Social Media Content Optimization

Developing visibility online for your business's activities is no longer restricted solely to Search Engines. Social Media is increasingly important to achieving online visibility.

Social Media Optimization not only creates benefits for Social Media Marketing Programs, but also has the potential to improve visibility in the Search Engine's Real Time Search and Social Search results.

Optimization of your Social Media content is similar to the processes used in the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) process. The fundamentals steps are similar however, with Social Media content optimization the focus is primarily on keyword relevancy whereas in SEO additional off-page competitive elements must be considered.

Social Media Optimization and Keywords

There is no way to avoid Keyword Research if you wish to obtain visibility online. In general your requirements for Keyword Research for Social Media are similar to those of Search Engine Optimization. The goal being, to discover the keywords most popular among Internet users to find your product and services.

Keyword Research is a required task and follows the same processes used for Organic and Paid Search keyword research and discovery. The difference being primarily in the selection and usage of the identified keywords and phrases.

Social Media Keyword Selection

The selection of keywords used within the Social Media Optimization (SMO) process differs somewhat from those of Organic and Paid Search. In Social Media, Organic Search and Pay Per Click the relevancy of keywords to a specific topic is of the utmost importance. However, the selection process does differ when selecting keywords for use in Pay per Click campaigns which must also take into consideration the cost of each individual click.

When comparing the requirements of Social Media and Organic Search keyword selection, the differences are not as straight forward and in some aspects similar. The primary difference in the keyword selection process for SMO is often keywords which would be deemed as too competitive for an Organic Search Optimization program due to various Organic Search specific requirements, primarily domain strength, do not need to be considered. Although this can be somewhat a gray area when we start to optimize content for Blogs which are considered one of the primary Social Media Tools.

When selecting keywords for use in Social Media consider:

• Popular keywords with high monthly search volumes. Often these keywords would not be suitable for Organic or PPC due to the highly competitive nature of this keyword type.
• High relevance keyword phrases which drill down to target a very specific niche within the broader topical area.

Social Media Keyword Integration

Once you have completed your keyword research and selection, decisions must be made regarding the when and how of keyword use and integration. There are a number of different tactics used when keywords are integrated into the Social Media Marketing Program including:

Discussion / Forum Titles: In this usage keywords are the attention getters. The use of the keywords identified as being most popular among Internet users to find information on this topic are the ideal keywords to use in this use case. It is these keywords which in many cases would be beyond the competitive capabilities of all but the most authoritive web sites within a specific niche.

Micro Blogging: Keyword use within Micro Blogging applications such as Twitter has gotten more complicated with the introduction of Real Time Search and how Search Engines rank Tweets. Regardless of Search Engines it must be remembered that in Twitter the target is human and therefore, like Discussion and Forum titles high value keywords can be utilized within the Tweet. In addition to high value keywords the inclusion of keyword phrases to further target the discussion can be beneficial to having your Tweets included within the Real Time Search Results.

Facebook: Like Micro Blogging Search Engines and the human elements must be considered. In addition to this, consideration must also be given to the type of Facebook page where Optimization is to occur. Only Facebook Fan Pages are available to Search Engines. Other Facebook pages such as personal walls and group discussions are available to logged in members only.

In both these cases, ideally a combination of attention getting keywords and more specific keyword phrases should be integrated into the content. A thing to remember is there are a lot of ex Googlers involved with Facebook and many elements of the Search Algorithms included within Google are likely to be present within Facebook in some form.

The Blog: Unlike the other Social Media Tools discussed to this point, Social Media Optimization of Blogs falls more inline with the processes used to Organically optimize any web page. The reason being a Blog Post is a web page and is not selected for attention out of a list of discussions or tweets.

In the context of this Blog post the Social Media tools such as Discussions and Micro Blogging are used to drive traffic to a specific Blog post. Therefore to ensure visitors expectations are met, it is important to utilize within the target Blog keywords and topics which initially created the attention on the Social Networks. In addition to this, consideration must also be given to effective Organic SEO to ensure the Blog also obtains viability in the general search results.

The Last Word

Social Media Optimization is becoming increasingly important due to not only the increasing popularity of Social Networking, but also the recent integration of Social into the search results of the major search engines, something that will continue to increase as time moves on.

Words are the basis of all of our communication regardless of the media. This is the primary reason why keyword research and integration is so important to your business being successful online. You must understand the keywords used by the public and integrate them into all online content. If you don't effectively integrate keywords into Social Media content the chances of accomplishing your business's objectives are significantly reduced.