The recent news from Instagram has the potential to be a game-changer for B2B social media and SEO strategies. On July 10, Instagram continued its roll out of a long-tested feature which allows, as Instagram states, “search engines to index photos and videos from public reels and posts that were uploaded or posted from January 1, 2020 onwards from accounts that meet all criteria listed below:
- The account holder is currently over 18
- The account is currently public
- The account is currently a professional account.”
This leads to the question: Should B2B businesses begin taking Instagram, a platform previously known to have primarily B2C audiences, more seriously? With this feature making your business’ Instagram indexable for search engines, the answer is yes. Let’s explore some of the B2B benefits of Instagram indexing.
Benefits of Instagram Indexing For B2B
With Instagram indexing posts, your brand can use the platform to help further boost its visibility. By becoming an additional source of your SEO-optimized content, companies may gain greater discoverability in search engine rankings and increased traffic from search engines to both your Instagram profile and website. Because posts are now indexed from 2020 onwards, it also means that your Instagram content becomes more evergreen, drawing engagement long after it disappears from in-platform Instagram feeds.
Overall, this feature represents an opportunity to reach new audiences through organic social media efforts, and it supports the growing trend the social media industry is seeing of audiences turning to social media as their search engine of choice.
Social First Search & How To Optimize
According to a May 2025 study from Sprout Social, “More than 1 in 3 consumers across age groups prefer searching on social platforms first for product reviews and recommendations.”
As social media becomes the place more audiences go to first with their search queries, Instagram’s increased searchability makes it essential to have your post content search engine optimized with your business’ top keywords. For your business to get the most out of this Instagram feature, you will need to:
- Ensure your company’s Instagram profile is set to public or is a professional account
- Utilize your business’ SEO keywords in your Instagram post captions in an organic way
- Add Alt. text to each of the images and videos you post
- Create visually compelling posts, including carousels and Reels that utilize your SEO keywords in the visual asset as well as within the captions
- Audit previous posts and ensure they have captions updated with your relevant keywords
These steps will ensure your Instagram content is optimized and able to support your broader SEO strategies by increasing the number of places your content is found by search engines.
Also, if you decide you don’t want your business’ public Instagram content to appear in search engine results, you can always turn it off by following these steps from Instagram.
Ready To Optimize Your B2B Instagram Efforts?
The team at W2 Communications are experts in organic social media, SEO, creative design and content development, and are ready to help you take your social media efforts, including Instagram, to the next level.
Reach out today and let us help ensure you are making the most of each social media platform’s unique features to reach your ideal audiences.