Keywords and Social Media

The importance of keywords in Social Media Marketing

Keyword research, analysis and understanding keywords and phrases utilized by Internet users to find the products, services and information they require, is not only important to the business performance of your web site, but also a prerequisite to the success of your business’s Social Media Marketing programs. Keywords are integrated into virtually all online activities

Search is still the most popular method used to find products, services and information on the Internet. Search however, is not limited to information available on web sites. Search Engines are increasingly indexing the Social Media Tools such as Blogs, Micro-blogging (Twitter) plus Social Networking profiles, discussions and forums.

Of course when considering Keywords and Social Media we must look closely at both human and Search Engine perspectives. Although there are specific issues which must be considered for keywords and their relationship with Search Engines, in most cases this occurs naturally if the primary focus of your keyword research and integration is focused on human interaction and readability.

Keywords and Social Media Marketing Tools

Keywords and Social Networks

The primary purpose of keywords in Social Networking is to gain the attention of fellow Networkers on a topic which is of interest to the users. These keywords must be important and relevant to the topic to stand out from the competing topics and the general noise found on Social Networking web site discussion forums.

The primary difference in keyword selection for Social Media Marketing versus Search Engines is with Social Networking highly topic specific generic keywords can be utilized effectively to gain the required visual attention. However, these generic keywords often do not perform well for the majority of web sites in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). The reason for this is the competition for these primary words is prolific, ranking well enough to obtain reasonable visibility for generic terms in Search Engine Results Pages is generally only achievable for well optimized, high ranking and well financed web sites.

Keywords and Micro-blogging

The use of keywords in Micro-blogging (Twitter/ Profile Updates), is similar to that of Social Networking due the high interaction between members. Generic keywords are best used to spark interest in topics to develop comments, interactions and retweets which stand out from the surrounding noise found on Twitter and other Micro-blogging web sites.

Due to Micro-blogging posts (Tweets) being indexed by Search Engines and searched by users to find topics of interest, including multi word keyword phrases to better target search results can be utilized to create and improve visibility in both Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) and other search function results.

Keywords and Blogs

The use of keywords in Blogs is quite different than the two previous examples of keyword use within Social Networks and Micro-blogging. In both those cases keywords have been used to create visual interest in the topic and attract human attention and visibility.

However, Blogs are quite different from Social Networks and Micro-blogging as they do not have to stand out from various discussions, forum topics and tweets, in both Social Networks and Micro-blogging there is a significant amount of noise which your message has to get through to be noticed.

The various methods used to promote and create awareness of Blogs are quite different from the other Social Media tools mentioned. Blogs are generally not found amongst competing topics which is the general format of Micro-blogging and Social Networking web sites.

The primary methods of blog promotion include:

• Search Engines
• Social Networking and Micro-blogging
• Social Bookmarking
• Commenting on other's Blogs
• Pay Per Click Campaigns
• Ping Services

When Social Media is utilized for Blog promotion, generic keywords work well to get noticed and cut through the associated noise. However, finding Blogs via Search such as Google Blog Search and Search Engines in general requires a different approach.

When using Search to have your Blog discovered, in most cases highly targeted 3 to 4 word keyword phrases offer a higher likelihood of your Blog ranking well for the selected content items thus providing your Blog with increased visibility.

Keywords and Social Media - The Last Word

Keywords are crucial to any online business promotion. Learn and understand the keywords used by individuals and your well on your way to increasing the brand awareness of your business online. Social Media does offer a tremendous amount of opportunity to leverage highly competitive keywords normally the property of large businesses and corporations.