Thinking
Beyond the feed: The expanding role of social content in search results
If you manage social media, you’ve probably experienced this: You pour time and effort into a post, hit publish and then … it disappears into the scroll. Poof, it’s gone!
But something is shifting in the digital landscape, and it’s giving social content a second life.
As of July 2025, Instagram has joined the list of social platforms whose public posts can appear in Google search results. That means your Reels, photos and captions from professional accounts could start showing up alongside your brand’s blog posts, landing pages and other SEO-friendly content.
Instagram isn’t alone. Google is already indexing public content from TikTok, YouTube, Reddit, LinkedIn, Facebook Pages, Pinterest and X (formerly Twitter). And it’s not just Google. AI tools and assistants are starting to scan and summarize public content — including social posts — to give users fast answers.
For social marketers, this shift opens up a new opportunity: thinking of social content not just as ephemeral, but as discoverable, too.
Social content is no longer just for the feed
Traditionally, social media and SEO have lived in separate silos. Social was about authentic engagement. SEO was about long-term visibility.
Now those lines are starting to blur.
When you create a social post that answers a question, shares a helpful tip or explains something clearly, it has the potential to show up in search results. It might even be pulled into an AI-generated summary. In other words: A well-written caption or a strategic carousel can have staying power well beyond the day it’s posted.
Now, that doesn’t mean every post needs to be evergreen or optimized with keywords. But it does mean that your most thoughtful, helpful content should be doing more than collecting likes.
How AI is changing the game
AI tools are increasingly shaping how people find and interact with information. You have undoubtedly used Google AI Overviews to get answers quickly.
To generate their answers, these tools don’t just scan websites and blogs. They’re pulling insights from all kinds of public content, including social media. This is especially the case if social posts are explanatory in nature. If your post is clear, direct and useful, it has a shot at being featured in an AI-generated answer. If it’s vague, overly clever or features a play on words that only make sense in context with an image or video, it’s likely to be skipped over.
So, while you don’t need to write *for* AI, potentially tapping into the reach it could help provide you is worth writing with clarity and purpose.
Three ways to make your social content more searchable
To get your social posts to appear in search results, you don’t have to overhaul your entire social strategy. It’s as simple as starting to think differently about how a few key posts are crafted.
Write captions with clarity
Aim for language that’s easy to understand, even when it’s not in the context of the social platform itself. Think of your caption like a microblog: Can it stand on its own and deliver value?
Use keywords your audience is searching for
Skip the brand jargon and use the language your customers use. Social listening can help here. What questions are your audience members asking in the comments or search bars?
Let your evergreen content do the heavy lifting
Highlight your FAQs. Share quick how-tos. Reuse and repackage your strongest content across social, web and email. If it’s helpful once, it’ll be helpful again.
Not every post needs to pull double duty
Before you start rewriting every caption to rank on Google, let’s be clear: Not all social content needs to serve a search function. And it shouldn’t.
Some posts are meant to celebrate a moment. Show personality. Spark conversation. Be fun for fun’s sake. That’s the heart of social, and it matters just as much as strategy.
But mixing in a few posts each month that are intentionally built for long-term visibility? That’s a smart move. It’s about balance. When your feed includes both timely engagement and thoughtfully crafted evergreen content, your brand benefits in the short and long runs.
