Social interactions like +1s on GooglePlus, Facebook comments, etc. are called social signals.
Google has been elevating the importance given to social signals as part of its ranking algorithm for several years now.
Note: Google encourages website owners to build their social media presence as a long-term investment to drive qualified traffic, rather than 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 assessing social media signals, as social trends and relationships tend to change too quickly to fully map out. Without a perfect ‘map,’ Google is understandably reticent to assign more importance to social signals over other aspects of their search algorithm. In summary, Google’s strategy is to “wait and see” how things develop over time, as websites that provide real value develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the websites that Google naturally wants to display higher in its search listings.
Social Signals – Which Sites Matter?
Social media sites that search engines like Google look to when measuring social signals include:
With over 1.5 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the most dominant social media community in the world. It has been estimated that an average post can reach over 100,000 users, so even if it seems like Facebook is not driving a ton of sales on your website, don’t be quick to dismiss the importance of Facebook in your online business strategy, as Google uses social data and information from Facebook to help determine your search rankings. In fact, research shows that Facebook seems to have the most influence on search engine rankings of all social media sites.
(Number of monthly active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the next biggest social media site in the world, with over half a billion tweets sent out every single day. Twitter plays a significant role as a global influencer online and places great emphasis on tweeting posts that provide great value to readers over the volume of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million tweets are sent every single day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
Google Plus
As Google’s own social networking site, GooglePlus naturally carries great authority online, even if it is still a fledgling online community compared to sites like Twitter and Facebook.
(More people are interacting on GooglePlus each day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
In addition to the big 3 social media giants listed above, there are a number of other social sites that should not be ignored, such as Pinterest, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Digg, and Reddit.
(A number of social media sites provide important signals to search engines that could affect your rankings)
Which Social Signals Should You Be Paying Attention To?
Search engines track various social signals, including the following:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook likes, comments, and shares you have, growth rate of likes and shares, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. how many tweets and retweets your web page has, how influential the person sharing the URL is, trending topics, etc.
- GooglePlus – e.g. who is following you (influential users), how many people follow you, amount and growth rate of +1s, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. number of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, upvotes on Digg, etc.
- Not so obvious signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious social media-related factors that can influence search engine rankings. These include positive and undesirable factors, such as backlinks from authority sites (not as influential as they once were, but still a factor) [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be irrelevant by site reviewers [negative].
As a business owner, it’s important to not only find ways to develop your social media presence, but also to be able to track and analyze your social media marketing in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media marketing can help improve your results online)
Social media monitoring allows you to find insights into your brand’s overall visibility on social media, help you take preventative measures against the spread of negative comments or feedback by dissatisfied users, spy on your competitors, measure the impact of campaigns, and identify opportunities for engagement. Additionally, social media monitoring can also provide you with valuable information about emerging trends and what consumers and clients are thinking about specific products, businesses, topics, or brands.
As a business intelligence tool, the ability to track social media is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, typically carried out by various people including market researchers, marketing professionals, online reputation management (ORM) agencies, professional sales reps, social marketing agencies, and social engagement and community personnel. Typically, smaller businesses do not have the budget to pay a social media monitoring service to track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately various providers have developed tools that facilitate the monitoring of a wide range of social media channels, allowing companies to identify what is being said online about their brands or products so they can respond to conversations and engage with online users in a timely fashion.
We have written a detailed article about social media measurement tools and technologies that are worth knowing about here:
(Are you searching for an effective way to measure social signals?)
In this article, you will learn about a simple, yet highly effective social tracking plugin for WordPress and growing your social media influence.
Our Recommended WordPress Product Is …
SocialMetricsPro – Social Media Analytics WordPress Plugin
Description Of Plugin
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-use social media analytics WordPress plugin that is designed to make increasing your social media exposure uncomplicated. It is built on a simple premise – the tool tracks and measures how each signal is performing and returns either a green or red indicator. The site owner’s task is simple … convert all the red squares into greens.
(Social Metrics Pro provides a system that any website owner can operate … simply turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts that receive the most shares are colored green. Posts with low social media activity display amber and red.
