Tag: treepodia

Clear & Compelling Video Thumbnails Can Boost SEO Rankings

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It hasn’t been easy for online merchants to maintain SEO rankings on Google in recent months, thanks to Google’s ongoing updates. No doubt you’re looking for any edge you can get in order to get highly ranked links.

Google has opened the door to one method for improving search rankings: a higher profile for videos. [Accordingly], as of late 2011, Google started showcasing larger video thumbnail images.

In the aftermath of Panda, many online merchants found that their rankings diminished dramatically. Video has offered one way for site owners to recoup some of these SEO losses: Google appears to be giving more prominence to video search results, an added boost for retailers whose sites feature videos.

As we noticed last summer, online retailers can boost SEO through video: online wholesaler DollarDays created videos and submitted a sitemap following the Google Panda changes and saw its videos appear on the first page of Google search results, immediately improving both viewing and conversion rates.

Another change you can use to your advantage is that Google recently increased the size of the video thumbnail images that appear within natural search results, making them more noticeable and appealing to people conducting searches. So now, not only do your videos help boost your rankings, but the larger thumbnails should also generate higher click-throughs. […]

[Keep in mind, though, that] you need to pay special attention to creating, tagging and submitting thumbnail images that show off your videos to best advantage; otherwise, you’re leaving it to Google’s random selection, and you could end up losing the value of your videos if the thumbnail image that Google chooses doesn’t show off your product in the best way.

You can see the placement given to videos by looking at a search result listing for catalog company Miles Kimball. A search for “solid colored braided chair pads” shows the Miles Kimball product about halfway down the first page of results, complete with a thumbnail image and video “play” button. The video-related search results typically appear as one of the first two or three results in the “shopping” section of combined search results on Google.

While you can’t entirely control where or how your product video will turn up in a Google search, you can make sure that the thumbnail image you make available to Google will highlight your product as effectively as possible. In fact, you should make it a regular practice to include a thumbnail image when you create a video sitemap for Google. […]

Some tips for creating effective video thumbnail images:

  • Make sure they’re in focus. This may sound obvious, but images taken from video can be blurry. Choose from only sharpest stills you can gather. If the image is blurry, it loses its appeal.
  • Insert marketing messages. NFLShop.com adds text to its videos to deliver messages about product quality and exclusivity and chooses thumbnails that illustrate these messages. For instance, the thumbnail for a “Faulk jersey” includes the message “Order Today.” (On the other hand, don’t let messages take over space that you need for the product image, which is the most important factor in a video thumbnail.)
  • Choose a large, well-centered product image.A thumbnail is still a thumbnail, after all. Counteract the small size of the image by selecting a product shot—or a picture of someone using the product—that fills as much of the limited space as possible and is properly centered so that it’s easy for the viewer to understand what it is. The thumbnail images for “drill pumps” at ToolKing.com […] leave viewers in no doubt as to what the product is.
  • Test variations. Try out two or three thumbnail options to see which ones drive the highest click-through rates. You may find out that thumbnails featuring people perform better than straight product shots or that a certain angle on a product draws more click-throughs than images from other vantage points.

Given Google’s affection for video, it makes sense to take advantage (and take control) of the ability to showcase your products as professionally as you can. Take the time to deliver thumbnails that are truly representative of your products—the effort will pay off in click-throughs and conversions.

Original article here:
https://multichannelmerchant.com/marketing/catalog/clear-and-compelling-video-thumbnails-can-boost-seo-rankings/

DollarDays Chooses Treepodia’s E?commerce Video Tool

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Treepodia, the leading provider of automated video solutions for online retailers, announced today that DollarDays, a leading online wholesaler that helps small businesses compete against chains in their area, has seen a major increase in conversions using Treepodia’s e-commerce video platform. DollarDays has also greatly improved the SEO of its product pages using Treepodia’s Dynamic Video Sitemap.

DollarDays, based in Scottsdale, Arizona, offers more than 165,000 bulk products—including decorative items, clothing and personal care products—that can be ordered in small quantities at competitive prices. Given the wide range of products, DollarDays needed to make it easier for its customers to find and choose products from the DollarDays website. Video offered one of the best methods for showcasing DollarDays’ products, but managing video content was time-consuming and labor-intensive.

“With so many products to cover and an ever-expanding product line, an automated solution was clearly the only option in terms of both sheer logistics and cost,” said Marc Joseph, President of DollarDays. In addition, DollarDays needed to make sure that each video was properly indexed so that searches for relevant keywords on Google and other search engines would include DollarDays’ products further up in results—a benefit that the Dynamic Video Sitemap provides.

