by by Katie Birrenkott – Twitter LinkedIn Portfolio
Search engine optimization (SEO) has become the epitome of what comes to mind when thinking about social media marketing. As the common social media user knows, it’s all about the hashtags. We’ve all seen the Instagram posts with a thick layer of hashtags, including the ever popular #throwbackthursday aka #tbt.
Aside from the fact that my awesome photo with Bahama Mama only received two likes (sigh), SEO is an important factor when it comes to achieving the exposure a company seeks. We also need to remember that seeing as we have access to companies similar to Indexsy, who specialise in digital marketing and SEO, no business has any excuse as to why they shouldn’t make this their main priority. The stronger your SEO, the more chances you will have of reaching a wider audience and getting whatever product or service you have to offer out there. This all makes a lot more sense when you actually think about it.
The perfect way to summarize why SEO matters comes from Elle & Company Design:
“Each time you enter a subject in Google’s search bar and hit Enter, Google crawls and indexes pages to see which websites are the most relevant. Many websites attempt to build in keywords and implement other techniques in order for Google to find their site relevant and give them a high ranking, and this is called SEO.”
We implement SEO so that a company or client can easily be found and seen as opinion leaders of their industry or the topic people are searching for. Companies like Victorious handles SEO for clients of all sizes, including small businesses, giving them the tools to hold their own against the competition. As search engines become more advanced with their algorithms, the content and context of posts become even more relevant than finding the perfect hashtag or keyword. Some of the easiest ways to start utilizing SEO is outlined in our blog post assignment.
- You must include external links.
- You must have a “feature” image.
- You must include one piece of multimedia in the body of the post.
By including links and images within your posts, you’re able to capitalize on the search engines since there is more content for the engine to search through. Though the game of SEO is constantly changing because of the advancements in search engines, keywords, tags/hashtags and titles will always be important as well. Using social media to help implement marketing strategy is so important to businesses selling goods like marijuana. Anyone who has read these 420 marketing tips will understand how essential adhering to the maxims of SEO has become in the digital age. In order to truly become the CEO of SEO, you must constantly be keeping these concepts in mind when posting owned media on behalf of your clients (oh, and listen to Kelli and follow her assignment guidelines).
Take a look at the king kong sabri suby success story; their services have benefited many businesses in fulfilling clients’ marketing requirements. Perhaps your business would do well to utilize them also.
Hi Katie, this was a good read regarding the large role that Search Engine Optimization plays in the social media world. Hashtags are a simple and easy outlet for SEO. For me, I first noticed the rise of hashtags on Instagram and originally did not fully understand them. I definitely considered the posts with more than five hashtags a bit excessive. However, I now understand the power of these simple hashtags. I have friends whose follower count has increased very significantly thanks to their specific hashtag choices. The power of the hashtag could be an entire focus of conversation in itself. It’s efficiency is undeniable, which is why I think we now see hashtags on all social media platforms- Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and more.
Great post! I have noticed that even my personal use with hashtags has increased my Instagram following. I am a huge fan of hashtags on Instagram posts! Key words are the main part of SEO and it is important to be able to find which key words will get you the furthest.
This was a great post about the importance of hashtags and the like when curating your social media presence. It is worth noting, however, the “stigma” of sorts that comes with overpowering your caption with a laundry list of hashtags (you know the type: #puppies #ootd #instasunset #girls #pretty #instagood etc.) I know that I am personally turned off my this practice, as it seems desperate for likes and immediately inauthentic. While I can appreciate the desire to up your like-count, I cannot get behind the idea of flooding your post with hashtags however relevant just to attract the eyes of strangers.
Great post!
I am curious about the links between hashtags and SEO. I feel like it is a form of SEO for social media, but are the two inherently different? If you were to populate your webpage with 100+ hashtags, I don’t actually think that it would bump you up on google search rankings. With Instagram ads, it seems as though hashtags have become less important for businesses on that platform as well. At least I see ads for targeting content such as adidas spots, or healthy groceries (or whatever), without even searching for the hashtags on Instagram. Many of those ads also do not include hashtags in the copy. If you have more hashtags does that make your media populate the “explore” button more frequently? I am still confused!
This was a great post in terms of really looking at the meaning more of hashtags. There is always the running joke I feel when you first started using social media probably Facebook that you had to put at least like 10 hashtags and that made your post seems cool. It cracks me up now to look back on that and think were some of those hashtags even necessary or related to the post? That there is a bigger purpose to hashtags and even the power of SEO in relation to them. The quote you chose by Elle & Company Design was really great. It helped wrap up what SEO is and present it in a more visual manner. That adding hashtags really helps to further your post and pop up better in search engines. There really is a science to it and it is fascinating.