Both search and social have changed over the years, just like everything else changes particularly fast online. So, while video SEO is just an extension of ‘normal’ SEO, social video marketing has actually extended beyond this. Basically this technique has its own forms of marketing strategy although Search Engine Optimization is still a strong component.

Let’s take for example YouTube; this is the second largest search engine, but still with a social bent – social is a massive driving force, and users at this site are continuously searching. To be able to rank well, it is vital that a video is described correctly, so it has to have a strong title, but there is a lot more to it than that. The originator of the video also has to make sure that it will elicit comments. They need plenty of “thumbs ups” and the assurance that people are sharing in order to get the result that they want. While many people would argue that YouTube is not ‘social’ per se, marketing experts disagree quite vehemently.

Social networks such as Facebook are driving a great deal of traffic to YouTube and basically video marketing is about marketing a message. The difference being, that the message is presented by the medium of video rather than words. Disseminating a message to the largest audience possible is so important any longer, but what is important, is driving the message to a targeted audience, and this is how social video marketing makes the leap into that targeted audience. There has also been a marriage of SEO and social with Google and BING for example – looking at what ‘likes’ are taking place on Facebook, as well as Twitter re-tweets. Both of these factors as well as other important data gleaned from social sites, are influencing rankings in organic searches. Video has also already been affected by this.

As far as internet marketing strategies are concerned, video marketing is more holistic. There is already research available supporting this premise. Companies who make use of Video SEO social strategies are doing well with this strategy in the realm of eCommerce and more businesses are starting to believe strongly in the concept. Essentially it is still about best practices for publishing video and optimizing websites, by means of both search and social video.

Tactics and strategies for video marketing tell us this medium is not going away, and is not about only one component, such as the situation with SEO. It takes forethought to strategize the social video concept as a part of as business marketing plan, and it also takes follow up. There are some special considerations, but these truly are basic marketing tenets and like most marketing strategies, it also pays well to ask the right questions. Not a great deal of forethought and follow up is being seen with video marketing currently, so this mind-set has to change. Fortunately YouTube is ahead of the game and have launched a whole load of new products, so, more companies and/or small businesses are socially enabling their videos.

If we had to leave you with one very important tip – this is it: Never ignore negative comments on YouTube – always respond. The reason for this – is negative momentum grows quickly – so, respond and this takes the negativity out of the equation. Essentially – follow up. You cannot just stick a video out and hope that your work is done.

In it’s ongoing legal battle Viacom over copyright, a judge has ordered that Google must do the unthinkable…

Google will have to turn over every record of every video watched by YouTube users, including users’ names and IP addresses, to Viacom, which is suing Google for allowing clips of its copyright videos to appear on YouTube, a judge ruled Wednesday.

Viacom wants the data to prove that infringing material is more popular than user-created videos, which could be used to increase Google’s liability if it is found guilty of contributory infringement.

This according to an article in Wired Magazine.

Although Google argued that turning over the data would invade its users’ privacy, the judge’s ruling described that argument as “speculative” and ordered Google to turn over the logs on a set of four tera-byte hard drives.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has already reacted, calling the order a violation of the Video Privacy Protection act that “threatens to expose deeply private information.”

The Court’s erroneous ruling is a set-back to privacy rights, and will allow Viacom to see what you are watching on YouTube.

So let’s just breathe and see what happens…

There is a great article in the new Fast Company Magazine all about the do it yourself social network “”Ning”.

The article begins by letting us in on a little secret:

Here’s something you probably don’t know about the Internet: Simply by designing your product the right way, you can build a billion-dollar business from scratch. No advertising or marketing budget, no need for a sales force, and venture capitalists will kill for the chance to throw money at you.

The secret is what’s called a “viral expansion loop,” a concept little known outside of Silicon Valley (go ahead, Google it — you won’t find much). It’s a type of engineering alchemy that, done right, almost guarantees a self-replicating, borglike growth: One user becomes two, then four, eight, to a million and beyond. It’s not unlike taking a penny and doubling it daily for 30 days. By the end of a week, you’d have 64 cents; within two weeks, $81.92; by day 30, about $5.4 million.

