Video SEO Tools with YouTube Video SEO Best Practices
March 24, 2018
Prashant Shukla
The rising focus on videos is expected to rule the trends of digital marketing. It has been predicted that by 2021, 80% of the digital content will be videos, which in turn will see a 3x increase in traffic.
Video SEO helps to improve rankings and visibility of videos on YouTube and Google search results.
Why Do You Need Youtube Video SEO?
An effective YouTube Video SEO is used to achieve:
- Better rankings on Google SERPs
- Better rankings on YouTube SERPs
- Get displayed on suggested videos on YouTube
Google & YouTube are top 2 platforms where you need a proper video optimization in 2023. The idea behind both these platforms is the same – to serve the best quality video content to the users. However, the parameters to judge a video are different for both. If you understand these parameters carefully and follow all YouTube SEO best practices effectively, then you can easily achieve a high volume of target audiences on each of your video.
Google Parameters to Judge a Video
Effective optimization of the video on factors given below are important from Google’s perspective:
- Relevancy
- Keywords
- Backlinks
- On-page optimization
- Domain Authority
YouTube Parameters to Judge a Video
Quality video content focusing on relevancy, engagement and entertainment gets better ranking on YouTube. Factors to be considered are:
- Watch time
- Bounce rate
- Likes, views and shares
- Embeds
- Relevancy
AdditionalRead: What is SEO
YouTube Video SEO Tools with Best Practices
Achieving rankings will require the use of tools and here are top Video SEO tools with best practices which have been used majorly to rank videos on YouTube and also on other video platforms.
Tools Used For Keyword Research:
Google and YouTube video SEO best practices should start with searching for the right keywords. Target the keywords through the video content.
1. Serpstat

Serpstat is keyword research and backlink analysis tool suitable for YouTube video SEO. The free version of the tool provides information for up to 30 queries, tracks the position and audits the performance. The paid subscription starts from $19/month, where you can access up to 300 queries per day and 100 results per report and many more.
Serpstat helps to-
- Research keywords both long-tail and short-tail; users provide a base keyword to the tool and get a list of suggested keywords
- Search for queries and questions that people are searching on related topics
- Get in-depth insight of your competitors via competitive analysis
- Fix occurring technical errors Optimize both SEO and PPC campaigns
- Track backlinks and conduct backlink analysis
By studying the keywords and queries being searched, you can create videos in answer to those queries – thereby increasing SERP rankings.
2. Google Explore
Google Explore is used for keyword research. It helps to get a better understanding of keyword and hashtag research.
Google Explore helps to-
- Get all content related to the base keyword you asked for
- Get access to target audience’s discussion
- Look for high-traffic hashtags- related concepts hashtags, hot trending hashtags, local hashtags, event hashtags, holiday hashtags and brand hashtags
- Get keyword suggestions
By strategic use and placement of suggested keywords and hashtags on a video’s title and description, higher rankings are possible.
Tools Used for Video Optimization:
Video optimization focusing on improving user experience. This is possible by reducing video buffering time and network bandwidth consumption by video sessions. These basically sum up YouTube video SEO best practices.
3. VidIQ

It is a great Video SEO tool to get loyal audiences for your videos. The paid tool allows for better keyword insights.
VidIQ helps to-
- Get 10x times relevant tags in less than 10 minutes
- Find and use the right keyword for your video, so that it gets displayed on YouTube’s sidebar and the related videos section
- Get the keyword score- search volume and its competition
- Know hot and tough-to-rank keywords; competition on hot keywords is low, so you can analyse whether to target them or not
- Manage the YouTube videos on VidIQ’s dashboard
- Track social conversations about your brand and videos
- Get details of Twitter and Facebook mentions and a competitive analysis of the posts
- Maximize the organic reach of the video
- Become more interactive with the audience to get 4x times more likes and 7x times more shares
These features can help your video to rank better on YouTube and Google.
4. TubeBuddy

