Hi,
the forum helped me on some occasions, so I'd like to share some information about videos and "give something back".
I got it directly from Google's John Müller at two german webmaster hangouts.
1. It is recommended to give every video one unique url. How does G think about this?
JM: This is not a strong "should" for us, no big matter. There may be a video on several pages, then we take one of them to which it belongs for us, the most relevant one. What page is the best for this video? This is our consideration. All videos will be indexed if there are several on one page.
2. Usually Google wants us to use video sitemaps, but in the FAQs about video sitemaps Google recommends not to use a sitemap if the video is not important for the video. Could you explain what "important" means?
JM: This does not mean that you must create a new page only for a video. Of course you can add a video to an existing text page and use a sitemap for it. Google user arriving at the page should find a relevant page for their search. The video should not be "hidden", easy to find and reach, not placed in the sidebar but in the main content.
3. Does an existing text page with normal snippet in the serps get an video thumb in the serps after a video has been added to the page and after having given Google a sitemap?
This depends on the search, in some cases may be yes in others no. You cannot control this. You have to try.
4. Due to Googles FAQ about video sitemaps the title and description MUST be the same as the ones of the page. Otherwise no indexation. But Google help describes all the video sitemap tags and does NOT mention there this important fact!?
JM: Not sure, but I think this is not valid any more and FAQs should be updated.
5. Is Google able and willing to index a video embedded in iframe, without additional sitemap?
JM: Yes, but this is not a technical question, it is more a question of being a relevant video. Even then, there is no guarantee. A sitemap clearly enhances your chances.
6. Video services distribute a certain video over many video portals like Youtube and Vimeo. Will Google recognize this and rank only one video portal in the serps? What about a backlink in the description, distributed along with the video itsself? Do they count all?
JM: Not always, but often we recognize the same video at all the video sites like Youtube and Vimeo and then only one site should be ranked.
Basically we count the links separatedly, but it's not a good linkbuilding strategy, for example because usually the backlink pages won't get further relevance, so their backlinks won't count (much?). (Not quite sure, i guess JM wants to say that this does not harm usually but it won't help in terms of seo).
deeper
