Social interactions like +1s on GooglePlus, Facebook shares, comments, and likes, etc. are called social signals.
Google has been tracking social signals as part of its ranking algorithm for several years now.
Note: Google encourages website owners to build their social 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 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 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 naturally wants to rank higher in its search engine listings.
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 most dominant social community in the world. It has been estimated that a single post on Facebook can reach over 100,000 users, so even if no one is buying your products or services on Facebook, you should not be quick to dismiss Facebook as an important part of your online business strategy, as Google uses data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, research indicates that Facebook seems to have the most influence on search engine rankings of all social media sites, like Twitter orGoogle+.
(Number of 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 day. Twitter has a significant amount of influence on the cybersphere and places great emphasis on tweeting posts that provide value to followers over the number of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million tweets are sent every single day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
Google+
As Google’s own social networking 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 Twitter and Facebook.
(More people are actively using 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 worth paying attention to, such as Pinterest, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon,Reddit, and Digg.
(A number of social sites provide important signals that can affect your search engine rankings)
Social Signals – Which Ones Should You Pay Attention To?
Search engines track a number of social signals, including the following:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook likes, comments, and shares a person has, growth rate of shares and likes, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. tweets and retweets, how influential the person sharing your URL is, trending topics, etc.
- GooglePlus – e.g. who is following you (influential users), how many followers on Google+ your site page has amassed, number of adds and shares, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. growth rate of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, comments on Digg, etc.
- Not so obvious signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious signals that can influence search engine traffic and rankings. 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 of poor quality by other users [negative].
As a website owner, it’s important to not only grow your social media presence, but also to be able to track, measure and analyze social media in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media marketing can improve your results online)
Social media monitoring allows you to find insights into what people are saying about your brand, products, or company on social media, spot potential market opportunities, spy on your competition, avert impending crises, and measure the impact of your marketing campaigns. Additionally, monitoring social media can also provide you with vital information about emerging trends and what consumers and clients think about specific products, topics, businesses, or brands.
As a business intelligence tool, the ability to monitor social conversations and social activity on 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 people including online reputation specialists, market research, marketing teams, social engagement and community staff, social marketing agencies, and sales teams. Typically, many small businesses do not have the budget to pay a media monitoring service to track their coverage in the and actively monitor their online reputation.
Fortunately different technology companies have developed many affordable tools that facilitate the monitoring of a variety of social media channels, allowing companies to identify and even predict what consumers, competitors, supporters, and critics are saying about their brands or products allowing them to respond proactively to conversations and engage with consumers in a timely fashion.
We have created a comprehensive article listing over 30 social media measurement tools that will help you keep track of online trends, monitor competitor activity, see what conversations are taking place online that affect your business, etc, see what online conversations are taking place that could affect your business,etc. More info:
(Do you know how to effectively track social signals?)
In this article, we discuss a simple plugin for WordPress users for tracking social media signals and increasing your social media influence.
Introducing …
SocialMetricsPro – Social Analytics Plugin For WordPress
Plugin Description
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-install social analytics plugin for WordPress that is designed to help users increase their social media influence online 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 user’s task is simple … convert all the red squares into greens.
(A standard operating procedure that any website owner can follow … 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 or red.
The developers of SocialMetricsPro tested their plugin on a network of over two thousand 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 they also experienced a 310% increase in revenues.
(According to SocialMetricsPro developers, improving your social marketing can result in higher search rankings, more web traffic and more revenue!)
Learn more here:
Plugin Benefits
Below are just some of the many benefits of using SocialMetricsPro to track Likes, Tweets, +1s, Pins and more directly from your WP Dashboard on your website:
Be Up And Running In Minutes
SocialMetricsPro installs just like every other plugin. Simply upload the plugin file to your Plugins folder via your WordPress dashboard and activate.
Really Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s task is to change all red squares into greens. SocialMetricsPro tracks and measures social signals the way Google sees it so you know which social marketing campaigns require investing more effort and where to optimize.
Track Only Social Signals You Care About
Social Metrics Pro lets you monitor social media activity across leading social networks like Twitter, Google+, Facebook, StumbleUpon, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Digg.
SocialMetricsPro helps you get answers to questions like:
- Which social networks work best for my site?
- Which social campaigns 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 social signals from the sites that you care most about!)
Features
Social Metrics Pro provides a number of features to WordPress users. Below we have listed just a few of these:
- Fast and easy to install and configure. Ready to use in very little time.
- SocialMetricsPro Is Widgets And Extensions Ready. You can extend its functionality using built-in and external widgets. Access updated stats from your WP dashboard, add socially popular content to your blog sidebar or anywhere on your site using point-and-click widgets.
- One-click upgrading. Update Social Metrics Pro in a single click via the WordPress Updates page, or update the manually manually. You can also opt to receive an email notification whenever new versions are released.
- Minimal usage of hosting resources. Reporting is in seconds, consuming minimal hosting resources. The tool also displays the amount of time it took to retrieve the information and the server resources used to compile the data.
Additional plugin features include:
- Sort, Search & Filter Features: SocialMetricsPro allows you to sort and filter the information however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by post type, category, post authors, or by publishing date.
- Export Data: 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 the spreadsheet application of your choice.
(Social Metrics Pro is really simple to use … just convert reds into greens!)
User Testimonials
Below are some of the testimonials and feedback plugin users have written about the Social Metrics Pro plugin:
”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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”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
Useful Tips
Social Metrics Pro comes with a practical, step-by-step guide on how to optimize your social media strategy (i.e. how to turn reds into greens).
Support
The software is well-supported, and comes with free support and free lifetime updates, backed by a no-risk, 60-day, complete money-back guarantee.
Product Licensing Pricing
SocialMetricsPro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License Edition – This allows you to configure SocialMetricsPro on a single domain. Pricing includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Price = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multi-Site Edition – This enables you to use Social Metrics Pro on unlimited websites that you own. Includes free lifetime upgrades and free support. Price = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: The cost of purchasing the product depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. When we last checked, the product is selling for the prices shown above. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the plugin developer when you visit the product site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details:
Additional Product Info
SocialMetricsPro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Our Recommendation
As mentioned earlier, social signals impact search engine rankings and Google has been tracking 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 website owners immediate feedback on the success of their social marketing strategy and shows them where to improve their results.
Social Metrics Pro is ideal for beginners and advanced users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WP admin area.
Get this plugin if you own or manage WordPress sites and want to outperform your competitors on social media.
For more information, visit the plugin website: SocialMetricsPro – Social Media Analytics Plugin
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