How To Use Instagram From SEO Point Of View

A picture is worth 1000 words. This is for the reason that pictures depict a story and Instagram is an approach to craft your own story. It is the newest among long list of social media sites present. With over 150 million users, it is one of those sites that is gaining popularity at a fast pace among companies and public figures who looking to connect with their customers/followers.

Instagram is a digital marketing company that allows users to follows posts of other users they are interested in. A common misconception about Instagram is that it only works for brands selling products, not for services. However, individuals and companies are adopting this new storytelling platform to create awareness. In a general perspective, anything put on Instagram by the brands is well received. Simply because it is not forcing the content into anyone’s feeds, rather they are broadcasting it via their own account. In terms of customer outreach, Instagram offers its own innovative SEO to the brands:

• Use of “Photos of You” and @mention lets you add potential customers to your photos. It will instantly send them notification and add the photo into their profile.
• Use of #hashtags makes the content easily searchable to the masses. Hashtags bring context to the posts. So instead of using highly-searched-for hashtags, you should always use those hashtags that describes your photos in the most effective way.
• Use of comments on target customers’ photos to help users discover your photos and content. Drop a comment on the top photos you catch, citing their authors.
• Use geo-tags wherever possible. Whenever you geo-tag a photo, it is grouped together with every photo available that has been taken in that same location which means other people who uploaded their geo-tagged photos will be able to view your as well.
• Have an agenda to schedule your photo uploads. Flooding with too many posts at once will annoy users. Instead focus on the timing of uploads when you expect maximum number of followers to be available online. This will increase user engagement per post.

Following the 80-20 rule is the key: post 20% of promotional photos of your products/services and 80% of photos for brand promotion without explicitly mentioning the products/services. Another way to promote your brand is to find key influencer (50,000+ followers) and pay them to post photos of your event or a product. However, in the end it all boils down to crowd sourcing your content. Once photos find their way online, it is up to the brands to increase social engagement of the posts. Just the number of page hits or views will not boost the search engine of the post, what matters it’s the user engagement for the post.

Instagram might not be as vast as Facebook and Twitter – at least not just yet. However, enterprises are beginning to see this prospect as they are now including it in their search engine marketing campaigns. This will not only enhance their SEO ratings, but also essentially boost their traffic to both - their website as well as brick and mortar business.