We don’t have a choice on whether we do social media, the question is how well we do it?”
― Erik Qualman
The meaning of the term “social media” has changed its literal function considerably in present times. The way it was considered some time ago is not the same now. Earlier, popular social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Google + and others were used just for entertainment and fun purposes. But with time, the whole concept of social media has faced a sea change.
What are social media SIGNALS?
Nowadays huge importance is given to the social media signals. Here we discuss for you how you can actually use these social signals for SEO in 2013 and do all justice to your online business. But before heading towards that, let us first understand the role and importance of social media in online business world.
How signals help?
Starting from retention, sales, lead generation and customer support, the social media graph goes up with content marketing, marketing campaign and finally spreading brand awareness. Yes! You are right, social signals are used widely to create brand awareness for one’s business.
Image Credit :- connectionmodel.com
It is indeed impossible to ignore the role and importance of social media in today’s world where everything depends so much upon the online world. Along with using these signals for promotion and brand creation, it is also imperative to incorporate the traditional and effective SEO techniques and let your business get noticed by the potential customers.
Moving further, it has been seen these days that customers are more likely to have faith in the site that is recommended by their colleagues, friends than by some search engine. So, the sites with powerful social presence are surely more easily accessible and are more recommended. The search engines too can analyze the shares as the recommendations thereby boosting the overall rankings and credibility of a site.
How Signals Benefit Sites?
The sites with great social presence too have far better brand loyalty as well as conversion rate thus resulting in more sales, more referrals, better brand awareness and more of positive reviews with better inbound links.
The much effective and successful SEO campaigns focus on creating fresh, original and search engine friendly content along with natural links. But have you ever imagined the huge benefit that can come along if you use the special signals to your advantage.
Hope you must have understood by now why it is important to use social media signals. So, coming back to the point of how we can use the social media for SEO In 2013, have a look below:
Facebook, Twitter and Google +
Facebook likes and shares are really important as they help one to see that others have approved of what you offer. Further, the Facebook comments show that your audiences are really interested in your posts, images etc and are actively participating in the same. Twitter too has proved to be a very useful marketing instrument for the online business. More the number of followers you have, more are the chances of building authority for your business/profile. Also, Google + signals i.e. the +1 has been considered to be a positive signal that shows the number of people who like your posts, pages etc. Greater the number of +1s, your profile surely becomes strong and highly authoritative.
You can also match the audiences and site through proper strategic content that links to the target website i.e. your own site. At Facebook, you can link to the stories and updates by people and about people. Then Twitter lets you link to the figures and facts and at the end, LinkedIn helps to link to employment stats, career tips, job openings and more.
Other Social Media Sites Worth Considering
LinkedIn, Flickr, YouTube and Pinterest are the other sites that help in spreading a word about your business as well. These sites have proved really beneficial for the professionals and businesses. At Pinterest, people can pin your things that they like and this can add more credibility to your profile/business. So, be it a post, image or sharing anything, Pinterest serves as a good way of reaching out to the audiences and growing the viewership.
Pinterest is basically about sharing the content all across the World Wide Web. Pin It option allows the readers to post picture or post to the account to start sharing. It is indeed a great way to have more mileage from everything on your site.
Create Back Links Using Giveaways on Social Media Sites
Another way to use the social media signals for SEO is through offer giveaways on your social media accounts/profiles. With this, you will not just be able to earn some valuable links, you can also generate social buzz. Giveaways serve as amazing ways to create natural, original links as they lead to the social shares in the most natural way.
As soon as you decide which giveaway to offer, you can then move towards creating pages and providing these giveaways on the social media sites. This way, the potential customers will get attracted towards your business thereby adding to more sales and profits. Social signals are indeed becoming new link when it comes to talking about importance in ranking algorithm. Having a look at this post on SEJ will let you understand completely why and how you can use social signals for SEO.
To Conclude
So, when SEO is your ultimate goal, the social media signals truly have implications for the organic search positions and rankings. Obviously the signals include followers and likes but the more important ones are shares, links and tweets. You need to pay due attention to the point that not just the number of likes is important, but actually what these shares and likes actually do for your business or site SEO.
