Earlier this week, Bing announced an integrated feature that displays photos from Facebook friends. The photos must be relevant to the keyword search on Bing, of course.
For businesses that have been actively creating visual content, the collaboration between the search engine Bing and the social network Facebook is an added opportunity for them to gain visibility. Follow the instructions below to start taking advantage.
Create a personal Facebook profile.
By now your business is behind if it doesn’t already have a presence on Facebook. In this instance, however, you’ll need to have a suitable, personal Facebook profile as well.
It’s highly recommended that you keep the profile professional because you will be using it to engage your audience. Create a profile – NOT a Page – about yourself and the position you hold within the company.
(In order to create a business page, Facebook requires you to have a personal profile, so you’d need to have your own profile either way.)
Create a business page.
Once your personal profile is set up, click “Pages” on the left sidebar of Facebook. Go ahead and create a page for your business.
A Page is your chance to explain what your business is all about – particularly what you can do to help your audience. It’s also an avenue for sharing the things that may interest them.
Keep the page updated on a daily basis to be most effective.
Post visual content to both profiles.
Because your personal profile is about you in a professional light, if the infographics, screenshots and pictures are suitable for the business page, they are suitable for posting to your own profile.
Create an album on your personal profile, where images for posting on the business page can also be uploaded. And be sure to write descriptive captions for all images. This helps the Bing search engine find what’s relevant.
Engage on the business page.
Using social media buttons and constantly updated content, it won’t be long before your business page starts seeing an increasing number of Likes and Subscribers.
This is where the personal profile really becomes handy.
On your personal Facebook profile, add the people as friends who have liked and subscribed. Everyone may not accept the request, but those that do are a segment you can benefit from when they use the Bing search engine.
The second time around.
When those people search on Bing for terms related to the photos you’ve uploaded, your profile becomes visible once again.
Assuming you’re linking to your website or blog and sharing content related to your product/service offering on the personal Facebook profile, this is another chance to connect with your audience and build mind share.
Most people already have a personal Facebook profile, so this process won’t be long. Get your business page set up, post visual content to both profiles and befriend the people who patronize your business page.
It is similar to Google allowing you to see your Google+ circles’ photos in Google Images. Different search engine and different social network. Same idea.
You’ll be optimizing your business for greater visibility on Bing through the Facebook Photos integrated feature – and subsequently enjoying more traffic to your website or blog.