DollarDays chose Treepodia to create about 50,000 product videos for its site. Treepodia’s e-commerce video platform enables online merchants to cover their entire product catalog with dynamic and effective video content in just 24 hours and includes monitored video hosting, high-quality streaming and a multi-environment video player. DollarDays also chose Treepodia’s Dynamic Video Sitemap, which ensures that all video content is indexed, including video titles, descriptions, duration, location and more, in order to drive more new traffic to their site.

Soon after it began using Treepodia to create and manage its product videos, DollarDays saw its conversion rate rise significantly. Additionally, all of its product videos were indexed by Google in a single day, and product-specific long-tail search terms such as “bright pencil pouch” were yielding far higher results on Google than before—in many cases, showing up first among search results.

“We’ve been incredibly pleased with the results we’ve received from the Treepodia solutions,” said Joseph. “So much so, in fact, that within a month, we’d already decided to expand the Treepodia solutions across our entire product offering. Not only was the ROI quick and concrete, but the implementation was surprisingly simple.”

Original article here:
https://www.digitalcommerce360.com/2011/12/06/dollardays-chooses-treepodias-e-commerce-video-tool/

Interview: Marc Joseph of DollarDays

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This week, it’s my great pleasure to post an interview we ran with Marc Joseph, founder and President of DollarDays, and Kevin Ryan, [DollarDays] Vice President and General Merchandise Manager.

It would be great if you could share some details about your company’s history, goals and values.

DollarDays is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. It was started back in 2001, because we felt the Internet leveled the playing field and was going to be the next channel of distribution for wholesale and closeout products to small and medium-sized businesses who had survived and were beginning to thrive against the chains in their areas. DollarDays became a public company in 2008 as America’s Suppliers, Inc. We now have over two million registered businesses and average over 1,000 new businesses joining us each day, attracted by our over 140,000 general-merchandise products, which are categories of items you would find in a Macy’s, Target or Walmart. Customers find us because of price, assortment, […] convenience and […] customer service provided by our 20 inside sales people.

We strive to be the premier online supplier for the small guys to compete against the big guys. Our second-largest customer base [is] nonprofit organizations like churches and schools who buy products from us to support their causes. We just went through hats, gloves, underwear, toothpaste, blankets, etc., and now are supplying them with backpacks, school supplies, kids’ clothing, health and beauty supplies, etc. We reach out to nonprofit organizations, because, with our buying power, it allows them to stretch their dollars and get more bang for their buck.

What initially kindled your the interest in e-commerce video? Where you actively seeking out an e-commerce video solution, per se, or was this simply part of the ongoing quest to improve the site and bring up conversions?

A little of both. We had been experimenting with video over the past year knowing that it was going to be an important part of SEO plans and goals. We partnered with a video company to produce several funny videos hoping they would “go viral,” but as we quickly learned, this is a one-in-a-million chance to happen, [s]o we decided to pull back until we found the right method and process for producing videos. When we found Treepodia, we knew we had found a value proposition that would give us more bang for our buck by producing thousands of product videos that would rank in product searches, rather than hoping for the one big viral video to come along.

How did you first hear about Treepodia? What were the factors that led to the decision to choose our solution for your implementation?

Our Vice President of Merchandising, Kevin Ryan, found Treepodia’s ad in a web design trade magazine and brought it to the management team’s attention. We discussed it as a team and decided it was worth pursuing. Again, we saw Treepodia as a value proposition to get us started down the road to video production and success.

What’s the impact e-commerce video has had on your operation so far?

We are still early in the game with Treepodia, but, so far, we have been impressed with the results we have seen. We are extremely pleased with our video viewing rate, conversion rate and product placement in Google search engines. Early on, we immediately started to see our product videos appearing on the first pages of Google searches. This just further helps us create the reinforcement in our product listings.

What have your e-commerce video experiences taught you? What would you recommend to smaller/less experienced vendors, in this respect?

We have learned over the past year that video is an important part of our current and future merchandising and SEO strategy, and that once we found the right partner, it was obvious that […] the results are promising and successful. The key part is finding a way to create videos in [an] automated manner that requires little setup on behalf of the retailer. We all have many other projects and goals to accomplish, and having a partner to do this on our behalf allows us to concentrate on the merchandising, selling and customer service part of our business. The small cost of a service like Treepodia has proven to be a successful partnership.

Original article here: http://blog.treepodia.com/2011/07/interview-marc-joseph-and-kevin-ryan-of-dollardays-com/