TubeBuddy is one of the brilliant YouTube video SEO tools to manage your YouTube channel. It can be added as a Chrome extension to your browser. Utilize it for video optimization, promotion and analysis. There is no need to leave the YouTube platform to use the tool. The features can be loaded on the YouTube site to show relevant video tags on which you are ranking, or you may work on. This maximizes the user experience.
TubeBuddy helps to-
- Search for opportunities outside YouTube based on search traffic and channel’s performance
- Create transcribed captions for each video as these professional captions can increase the number of views by 7.3%
- Find mistakes while uploading the video, such as broken links, improper tagging, error in the title or description writing, etc.
These video optimization tools are important for conducting successful video SEO. They can help increase the traffic of your channel. Don’t forget to conduct A/B testing on thumbnails, titles, tags, etc.
Tools Used for Video Promotion:
Video promotion is necessary for Video SEO best practices for Google and YouTube as it is the most effective way of attracting customers to your channel.
5. DrumUp

DrumUp is a great YouTube video SEO tool for video promotion. It is an application fit for searching and curating the right content. It also helps in conducting social media management.
DrumUp helps to-
- Schedule the video posts for social media distribution
- Target different audiences across different social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram
- Show a preview of video posts
- Authenticate your social media platforms
Creating a video is never enough, unless and until you promote it extensively over different platforms and gain more traffic and views. Google and YouTube Video SEO best practices are incomplete without video promotion.
6. YouTube Custom Video Embed Generator

YouTube Custom Video Embed Generator is a brilliant video SEO tool designed for promotion of videos. It generates enhanced embedded code of the videos.
It helps to-
- Include social media sharing links of Facebook and Pinterest on the video
- Put features like starting the video from any second, keeping it in a loop, etc.
- Monitor the controls of the viewers
The tool assists to perform advanced-level SEO for your videos and YouTube channel. For example, add video schema for the ease of search engines to locate and understand a video’s topic.
7. Google Reach Planner
A new YouTube video SEO tool has been introduced by Google in AdWords to make more effective media plans on YouTube and on other Google supported display platforms.
Reach Planner helps in –
- Forecasting the reach of a video, a video campaign or even the YouTube channel.
- Creating a plan to connect with the correct target audience.
- Suggesting the appropriate ad format on YouTube on the basis of marketing objectives and budget.
How to use Google Reach Planner:
- First, select your target audience and then this tool will suggest some effective ways to reach them through YouTube Ads.
- Second, identify the right product mix for your brand, based on you’re the objective and budget allotted for the video campaign.
- Third, get your reach curve, frequency of their visits and some other important metrics for your desired target audience.
- Finally, alter the basic inputs of a campaign to see changes on the output metrics.
Currently, this tool is in beta stage. So, to get the access to its beta version, you should place a request via Google AdWords if you have a Google sales report.
Tools Used for Video Analysis
Fourth level of Video SEO best practices includes analysing the performance of your videos and your channel.
8. Cyfe

Cyfe is renowned as a content marketing tool. It offers one single dashboard to show all the data related to social media, clients, marketing, finance, sales, IT, etc.
Cyfe helps to-
- Track the video performance by reviewing YouTube stats and then analyzing it
- Display the channels as well as each video’s performance
- Get the details of views, likes, shares, engagement, traffic sources, bounce rate, etc.
- Track the mentions of your brand on social media
- Deliver report to the clients
It’s customized dashboard also helps to conduct YouTube keyword research and find search results of different social media channels. This provides you with the right path to choose the content of your video.
9. BirdSong Analytics’ YouTube Analysis

BirdSong Analytics’ is a brilliant video SEO tool that assists to analyse the performance of your competitors. You are doing your best on your YouTube channel, but to rank above your competitors, you need to conduct a competitive YouTube Analysis.
It helps to-
- Know when your competitor is uploading a video- date and time
- Know what keywords your competitors are targeting through video
- Know the length of their videos as video length directly impacts the views and engagement of the audience
This report gives you a direction to evaluate whether your progress is on the right path or not.
Additional Read: Youtube seo guide
Why Choose these Video SEO Tools?
If you are thinking of conducting a flawless video SEO and want to adopt all of the above mentioned Video SEO best practices for YouTube or Google, it is time you take the help of the tools mentioned above. Apart from helping you analyse and decide which keywords to target or which audience to target while promoting and publishing your videos, these tools will also provide insight on the performance of your videos. This is true for a newbie as well as for a pro Videographer and video blogger.
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