How to Maximize Search Engine Optimization for Web Video

This looks to be an excellent article about SEO and Web video. Definitely worth a read.

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If you haven’t already you should subscribe to Webvideo Report where this article was sourced. Dick Stroud

Demographics of your YouTube video watchers

Ever wondered who on earth is watching all of those YouTube videos you have uploaded? Now you can.

What a great feature. The above shows the demographic breakdown of the views of two ads on my YouTube channel. Lots of young guys watching the beautiful M&S models. A much more mature group of females watching the Dove Pro.Age ads. Dick Stroud

Latest US data on Web video watching

In March 2008, people in the US watched about 11.5 billion videos online, Google dominated the viewing with more than 4.3 billion videos viewed (according to comScore Inc).

The videos viewed in March, were up 13% from February, which came from almost 139 million users or 74% of the total U.S. Internet audience.

Accordingly, the typical online video viewer watched 235 minutes of video, up 14% from an average 206 minutes in February. The regular online video clips duration was 2.8 minutes, compared with 2.7 minutes in February.

That is one hell of a lot of Web video watching. Dick Stroud

The small business Web video ad

This article gives a good overview of the new ventures that are entering the local small business web video space. There are lots of them.

one new entry will need no introduction - Fox Interactive Media will soon launch a service for creating video and display ads targeted to small local advertisers.

The service, called FIM AdStore, will be accessible via local Fox TV station Web sites and branded by each site. Advertisers will purchase the ads through a bid system on a CPM basis.

Others companies attacking the local ads market are TurnHere - with a custom approach, pairing local advertisers with video makers based around the globe. Firms like Mixpo sell ready-made video spots and handle custom jobs. Spotmixer is a self-serve video company. Dick Stroud

Using Web video to sell property

Cristalla 1010

An interesting venture that is all about using Web video to sell property. I particularly like the featured video. Dick Stroud

Standardising online video ads

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) has published new guidelines for online video ads for public comment.

The guidelines do not prevent new online video ad formats from developing in the future, but they may cut down on proliferation of forms, which can frustrate consumers and make the business of selling ads more difficult.

eMarketer has published some predictions about spending on online rich media and video ads, by format, from now until 2012. As you can see the format will dramaticly increase in importance. Dick Stroud

A YouTube Factlet

The Google-owned video-sharing site attracted 70% of the U.S. traffic to video Web sites in December 2007.

Just over half of Americans will watch videos on the Web regularly in 2008, a 12% increase over 2007, according to eMarketer. Video clips shorter than five minutes dominate viewers' attention online. Dick Stroud

Google – what a company

This article in BusinessWeek is worth reading, especially if you are interested in video ads on YouTube.

I still don’t have any firm views about this promotional mechanism. I suspect that like most things Google does it will work or will evolve until it does work. What is so refreshing about Google is that they appear to tell it as it is.

“It takes longer to bring in a YouTube dollar than it does to bring in a search dollar," concedes Google's top U.S. ad-sales executive. "Can you make [that process] more efficient? We think "yes.'" He adds: "If you talked to me about this in early '08, "I'd have been more anxious. But we're making nice progress."

I bet they are. Dick Stroud