Social interactions and recommendations like Twitter mentions and retweets, Facebook comments, shares, and likes, etc. are called social signals.
Google has been elevating the importance given to social signals as part of its ranking algorithm since late 2010.
Note: Google encourages website owners to build their social media presence as a long-term investment to drive qualified traffic, instead of aiming for short-term benefits like search ranking placement. Matt Cutts, the head of Google’s own web spam team has stated that Google takes a cautious approach when it comes to social signals, as so many things change quickly on social media. Without a reliable ‘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 websites that Google wants to rank higher in its search engine results.
Social Signal Sources
Social media sites that search engines like Google and Bing look to for measuring social signals include:
With more than 1.5 billion active users, Facebook is the most dominant social community on the planet. Research shows that an average post can reach up to 150,000 users, so even if it seems like Facebook is not driving droves of customers to your site, you should not be quick to dismiss the power of leveraging Facebook, as Google processes data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, Facebook seems influence search rankings more than other social media sites, like Twitter orGoogle+.
(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 every single day. Twitter plays a significant role as a global influencer online and places great emphasis on the authority of tweets posted to followers over the volume of tweets sent …
(Over half a billion tweets are sent every single day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
Google Plus
As Google’s own social media 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 socially on GooglePlus every day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
In addition to the big three listed above, there are a number of other social media networks that provide important social signals, like Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit, Digg, and StumbleUpon.
(A number of social sites provide important signals that can affect your search engine rankings)
Social Signals – Which Ones Should You Be Paying Attention To?
Social signals tracked by search engines include:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook likes, comments, and shares a person has, growth rate of likes and shares, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. how many tweets and retweets a site has, the number of people sending a tweet, 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 Reddit, etc.
- Not so obvious signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious social media-related factors that can indirectly influence search engine traffic and rankings. These include desirable and undesirable factors, such as backlinks from authority sites (not as important as they once were, but still a factor) [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be irrelevant by visitors [negative].
As a business owner, it’s not only important to find ways to grow your presence on major social networking websites, but also to be able to monitor, measure and analyze social media marketing in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media marketing can improve your results online)
Tracking social media activity allows you to gain insights into your company’s overall visibility on social media, spy on your competitors, help you take preventative measures if you detect negative comments or feedback by dissatisfied users, measure the impact of your marketing campaigns, and identify market opportunities. Additionally, monitoring social media can also provide you with vital data about emerging trends and what consumers and clients are thinking about specific topics, brands, businesses, or products.
As a business intelligence tool, being able to track activity on social media channels like blogs, forums, news sites, micro-blogging platforms like Twitter, Quora, etc., discussion groups, video sites, and user-generated content is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, often carried out by various groups that include market research, marketing professionals, digital reputation management companies, social media marketing agencies, sales teams, and social engagement and community personnel. Typically, small businesses don’t can’t afford to pay a social media monitoring service to track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately various providers have created tools to facilitate the active tracking of a variety of social media channels, allowing you to identify and even predict what is being said online about your brand so you can react to conversations and interact with online users in a timely fashion.
We have written a detailed article about social media monitoring tools that are worth checking out and knowing about. Go here to learn more:
(Are you searching for an effective way to measure your social signals?)
In this article, we explore a simple WordPress plugin for monitoring social signals and improving your social media presence.
Announcing …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics WordPress Plugin
Plugin Description
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-use social analytics plugin for WordPress that is designed to help you increase your social media presence in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – SocialMetricsPro measures and tracks how each signal is performing and returns either a green or red indicator. The site owner’s objective is to convert reds into greens.
(A standard operating procedure that anyone can operate … just turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts that receive the most shares display green. Posts with low social media activity display amber or red.
The developers of SocialMetricsPro tested their plugin on a network of over two thousand 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”. According to the plugin developers, they noticed a 360% improvement in traffic for their top 10 performing sites, 410% more keywords ranked in the first page of Google and they also experienced a 310% increase in revenues.
(According to the plugin developers, focusing on improving your social marketing campaigns can result in better search engine rankings, more web traffic and more revenue!)
Learn more here:
Plugin Benefits
Here we have listed just some 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 web site:
Installation Is Easy, Quick & Simple
SocialMetricsPro is quite easy to install. Just upload the plugin file to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate.
Very Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, your task is to change reds into greens. Social Metrics Pro tracks and measures social media signals so you know where to put more effort and which campaigns need to be better optimized.
Track Social Signals From The Networks You Care About
Social Metrics Pro lets you monitor social activity from networks like Twitter, Google+, Facebook, Digg, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and StumbleUpon directly from your WordPress admin area.
SocialMetricsPro lets you easily answer questions like:
- Which social media networks work best for my site?
- Which social campaigns are performing the best on these social networks?
- Which of my posts are the most popular on social media?
- And more …
With SocialMetricsPro, all of this information can be accessed with just one click.
(Social Metrics Pro constantly tracks the social sites that you care most about!)
Social Metrics Pro Features
SocialMetricsPro offers many features to WP users. Here are a few:
- Quick and simple to install and implement. Ready to go to work in minutes.
- Social Metrics Pro Is Widgets And Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality with external and built-in widgets. View updated stats from your WP dashboard, display socially popular content on your sidebar or anywhere on your site using widgets.
- One-click updating. You can update SocialMetricsPro in one click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update the manually manually. You can also choose to receive email notifications when new versions are released.
- Plugin uses minimal resources. The plugin can generate social metrics reports in seconds, using minimal hosting resources. Reports also include the amount of time used to retrieve the information and the server memory used to compile data.
Additional plugin features include:
- Sorting, Searching And 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 type, post authors, category, or by publishing date.
- 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 the spreadsheet application of your choice.
(SocialMetricsPro is really simple to use … just convert all the reds into greens!)
User Feedback
Below are just a few of the testimonials that plugin users have written about SocialMetricsPro:
”As with any cool plugin, it solves a very simple problem – how to view how well your WordPress posts are being promoted.” Adam Small, Marketing Tech Blog
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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
Useful Tips
A practical guide showing you how to optimize your campaigns and improve your social media strategy (i.e. turn reds into greens) is also included.
SocialMetricsPro Plugin Support
Social Metrics Pro is well-supported, and comes with free lifetime updates and support, backed by a risk-free, sixty-day, full refund guarantee.
Plugin Pricing
SocialMetricsPro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License – This license option enables you to set up Social Metrics Pro on one website only. Includes free lifetime updates and support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Unlimited Sites Edition – This lets you install SocialMetricsPro on unlimited domains that you own. Includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Price = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: The cost of purchasing Social Metrics Pro can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The above reflects the pricing when this content was written. This may or may not be the actual price charged by the software author when you visit the product site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for the current price:
Additional Information
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
We Recommend
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. SocialMetricsPro solves the problem of how to find a simple, time-saving solution that gives WordPress users immediate feedback on the success of their social marketing campaigns and guides them how to direct their efforts in order to improve their results.
SocialMetricsPro is ideal for beginners and advanced WordPress users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WordPress dashboard.
Get SocialMetricsPro if you own or manage WordPress sites and would like to shave years off your social media marketing learning curve.
To learn more, visit the plugin website: SocialMetricsPro – Social Media Analytics Plugin
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