As a brand are you assured that your content is reaching the right audiences?
Surely you may be posting on social media and witnessing increasing some user interaction but is all of it helping your brand organically? With extensive paid content being promoted across social media platforms, the power of money seems to have overtaken the power of good old organic growth. In fact the falling organic reach of posts on all platforms is causing many smaller brands sleepless nights.
Understanding organic growth and its challenges
For the layman, organic growth on social media is best described as the reach or growth of a post without any money behind it. Since most social media platforms allow users to make use of their paid promotions that offer increasing penetration of posts to the interested users, the non paid ones often lag behind. SEO Companies and social media experts are of the view that organic reach of posts has been on a constant decline. Facebook, one of the most widely used social media channels updated its algorithm in 2018 whereby it is now pushing posts or content from family and friends over publishers and pages.
7 Tips for increasing your organic reach on search
Every dark cloud has a silver lining they say and fighting with challenges is what comes naturally to businesses. Surely this organic reach challenge can be tackled by optimizing social media publication strategy. To bring out the best organic growth it is essential for businesses and business owners to be proactive rather than relying solely on SEO agencies. Of course with startups and cash crunched business making use of affordable SEO services still adds value to the business’s overall growth, increasing organic reach requires specified social media management.
1: Create more engaging and unique content
Content remains the king irrespective of any algorithm change by social media platforms. A good innovative and unique content that makes use of audio, video, info graphics not only adds value to the consumer, it can easily earn more user engagement. Uniqueness holds the key as many brands commit the mistake of using the same content on all social media platforms. Since each platform targets a specific age group of users, the content must not just be compelling and fresh but also unique for each of the social media platforms. For example a fashion brand can make use of Instagram to post behind the scene stories while showcasing Live feed of a fashion show on their Facebook feed, thus making the content unique and innovative for both platforms. Some of the best SEO agencies also advocate sharing of genuine content from others and not always pushing of your own brand’s content.
2: Optimize your social media profiles
When was the last time your updated your brand’s social media profile? Being organic has a lot to do with ensuring your profiles are up to date and SEO friendly. For example pages with keywords in their Facebook profile names are crawled better by search giant Google compared to brands with minimal description. A good Search Engine Optimization agency can help monitor social media profiles and make changes in accordance with changing algorithms of both search engines and social media platforms.
3: Publish evergreen content
Social media posts can have a varied shelf life. If you as a brand are posting content with a short shelf life, the chances of it being already out of date when reaching the audiences is high. As part of your overall social media marketing plan posting evergreen content including educational or humor oriented take on matters. All of this holds a higher chance of being viral and thus higher organic reach. Engaging posts are what SEO firms, social media marketing companies and social media platforms love. The higher the interactivity in your posts, the higher is the chance for a wider reach.
4: Use organic post targeting
For an organic reach, it is important to ensure your content is being targeted organically to people whom it is meant for. Most social media platforms allow for organic post targeting based on gender, interest, relationship status, language and location. For example if you are a wedding services company it serves no purpose if your post is seen by users who are already married or live in a different location than places you serve. Targeting the right audience is just as essential as creating the perfect content to ensure an organic growth in search results.
5: Post quality over quantity
The one thing almost every Search Engine Optimization agency will advocate is quantity of content. The higher the content, the better is the chance to make it popular and searchable. On social media platforms however posting quality content over quantity is what can make a difference. Timing your content as per the demographics of your user base and posting interactive content outlives the value of posting high quantity content with not much activity.
6: Be interactive
Facebook organically pushes posts which ensure a higher interactivity amongst people. This means that a higher interactive page has more likelihood of becoming better crawled in organic search results. Brands can make use by posting content that can spark debates and discussions in the comments section. The more interaction by the page or brand itself not only allows for better interactivity but high organic growth. Start out an interactive poll, contests or ‘Ask Me Anything’ based conversations are also good ways as suggested by top SEO agencies.
7: Get verified
The blue tick of verification on social media platforms is not just some ego boost but can make a real difference in organic growth. It is not uncommon for brands to come up against impersonators claiming to be the official page of the brand. With blue tick verification in place, brands can ensure their official page ranks higher in organic search over any such dubious claimed pages. Getting verified not only ensures credibility but also ensure followers follow your official page. For smaller brands, appearing on news publication websites and having a good number of dedicated followers can help in claiming the blue tick verification tag.
Conclusion: Increasing organic reach on social media is a challenge especially for smaller brands. However by incorporating dedicated tips and strategies the road to organic growth can be a smooth ride.
