Step 1. Keyword Research.
To ensure that you are picking the right keyword make sure that you have completed some form of keyword research that has shown how often people search for that keyword. Optimizing for highly trafficked keywords will help drive visits to the website.
Step 2. Make a relevant video.
Make a video that is targeted to your audience, think of the type of content they want to see, that is of interest to them, and that mirrors your keyword phrase in some (obvious) way. For example if you want to rank for Paris, making a video about “Top things to do in Paris” is a great place to start. Use the types of videos that are already being rendered in search results to help
Step 3. Optimize the video Text.
Search engines, like Google, are blind to the content that is held within your video. If you want a video to rank for a keyword phrase it is important to use that keyword phrase in the writing associated with your video. Most video sharing websites have 3 different areas that you can write about your video.
1. Title
2. Description
3. Keywords / Tags
Ideally these should build – so that if a keyword is important enough to be in the Title, it should be in the Description. All keywords important enough to be in the Description should be in the Keywords tag.
It is also important to name the video file with your keyword as this helps the search engine recognize the content if there are multiple videos on the page. Loading a video file called vid123885.wmv will be less likely to rank well for a search on “Paris Activities” than loading your video file called activitys-in-paris.wmv
If you can, the best practice is to customize the URL of the page that hosts the video to include the keywords that you want to be ranked for. For example if the video is about Activities in Paris then the URL should be
www.lonelyplanet.tv/paris/acitivitys-in-paris



Step 4. Set up a Site Map
Top 5 Rules for Loading You Tube Videos
1. Use your main keyword in the title, description and keywords of the video
2. Name your video file something relevant, preferably including the keyword
3. Load on both YouTube and Meta Café
4.
5. Use a video site map to ensure that all videos hosted on your own website are spidered
6.
Here is what google said about video tagging:
“I create and publish video content. How can I make this available to Googlebot?
If you want your video to appear in Google Video search results, you have several options:
• Upload your video content to YouTube, or Google Video. As long as you mark it Public, your content will be searchable by Google.
• Create and submit a Video Sitemap. A Video Sitemap is a file that contains relevant information about the video URLs on your site. Once your Video Sitemap is validated and processed, your content will be crawled and indexed, making it available to Google search results.
• Upload your video to any third-party site. Google's robots regularly crawl the web, and as long as we can access the video files, they will be searchable by Google. It's a good idea to check to make sure videos from that site appear in Google's search results. Note that videos might take a little longer to appear in search results when this method is used, and that the third-party hosting site may in the future stop allowing your video to be indexed.“

The guys at RegMe seem to know what they are doing with the sports industry for equestrians in Aussie. This site lets people login and register for equestrian events online. Its a nice site with an easy login page and very neat search engine that lets you narrow down what your looking for - showjumping, NSW in my case which sadly did not bring up anything - not that i can ride at the moment anyway with all the flu and what not... Hopefully the end to end features of getting your drawn order are as user friendly as the search? Have not tried it yet but any feedback is welcome.

Perhaps when the NSW equestrian industry gets back on their feet (no doubt when the NSW riders get back on their horses..) we will see lots more shows electing to have the hard work of registrations performed by sites like regme... It might save some volunteers some time and energy! I wonder what the revenue system behind the site is?

Incase anyone is actually reading my application to do the Firefox stunt - the proof is in the pudding!

1. coconuts
2. pawpaw – especially with granola for breakfast
3. tapioca – coconut pancake with condensed milk filling – YUM
4. sausage on a stick
5. Quefo Asado (BBQ Cheese on the beach)
6. Acai with Granola
7. Making rolls at breakfast and having them later as snacks
8. Cocktails – pina colada
9. Men on the beach in short shorts, also just wondering around in the city
10. Bikinis sold on beaches with jewellery and sarongs – do your shopping while you lay on the sand!
11. Everyone has the same Brazilian flag sarong
12. Samba drums in Salvador
13. Havana’s sold everywhere – even chemists – and lots of styles and colours
14. Staying in a plush hotel in rio – and staying in hostels everywhere else!
15. Wearing feathers and it being normal
16. Everyone wears a bikini no matter how small (or big) they are!
17. Parades in the street – it’s a party for everyone
18. Cocktail and beer venders are never more than 5m away
19. Churos with chocky sauce or condense milk
20. Beach life even in a city of 18+ Million people… how do they do it?

