Hosting Video both on YouTube AND Independently on Site?

[AndrewY]

I've got a pretty good handle on the pros / cons of hosting on videos on a free service like YouTube vs. hosting them independently with something like Wistia. But one question I've never heard answered is "Why not host the same video both ways?"

Why wouldn't I publish a video to YouTube (to get the exposure and better chance to rank) and then also host the same video independently on my site  with Wistia (to get a second listing in the SERPs, as well as a thumbnail that links to my site)?

Is this seen as a spammy practice?  Duplicate content?  Would love to hear your thoughts on this as it's something that seems to potentially be a win-win, but haven't heard it discussed.

Thanks!

[PhilNottingham]

I totally agree re 2 relevant vs 1 semi-relevant.

I take your point about not having explained that in detail before - I'll try and get something written to explain that! Thanks for challenging me and forcing me to articulate it with more clarity!

[EvolveCreative]

Thanks for the link Phil. I actually have read that before. And I read it over at CMI too. Are you aware that the author of this post:

http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2012/10/create-video-content-that-actuallreally-works/

Basically said the same thing you did in the "Example: Google Analytics Qualification Test" section without giving you credit? Not sure if you're working together or not but just wanted to let you know.

And this:

"For such a keyword, You don't want YouTube to rank - you want your site to rank with a great landing page you can sell from and drive users there so you can retarget them if they don't convert. If you've decided that your landing page will be best served with a video explaining why your cat urine odor removal spray is the best - this video shouldn't be on YouTube - for the risk that users go to youtube.com rather than your site and likey therefore don't convert to sale. Additionally, the video snippet may help to improve your CTR."

We're on the same page here. Totally agree.

I think two videos is a great compromise. I don't think you've really made that point before, but I think it is a good one. There really isn't an issue with two short :30-1min videos. In fact, I'd say it's better to have two short videos highly relevant to their title than one long video that is semi-relevant to its title.

[PhilNottingham]

Regarding the content type distinction - the most I've written about it will be in here http://www.distilled.net/training/video-marketing-guide/ - chapter 4

I agree that there's not completely hard and fast distinctions in terms of keyword type - but there is a trend of user-intent and - for the vast majority of keywords, you can make a reasonable assumption about what the user wants. Whether or not they are convinced to reassess or shift their intent based on what they find is another question .

Your cat urine odor example is a good one. Like you say, this would be best served by a YouTube video that explains the process....and could also recommend products within that video.

However, assuming the user doesn't then either click through to your website - or do a branded search off the back of that video, the second level of their journey might be to search "cat odor removal spray." At this point, they know what they want and are clearly (rather than ambiguously) keen to purchase.

For such a keyword, You don't want YouTube to rank - you want your site to rank with a great landing page you can sell from and drive users there so you can retarget them if they don't convert. If you've decided that your landing page will be best served with a video explaining why your cat urine odor removal spray is the best - this video shouldn't be on YouTube - for the risk that users go to youtube.com rather than your site and likey therefore don't convert to sale. Additionally, the video snippet may help to improve your CTR.

In this "on landing page" video instance, a cat urine odor removal spray video that helps users who want to buy the stuff is probably not going to be much use if it just explains the process and reasons for using a spray, rather than actually selling the virtues of the production. Conversely, the video which just sells the virtues of the spray isn't really going to serve the needs of the user who searches "how to remove cat urine odor."

You can say that you don't think the videos need to be that different - but I can guarantee when you actually give it a go and test the stuff, you'll start to comprehend the nuances and see what kind of content performs best. Interesting - it shouldn't take much more budget to produce two cuts of a video - one more informational and one promotional, than it would to create just the one video. Any skilled editor could easily do both at the same time.

Competing against yourself is problematic in two instances - specific traffic to commercial pages ..and also if you're trying to build links using video.

[EvolveCreative]

A commercial keyword is any keyword that brings you leads / sales IMHO. We've gotten 3 calls in 4 months... sounds pretty commercial to me. Just because it has "how to" in it does not make it informational. For example, in my "how to remove your name from Google" video I explain why you need to make your own website to combat negative reviews, but I strategically left out information on HOW to build that website.... which is what people have called us about and asked us to do for them.