The developers of Social Metrics Pro tested their plugin on a network of 2,000+ sites over a period of 3 months. During this period, all they focused on was turning the “reds” to “greens” and then keeping everything “green”. From these tests, they were able to notice 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 their revenue increased by 310%.
(According to SocialMetricsPro developers, focusing on improving your social media marketing can dramatically affect your search engine rankings, traffic and revenue!)
Learn more here:
Benefits Of Using Social Metrics Pro
Below we have listed just a few of the benefits and advantages of using Social Metrics Pro to track Likes, Tweets, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WordPress Dashboard on your website:
Be Up And Running In No Time
Social Metrics Pro is really easy to install. Simply upload a zip folder that contains the plugin files to your Plugin folder via your WP dashboard and activate.
Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the site owner’s goal is to convert reds into greens. The plugin tracks and measures social media signals so you know which campaigns require investing more effort and which need to be better optimized.
Track Only Social Signals From Social Networks You Care About
Social Metrics Pro lets you centrally monitor social activity across leading social networks like Facebook, GooglePlus, Twitter, Digg, Pinterest, StumbleUpon, and LinkedIn.
SocialMetricsPro lets you easily answer questions like:
- Which social media 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 SocialMetricsPro, all of this information is available on-demand, with a single click.
(Social Metrics Pro constantly tracks the social media sites that you care most about!)
Product Features
SocialMetricsPro provides web site owners with many features. Below we have listed just a few of these:
- Quick and easy to install and implement. Be up and running in minutes.
- SocialMetricsPro Is Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality using built-in and external widgets. Access the latest stats from your WP admin bar, add popular content to your sidebar or anywhere on your site using widgets.
- 1-click updating. Update Social Metrics Pro in a single click via the WordPress Updates page, or update the manually manually. You can also choose to receive an email notification whenever new plugin updates are released.
- Uses very little resources. Metric reports are compiled very quickly, using minimal hosting resources. Report generation also displays the amount of time spent retrieving information and the server memory consumed when gathering data.
Additional features include:
- Sort, Search And Filter Features: SocialMetricsPro allows you to sort, search and filter data however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by category, post authors, post type, or publishing date.
- Export Data: You can export filtered data and custom queries to 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 more reds into greens!)
User Feedback
Here are just some testimonials that plugin customers have written about SocialMetricsPro:
”Our entire marketing strategy relies on social media. Each post on the site has viral potential, but we needed one place to see which social networks are performing the best for us…We went ahead and got the PRO Version of Social Metrics.” Syed Balkhi, Founder of List25 and WPBeginner.com
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”If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve.” Goes one of the most important sayings in business. And this is particularly true for tracking of your social mentions I found. There were two things that helped me a great deal to increase sharing after installing Social Metrics: First, I was able to see that some of my articles would perform much better on networks I wasn’t particularly using, such as StumbleUpon for example. Secondly, I could filter out the best performing content more easily and analyse what makes my readers share. Since then I have focused strongly on producing and replicating those posts that performed best.” Leo Widrich, Co-Founder of Buffer
SocialMetricsPro Plugin – Useful Tips
SocialMetricsPro includes a practical, step-by-step guide containing useful advice on how to optimize your social media strategy (i.e. how to turn reds into greens).
SocialMetricsPro Plugin Support
SocialMetricsPro is well-supported, and users get lifetime software upgrades and new releases for free with their purchase, backed by a no-risk, sixty-day, complete refund guarantee.
Software Cost
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License – This edition allows you to configure Social Metrics Pro on a single website. Price includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multiple Sites License – This lets you set up SocialMetricsPro on multiple web sites that you own. Includes free lifetime updates and free support. Price = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: Current pricing for the Social Metrics Pro plugin depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The above reflects the current price when this review was published. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the plugin author when you visit the website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details:
Additional Info
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
In Conclusion
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 you immediate feedback on the success of your social media marketing campaigns and shows you how and where to improve your results.
SocialMetricsPro is ideal for beginners and advanced WordPress users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WP dashboard.
Get this plugin if you own or manage WordPress sites and want to measure your social media marketing results professionally.
For more information, visit the plugin website here: Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics Plugin For WordPress
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