This guest blog from Simon Dell talks about why Facebook Ads & SEO work so well together
If you’re reading this blog on the Popularise website, you don’t need to be convinced of the benefit of Facebook ads. When done right, the platform can deliver high quality, low cost traffic to your website that will convert. It’s a no brainer.
But why should you be also spending on search engine optimisation at the same time?
SEO & Facebook need the same fuel
One of the major reasons for focusing on both SEO and Facebook is that they need the same fuel for their success.
If your goal is creating a successful Facebook presence, in which Facebook ads are part of that platform, then you need content. Lots and lots of good content. A Facebook business page without good content is a waste of everyone’s time.
So it makes sense that if you’re going to want a strong social presence, part of that content strategy should be developing blogs and longer form written content, such as downloadable white papers or reports.
These are great to use for Facebook advertising especially if you’re a service-based business; linking a prospect customer through to a form to download a white paper is a perfect way of generating leads. Many people use these clicks to start a drip-feed funnel systems too. A successful Facebook campaign can often rest on good content.
SEO is a similar beast. Whilst there are some 200 different things that Google measures when it comes to ranking your website, one of the cornerstones of driving your website up the Google charts, is good content, shared frequently. That content should be engaging, detailed and targeted to your web visitors; exactly the sort of that you’d be using in your Facebook advertising campaign.
So how can my Facebook campaign and SEO work together?
The first step is to decide on what keyword you’re optimising for. This is the cornerstone of SEO strategy. You can use Google’s free Keyword tool to work that out. Simply put in your website, the location parameters and a couple of example keywords and Google will show you the traffic for all keywords related to you. You’ll get about 800 examples, give or take.
Then you build your content around that – whether it’s a web page, e-book, white paper, report, video, infographic – or any other content. The longer the content, the better. Google is a fan of blogs that run over 2,000 words and whilst that might seem like a challenge to produce something that epic, it will also rank blogs with only 600 words on it.
This is where you also need to think about your Facebook audience; if they’re going to click on an advert in Facebook and leave the platform, they’re going to want to be rewarded with a rich content experience that engages them as a user. 2,000 words about a subject matter they’re interested in is much more likely to convert them into a prospect than 600 words and a picture. So really put some thought into what you produce.
In short, a well-thought out, engaging piece of content does wonders for your business. It means your Facebook campaign visitors are much more likely to convert into an enquiry and it means Google will be much more willing to give your site a positive boost in their rankings.
To conclude
Facebook campaigns and SEO work hand-in-hand, so when you’re developing your next social advertising campaign, it’s well worth giving consideration to keywords that might have significant traffic through Google. Done properly, you could end up giving your business a double boost.
Simon Dell is a Brisbane-based marketing consultant who has been working with business of all sizes and industries for the past ten years. His focus now is as a digital, Adwords and SEO consultant. His podcast The Simon Dell Show is available through iTunes.