Your Guide to Instagram SEO
Instagram SEO: What is it?
Instagram SEO may be a new term to you but luckily it’s quite easy to understand. Just like your online Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), the aim is to appear higher in search results when your customer searches for you. You may associate SEO with Google Ads however SEO does not necessarily mean a paid advertising campaign. And just like ordinary SEO, Instagram SEO can operate organically, meaning if you’re strategic, appearing in search results won’t cost you an arm and a leg.
Where to find the Instagram search bar.
Just like your Google Search Bar, Your Instagram Search Bar can be manipulated to your benefit with a few thought-out strategies and techniques. Exactly like your website copywriting, all text on your instagram page has impact including, captions, hashtags, words in your reels, closed captions for your videos, alt text, comments and more. So what does optimising that content mean?
How to Optimise your Instagram SEO in just 5 steps:
1. Your Account (Username, Name, Bio, Location+)
You’re probably already aware that on Instagram your name and username are very important. However they’re also relevant to SEO. All experts recommend researching keywords for your business type and incorporating them into your business name, for example as a “marketing” company we are called Purple Label Marketing. Sometimes this is not possible so as a secondary measure you can make sure it appears in your Instagram account name instead.
Where to change your Instagram account name.
Having your business type in your account name makes your business more likely to appear in the instagram search results when a user looks up your keywords like,‘digital marketing’ for example.
You should also feature your keywords in your bio including very descriptive words, keywords that you’ve searched and even clickable hashtags. If you’re struggling to know exactly what keywords mean for your business, research through Google Analytics, Hootsuite and other sources are your best guide to what keywords to use!
Or alternatively you can search instagram specific keywords for use all over Instagram by searching similar terms in the search bar and checking the results yourself. For example if you were writing a post on ‘caption writing tips’ when you type ‘caption’ into the instagram search bar ‘caption ideas’ appears first, you’d be best to rename the post and use the exact words in the caption and the same applies to your business account’s bio too!
Where to start your keyword research.
2. More on Captions (hashtags, hashtags, hashtags)
A common saying in the digital marketing world is that “Hashtags are keywords” and by extension so are your captions! Now we’ve returned to putting hashtags in captions you need to ensure that you are making the most of caption writing. Having a set list of hashtags and keywords to use in every post caption is a great starting point but you need to make sure you’re updating constantly and changing every post up, making sure what you’re saying is relevant and trending is a serious way to rank on Instagram SEO.
It may sound tedious but a lot of this process is following the last step and playing around with searchable ideas using the Instagram search engine testing everything out.
Finding hashtag keywords.
A recent tip we’ve also heard is to cover all your bases, if you have the time and dedication it might be great to post a few targeted keywords as hashtags, a few target keywords as captions and follow up in the comments using another set of relevant hashtag keywords there too!
3. ALT TEXT (What is it & How to use it)
ALT TEXT otherwise known as Alternative Text and also known as alt tags or alt descriptions, is the text that describes videos or images, either to the visually impaired or when the content fails to load. Alt Text describes in simple descriptive language exactly what you would have seen if you could see the image, however through website design and Instagram marketing a third purpose is to narrow down keywords for SEO.
Our biggest note with Alt Text is to ensure that you never misdescribe an image, however you simultaneously ensure never to waste a description either. Instead of ‘image of laptop’ you can manually alter that automated Alt Text from Instagram to say ‘image of laptop screen with digital marketing content open’ and through this both describing the image accurately and using a keyword you will help boost your Instagram SEO.
Where to find ALT TEXT.
4. Tagging (business accounts helping business accounts)
Tagging on Instagram shows a community and network that is shared, and therefore expands your reach both to individual followers and specifically in that Instagram search engine. If you can have a few accounts that will tag you and share your content and in return you do the same, it will be greatly beneficial for both businesses, we often do this with our marketing clients, helping us both, however on a smaller business scale even going for work lunches at branded Instagram cafes could leave you having a perfect tagging partner.
5. Finally Track your analytics (and if they’re not improving change your tactics)
None of our SEO Instagram tips from above will be worth it unless you are monitoring and tracking your progress. Instagram Analytics/Insights provide in depth analysis of where all your views and interactions are coming from, and are vital to know if you’re appearing in that search engine, if you’re found from your hashtags or if you’re not appearing at all. For example you could follow all our steps above but have described yourself using an inaccurate business description and therefore incorrect keywords throughout and get absolutely no traction, and if you didn’t follow up and check in your analytics you would never know.
Example of following insights.
We are always posting reminders for you to update your keywords and by that we also post to check your results, if you’re not seeing positive and increasing numbers there is some strategy you need to look at and change.
But don’t start to stress! We’re here for you every step of the way! Answering all your questions and even if a digital marketing manager handle everything is what you need then you’ve come to the right place.
We hope this helped you wrap your head around Instagram SEO and feel free to follow us on Instagram @purplelabelmarketing for tips and tricks and reminders, or contact us to find out more!
