Thursday, April 7, 2011

So I spent some time


on a marketing conference call this am and we started to talk about YouTube - they asked if anyone in the group had a YouTube page -we (my work) was the only one, but there is not much to it.  So it was not a good example.  As a last resort they asked us if anyone had a personal page...no one did but me.

Now I usually do not mention my hobby at work - everyone is very normal, so I sorta keep to myself.  But for some reason I said..."well, yeah, my hobby has a site"  She pauses and says "Thanks, but I am looking for something a bit bigger."

I think "Wait a minute, you did not even ask me what it was?  It is not like I collect spoons or anything...really, that kinda hurt my feelings." But I don't say that. 

Then someone ask, "So what is your hobby that you actually have a YouTube page?"

"It is Halloween related. We make Halloween decorations."

Someone else says "Halloween is a big retail marketing, let's take a look at her YouTube site!"

Again...I think "Yeah it is a retail boon these days.....but if you are looking for my site to sell you Wal-Mart and Halloween Store stuff you are going to be disappointed." :)

So the person leading the class types "Halloween decorations" into the YouTube search.

Many, many yard haunts with hits in the 50K to 25K hits show up, we go through about 10 pages of yard haunts. They are very impressed.  "So are any of these yours?"

"Ah, well, no."

"Really? Let's look for it directly. Does your page have a name?"


She types it in and our page comes up.

"Wow" is the collective response.

I meant it would be after seeing 100's of plastic pumpkins and chattering skulls and the same latex zombie mask over and over :)  Nothing wrong with those.... ours is just different.

So everyone is asking how the stuff is made and I have the usual "Foam."  Really?  "Yes, foam."  That goes on so long that I almost want to say "No, you got me, they are all carved out of stone!"

But I don't.

She did go on to explain to me (and I should have known this) why our site gets so few hits.

The word Halloween is not in any of our descriptions or titles.  Someone searching for "Halloween decorations" will not see us unless you are looking for Davis Graveyard specifically.

Now, there is something to be said for obscurity.....but there is also something to be said for being popular :D

Not that I want to do it so that I will get more hits.....but I would like our stuff to come up more readily.  Just so we can show people a version of what is possible.  And come on, all of us want to be noticed :)

So I pass this on to you, fellow haunters.  Change your YouTube descriptions and or titles to include the word "Halloween" - might help your display videos come up more in YouTube searches.

Back to prop building.

3 comments:

  1. Now they know they are in the presence of the Queen of Halloween/Haunt Props!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Pretty interesting, never really thought of it like that. I guess people in the community/industry dont totally think like that. We know eachother by our haunts names our our avatar names so thats what we search out but most non-haunter folks would just search for Halloween like your saying.

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  3. I used to do SEO (Search Engine Optimization) a few years ago. Each industry/community use specific terms related to their work and more often than not, common people don't use these terms. One simple way to determine what keywords is most commonly used by web users is to use Google AdWords tools (https://adwords.google.com/o/Targeting/Explorer?__u=1000000000&__c=1000000000&ideaRequestType=KEYWORD_IDEAS#search.none)

    ReplyDelete

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