I understand what you're saying about commercial and informational keywords though. I actually wrote a post on it a few months ago. I'm not going to create content for something like "best SEO agency" though, what would I say? I might put something like that in a homepage title tag, but its ranking is going to be determined by backlinks.

There really isn't a hard distinction line between commercial / informational / comparison type keywords. "how to remove cat urine odor" is information but could lead someone to buy a Cat Urine Odor Removal Spray. You just don't know. And, if I were to make a video on "how to remove cat urine odor" I'd put it on YouTube because it'd get more views and I'd get more sales. Hence the "cast your net."

So, if I understand you correctly, the "competing against yourself" theory is only applicable when you are "designing to improve conversions on a specific page?" If so, then yes I totally agree (and thank you for your blog posts communicating this.)

I think I understand what you're saying about tying the content type to the hosting platform, but not positive. You've never really defined "content type" I don't think? By "Content Type" you would separate content by categories like this?:

Educational Content

Instructional Content

Opinionated Content

By Content Goals you would separate content by categories like this?:

Content created to convert users

Content created to increase brand awareness

Content created to increase authoritative persona of employee or brand

We'll just agree to disagree on the budget portion.

[PhilNottingham]

I think you may have got mixed up with where stuff like the "competing against yourself" principle is relevant.

As mentioned, I concur that what you've done there is an appropriate implementation - and I do the same with Distilled's stuff - but "how to remove your name from google" is not a commercial term - it's an informational term. A term with commercial intent would be something like " best SEO agency new york". For informational terms - YouTube is the way to go 9/10 (and i actually think SEOmoz should host with YouTube for Whiteboard Friday - not Wistia). The key, which i'm not sure you're quite understanding - is tying the content TYPE to the hosting platform, not just the goal.

Regarding video for conversions (which should be self hosted) - what i mean here is not marketing funnels in the broadest sense. You absolutely can market cleverly through YouTube and drive enquiries that way for your particular business (And i do EXACTLY the same at Distilled), but that's not the same as having video designed to improve conversions on a specific page - which normally looks like a product video.

At no point am I suggesting YouTube is a bad place for marketing content - far from it, but that doesn't mean you can just put anything up there and hope it sticks. Competing against yourself is relevant when the user experience landing on the video on YouTube is subpar to them coming to your site - in a fundamental way, i.e. when the video doesn't make sense to those who don't have wider knowledge of your brand/business.

Regarding budget - I simply don't think that's true. I've given out plenty of examples of small budget successes, but nevertheless, budget doesn't effect "appropriateness" for specific channels. Your example is appropriate for YouTube - but not for self hosting.

[EvolveCreative]

One of my objections is with your argument of "competing against yourself." My above example shows that is simply not the case. Of course, that is only one example and I'm sure you have others that back up your case (some great ones in your recent blog post - thanks)

That video was actually part of a strategy to get leads. Just like my videos and blog posts on recovering from Google penalties. I posted the "how to remove your name from google" video 4 months ago and we've gotten 3 phone calls from it. Users may not click over to your website (as the case study from your recent blog post points out), but that doesn't mean they're not calling you and it certainly doesn't mean that YouTube videos don't lead to conversions. That's what the handy free AdWords YouTube overlay ad is for.

My second objection is to your refusal to accept budget into your theory. If a brand dosn't have any money to promote a video and is only making a few why not let YouTube do the free advertising for them? It's cheaper, and as my above example shows, still very effective.

[PhilNottingham]

I agree you've done the right thing with that video - I'd recommend exactly the same implementation, which I have also followed for all of Distilled's informational/bloggy kinda content.

You can't monetise that stuff, it's not part of a specific conversion funnel and it isn't really going to get links by itself - making it the perfect kinda content to put on YouTube, rather than self host.

