Social interactions and recommendations like +1s on Google+, Facebook comments, shares, and likes, etc. are called social signals.
With the rising importance of social sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Google and Bing have started taking into account various social signals to help determine a site’s ranking.
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 the web spam team Matt Cutts has stated that Google takes a cautious approach when it comes to social media, 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 short, Google’s strategy is to “wait and see” how things develop over time, as sites that provide real value tend to develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the websites that Google naturally wants to display higher in its search results.
Social Signals – Which Social Media Sites Matter?
Social media sites that search engines like Google look to for measuring social signals include:
With more than 1.5 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the largest social network on the planet. It has been estimated that an average post on Facebook can reach over 100,000 users, so even if no one seems to be buying your products or services on Facebook, you should not be quick to dismiss the power of leveraging Facebook, as Google uses data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, research shows that Facebook seems to have the most influence on website rankings of all social media sites, like Google+ or Twitter.
(Number of monthly active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the next largest social media site in the world, with over 600 million tweets sent out every day. Twitter has a significant amount of influence online and places great importance on tweeting posts that provide great value to followers over the amount of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million tweets are sent each day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
Google+
As Google’s own social networking site, Google+ naturally carries great authority online, even if it is still a fledgling social community compared to sites like Twitter and Facebook.
(More people are starting to interact socially on GooglePlus each year. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big 3 listed above, there are a number of other sites that provide important social metrics, such as Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit, StumbleUpon, and Digg.
(Social media sites provide important signals that could affect your search rankings)
Social Signals – Which Ones Should You Be Paying Attention To?
Social signals tracked by search engines like Bing and Google include the following:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook likes, shares, and comments 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 your information is, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (high profile users), how many followers on Google+ a site page has amassed, number and growth rate of +1s, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. growth rate of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, comments on Reddit, etc.
- Not so obvious signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious social media-related signals that can indirectly influence search engine traffic and rankings. These include desirable and undesirable factors, such as improving clickthrough rate (CTR) [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be irrelevant by other users [negative].
As a business owner, it’s not only important to find ways to develop your social media presence, but also to be able to track, measure and analyze your social signals in order to improve your business results.
(Use social media to help improve your results online)
Social media monitoring allows you to gain insights into what people are saying about your products, brand, or company on social media, measure the impact of your marketing campaigns, help you take preventative measures if you detect negative comments or feedback by dissatisfied users, spot potential market opportunities, and spy on your competitors. Additionally, social media monitoring can also provide vital information about emerging trends and what consumers and clients think about specific products, businesses, topics, or brands.
As a tool for business intelligence, the ability to track social media channels like blogs, internet forums, news sites, micro-blogging platforms like Twitter, Quora, etc., message boards, video/photo sharing websites, and user-generated content is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, typically carried out by various groups that include digital reputation management (ORM) specialists, market researchers, marketing professionals, professional sales reps, social media marketing agencies, and social engagement and community personnel. Typically, small businesses do not have the budget to pay media monitoring professionals to track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately many technology companies have developed tools to facilitate the monitoring of a wide spectrum of social media channels, enabling companies to identify and even predict what consumers are saying about their products or brands allowing them to respond proactively to conversations and interact with online users in various social media platforms.
We have written a comprehensive article where we explore many social media tracking tools that you may want to check out. More info:
(Are you searching for an effective tool that can help you measure your social signals?)
In this article, we review a simple, yet effective plugin for WordPress sites for tracking social media signals and increasing your social media influence online.
Our Featured WordPress Plugin Is …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics Plugin For WordPress
Description Of Plugin
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-use social analytics plugin that is designed to help you increase your social media exposure online in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – Social Metrics Pro measures and tracks how each signal is performing and displays either a green or red indicator. The user’s task is to change more red squares into greens.
(Social Metrics Pro provides a standard operating procedure that anyone can operate … simply turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. This simplifies your social analytics. Posts that get shared the most display green. Posts with low social media activity show up amber and red.
The developers of SocialMetricsPro tested their plugin on a network of 2,000+ websites 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 were able to notice a 360% improvement in traffic for their top 10 performing sites, 410% more keywords ranked in the first page of Google and their revenue increased by 310%.
(According to the plugin developers, improving your social marketing can result in higher search engine rankings, increased web traffic and increased revenue!)
More info:
Benefits
Here are just some of the benefits and advantages of using SocialMetricsPro to track Likes, Tweets, +1s, Pins and more right from your WordPress Dashboard on your site:
Fast And Easy To Install And Configure. Ready To Start Using In Very Little Time.
SocialMetricsPro is quite easy to install. Simply upload it to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate.
Really Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the site owner’s goal is to change all red squares into greens. The plugin tracks and measures social signals so you know which campaigns need you to invest more effort and where to optimize.
Track Social Signals You Care About
Social Metrics Pro lets you centrally monitor social activity across leading social media networks like Google+, Facebook, Twitter, Digg, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and StumbleUpon 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 of this information is available on-demand, with a single click.
(Social Metrics Pro actively monitors social signals from the social media sites that you care most about!)
Social Metrics Pro Features
Social Metrics Pro offers WP users with many features. Here are just some:
- Fast and simple to install and use. Be up and running in very little time.
- Widgets And Extensions Ready. You can extend its functionality with external and built-in widgets. Social Metrics Pro displays updated stats from your WordPress admin bar, add social content to your sidebar or anywhere in your site using point-and-click widgets.
- 1-click upgrades. Update Social Metrics Pro in a single click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update the manually manually. You can also opt to receive email notifications whenever a new version is released.
- Plugin uses minimal server resources. Reporting is in seconds, using little hosting resources. Report generation also displays the amount of time used to retrieve the information and the server resources used to gather and compile the data.
Additional plugin features include:
- Sorting, Searching & Filtering Features: Social Metrics Pro allows you to sort, search and filter information however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by post authors, publishing date, post type, or by category.
- Export Data To Excel: You can export and plot filtered data and custom queries 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.
(Social Metrics Pro is really simple to use … just convert all reds into greens!)
Feedback From Users
Here are a few of the testimonials customers have submitted for SocialMetricsPro:
”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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”I give Social Metrics a big thumbs up and I recommend it to anyone who’s serious about tracking their social sharing analytics.” James Johnson, Senior Editor at The Inquisitr
SocialMetricsPro Plugin – Tips
SocialMetricsPro comes with a step-by-step, practical guide containing useful advice on how to optimize your campaigns and improve your social media strategy (i.e. turn reds into greens).
Product Support
Social Metrics Pro is well-supported, and comes with free support and free lifetime updates, backed by a risk-free, 60-day, complete refund guarantee.
Plugin Cost
SocialMetricsPro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License Edition – This lets you install SocialMetricsPro on a single domain. Pricing includes free lifetime updates and free support. Price = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multiple Sites License Edition – This edition allows you to run SocialMetricsPro on all the sites that you own. Includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Cost = $47.00 (one-time).
Note: Price details for this product 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 or may not be the actual price charged by the product author when you visit the site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after your purchase.
Check the plugin’s website for the latest price here:
Additional Information
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Install This 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 the importance of social media. 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 marketing strategy and guides you where to improve your results.
Social Metrics Pro is ideal for beginners and advanced WordPress users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WordPress dashboard.
We recommend Social Metrics Pro if you own or manage WordPress sites and would like to shorten your social media marketing learning curve.
To learn more, visit the plugin website here: SocialMetricsPro – Social Analytics Plugin For WordPress
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