A trending subject in the search industry is the influence of social media on SEO. With the outburst of digital marketing everywhere, people are investing more in search engine optimization. Billions of people around the globe spend most of their free time browsing social media. If you want to market your product on a platform, the first thing you would look for is the audience. So, since social media holds most of these audiences, it is seen as a platform that could impact SEO.
Social media SEO refers to how social media activities can be used for boosting your website’s traffic through search engines. This topic never gets old. Social media and SEO are closely related as it not only makes SEO activities effective but also productive. Although social media and SEO may look different from each other, they do help each other in many ways!
Let us dive into the link between social media and SEO and how social media can help SEO build authority and visibility!
Importance of Social Media for SEO
Social media does not influence SEO directly. Social signals don’t directly help rank better, but the links you share on social media can help your brand get a good exposure, but Google does not see them as a ranking signal. So, although social media is not a ranking factor, it has great importance if you look at it deeply!
Though Google does not include social media pages in their rankings, it does index them. It means there are chances in the future they may incorporate social ranking factors. It is just a possibility!
Here are some of the advantages social media can have on your brand.
1. Visibility
Many people find it difficult to find what they search for on the internet. Social media provides a platform to help deliver information about your products or services to a broader audience. The reach of your message depends on the density of your followers!
You will build visibility for your brand by using social media, and it can eventually lead many to see your business name or learn about your product. It can capably fetch you customers.
2. Authority
The existence of your brand can be gauged through your presence on social media. People usually tend to trust brands they can conveniently interact with., and it can be accomplished through social media!
You are showcasing your brand on social media to a vast audience, so you need to post things that are worth hearing about. Social media helps you collect data and understanding of your audience from their engagements and behaviours. With the data collected, you will be able to provide content they wish to see!
3. Social proof
Search engines pay attention to what is known as social proof. People usually tend to turn to people we trust for recommendations on specific products or services. Most of them ask their friends and family while some ask their colleagues at work!
Now, many turn to social media. People value influencers’ recommendations. People also look for reviews from others.
How It Impacts Search Rankings
You may not experience a sudden jump to the top spot overnight with social media marketing, but you will be able to see an increase in your SERP rankings with social media!
Here are some of their impacts on search rankings
1. Increased Traffic
One of the things social media can do is improve your traffic. Sharing new content and resharing still relevant content can up your traffic significantly.
You can continue driving traffic as people engage with your content or share it on their network. Search engines use traffic and associated statistics like dwell time fro determining the quality of your content!
2. Backlink Generation
Shares can affect in increasing the reach to a broader audience. Shares can also direct a good number of links back to your website. Google and other search engines rank the number of authoritative sites linking back to your site!
Shares and engagements can direct authority and quality to search engines. People tend to share content that is highly informative or entertaining!
3. Bounce rates and clicks
The number of brand searches can be increased by building your audience. As a user clicks on your page while running a search, search engines consider it as a signal that your content is a good match for the searched keywords. It can push your ranking higher!
Most of these clicks will usually have a lower bounce rate. It is another signal search engines use to check how well the content meets user intent.
Optimize Social Media On Your Website
You have an idea of how social media impacts SEO efforts. Next, we should think of how to go about improving your social media optimization! Optimizing social media can be pretty difficult because getting shares and comments is up to the users.
However, there are a few things you could do to encourage people to share, comment, and link!
Content- Quality content creation can increase your chances of getting users to engage in your posts. Discover what content your users love or ask them about the content they want to see. Here is where the importance of data analytics from social media plays a vital role.
Easy Sharing- Always make your content easy to share. The social media sharing on your blog means it takes just a click or two to share something. You can also share your content on social media platforms that will allow users to reshare your links and content across those platforms!
After you have done everything, you must measure your progress. Measuring your metrics will help you in keeping track of social media shares per post or see how much social referral traffic you are generating. Always be clear about your actions before jumping into social media SEO. Letting go of guesswork and concentrating more on the data side can give you much clarity to move forward. After all, we can say that social media does influence SEO in SERP many ways!
