Most brands don’t know anything about Instagram SEO and it is costing them not hundreds but thousands of followers in a long run.
I would even argue that some brands don’t even know it exists. But if you’re going to do it, it’s going to grow your Instagram page on autopilot and get you more results than you could imagine.
So, are you ready to begin? If so, let’s dive in…
What Is Instagram SEO?
Instagram SEO means optimizing your profile and content in a way that’s going to make it show up as a result when somebody types a keyword into the search bar.
For example, if Johny wants to discover something about plumbing, he is going to go to the search bar and type there a keyword like “plumber” or “plumbing” or “plumbing California.”
And of course, there’s going to be a ton of accounts that are going to pop up as well, as an option to search for posts including those keywords.
And because those accounts did Instagram SEO, Johny is going to check some of them, go through some of the posts that have appeared as search results, he is going to follow some of them, and even decide to purchase.
Isn’t that cool? But guess what?
There are thousands of Johny’s doing the same thing. In other words, tens of thousands of people might be searching for keywords in your niche and you are losing all of the attention because you didn’t do Instagram SEO for your brand.
It’s so important I can’t emphasize it enough.
So, the question is, how are you going to do Instagram SEO? Well, that’s exactly what I’m going to show you…
How To Do Instagram SEO For Your Profile
Doing Instagram SEO for your profile so that it appears in the search results is pretty simple. You need to include a keyword in the name or username of your profile.
Preferably you want it to be both, but if you are building a personal brand, you want your username to reflect your name.
Here are some examples of how you can do that:
Now, notice one thing. Instagram doesn’t recognize keywords in your bio relevant for the search.
That means no matter what you write in your bio if the keyword is not in your name or username, the profile is not going to appear in search results.
Ok, but which keyword should you use?
The simplest and easiest thing that you can do for Instagram SEO of your profile is just to add a keyword that reflects the name of your niche or industry. For example, “social media marketing”, “plumbing”, “pharmacy”, “dental care”, etc.
If you want to be more strategic, you can use normal SEO tools like Ubersuggest or Ahrefs, search for Google keywords, go to Instagram and type them into search, and if you’re going to see that a lot of people engage with the posts that show up (don’t look for a lot of profiles showing up), then you know that the keyword is lucrative as people look for content in that niche and, of course, people who share it.
If you’re going to see that the posts that are going to pop up have little engagement and next to no reach, forget it and look for another keyword as almost nobody is searching for it.
However, use this advanced Instagram SEO keyword research method carefully, because if the keyword is irrelevant to what you do and to your actual niche…it’s not going to be good for your brand.
For example, don’t use “Plumbing For Schools” when you’re doing plumbing for everybody. However “California Plumber” or “Plumbing In California” is fine if you’re based in California.
You’re going to get more traffic, and it’s not going to hurt your brand or marketing strategy.
Got it? Awesome, now let’s move on how to do Instagram SEO for your content…
How To Do Instagram SEO For Your Content
This is easier than you might think. The first way you can do this is by adding the desired keyword or keywords in a caption.
The benefit is that the keyword doesn’t have to be together like a phrase, e.g. London restaurant, but it can be totally divided. If the two words are included somewhere in the caption, it will count for the search as a keyword.
This is the harder way to do it. The easiest and simplest way to do Instagram SEO for your content is just by adding 30 hashtags to the post.
You see, hashtags themselves act as keywords, and if you add them to the caption, your post will not only be finable on the used hashtags’ pages, but also they will act as keywords for the search.
So, you can boost your post search traffic like crazy just by doing this simple Instagram SEO trick. That’s why the next time you post something, you must add hashtags in your caption.
However, if you have a good reason not to…for example, you need the space to write a long caption, add them to comments, and include the keywords directly in the message.
How To Do Instagram SEO For Your Shop?
Doing Instagram SEO for your show is very similar to doing it for your account because shop search works on a similar basis, except you need to have the keyword included directly in your username.
So, the best way to do this is to combine it with doing the Instagram SEO for your profile and ask yourself if you’re going to use an Instagram shop to promote your products or services.
If yes, then you want to add the keyword to your username.
If not, then you can use any username you want and just add the keyword to the headline on your profile.
It’s that simple.
Filip Konecny 