Nowadays every “guru” has their own method of explaining how to best optimize your SEO for views. There are a couple that you hear all the time, but they’re just not true.
You don’t want to waste your precious time on something that doesn’t work, so don’t!
Today, I’m here to expose those myths so you don’t spend your time on optimizing there when you should focus on a different area. Let me show you the top 5 YouTube optimization myths.
What You Will Learn
- The top 5 video optimization myths
- Why you should avoid these areas
- What YouTube optimization tips work
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Don’t Believe Everything You Read
You’re about to find out why it’s important to take everything you read with a grain of salt. Not everyone wants you to find the road to success!
1. “Use your tags somewhere in your description box.” – Wrong! Believe it or not, this is actually against YouTube community guidelines so don’t do it.
I’ve seen people had their channels terminated over doing this multiple times, and I’ve even had my own content taken down because of this. This is actually called keyword stuffing and more than anything will hurt your overall SEO.
2. “Repeat keyword variations in your transcript.” – The idea of this is to use as many variations for the main keyword you want to rank for as you can and upload your transcript for closed captions.
It’s true that Google does index your captions, but keyword stuffing in your transcript file is not going to help you rank and can prove to be a waste of time.
3. “Buy views and subscribers to make your channel look more engaged.” – I’ve even seen so called “gurus” on sites like Blackhat World telling people to do this. Buying views and subs will do nothing more than hurt you.
Doing this can run the risk of your channel getting terminated, and it takes away a lot of authority you might gain since your channel looks fake. You’re better to just authentically build up your channel. It’s true that in some blackhat ranking methods buying views can help, but that’s for another article.
4. “Use keywords in your upload file name.” – This, as far as I know, has been a myth since rumors first came out years ago. Just like buying views and subs, this is another “tip” that people give out that proves to be another waste of time because it doesn’t help.
You don’t have to take my word for it, YouTube actually says in their official help section actually says that it’s not true.
5. “Dislikes on your video will hurt your rankings.” – I can’t stress enough just how false this is. Likes, comments, dislikes, etc. are all forms of social engagement which helps YouTube gauge how popular your video is. The more popular it seems, the higher you’ll tend to rank.
This is why you may have heard some people say that their most disliked video has been one of their most successful. People are quick to tell you if they don’t like what you did – and let them! It jut overall helps you in the grand scheme of things.
Factors That Do Help Your Video SEO
I have written a couple articles on this, so here’s a brief, partial outline of what affects your YouTube SEO:
- Viewer watch time
- Total social engagement
- Your channel authority
As I said, I have articles that go more into more detail on how to rank your YouTube videos that you can find in the YouTube section of the site.
Wrapping It Up
I really hope that this article has helped to shed some light on what some major myths YouTube “experts” tell you. Remember:
- Use tags in your description – Myth
- Repeat keywords in your transcript – Myth
- Buy views and subscribers – Myth
- Use keywords in your upload file name – Myth
- Dislikes on your video will hurt your rankings – … MYTH
Let me know any other myths you may have heard in the comments below.