How big is YouTube? Behind Google, its parent company, the video-sharing site has become the second-largest search engine. Yes, it’s more popular than Bing and Yahoo.
That is why merchants see the value of not just using video on their sites, but having YouTube as the host.
YouTube is so important to Dynomighty Designs that Terrence Kelleman, president of the jewelry and accessories merchant, sees keeping up with YouTube comments as a full-time job. He has an intern whose sole responsibility is to keep the dialog going on its YouTube channel, and answer even the simplest viewer comments, such as “where can I buy this?”
Like Facebook, Twitter and blogs, YouTube is yet another social media touchpoint.
“There are about 120 different videos, so there are plenty of opportunities for our customers to engage us,” Kelleman says. “Some of their questions are simple, others are more complex. It really becomes more of a role for customer service.”
The viral aspect of YouTube also helps: If someone likes your video, he or she can share it through a social network, e-mail it to friends, or place it on a blog.
But not all marketers and merchants are doing this right, says Baljeet Singh, senior product manager for the YouTube and Google product network.
“Please, make your video embeddable,” Singh said in March at Search Engine Strategies New York. “It drives me insane, every time someone uploads a video to YouTube and they don’t make it embeddable. You’re just doing yourself an injustice in terms of driving social media views.”
A more recent attribute of YouTube: You can add annotations and direct links to your video, which allows a user to read additional notes about your video and link directly back to your site or a product page. — TP