At no point do i ever recommend anything to the contrary - nor do i suggest you need an elaborate strategy. My principle is always that the hosting has to fit the goal and the content type - that's all. If you're only doing a few videos, great, but have a thing about what you're creating them for and who the audience is in order to work out where you should host them. You can by all-means test some things out to see what works best for you, but to just ignore that altogether and think it doesn't matter IS foolish.

I'm not entirely sure I understand what your objection to this is David? Do you just think it's worth putting all content on YouTube and disagree with my appraisal of the possible downsides?

[EvolveCreative]

We'll never agree on this topic. An elaborate content strategy is simply not necessary if you're only making a few videos.

On a side note, search "how to remove your name from google" in google right now. My YouTube video with snippet is number 3 and my blog post with the YouTube video embeded on it is number 8. The blog post has the YouTube embed and the transcript on it - that's it.

Now, if I would have self-hosted that video with Wistia and uploaded a sitemap rather than post it on YouTube then yes there is a chance we would have got a self-hosted snippet and our conversions would probably go up (because we're sending people to our site rather than YouTube). However, by hosting on YouTube and then on our site as well we get two listings on the first page of SERPs.

[AndrewY]

Great replies, thank you very much!

[PhilNottingham]

Views, in the purest sense, are not a significant ranking factor for YouTube - but embeds and having "engaged views" are at least a significant part of the algorithm

[PhilNottingham]

I like your distinction, but I'd really question calling that approach "realist" - it's just simply lacking in any sort of strategy.

More akin to "throwing stuff at a wall" rather than "casting a net".

[PhilNottingham]

Short Answer - you can do it, but it's not very strategic. It will mean that you don't hit any of your possible goals with the maximum effectiveness and ninety nine times out of 100, you won't have content suitable for both driving conversions (which should ve self hosted) and also being popular on the YouTube platform.

• You still risk the problem of potentially having your video outrank your own site if it's optimised for similar keywords
• Embedding the YouTube version on your own site helps to optimise that for YouTube and organic search - using a different embed means you're splitting the potential views across platforms.
• Some of your links will end up pointing to YouTube, rather than your own site.

The problem is ultimately trying to "do everything with one bit of content" when actually a proper video strategy should have your content types segmented into the appropriate channels.

Long answer - read the whole of this post which pretty much covers that exact question in detail. http://www.seomoz.org/blog/building-a-video-seo-strategy

[AndrewY]

Thanks for the responses!

Just to be clear:  I'm not talking about hosting a video on YouTube and then embedding it (via the YouTube embed code) onto my product page.  Doing this will never result in my site page ranking with a video thumbnail.

Instead, I'm talking about hosting the video on my own domain independently of YouTube (via Wistia or Amazon S3) and then creating a Video Sitemap to try to get google to rank my own domain page with the video thumbnail.

In addition, I'd be hosting the same video on YouTube as well for the additional exposure.

[EGOL]

I have videos on youtube and embed the same youtube videos on my product pages and article pages.  I also link to my youtube channel in the top navigation of my website.

I am all about showing people that I have the content that they are looking for.

Traffic flows between my youtube channel and my website and back.

If they go to youtube and search for keywords associated with my products they will  find several of my videos on the first page of the youtube SERPs.

Since I have done this my conversions are up.

I don't know exactly how youtube ranks videos but I do believe that the views accumulated on my website help the videos rank better in the Youtube SERPs.

Anybody know for a fact if that is true?

If you brand your youtube channel and make it a busy place it can bring business to your site and help your brand

[EvolveCreative]

The pros will probably say something academic like:

"Consider your goals. If the video is product-focused it does not belong on YouTube because YouTube is a social media platform."

The realist will say:

"cast your net out and hope for some bites."

Basically, I see nothing wrong with this technique. If you're talking 100s of videos, well, then I might side with the academics.

[William.Lau]

I've never really heard of anyone disagreeing with this. I certainly would post on both locations if this was my own content I created.

I see this with many sites. Don't forget to put a link to your own site in the YouTube description. That could let Google know your site is the original source.