Performance Marketing Blog

There Are Two Types of Twitter Searches

There are two types of keywords on Twitter. The actual keyword as it exists, such as “college” and the hash tag “#college” version of the keyword.

Searching for either of these will display two different sets of results.

It goes without saying that the natural method of search is to type in the keyword without a hash. If someone is interested in tweets about Star Trek, they are more likely to search for “Star Trek” than “#startrek”.

Because there are two ways to perform this search, there are two ways to optimize tweets for these searches. You can optimize for the hash tag version and the actual version of the keyword.

For this article, I am going to focus on how to optimize for the actual version of the keyword, the one without the hash tags.

Keyword Search Frequency

In my research, I found that there is more competition in keywords without the hash tags. I performed a search with the hash tag and without it. I noticed that the time between tweets is much smaller without the hash tag, which proves that the keyword appears on a higher frequency.

This means that the competition to rank for this keyword will be much higher. Which means as a performance marketer, you have to keyword optimize every opportunity you are given.

Keyword Optimization

Keyword optimization in general is a well-covered topic. But I am going to introduce a method that is not currently being utilized on Twitter. But you can rest assured that as soon as people become aware of this technique it will spread like a wildfire.

A huge missed opportunity is in the shortened links people use on Twitter. Why do we post these links? We post these links to drive traffic to them. What if we could create keyword rich shortened links as easily as we create them now?

Of these two links, which has more SEO value?

http://9mp.com/t7x

http://college.9mp.com/t7x

From a purely cosmetic point of view the link with “college” is generally preferred because it gives insight into what the link is about.

There is an even greater value in including keywords in your shortened URL’s. Yes, you guessed it, through the keyword that is in the URL. Twitter takes these keywords into consideration in their search results.

Want proof? Here is an update I posted today from my personal Twitter account @JoshuaOdmark as a test:

Ashford University ranks high on the list for an online school. Checkout their listing here: http://college.9mp.com/t7x

Twitter Search Results

As you can see, the keyword “college” is not anywhere in the tweet except for in the URL. Here is a search result after this message was posted:

The 2nd result shows that my tweet showed up for a keyword that only existed in the shortened URL.

This proves that the keywords in a shortened URL are a huge opportunity for SEO on Twitter.

How To Get Branded Shortened URL’s

I recommend using a URL Shortener such as http://9mp.com because not only does it offer detailed statistics, free usage, vanity url’s, and all the features you are used to with the hundreds of URL shorteners out there, but you can also brand your URL’s for free.

http://9mp.com gives you the option of branding your URL’s with any sub domain you wish. It also allows you to tag on keywords at the end of your URL for additional SEO on Twitter.

http://college.9mp.com/t7x/education

This URL gives you two extra keywords to maximize your SEO on Twitter.

If you are into any form of performance marketing from selling purses online to music album promotion, and you are not using branded URL’s, you are missing the biggest opportunity available on Twitter right now.

Contact Information

Contact a representative at branding@9mp.com to receive information on how to secure your own custom branded URL. It took less than 10 minutes for my custom branded URL to be setup and available for usage inside of my 9mp.com account.