - word of mouth referrals, as we all know, are the best form of marketing.

 

Moving forward, each day the web is becoming less and less textual, and it's evolving into a massive media platform - video will soon become a highly sort after medium for delivering your message. If you've not embraced video, YouTube, and video SEO, maybe now is a good time to get behind the camera.

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