Yeah we all remember that little game, “I’ll give you $1 Million today or one single penny and double everyday for a month, which would you rather have?

Me? I’ll take the “Viral expansion loop” – but I want to call it the “Viral Spiral”.

This article goes on to explain how the viral loops (spirals) work as an accelerant for internet businesses – take Google, PayPal, YouTube, eBay, Facebook, MySpace, Digg, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Flickr as good examples.

So where does Ning fit in?

Well they use this concept on steroids! What they’ve got going is a “double viral loop”.

Only Ning, Andreessen declares, benefits from a “double viral loop,” which spreads two ways, because every network creator is a user and any user can become a network creator. Say someone sets up an Angelina Jolie net with 10 members, which grows as each person draws in others. Then an adoption site breaks off, a Jon Voight hate group rises up, and a Brad Pitt love club forms. Meanwhile, a Lara Croft nostalgia net launches, spawning a legion of soft-core cyberporn spin-offs. Soon you have 2, 3, 10 networks — all expanding simultaneously. Meanwhile, the original group is attracting even more users. Ning swells like a river fed from an ever-growing number of tributaries.

You can read the rest of the article here

But how do we launch our own Viral Video Marketing Campaign? Now that’s a good question…

Watch this video and learn. Great stuff!

With the lack of new dramatic programming on TV the world has finally discovered the vast amount of video entertainment (and otherwise) available online. Or so says Daisy Whitney on TelevisionWeek (tv.week.com)

Even if the writers strike ends this week, the genie isn’t going back into the bottle when it comes to Web video.

With an agreement looking likely to come soon in the three-month writers strike, online video experts aren’t worried that viewers who have been turning to the Internet for their entertainment fix in the last 90 days will suddenly tune out.

“The strike opened many people’s eyes to the wide range of video available on the Internet,” said Jim Louderback, CEO of Internet TV network Revision3. “It’s also going to take [television] a while to ramp back up to full production, which means even more people will find how good online video is.”

Consumer behavior already has begun to shift to the Web. Solutions Research Group recently found that in November, about 20% of Internet users watched a TV show online each week.

You can read more about the Internet Video boom here from TVWeek.com.

Beginning December 18, 2007, we plan to end support of direct consumer uploads to Brightcove.TV. As a result, you will not be able to upload new videos to Brightcove.TV after December 17, 2007. But videos you have already uploaded to Brightcove.TV will remain available on the site and through your Brightcove.TV channel. Videos you have embedded in other sites and blogs will also continue to play.

The good news is that if you create a business account, you will still be able to upload video to Brightcove.com and have those videos appear on Brightcove.tv. That is good news. With the Brightcove pro service (I use a free version) you can create a great video player to use on your site (see: Tiffany Miller Mosaics as an example).

When asked by Tech Crunch’s,Erick Schonfeld, Brightcove CEO Jeremy Allaire why he decided to throw in the towel on Brightcove.TV. His response:

We are not throwing in the towel on Brightcove.TV, we are eliminating its use as an end-user sharing service. Note that the vast majority of programming on Brightcove.TV are professional channels published by media businesses that use our overall platform for their websites and syndication. It will continue to operate as a content showcase of pro publishers using the Brightcove Platform.

He he goes on in this blog post that the eight million monthly unique visitors to Brightcove.TV (as reported by comScore) is “dwarfed by the adoption of our Internet TV platform by media businesses around the world.” He counts 4,000 such media publishers, who collectively attract “over 120 million uniques visitors per month across thousands of websites.” Brightcove.TV was always a sideshow.

Even though Brightcove.TV will continue to operate and showcase videos from Brightcove’s partners, it will no longer accept videos from consumers. I am tempted to put it in the deadpool, but will refrain for now. If it disappears completely, or arises Zombie-like in the future, we will let you know.

Usually, I upload my videos o any and every site I can. I will continue to watch Brightcove to see how this develops.