Social interactions like Facebook comments, Twitter retweets and mentions, etc. are called social signals.
With the rising importance of social sites like Facebook and Twitter, search engines like Google and Bing have started taking into account various social signals to help determine a website’s ranking.
Note: Google encourages businesses to build their social presence as a long-term investment to drive qualified traffic, instead of aiming for short-term benefits like search ranking placement. Google’s own head of its web spam team Matt Cutts has stated that Google takes a cautious approach when it comes to social media, as social trends and relationships can change at a moment’s notice. Without a full ‘map,’ Google is understandably reticent to assign too much importance to the social sphere over other aspects of their search algorithm. In short, Google’s strategy is to “wait and see” how things develop over time, as websites that provide value develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the sites that Google naturally wants to ascribe higher search rankings to.
Social Signal Sources
Social sites that search engines like Google and Bing look to when measuring social signals include:
With more than 1.5 billion active users, Facebook is the most influential social media community on the planet. It has been estimated that a single post can reach up to 150,000 users, so even if no one is buying your products or services on Facebook, don’t be quick to dismiss Facebook as an important part of your online business strategy, as Google processes social data and information from Facebook to help determine your search rankings. In fact, Facebook seems influence search rankings more than other social media sites, like Google+ and Twitter.
(Number of monthly active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the second largest social media site in the world, with over half a billion tweets sent out each day. Twitter plays a significant role as a global influencer on the cybersphere and places great importance on tweeting posts that provide value to readers over the number of tweets sent …
(Over half a billion tweets are sent each day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
Google Plus
As Google’s own social site, Google+ naturally carries a significant degree of authority online, even if it has not reached the same level of growth and take up as Facebook and Twitter.
(More people are interacting socially on GooglePlus every day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
In addition to the big three social media giants listed above, there are a number of other sites that should not be ignored, like Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit, Digg, and StumbleUpon.
(Social media sites provide important signals to search engines that can affect your rankings)
Social Signals – Which Ones Should You Be Paying Attention To?
Search engines like Bing and Google track various social signals, including:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook shares, likes, and comments a person has, growth rate of shares and likes, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. tweets and retweets, how influential the person tweeting is, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (high profile users), how many followers on GooglePlus a site page has, amount and growth rate of +1s, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. growth rate of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, upvotes on StumbleUpon, etc.
- Other signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious factors that can indirectly influence search traffic. These include desirable and negative factors, such as age and authority of your social media account [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be irrelevant by site reviewers [negative].
As a website owner, it’s not only important to develop your social media presence, but also to be able to monitor and analyze your social media marketing campaigns in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media can help improve your business results)
Monitoring social media activity allows you to find insights into your brand’s overall visibility on social media, avert crises, assess competitor activity, spot market opportunities, and measure the impact of your marketing campaigns. It can also provide valuable data about emerging trends and what consumers and clients are thinking about specific businesses, topics, brands, or products.
As a tool for business intelligence, the ability to monitor social media is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, often carried out by a cross-section of groups that include PR companies, market researchers, marketing teams, social media marketing agencies, sales teams, and social engagement and community personnel. Typically, many small businesses do not can’t afford to pay social media monitoring professionals to track their coverage in the and actively monitor their online reputation.
Fortunately various technology companies have developed many tools that facilitate the active monitoring of a variety of social media channels, allowing you to identify what consumers are saying about your products or brand so you can respond to conversations and engage with online users in a timely fashion.
We have written a comprehensive article about social media tracking tools that will help you manage, measure, and analyze your social media marketing campaigns here:
(Are you monitoring social signals effectively?)
In this article, we review a simple, yet effective plugin for WordPress users for tracking social media signals and increasing your social media influence.
Let’s Review …
SocialMetricsPro – Social Media Analytics WordPress Plugin
Description Of Plugin
SocialMetricsPro is an easy-to-use social media analytics WordPress plugin that is designed to help users grow their social media influence in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – SocialMetricsPro tracks how each signal is performing and returns either a red or green indicator. Your objective is simple … turn reds into greens.
(A standard operating procedure that any user can follow … turn all the reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts that get shared the most show up green. Posts with low social media activity are colored amber or red.
