Instagram SEO: 5 Ways to Increase Your Discoverability

SEO on Instagram… 5 ways to make your brand more discoverable 

What is SEO and how is it used on Instagram? 

SEO on Instagram is pretty much like SEO on google, or any other place on the internet. It is about optimising your content so that it appears in as many places as possible - whether that is on homepage, search results or suggested content / reel feeds. 

It’s important to make your content as discoverable as possible so that more eyes land on it and you have more opportunities to engage with your audience. 

Being able to do SEO well will completely transform your visibility on Instagram and will show a massive difference in your business’ engagement. Here are 5 tips on how to do it: 

1: Write Descriptive Captions With Keywords

Previously, you could only search in Instagram Explore through hashtags, location tags, user/profile names. But now, you can search using keywords. This means that if you write descriptive and relevant captions, using topical keywords, you could get more visibility when people search. 

2: Use Keywords in Your Profile Name 

A good way to optimise your Instagram profile is to include a keyword you’re hoping to rank highly for in your name or username as both of these are searchable on the platform. Ie. For Costa Coffee, both the name and username contain the keyword “Coffee”

3: Include up to 30 Relevant Hashtags

As long as the hashtags are relevant, using up to 30 targeted ones on posts and stories is still one of the most consistent ways to be discovered by new audiences. If someone were to then search for that hashtag, your post would appear on that search page. 

4: Add Descriptive Alt Text to Your Posts

Alt text is a feature that allows you to include custom alternative text for a deeper description of your images which is often used to improve accessibility to its users, but is also very relevant for SEO purposes. 

5: Be Consistent With Your Niche 

This one is a little more simple, but absolutely key when trying to improve SEO on Instagram. The more you follow these best practices around implementing specific keywords and hashtags, and increasing descriptive Alt text, the more the algorithm will learn what your account is about. You need consistency to help teach Instagram who you are and what your business offers, and once it has learnt this, it will make your profile and posts more visible to relevant audiences as they use the platform. 

SEO can be a bit to get your head around, especially if you wear many hats in your business and social media is new to you. If you’d like a chat to see how SEO can help your business, click the button below to book a discovery call.Fr

ancesca