You’ve probably reviewed and improved the search engine optimisation (SEO) of your business website, but have you heard about Facebook SEO?
You may not realise how much your social media pages can affect your search engine ranking through attracting and engaging with your audience, driving traffic to your website, creating links through social media shares and boosting your profile through keywords.
Although social media accounts do not directly boost your website’s profile on Google, popular content which is shared and liked will always attract a wider audience. More link clicks create more traffic, which is a key player in search engine ranking. Research has also shown that Facebook has more effect on SEO than any other social media platform.
So now that we know that it’s important, what can we do? Here are my five ways to boost your Facebook SEO:
Customise your Facebook URL
Customising your Facebook URL to match your business name is an essential element if you want to improve the SEO of your Facebook page. As well as promoting your brand, a custom URL makes your page much easier to find via Facebook and search engines.
Don’t worry, creating a custom URL for your Facebook page is easy. Simply go to the ‘Page Info’ section and click on ‘Create Page @username’. This is when you need to create a unique name, ideally the same or similar to your business name. When you start typing a green tick means the URL is available.
Facebook SEO keywords
It might sound obvious, but littering keywords throughout your content and meta data will improve your Facebook SEO ranking. I recommend that you use this technique for all of your social media accounts. So why is this important?
Take my teenage son as an example. He rarely watches mainstream television as he prefers to watch video content on social media sites such as YouTube. He simply types keywords into the search bar and scrolls through the results. The most successful YouTubers have a deep understanding of SEO so ensure that the right keywords are included in each video description.
As an exercise, find the keywords most relevant to your business and type them into Facebook, for example: “tree surgeon Milton Keynes”. Hopefully, your page appears near the top – if not, you need to review and amend your page.
Review your About section
Once you have identified the keywords most relevent to your business, you need to add them to your Facebook page. One of the most important areas is the ‘About’ section – try to include a keyword in every paragraph, at least six times in total. The trick is to try to make your business description sound natural, and less like a list of services.
You can also spread your keywords throughout your page including any future posts. To see how it is done, visit the Facebook pages of your favourite household brands to see how they use keywords.
Update your business info
Have you populated every section of your Facebook page? Facebook allows you to add lots of information about your business, including location, opening hours and contact details. As well as being helpful to potential customers, adding an address can improve your Facebook SEO as the site is more likely to index your business in local searches.
Improve post visibility
The hard work begins once you have updated the information on your Facebook page. You need to optimise your individual posts to attract more views and clicks, this means regular content containing your keywords. Even if you are just sharing someone else’s post, you need to add a short description with keywords. Don’t forget to add a call for action such as asking readers to share the post, add a comment, watch a video or click on a link.
Need advice on Facebook SEO?
As an experienced journalist and copywriter, I remember being an early advocate of social media sites such as MySpace back at the turn of the 21st century. These days I use my extensive knowledge to help business clients to reach more customers via Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and other platforms. If you need advice on social media, contact WordSmart Communications – we would be more than happy to help. You can also visit my LinkedIn or Facebook pages.