It started as a way for college students to stay connected but Facebook has quickly grown into so much more as many businesses use the social networking site to market themselves. But just being on Facebook is not enough as one expert says it’s "crucial" that users implement search engine optimization (SEO) on their pages.
Writing for Search Engine Land, Marty Weintraub says the idea of having an optimized Facebook page has become even more important since the company’s purchase of friendFeed.
This, combined with Facebook’s recent unveiling of real-time search means search engine optimization (SEO) has ventured outside of the traditional search engines and businesses can potentially benefit from having keywords in their profiles that people are searching for on the social networking site.
Weintraub says that, as with typical search engine optimization, Facebook content is king.
"As always in social media marketing, leveraging friends’ (and your own) recommendations, without being a spammer, is sticky business," he writes. "Follow the timeless axioms of social media participation. Give more than you take by contributing unselfish & recurrent content recommendations for others to consume. Be holistic in how you promote your own content and (as always) think in terms of supporting the community first."
It appears that real-time results are the future of search and search engine optimization (SEO). In addition to Facebook’s search feature, Twitter has made real-time search a big part of its site with its search bar featured prominently on the site’s homepage.
