Search engine optimization, the process of organically improving your web presence in search results, entails many moving parts. One such part is social media. Many people have a hard time believing that social media impacts their SEO. They wonder how on earth Facebook can help them rank in search results. The truth is that it totally can. Social Media Today wrote a great article on whether or not social media has any SEO impact, and they found that it did. They offered 12 ways that your social media impacts your SEO and below we discuss our 6 favorites.
6 Ways Social Media Affects SEO
1. Social Media Shares Build Links
When you post popular content on social media, you are likely to see interaction in the form of likes (favorites), comments, and shares (retweets, pins, +1’s). The main metric here that affects your SEO is the share. If you post an amazing blog on your website and then post a link to it on your Facebook page, you have just given yourself one inbound link. And as you may recall, inbound links are seen as votes in the eyes of search engines, and are therefore very important to SEO. Each time that one of your followers shares this post on their social site, you receive another inbound link!
2. Increases Your Online Presence
Having a website is the number one way to establish an online presence. But having a presence on social media channels can expand this presence exponentially! According to Social Media Today, “if you do not have a larger presence, you are less likely to be found organically which means more money being spent on advertisements to gain new clients”. Joining several social media sites will ensure that users can find you whether they are searching in Google, Facebook, or other popular social sites.
3. Social Profiles Turn Up in Search Results
Social media profiles do turn up in search results, meaning that when someone searches for your product or service, your Facebook page may turn up just as easily as your website. Having your social profiles fully optimized will ensure that they can get found when people are searching for your keywords. Wouldn’t it be great if your homepage and social profiles turned up as the top 3-5 search results for your targeted keyword?
4. Social Channels are Their Own Search Engines
Have you ever gone straight to Facebook for information on a restaurant’s Happy Hour deals or searched for the answer to an important question on YouTube? You’re not the only one. Social media sites are actually search engines in their own right. People go to social sites like Facebook and Google+ every single day to search for companies or “how to” videos. Having a social presence ensures that you can help current and future customers no matter their search engine of choice.
5. Google Uses Twitter to Search for New Content
Social Media Today found that Google does indeed use Twitter to locate new content to add to an index. Various ranking factors including “re-tweets, the amount of time people link to and tweet your content, and how quickly it was shared over a certain time” help Google discover and rank content. Having a Twitter presence and working to optimize it will increase your odds of ranking in Google search results.
6. Keywords Can Be Used as Hashtags on Social Sites
Hashtags are popular topics on social media that are signified by the phrase and a pound symbol (i.e. #SEO). These hashtags make it easier for social sites to index trending topics and for users to search for and participate in conversations about these topics. Using your keywords as hashtags will help you join conversations about your keywords and will assist others in finding your account when searching for the particular hashtag.
If you weren’t convinced before, we hope you are now. Social media and search engine optimization truly work together to increase your online presence. If you need assistance with social media management or search engine optimization, please call Informatics.
