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YouTube SEO Checklist to Rank at the Top

Have you ever wondered how to increase your YouTube views? Follow our comprehensive YouTube SEO checklist to rank at the top and increase the visibility and success of your channel.
Oct 23, 2024
10 Minute Read

Have you ever wondered how to increase your YouTube views? Follow our comprehensive YouTube SEO checklist to rank at the top and increase the visibility and success of your channel.

This checklist will not only help your videos acquire more views and reactions, but it will also boost the possibility of your videos being often ranked in more search results. Let’s begin.

#1: Keyword Research: Identify Relevant Keywords To Your Video Content

Effective keyword research is the first item on the YouTube SEO checklist. YouTube is the most popular video-sharing platform, with over 3.7 million videos published every day, and the competition to get more visibility is intense. As a creator, you must determine what individuals are seeking when they want to view a video. This can be achieved through video keyword research. 

Finding out exactly what topics or phrases the audience is searching for will help you reach a larger viewer base. Keyword research for YouTube starts with identifying YouTube searches. There are many other ways to do this. Here are the steps for conducting perfect keyword research:

  • Use the YouTube search autocomplete feature to find out exactly what viewers are searching for on the video-sharing platform.
  • Find out what video ideas are working best for other creators in your niche.
  • Use YouTube’s keyword research tools. You can use tools like TubeBuddy, Keywordtool.io, Ahrefs Keyword Explorer, and Keywords Everywhere.
  • Tailor a keyword map for your videos. Interlink your videos through the YouTube video description.
  • By looking at your video analytics, you can find potential keywords. Work on these search terms.

#2: Proper Title and Description Writing

YouTube video titles are integral to YouTube SEO success. Nevertheless, it may be challenging to find an intriguing title that helps a video stand out from other content. If the title of your video is interesting, you will get more people to start watching it whether they find it through the YouTube homepage or a search result.

In contrast, if you have a poor or unremarkable title, your video will not get the expected views because there are more engaging videos available. Therefore, the title is one of the most important elements for gaining attention on YouTube. 

The same goes for descriptions. Despite the fact that your viewers never read the video description before viewing your videos, it is one of the most important YouTube ranking factors. Because a well-written, keyword-optimized description will help the YouTube algorithm comprehend your videos better.

To write better titles and descriptions follow these steps:

  • Find the one or two keywords that best describe your video and put them in the title and description. 
  • Use the keywords or the search terms that you want to rank for. 
  • The title should be descriptive and should tell your audience what the video is about. 
  • The title should have a promise of providing value to the audience. 
  • Use the description to suggest more videos of related topics from your YouTube channel.
  • Keep the description human and readable. 

#3: Use Relevant Tags and Categories

YouTube tags should be included in a YouTube SEO checklist. They aid YouTube in comprehending the content of your video and ensuring that it appears in search results. Tags are required if you want to promote your content to new audiences or appear in more relevant search results.

You must also locate and select the appropriate YouTube categories. Select the video you wish to categorize. Click the tag drop-down and a list of your categories will be displayed. In this box, you can now search for a tag or create a new one.

  • Here are some effective steps for using relevant tags and categories:
  • Find and use trending tags on YouTube.
  • Never use decisive, spammy, or irrelevant tags. It will harm your YouTube SEO the most.
  • Use specific tags that surely match your video’s content.
  • Using tag generators is always a good idea if you don’t go overboard.
  • Using tags from top videos for your target keyword is a popular technique. But be cautious about plagiarism and don’t copy-paste all the tags.

#4: Use of Captions and Transcripts

A transcript consists of plain text, whereas captions include time information. Captions are a form of transcription that include both the video’s spoken dialogue and any sound effects. The transcription is used to make audio-only content accessible, but YouTube closed captions are required to make videos accessible. There are multiple ways for creating captions. If you have access to the video file and an audio transcript, you can easily generate captions from the transcript using YouTube’s transcript alignment tool.

Steps to use captions and transcripts more effectively:

  1. Use professional transcription services for YouTube. 
  2. Review the transcript until it is perfect. 
  3. Tools like Zoom Cloud, Canvas Studio, and YouTube can automatically make captions. Typically, these automated captions are not accurate enough to fulfill a reasonable accommodation and should be corrected.

#5: Thumbnail: Ensure That It Accurately Represents The Video’s Content

YouTube thumbnails are the small, clickable pictures that people see when they look for videos. They can be just as important as a video’s title because they show a preview of your video and get people to click on it. Because when browsing YouTube, the video thumbnail is the first item that viewers see. Take these steps to make your SEO-friendly YouTube thumbnail

  1. Employ legible text size and font
  2. Faces can increase views twofold. 
  3. The optimal thumbnail dimensions are 1280 by 720 pixels with a width of at least 640 pixels.
  4. Use background colors with high contrast
  5. Create more than one thumbnail and conduct A/B tests
  6. The thumbnail should be engaging and intriguing above all else.

