Social media marketing can and should be a valuable ally of SEO. Here are 5 social strategies that can help support SEO performance.
How Does Social Media Impact Website SEO?
First, it’s important to recognize that social media does
not directly boost search rankings.
There’s a lot of mixed messaging out there on this topic,
despite numerous studies and claims.
Google itself has sent out conflicting signals – Matt Cutts, who was the head of Google’s webspam team at the time, released a video in 2010 claiming, “Yes, I can confirm it. We do use Twitter and Facebook links in ranking, as we always have in our web search rankings…”
Google, he explained, crawls the web for information, effectively taking a snapshot of that moment in time. But social media is updating constantly and sending incomplete signals, so it’s not providing a comprehensive picture.
You might be thinking, “Okay, so links to my content on
social media are good for SEO, but the number of followers and likes I have
don’t affect my ranking. Right?”
Search engines are also limited by the challenge of
assessing the true identity and authority of social profiles, which makes it
difficult for them to know how much value to give a link.
We know that Google doesn’t consider a share on Facebook to be equivalent to a backlink from an authority site. But social media does influence SEO in other, less direct ways, including:
Distributes content.
Raises brand awareness.
Enhances brand reputation and authority.
Improves the lifespan of a post.
Increases organic traffic and online visibility.
All of these benefits add up to have a notable impact on
your SEO ranking.
5 Ways social media Supports Organic Search Marketing Campaigns
1. Create Link Opportunities
The number one opportunity on this list is also the hardest
to achieve.
The difficulty lies on the recipient side rather than the
actual implementation because this method is passive. It’s dependent on a third-party
taking action without a direct push from you.
I mentioned before that a link on Facebook isn’t equivalent to a backlink on another site. But the Facebook link did make me aware of the content’s existence so I could reference it on my website.
2. Increase Brand Awareness and Positive Mentions
Google’s Search Quality Raters Guideline document shows
human raters do factor brand mentions into the equation when considering a
website’s reliability. That doesn’t mean the algorithm does, as well — but we
know these guidelines are representative of what matters to Google.
This is where social media can play a major role in the overall perception of your brand. Companies with a strong social media presence and who respond directly to their customers there see a noticeable increase in overall satisfaction.
3. Build Partnerships
Although I still systematically share content on social
media in a tried-and-true fashion, I’ve been shifting more of my time toward
building relationships on social that are likely to lead to potential
partnerships.
But these platforms were originally designed to connect people and foster relationships, and they still excel at that function.
Brand advocates: Active social media fans who are loyal to
your brand and promote you for free, multiplying your effectiveness without
costing an extra penny.
Organic influencers: Unlike paid influencers, these are social
media accounts that have genuine expertise, authority, and trustworthiness (the
E-A-T formula) within your industry. Any positive endorsements of your brand,
products, or services carry a lot of weight with their engaged audiences.
Strategic partners: Non-competitive businesses or influencers within your niche who are willing to partner up and co-create valuable content that taps into both of your audiences for crossover marketing opportunities.
4. Establish Authority
Social media, content marketing, and SEO go hand-in-hand.
One of the primary benefits of content marketing is that if you’re consistently publishing high-quality content, you establish yourself as an expert within your niche over time.
People come to trust the information you provide, and that trust starts to encompass your brand as a whole.
That’s good news because Google’s evaluation of your website’s authority and trustworthiness plays a huge factor in your search ranking success.
5. Boost Content Lifespan and Engagement
We touched on this topic in the first point on this list when discussing link opportunities.
You might be writing and publishing amazing content but if people aren’t finding it, you’re not getting the traffic and backlinks you should be.
Sharing your content on social media platforms can help people discover your content and brand. But just as importantly, it can give the content a longer lifecycle as it’s shared and circulated.
The first trick here is to make sure your content is engaging.
If it’s not, it doesn’t matter what you do – people aren’t going to be
interested.
Google Source: 5 Social Media Strategies You Can Use to Boost Your SEO - Search Engine Journal
