Do Videos Increase SEO

I get this question all of the time at TMG and different search engines calculate SEO differently. But here is a Q&A I found on the web about the subject.

Q: I've been told that Google and the like will rate your website higher if there is some sort of video or audio on it (no matter what kind of quality). Does anyone know if this is true or just some of hype?

A: Many times people will increase traffic to their site through the use of videos, because it is the video itself that gets ranked highly. Simply create a video, do the appropriate keyword research/incorporate that in the title, etc -- submit it to various video websites -- and then include a link to your website within the video. When someone does a search, they may see your video, then visit your website.

For a video itself, yes, it can help make your site rank higher. But it is only part of the equation. Google uses a mathematical algorithm in determining how important a site is, and video/audio, etc is only one small portion, i.e., +/- 0.5%.

A: In my opinion it is one of the best things you could do to make your site pop in ranking.

A: I don't think it would be unreasonable to assume that google judges the quality of a site partially based on the variety of media on the site. The more diversified the content on a site, generally the the more informative and accessible it is.

And for a case of example: I have a site that outranks several others in my niche and those sites have more backlinks and more domain age. I attribute this success partially to the video I've posted on my site.(The other sites don't have any video)

Whether or not that is misplaced faith will be tested as I've got another site that I recently added a video to in a different niche. I'll be tracking its success after this minor change.

For other industry info take a look at Music Man's Blog.