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Web Encyclopedia

Understanding the web,
in plain English.

YouTube SEO — making your video content discoverable on the world's second-largest search engine.

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
01

YouTube SEO

YouTube SEO is the practice of optimising your videos so they appear prominently in YouTube search results and in Google's video search results. Key factors include your video title (keywords first), description (detailed, keyword-rich), tags, thumbnail click-through rate, watch time, and subscriber engagement. YouTube is the world's second-largest search engine after Google — which owns it.

Real-world example

YouTube SEO is like optimising a stage show for the most popular theatre listings website. The show may be brilliant, but if the title is unclear, the listing description vague, and the poster unattractive, nobody books tickets.

Why it matters for you

Video is the fastest-growing content format online. A well-optimised YouTube video can appear both in YouTube searches and on the first page of Google — giving you two positions of visibility from a single piece of content. For local businesses, video testimonials and explainers are particularly powerful.

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02

YouTube Shorts SEO

YouTube Shorts SEO is the practice of optimising short-form vertical videos (under 60 seconds) to rank in the YouTube Shorts feed, YouTube search, and Google video results. Key factors include a keyword-rich title, a clear description, a strong hook in the first 3 seconds, and high completion rate.

Real-world example

A hairdresser who posts 30-second tutorials titled "How to cut a French bob at home" can reach thousands of viewers already searching for that exact content — combining YouTube discoverability with Google video results.

Why it matters for you

YouTube Shorts are one of the fastest-growing content formats and receive preferential promotion from the algorithm. A 30-second optimised Short can outperform a 10-minute video in terms of reach — making it one of the most cost-effective ways to build brand awareness.

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03

Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO is the most widely used SEO plugin for WordPress, with over 13 million active installations. It helps website owners optimise individual pages and posts by providing a traffic-light system (green, orange, red) rating readability, keyword usage, meta description length, and technical SEO elements like canonical tags and XML sitemap generation.

Real-world example

Yoast SEO is like a co-pilot for a writer who is not an SEO expert: as you write a blog post, it highlights if your focus keyword appears too rarely, if your sentences are too long, or if your meta description will be truncated in search results — before you publish.

Why it matters for you

If your site runs on WordPress, Yoast SEO (or a comparable plugin like Rank Math) is essential for basic SEO hygiene. However, a green Yoast score does not guarantee Google rankings — it checks on-page signals but not authority, backlinks, or content depth. A professional SEO audit goes beyond what any plugin can measure.

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04

YMYL (Your Money or Your Life)

YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) is a Google content category encompassing pages that could significantly impact a user's health, financial stability, safety, or life decisions — such as medical advice, legal information, financial guidance, and news. Google holds YMYL pages to a much higher E-E-A-T standard because the cost of low-quality content in these areas is real and severe.

Real-world example

A blog post titled "How to treat a broken bone at home" is YMYL content. Google will scrutinise the author's credentials, the accuracy of the information, and whether the site displays clear signals of medical expertise — far more than it would for a recipe post.

Why it matters for you

If your business operates in healthcare, finance, legal services, or any sector involving critical life decisions, your content is subject to YMYL scrutiny. This means author bios, qualifications, about pages, and trust signals are not optional — they are direct ranking factors. Investing in demonstrated expertise is non-negotiable for YMYL domains.

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05

Ad Yield

Ad yield is the total revenue generated by a publisher's advertising inventory — the actual money earned from displaying ads on a website or app. It is calculated as: impressions × click-through rate × cost per click (or CPM). Maximising ad yield means balancing ad volume, placement quality, audience relevance, and page performance.

Real-world example

A news website with 500,000 monthly visitors can dramatically increase ad yield by moving banner ads above the fold, using lazy-loading to improve page speed, and targeting premium advertisers relevant to their editorial niche — rather than simply adding more ad slots.

Why it matters for you

If you monetise your website through Google AdSense or a programmatic network, understanding ad yield allows you to optimise revenue without degrading user experience. Poor ad yield often indicates weak audience targeting, slow page speed hurting viewability, or ad placements that users scroll past without seeing.

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