Social media is a massive generator of traffic and you should have a solid campaign in place. Through social media businesses and single bloggers have been able to generate traffic quickly which otherwise would have taken months. However, even in social media it’s important to have a solid keyword research strategy. Social media platforms use keywords to organize content being shared just like search engines. You’ll learn later on why the keyword research element of social media is very important to get your content noticed and to create an immediate buzz. Let’s get started with first discussing how keywords and social media is connected.
Social Media + Keywords
First, keywords are important to get the right content in front of those searching. Both in social and search, keywords have been used to organize your content, making it available to those searching online. Secondly, keywords are a great way to generate content because they provide you with ideas going forward. When you know what your readers are looking for, you know EXACTLY how to leverage your content going forward. Third, social media content does get ranked within search engines so having the right keywords is a great way to generate traffic via organic.
It’s time to identify 10-15 keywords associated with your brand and the good news is, these keywords will be perfect for search and social. It’s not like you’re doing keyword research separately because if you can indentify search, then you’ll be able to identify social. Once you’re done doing research, write down the list of keywords and keep them handy for when you have to write content. However,
If you’ve already written content, then make sure you have the right keywords identified. Skim through your content and write down the keywords you used in your content so you can implement them into your social media strategy. Many people ask: Why is it so important to identify the right keywords? Here’s some reasons that will help shed some light.
Identifying Keywords Will…
#Hashtag Development –
Having the right set of keywords will allow you to gather the right #hashtags for social media. Many of these platforms use tags to organize information and give people an awesome way to search content. Identifying the right #hashtags will allow you to implement them with your content marketing. Finding the right #hashtags requires a root keyword and a tool like hashtagify.me/.
Help Build Your Messages –
Having your keywords in mind will allow you to build the perfect message for sharing. Just like keywords helped with your content creation, you can use #hashtags to build your message, which you’ll be sharing online. It should work as the following: identify keywords > write content > find #hashtags > post your tweet
Trend Development –
Many new tools online have taken an advanced approach to research. This means a root keyword can lead to secondary keywords, which are perfect for additional content writing or social media posting. However, I like to use secondary keywords to find new trends developing within my main niche. For example, if my main root keyword is “link building” and my keyword tool starts providing the following:
- Expired domains
- Forums
- RSS
- Google Alerts
I can determine these might be potentially awesome link building strategies going forward. I can continue to perform research and create content around these keywords.
Testing and Tweaking –
Having a whole set of keywords is great for testing and tweaking. I’ve always encouraged my clients to always think outside the box and this means being able to optimize what’s working. If you have a handful of keywords, then some will work better than others giving you a ROI and your objective should be to identify which ones do the trick. The more keywords you have, the more testing you can do figuring out what works and what doesn’t. In the end, you’ve learned a lot along the way and found creative ways to NOT only test your content writing, but also your social media marketing.
If you have 10-15 words, then start using tools like bufferapp.com to automatically setup social sharing. This will allow you to automate the process of sharing while providing you with vital data. Track this data to find CTR and conversions, narrowing down the best possible social platform marketing campaign.