Today Lex and I dragged our hangovers up Sugerloaf mountain. This is a main sightseeing attraction of Rio because you can see the Christ - not that either of us are religious... its more the size of the thing that attracted us... and the cable cars... yep we loved them!

Other cool photos from the day are



Lex with the beach at the top of the photo which is Copacabana (where we stayed)... its massive but the one just out of sight is about 5 times as big!



Anyway - you get the point... Rio is massive, the view is lovely and the trip was worth the battle with hangovers to get there.

On our last day in Salivdor Lex and I orginised to go to Morro de São Paulo, an island 272 km (or 2 hours by boat) off the coast of Salvidor. We nicknamed it Paradise after the great 24 hours we had!

The boat ride was lovely, with beautiful clear waters and blue sky's for as far as the eye could see... sadly this meant that after the lack of sleep we had been suffering from, both me and lex nodded off. At one stage we dabbed on some sun screen but alas, not nearly enough and tan lines formed that only weeks of sun baking Brazilian style could remove...

The town was so cute; gorgeous wooden buildings and roads made from sand. The only transportation allowed where the "wheelbarrow taxis", but you could easily walk from one end to the other. The island has 4 beaches called Beach 1, Beach 2, Beach 3 and Beach 4.... Original - but it sounds more exotic in Portuguese!



After finding some seriously budget accommodation (AUD$10 for the night) we relaxed on sun beds at the lovely beach drinking coconuts and eating Ashi. YUM!


That night we met up with the twins from De Jah Groove, and there travailing mates for a great night of seafood dinners and drinking cocktails! The place we had dinner was hosting a huge party and people from all over the Island came to party till dawn!


After we had danced our legs off, and everyone was well hammered, we all sat on the beach and watched the sun rise, then the twins Harley and Del grabbed the guitars and we kicked back to listen to some of the best music of the night... these guys rock, if you get a chance to see them - and they tour all the time in Aus - don't miss out!


The sad part came when it was time to leave and the hangovers from the night before had begun to form... suddenly the ferry port - a mere 10 min walk - seemed very far away, and the possibility of making the boat at 9.30am seemed very slim. We began to walk. But our pace was so slow, and the option of staying so powerfully drawing, it was the longest walk ever.


Somewhere along the beach Lex lagged behind... When i reached the port and she wasn't there I worried... because here was the catch.. we had a flight leaving that day at 1pm. Work it out folks, 2 hours on a ferry, get back to the hostel, grab bags and pomie boys (Simon and Chris) and a half hour cab ride to the airport... where we going to spend another few days in Salvidor after all??


We made it, just in a nick of time though!

We both truly believe that if we had not made that ferry we might still be on that island today...

Saying goodbye to Paradise...

After leaving Peru, and suffering the journey from hell; where flying from Cusco to Salvidor (probably supposed to take 4-5 hours) took 48 hours. Thanks to rain in Sao Paulo the plane couldn't land, I missed my connection and ended up in Rio - where i wasn't supposed to be until carnival 2 weeks later... I finally arrived, thanks to a bunch of Argentinians for entertainment, a French girl who helped translate everything and a good deal of patience I got a connecting flight to Salvidor.

Salvidor is a fantastic city, we stayed at the old section of town, Pelourinho, in the Albergue das Laranjeiras Hostel, bustling with people getting ready for the very cultural carnival that is hoasted in this city. Its the second largest in Brazil and seems much more culturally involved where people join the celebrations and dance in the streets for 5 days around town. The Bahian people are lots of fun; they stay up late, dance and sing and tend to enjoy the lighter side of life - you have to when its 45 degrees most days i guess! The streets are all beautifully cobbled and a short walk away is the elevator - this costs 5 Brazilian cents and takes you down to the lower level of the city (yes it really does have two levels!) where the big industrial harbor is. There are also large markets where we bought Brazilian Sarongs (a must have) and some great jewelery.



In the afternoon a samba band of 50+ people might congregate outside the hostel on the streets around town and start up a drumming noise that would wake up even the most hungover of revelers... the local Capoeira schools perform the traditional dance - which stems from the days of slavery when fighting was banned and slaves where not allowed to practice the martial art. They overcame this by performing it so beautifully and skilfully that they could pass it as a dance. In that way the tradition has lived on... Are you learning here people...?

The town is full of old buildings and churches. But the traditional stuff mixes with a lot of amazing graffiti and modern artwork like the photo exhibition around town (see photo with Lex)