Why do I need to improve social signals for my business?

  • Social media activity is on the rise, and we can harness that for your company.
  • While it is not clear exactly how social media play a role in site rankings, the importance of social signals in SEO is increasing.
  • Google and other search engines like engagement, so the more your content is liked and shared, the higher it will rank.
  • Most likely, your competitors are using social media signals to increase engagement and promote sales.
  • Our social signals service will help you create more shareable content and analyze the effect social media has in driving traffic to your site.

Social Signals for Business

The role played by social signals in SEO is mysterious.

Certainly a social media presence has become an integral part of online marketing campaigns. Social activity drives traffic to other parts of your online presence; whether you rely on organic content or paid promotion. But just how important are social signals when it comes down to that all-important ranking position?

Boosting Traffic

Traffic is the heart of this topic. Let’s start off by looking at some historical background. Ever since the Penguin algorithm update by Google, outbound links from social sites have been set to no-follow by default. Although no-follow links still produce traffic, marketers and search optimizers hoped to pick up more traffic from social media.

While the links themselves have been cast aside, Google definitely DOES look at inbound traffic generated by social activity when it’s ranking pages. Social signals are also a strong positive indicator to the search engine that your site is an active subject of discussion and that the odds are good that there’s a real human presence taking responsibility for your social media presence. Social signals measure engagement, and Google loves engagement.

When you stop talking about plain social signals (likes and mentions) and get into sharing, you enter a whole new world of optimization value. Strong content gets shared, and this sharing often takes the form of broadcasting links socially. This is where social signals become traffic multipliers and start playing a dramatic role in SEO work.

Building Better Social Links

Links propagated on a social network do not carry the same heft and relevance as a formal web citation or an editorial link on a prestigious site.

The popularity of various SEO techniques tends to ebb and flow over time, and the reputations of traditional link building and guest posting are a subject of debate. Keep your link building expectations realistic, procure relevant links, and leverage them for a positive impact.

The advantage of social links is that they come with a little helping of built-in authority, especially if they’re coming from prominent platforms. That’s why they’ve proven to be so effective at boosting your notoriety and driving traffic to your site.

You want to make the most of this newfound source of attention by preparing your site to deal with it. You need landing pages that are optimized for the type of traffic they’ll receive from social mentions. They should be prepared to track that traffic and put it to good use. Pay special attention to the profiles and user data on your social accounts; these can be valuable sources of inbound traffic to your main site.

If you’re posting YouTube videos, each one should feature a strong link in its description. Your Twitter profile, and all other social profiles, must include a site link in its profile.

Building More Authority

If the link between social signals and site ranking is murky, any ties between social activity and domain authority are even less well-defined. This hasn’t stopped many experts from postulating a definite link there. Strong social signals and high authority go hand in hand. It all builds trust online.

Joining The Social Conversation

Hopefully, considering the role of social signals vis-a-vis SEO should inspire you to give social media marketing more emphasis in all of your future efforts. As we move into the future, it’s virtually certain that the big social platforms will end up better and better represented on the results page.

Your primary focus should be on generating content that’s attention-grabbing and easy to share. This will enhance your social reputation and send plenty of traffic your way.

Just keep in mind that social media is an inherently two-way street. Make sure you’re reacting to social media developments as well as spreading your own content.

A healthy social media account can be leveraged into a significant asset for all of your online activities, and it can deliver a lot of traffic and an authority boost to your primary site.

Read what Jayson DeMers MOZ has to say about social signals, for more Business to Business Marketing information, visit here.