Is Youtube an authority signal source?

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

I don't mean creating a channel and showing off your expertise in videos, which would be a good topic authority signal in many niches.

I'm referring to your watched videos and comment history. Sounds unlikely but hear me out.

- Youtube and search console login match thus identifying the site owner
- You must be logged in to comment
- Youtube comment and watch history tells Google what your intersts are
- It makes sense that if you watch widget content and have a site about widgets and offer insightful comments about widgets that MAYBE you know widgets?

Could this be a source of identifying authority and knowledge about a topic?

[saladtosser]

We linked our website to our youtube channel in the channel profile page and although we are currently up to 4k subs and growing daily it had no effect on our website rankings as they have gone down...

[robzilla]

Creative, but very unlikely indeed. It would be a very unreliable signal, if you can even get one out of it. For one, whoever's account is connected to Search Console does not have to be the site owner; they may not even be connected to the production of the site's content. Not every site is owned by a single webmaster. Even if that were the case, a site owner can post "insightful comments" on YouTube and still have crappy content.

So, no :-)

[engine]

YouTube's "value" is in the ranking in SERPs for the video topic.

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

YouTube's "value" is in the ranking in SERPs for the video topic.

I agree. I've seen a channel post a video and appear in search where no videos were ranked before.

The question came up during a brainstorming session on how to display authority in a way Google trusts, off site.