Search engine optimization (SEO) is an important aspect of building a digital audience and creating a visible brand. It’s crucial to follow the basic rules and get keywords and relevant content on the web; however, over-optimization can kill your social potential by overloading an audience, reducing content quality, and appearing to be marketing efforts instead of social content.
Overloading the Audience:
There is a balance that must be achieved by companies who do not want to drive away audience members as a result of SEO efforts. The number of posts per day a brand submits to social sites such as Facebook and Twitter can affect how the audience interacts with the brand. Facebook is primarily a friend sharing social tool. Users who “like” brand pages are showing support for the brand, but unlikely to want to see posts lining up in news feeds multiple times each day. Users who feel their feed is being overrun will unlike a brand or hide brand content. Neither of these reactions is ideal.
Twitter is a different avenue and allows brands more freedom to post multiple times per day. As a result of the constant flow of tweets and the likelihood that users review their entire Twitter feeds, it is a good idea to repost content to capture more users. Those who saw it the first time probably won’t see it the second time: it’s the nature of the media.
Knowing your audience and their level of engagement can help regulate the number of posts a brand projects. If users are participating actively multiple times per day, providing more content is suitable. If users are engaged in the morning and ignoring evening posts it would be advisable to remove evening posting schedules.
Reducing Content Quality:
Content is King in the world of SEO and social media. Users want to see that their time and support of a brand has not been wasted. Providing good content is a key element of developing an active social audience and improving search engine rankings. Over-optimization can cause the quality to decrease and disengage the audience. Overloading content with keywords and improper grammar is a red flag to the audience. No one wants to support a brand that doesn’t understand spellcheck or the basics of writing.
Obvious Marketing Efforts:
Obvious marketing efforts are one of the fastest ways to drive away an audience. The primary culprit in this avenue is currently the social media darling, Pinterest. As brands look for a way to incorporate Pinterest for SEO efforts many are too clearly promoting product sales and driving away potential follows and pins. Users view social media as a conversational haven, not a place where marketers will target them. It is up to the brands to be smart and develop keywords and captions that don’t appear to be sales pitches.
Over-optimization is a problem in the current social media climate. Finding the balance between engaging an audience and driving them away is tricky and should not be taken lightly. As a St. Louis SEO company, we know it is up to the brands to understand the population and its reaction to advertising and promotional posts. Accounting for the wants and needs of the audience can prevent over-optimization and keep your conversation relevant.