#6: Quality of Video Content

The key to earning more YouTube subscribers is creating high-quality content. The remaining steps of YouTube channel optimization will be simpler if your content is engaging, interesting, and relevant. Additionally, it increases the watch time. YouTube’s algorithm is designed to assist users in locating the most relevant videos. An average watch duration is a crucial factor in determining the algorithm’s output. It is also essential for monetizing your content on the platform.

These are the top-quality content creation steps for your YouTube videos:

  • Determine the theme of the video, as well as its title and tags.
  • Establish the schedule for the production and publishing of content.
  • Include an end screen in your videos.
  • Sharing on social media
  • Optimize your channel Homepage
  • Use video analytics for producing better content

#7. Don’t Forget to Promote your Videos

It’s important to promote your movies on YouTube. When it comes to promoting a YouTube movie, the first 24 hours are extremely crucial. This is because YouTube likes to put popular new videos on the homepages of its users. YouTube considers it a good sign if you talk to your fans in any way.

  • Promote Upcoming Videos in a Community Post 
  • It’s important to get the word out about your videos in the first 24 hours after they go live.
  • Work together with other channels.
  • Ask people to share your content. 
  • Make an email list and send out new information.
  • Make a video for your channel and use it to spread the word.

#8. Analyze and Optimize Your Video

The YouTube analytics tool has a lot of information that can tell you everything you need to know about how your channel and video are doing. It helps you find the best videos based on how many views, how long people watch them, who they are, and how engaged they are. In addition, it gives you important information about how things like thumbnails, titles, and video length affect how well your videos do. Follow these steps to analyze your YouTube content as a pro : 

  1. Check out the story on the channels. Find it on the dashboard for your YouTube data.
  2. Pay close attention to the Watch time, the audience, and trends reports and graphs. 
  3. Check out the number of unique viewers, the percentage of viewers, and how long they watch your videos.
  4. Take steps to make the numbers above bigger over time.
  5. Check out the “Audience Retention” report as well. It tells you how well different parts of your video kept people watching.

YouTube Free SEO Tools

YouTube Free SEO tools are essential for content creators and marketers looking to maximize their video visibility and reach. These tools offer invaluable insights, allowing users to optimize their video titles, tags, and descriptions, ultimately increasing organic traffic and audience engagement. Here are our top choices for free SEO tools for YouTube:

1. Google Keyword Planner

Using Google Keyword Planner for YouTube can make the video much easier to find and reach more people. By doing thorough keyword research and using relevant terms in your video titles, descriptions, and tags, you can optimize your content to draw a larger audience and increase your chances of ranking at the top.

2. TubeBuddy

By using the power of TubeBuddy for YouTube, you can give your videos an edge over those of your competitors. TubeBuddy helps content creators improve their YouTube SEO strategies by giving them a wide range of tools, such as keyword research, tag ideas, analytics, and A/B testing. By using the information that TubeBuddy gives you, you can improve the way your videos are optimized and increase your chances of being at the top of YouTube’s search results.

3. Google Trends

By using the power of TubeBuddy for YouTube, you can give your videos an edge over those of your competitors. TubeBuddy helps content creators improve their YouTube SEO strategies by giving them a wide range of tools, such as keyword research, tag ideas, analytics, and A/B testing. By using the information that TubeBuddy gives you, you can improve the way your videos are optimized and increase your chances of being at the top of YouTube’s search results.

4. Keywordtool.io

Keywordtool.io is a strong SEO tool for YouTube that suggests a wide range of keywords that work well on YouTube. Keywordtool.io helps people make better titles, descriptions, and tags for their videos by using its huge library to find relevant keywords and phrases. By using these high-performing keywords in your YouTube video, you can increase your chances of ranking at the top and getting more people to watch your channel. 

5. Social Blade

Social Blade is a useful platform for keeping track of and analyzing the performance and statistics of a YouTube page. It gives content creators useful information about key metrics like the number of subscribers, views, engagement, and expected earnings. Using Social Blade, you can track the progress of your channel over time, spot trends, and make decisions based on the data to improve your YouTube SEO approach. Social Blade is a must-have tool for YouTube artists who want to grow their channel and get the most out of their SEO.

To Sum up

So, we’ve reached the end of our YouTube SEO checklist to rank at the top. YouTube is a very big site. The method used to rank videos changes over time. Making an SEO plan for YouTube and improving it over time will help you stay ahead in a very competitive market. I’m glad you read it. Don’t forget to show this to the other people who make things.

thank you for reading!