How to Promote YouTube Videos to Gain Traffic

YouTube videos are meant to deliver a message or promote a video clip that one has created. Companies, entrepreneurs and individuals use these videos to market, promote, advertise and even make money from these videos. The reason why YouTube is a great platform to market products and ideas is because, visual adverts play a major role in awareness, as they tend to stick to the mind faster than audio or written formats.

Although you might have created a great video, chances of people stumbling upon it are few, because there are millions of videos being uploaded in YouTube each day, thus making the platform saturated. To milk and obtain more visibility on the web, you will need to learn tips on how to promote YouTube videos effectively. There are several ways to do this as discussed below.

1. Use video search engines:
Video search engines play a big role in advertising video content. Having the video in YouTube alone is not enough to create awareness. Make sure you add the video content to these videos search engines, such as MetaCafe, Netflix or even truveo.com. You however need to select a relevant niche for your video for optimization and relevance needs. Doing this increases visibility probabilities online.

2. Optimize the video Title as well as its descriptions
This is an important step when learning how to promote YouTube Videos. Although YouTube has its own search engine to rank videos based on traffic and visibility, you can alter these by adding in video descriptions and what it is about. Video Meta descriptions are very important as they give a brief overview on what the video clip is all about. This works in the same way as Search Engine optimization, where you need to focus on the main keywords that people will use when searching for your content or related media.

3. Video Branding
Some people may try to use your video clip to advertise their content and media, and you may not benefit from their acts. To protect yourself against these, video branding will work for you best. You can do this with the help of a branding software such as adobe illustrator, where you can add in your addresses and links to your website. If anyone uses your content, he will participate in promoting yours too.

4. Use social media plugins to promote the video clip
Many people today use the social media to meet up new people and make friends. They also use this media to discuss trending videos, music and other life events. Facebook and MySpace offer a great platform to advertise the YouTube video. You can upload the video for Facebook users to view and comment on. In addition to this, you need to place a captivating description of the same. Through the Facebook users, you can generate enormous traffic thus lead to sales.

5. Market your video links through email marketing
If you are advertising a product or service through the video, and have a mailing list of target audience, you should then include links of the same in your mails, and direct them to view the clips. Although it may not be taught in many “how to promote YouTube videos” online programs, never leave out this strategy as you never know whom it will bring onboard.

6. Follow other popular videos in YouTube
Just like other social sites, you need to give for you to receive. The best way to earn traffic into your video is by responding to other people’s video clips on YouTube with a big follow-up. When you respond to a video clip, a link to your videos is created on these comments, thus leaving a trail for other people to follow.

Marketing through videos is a great way to win audience over, as well as enlighten them on what you have to offer. However great the clip is, you need to optimize it for video search engines and viewers. There are many free lessons on how to promote YouTube videos you can use to learn more.

There is an excessive amount of traffic coming from your Region.

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Are Your References “Professional”?

What do your professional references say about you? Ever think about it? You should because no matter how good your interview went, if your references don’t say good things about you….you’re not getting that new job you want. Seems kinda harsh doesn’t it? But it’s true, a bad reference can single handedly sink an otherwise great opportunity.Ironically, most people pay little to no attention to their references. I hear things like “I haven’t talked to him in ages.”, “I didn’t really work that closely with her.”, “I’m just his friend” but my favorite is the “one word answers” – yep, no, yes, maybe, absolutely. Joking aside, if you aren’t taking the time to really cultivate and inform your professional references you are putting yourself at a disadvantage in any job search. Someone who takes their job search seriously has educated, informed, prepared and PREDICTABLE references. I recall a candidate interaction a long time ago where the recruiter asked a reference “Would you hire so and so again?”. Simple stuff, nothing major, should be a straight forward response and it was just that….”I wouldn’t hire that guy to stock shelves”. End of interview, no hire, thanks for playing. If your references say they wouldn’t hire you again, it’s pretty bad but when they go out of their way to torpedo your application it’s apocalyptic.Without further adieu, a few quick tips on how to give the best professional references:1) Give people who you know, trust and who will absolutely, positively say nice things about you – I know, right, who WOULDN’T do that? You’d be surprised. I’m not even going to talk about this anymore, do your homework, call your references so when they talk to potential a employer they don’t throw you under the bus.2) Give a former manager – Again, I know, not rocket science. I’m always happy to hear how great a guy someone is, or how they play a mean guitar or how they can finish Halo without dying……….but, at the end of the day it doesn’t matter. I want to talk to someone who can tell me what kind of an employee you’ll be once you are hired. Former managers are critical to making sure any potential employer can get the info they need to hire you without reservation. If you don’t have a former manager who’ll say nice things, try someone else in a leadership role. You need someone besides your lunch buddies to say nice things about you, especially in a competitive job market like we have now.3) Make sure your references are available and expecting the call – This one drives recruiters crazy. Nothing more frustrating than leaving voice mail after voice mail for a reference only to follow up with an email that bounces back “On vacation until September 2013″. Good times! It’s common courtesy for everyone involved and will help also make sure our references say nice things about you.4) Have a few people recommend you on LinkedIn – Simple stuff, and frankly it doesn’t matter if this is a former manager or not. With the rise of social networking, more and more companies are searching the web for potential hires. No better way to reinforce that you are a quality hire than to have a well groomed LinkedIn profile that has several people singing your praises.5) Keep in touch with your references to make sure you have a big stable of people to use -This is the final tip, and probably the most important. You want to keep in touch with people who can serve as great professional references. Seriously, think about it. How many former managers can you give that would say nice things about you? The more you have, the better off you’ll be long term. You don’t need to talk to them every day, week or even every month however, you should be just touching base once every quarter or two, JUST in case you need them or, get this…..maybe they need you. That’s right, your former boss may be looking for a job and need a “former direct report” to say nice things…next think you know you guys are colleagues again. So, trust me on this one, figure out who will give you a stellar reference and then maintain and build on that relationship.That’s it, nothing crazy, nothing complicated. Follow these simple tips and I can guarantee you’ll have much more success converting those interviews into offers.