You already know about the great potential in social networking sites for marketing your business, but you may not have thought of using the YouTube digital marketing channel as a part of your social media marketing mix, especially if your business isn’t media-related. However, it is a top way to show off your products or services, while engaging your current customers and reaching potential ones.

The possibilities are endless on how you can create intriguing videos and here are a few ways of using YouTube to drive traffic to your website that you should use once you commit, the top three of which are described below.

Top Way #1 – Identify the Keywords that Need to be Included in the Video
YouTube is the worlds 2nd largest search engine. It has hundreds of millions a user a day and every day thousands of hours of video content are added. YouTube is 4th largest web property in the world and is on the path to become the source of advertising and publishing new content.

Use the most highly searched, relevant keywords in your video title and description. There are tools that you can use to help you discover the keywords that are relevant to your business.

You can change your video’s title and description at any time if you find that the video is no longer coming up high in searches or if you want to explore a new “keyword market.” The right keywords will get you ranked higher in both YouTube and search engine searches.

When thinking of a title for your video, you should consider descriptive, eye catching phrases that the user would think of inserting in the search field in a search Engine. Possibly adding dates, time, location or something more unique and specific can drive higher ranking to your video.

When you add a description to your video, try to use complete sentences, add details like place, location, dates and something the user can relate to. When adding tags to your video always be consistent, use descriptive keywords and avoid keyword stuffing.

YouTube highly recommends using there Insight tool which gives results of demographics and data that can give you a better hand on whats working and whats not. Insight will help generate reports that tell you where there traffic is arriving from, what keywords are being searched and provide data that will help you see which target audience is viewing your video.

Top Way #2 – Include a Transcript of the Video
The transcript makes it easier for search engine spiders to identify the topic of your video, so indexing is more accurate, and any keywords in the dialog of your video get included, too, which can translate to higher ranking. Transcripts should be saved in the .txt format and can be uploaded using the Edit Captions button on your video’s YouTube page.

Follow this link to find a few very useful tips on how to create free high quality captions and check out a screenshot of what the Captions screen looks like:

Top Way #3 – Include a Call to Action
Perhaps the most important tip is to include a "call to action" in your video. In other words, tell the viewer what you want them to do (visit your site), why they should do so (for example, to purchase the product you’ve just showcased), and give them the means to do it.

There are several ways to go about it. There is a call-to-action overlay that you can customize to take viewers directly to your site from within the video.

In addition, remember to include your domain name in the description – use the complete URL to create an automatic hyperlink. You can also add annotations to your video.

These small, pop-up boxes can be used for things like recommending other related videos of yours, reminding viewers to subscribe to your channel and to like and share the video.

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Are you an Adams and York county small business owner? Want to make money using YouTube? It can be a great social media marketing tool.

The days when YouTube was just a way to share silly videos is long gone. Today, YouTube is more than just a place to get free video hosting. Few small business owners realize that YouTube can be a fantastic tool for lead generation, search engine optimization and social media marketing.

For most small business owners, the idea of posting a video on YouTube is over the top. The good news is that you don’t have to produce your own videos to have an active social media marketing experience on YouTube. At some point, a video would be ideal, but there isn’t a requirement to get started. In fact, just interacting with and aggregating the public’s content can get bring traffic to your own site.

Setting up your own channel will help you start getting optimized, allowing you to build a reputation and create a foundation for attracting potential customers or prospects. Other things you can do include:

• Creating playlists of your favorite videos
• Rating videos (1-5 stars)
• Listing favorite videos (another playlist)

Just like blogging and other social media networking sites, YouTube has various sharing options as well.  YouTube users can share a video using popular social networking sites including Twitter. Plus, YouTube allows you to understand how your market responds to your content – a big plus for any small business. Who doesn’t want to know about market statistics and data?

So go ahead, try YouTube. Before you know it, you’ll be an expert at publishing videos and using it as a small business marketing strategy . . . and you’ll most likely have fun doing it.