The developers of SocialMetricsPro tested their plugin on a network of 2,000+ sites over a period of three months. During this period, all they focused on was turning the “reds” to “greens” and then keeping everything “green”. From these tests, they noticed that their top 10 best performing sites saw an improvement of up to 360% more traffic, 410% more keywords ranked in the first page of Google and they also experienced a 310% increase in revenues.
(According to Social Metrics Pro developers, improving your social marketing can result in higher search rankings, increased traffic and an increase in revenue!)
More info:
Benefits
Here we have listed just a few of the benefits and advantages of using Social Metrics Pro to track Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WordPress Dashboard on your site:
Quick And Simple To Install And Implement. Be Up And Running In Very Little Time.
SocialMetricsPro is very easy to install. Just upload the plugin file to your Plugins folder via your WordPress dashboard and activate.
Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, your job is to convert red squares into greens. The plugin tracks and measures social signals so you know where to invest more effort and where to optimize.
Track Social Signals You Care About
SocialMetricsPro allows you to track and monitor social activity from social media networks like GooglePlus, Twitter, Facebook, StumbleUpon, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Digg directly from your WordPress admin area.
SocialMetricsPro helps you get answers to questions like:
- Which social networks work best for my site?
- Which posts are performing the best on these social networks?
- Which are my most popular posts?
- And more …
With Social Metrics Pro, all this information is available on-demand, with a single click.
(Social Metrics Pro constantly tracks the sites that you care most about!)
Features
Social Metrics Pro provides a number of features to web site owners. Here are just a few:
- Quick and simple to install and use. Ready to use in no time.
- Social Metrics Pro Is Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend its functionality using built-in and external widgets. Social Metrics Pro displays the latest stats from your WP admin bar, display socially popular content on your sidebar or anywhere in your site using point-and-click widgets.
- One-click updating. You can update Social Metrics Pro with a single click via the WordPress Updates page, or update it manually. You can also opt to receive an email notification whenever a new version is released.
- Low server resource consumption. Reporting is in seconds, consuming minimal hosting resources. Report generation also displays the amount of time spent retrieving the information and the server resources consumed when gathering data.
Additional plugin features include:
- Sort, Search And Filter Features: Social Metrics Pro lets you sort, search and filter the data however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by post type, publishing date, category, or post authors.
- Export Data: You can export and plot data in Excel for further analysis. Data can be exported in tab-delimited and comma-separated file formats, and imported to Excel or the spreadsheet application of your choice.
(SocialMetricsPro is simple to use … just change all reds into greens!)
Feedback From Product Customers
Here are just a few of the testimonials and comments that plugin customers have submitted regarding Social Metrics Pro:
”Social Metrics is the easiest way to see at a glance which posts have performed well on social networks.” Kevin Muldoon, Founder of WPMods.com
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”Social Metrics is one of the recipes for Social WordPress. You can integrate it quickly and easily on your WordPress site to view your performance on social networks” Jean-Francois Arseneault, Arseneault Consultation
Plugin Tips
SocialMetricsPro comes with a step-by-step guide on how to optimize your site for social media success (i.e. how to turn reds into greens).
Plugin Support
Social Metrics Pro is well-supported, and comes with free lifetime updates and support, backed by a no-risk, sixty-day, 100% money-back guarantee.
Product Pricing
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site Licensing – This license option allows you to install Social Metrics Pro on 1 web site only. Price includes free lifetime updates and support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multiple Sites License – This enables you to run Social Metrics Pro on unlimited sites that you own. It includes free lifetime updates and free support. Price = $47.00 (one-time).
Note: The cost of purchasing SocialMetricsPro depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. Currently, the plugin sells for the pricing shown above. This may or may not be the actual pricing charged by the plugin author when you visit the plugin website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing here:
Additional Information
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Download The Product
As mentioned earlier, social signals impact search engine rankings and Google has been elevating the importance given to social signals as part of its ranking algorithm.
No website owner can afford to ignore how important social media is to their online success. Social Metrics Pro solves the problem of how to find a simple, time-saving solution that gives website owners instant feedback on the success of their social media marketing campaigns and shows them where and how to improve their results.
Social Metrics Pro is an ideal tool for beginners and advanced users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WordPress dashboard.
Get this plugin if you own or manage WordPress sites and want to save money on outsourcing your social marketing or train your staff to manage your campaigns in-house.
For complete details, check out the plugin here: Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics Plugin
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