Want to make sure your videos appear in Google』s video carousel and on the Google Video tab search results? Want your videos to be easily found by search engines like Google? The Video SEO plugin takes care of this! In this article, we』ll explain how to configure the Yoast Video SEO plugin.
If you want to learn what other things you can do to optimize your videos for search engines, then this introductory guide on video SEO will help you out!
Table of contentsHow to configure the Video SEO pluginGeneral SettingsEmbed SettingsThe Video SitemapShould I add the video XML sitemap to Google Search Console?IndexingUsing Video SEOVideo SEO metabox/sidebar features and settingsVideo thumbnailTitle and descriptionDurationTagsMark if not Family Friendly Troubleshooting the plugin
How to configure the Video SEO plugin
The Yoast SEO: Video settings page is located under SEO → Video SEO Log in to your WordPress website. When you』re logged in, you will be in your 『Dashboard』. Click on 『SEO』. On the left-hand side, you will see a menu. In that menu, click on 『SEO』. Click on 『Video SEO』. The 『SEO』 settings will expand providing you additional options. Click on 『Video SEO』.
General Settings
This section contains the basic settings and allows you to quickly access your video sitemap.
Embed Settings
This section allows you to enable to Facebook video features as well as making videos responsive where the videos will automatically resize to fit your content width. Since Yoast 15.8, you can also select the option that makes your YouTube embeds load only when the visitor clicks play, instead of loading automatically. Loading YouTube embeds in this way can have a positive influence on your page』s loading speed. Finally, in these settings, you can set a content width and add the Wistia domain name to use for videos.
The Video Sitemap
Note: You must enable sitemaps in the Yoast SEO plugin before using the Video SEO plugin.
Your video sitemap can be located by clicking on the blue XML Video Sitemap Link. By default Yoast SEO video sitemaps will end with: video-sitemap.xml.
Should I add the video XML sitemap to Google Search Console?
No, you don』t have to add it separately, because a link to the video sitemap is already included in the XML sitemap index file. Yoast SEO generates the index file. The only thing you have to do is add the link to this index file to Google Search Console. How? Follow the steps in this guide to submit the sitemap to Google and other search engines.
This section allows you to customize the plugin so it only scans items that contain videos when building the video sitemap. This does not affect other sitemaps.
Indexing
In some cases, you may need to re-index your videos to update meta data or to check old content for new features. By default, a reindex only scans content that hasn』t been indexed. However, if you check 『Force reindex of already indexed videos』, you can force the plugin to rescan everything.
Using Video SEO
Now that you』ve setup the plugin, adding new posts with videos is of course the first thing you』ll want to do. It』s really very simple. Open a new post and embed a video from one of the supported platforms. In the image below, we added a video from YouTube.
The video block with a video embedded from YouTube
Then, save the draft or publish the post. After you』ve done that, you can customize the video under the add-on Video tab in the meta box or the sidebar.
Video SEO metabox/sidebar features and settings
Video thumbnail
This feature outputs a video thumbnail which Google will display in a Google Video Search. It appears both as an item property for VideoObject and into the video sitemap. If you do not add a custom thumbnail, by default the plugin will use the still shot of the first frame of the video for the thumbnail.
Note 1: You can add a specific video thumbnail by clicking on upload image. You can also add a link to an image that exists on another site.
Title and description
The plugin pulles the title and the meta description for the video from the information you add in the Google Preview setting in Yoast SEO. If you haven』t added an SEO title, it will be pulled from the title of the page. Similarly, if you haven』t specified a meta description, the plugin will automatically pull the first couple of lines of the content on the page.
Duration
This features allows you to describe how long the video is. It is outputted as an item property for VideoObject schema and also into the video sitemap. If you do not add one, Video SEO will attempt to calculate it.
Tags
This feature permits tags to be used to describe the video. It is outputted into the video sitemap.
NOTE 1: The default fallback is the focus keyphrase. Meaning, if neither a video specific tag nor a post tag has been entered you may expect the focus keyphrase to be outputted into the tag field in the Video sitemap.
NOTE 2: Video SEO will output the focus keyphrase AND ALSO any video specific tags or post tags into the tag field on the Video Sitemap.
Mark if not Family Friendly
This feature when selected means the video will not be shown if using a Google Safe Search. It is outputted as an item property for VideoObject schema and also into the sitemap. The default is for the box not to be marked.
NOTE 1:Please know that if you do not mark the box the schema that gets outputted will be 「false」. If you do mark the box the schema that gets outputted will be 「true」. If you want your videos to be seen everywhere in a Google Video Search then leave the box unmarked.
Video Marked as NOT Family Friendly
Video Marked as Family Friendly (the default)
If you publish the post, you』ll also notice that the plugin has added the video to your XML Video sitemap:
That』s really all there is to it, just embedding a video will make all this work. If you write a meta description and add tags to your post or page, the plugin will use those for the video XML sitemap.
If you want to look under the hood, you can do a view source of the video post. You』ll see that the plugin has changed the OpenGraph type to 「video」 and added a couple of other meta tags to indicate to both Google and Facebook that this is a video page.
That』s it! Have fun using the Video SEO plugin! Want your videos to rank? Read the post: How to rank with your videos in Google.
Troubleshooting the plugin
If the video tab does not appear, the plugin has not detected a video. Please make sure you are using a supported video hosting platform and/or a supported video embed plugin.
If you use custom fields, see this article. To learn how to use the plugin with a visual page builder, see this article. If you have a custom post type called 『Video』, see this article.
Want to learn how to further optimize your videos for search engines? Then this introductory guide on video SEO will help you out!