Create Video Metadata

Video Improvement—Step 1 of 4

Your video’s Return on Investment (ROI) is determined by how many people see it. Tag your video content and include descriptive metadata, so your videos get the attention they deserve.

Main Metadata Pieces

These elements are key to helping your video get found by search engines:

• Title—Your video’s name. Put subject keywords first, and your organizational branding at the end
  • Example: "Economic meeting with Indian Prime Minister—GSA"
• Tags—Labels or keywords about the subject of your video—space flight, transportation, recalls, etc.
• Description—A short summary of your video. Put the most compelling information first, and include keywords
• Thumbnail—An image that people will see in your video before they click "Play." High–resolution, clear and action–based images are the most compelling

Depending on your agency's video posting processes, you will either email your metadata to whomever is posting your video and they will add it for you, or you can add metadata directly to your video, like the below example on YouTube:

If you’d like to learn more about keywords, programs like Google Ad Words, WordTracker or Wordstream can help you out.

Resources

•  Distributing Your Video on YouTube: Earned and Paid (PDF, 1.1 MB, 16 pages, July 2012)

Next Step

Go to our Video Improving Step 2: Gather Feedback and Metrics

Return to the Main Video Guide.

Content Lead: Jonathan Rubin
Page Reviewed/Updated: August 8, 2012