Social interactions and recommendations like Facebook likes, comments, and shares, +1s on Google+, etc. are called social signals.
With the rise of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines are now taking into account social signals when determining a website’s ranking.
Note: Google encourages website owners to build their brand on social media as a long-term investment to drive qualified traffic, rather than 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 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 true value tend to develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the websites that Google wants to ascribe higher search rankings to.
Social Signal Sources
Social sites that search engines like Google and Bing look to for measuring social signals include:
With almost 2 billion active users, Facebook is the most influential social media community in the world. Research shows that a single post can reach over 100,000 users, so even if no one is buying your products or services on Facebook, don’t be quick to dismiss the power of leveraging Facebook, as Google processes social data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, research indicates that Facebook seems to have the most influence on website rankings of all 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 every single day. Twitter plays a significant role as a global influencer on the cybersphere and places great importance on the authority of tweets posted to readers over the volume of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million tweets are sent every day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
Google+
As Google’s own social media site, GooglePlus 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 starting to interact socially on Google+ each month. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big three listed above, there are a number of other sites that should not be ignored, such as Pinterest, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon,Reddit, and Digg.
(A number of social media sites provide important signals that could 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 shares, comments, and likes a person has, growth rate of likes and shares, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. tweets and retweets, the authority of the person tweeting, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (high profile users), how many followers on Google+ your URL has accrued, 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 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 low quality by other users [negative].
As a business owner, it’s not only important to find ways to develop your presence on major social networking websites, but also to be able to track, measure and analyze social signals in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media marketing can improve your business results)
Monitoring social media activity allows you to gain insights into your brand’s overall visibility on social media, avert crises, spy on your competition, spot market opportunities, and measure the impact of your marketing campaigns. It can also provide you with vital data about emerging trends and what clients and consumers think about specific businesses, brands, topics, or products.
As a business intelligence tool, the ability to monitor social activity, volume and sentiments of social conversations, and trends on social media channels like blogging, internet forums, wikis, micro-blogging platforms like Twitter, Tumblr, etc., discussion groups, video sites, and user-generated content (UGC) is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, typically carried out by a cross-section of people including digital reputation management companies, market research, marketing teams, sales teams, social media marketing agencies, and social engagement and community staff. Typically, many small businesses don’t have the budget to pay media monitoring professionals to track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately various service providers have developed many tools that facilitate the active monitoring of a wide range of social media channels, enabling companies to identify consumer behavior around their brands or products so they can react to conversations and engage with online users in a timely manner.
We have written a comprehensive article about social media monitoring tools that are worth knowing about here:
(Are you monitoring your social signals effectively?)
In this article, we review a simple WordPress plugin for monitoring social media signals and improving your social media exposure online.
Presenting …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics Plugin For WordPress
Plugin Description
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-install social analytics premium WordPress plugin that is designed to help users increase their social media exposure in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – the plugin measures and tracks how each signal is performing and returns either a green or red indicator. Your objective is to convert all red squares into greens.
(A system that any website owner can follow … just turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. This simplifies your social analytics. Posts that receive the most shares show up green. Posts with low social media activity show up amber and red.
The plugin developers tested SocialMetricsPro 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 their metrics on “green”. According to the plugin developers, 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 the plugin developers, focusing on improving your social marketing can impact your search engine rankings, traffic and revenue!)
For more details, visit the plugin site here:
Benefits Of Using SocialMetricsPro
Below are just some of the many benefits of using SocialMetricsPro to track Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more from your WordPress Dashboard on your web site:
Be Up And Running In No Time
Social Metrics Pro installs just like any other plugin. Simply upload the plugin file to your Plugins folder via your admin login and activate.
Very Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, your goal is to convert all red squares into greens. The plugin tracks and measures social media signals so you know which campaigns need you to invest more effort and which ones need to be better optimized.
Select Only Social Signals You Care About
SocialMetricsPro lets you centrally monitor social activity from networks like Facebook, Twitter, GooglePlus, StumbleUpon, LinkedIn, Digg, and Pinterest.
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 of my posts are the most popular?
- And more …
With Social Metrics Pro, all this information can be accessed with a single click.
(Social Metrics Pro actively tracks the sites that you care most about!)
Product Features
SocialMetricsPro provides a number of great features to WordPress users. Here are some:
- Quick and easy to install and implement. Ready to use in no time.
- SocialMetricsPro Is Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality with external and built-in widgets. Access updated stats from your WP dashboard, add social content to your sidebar or anywhere in your site using widgets.
- 1-click updates. Update Social Metrics Pro in a single click via the WordPress Updates page, or update it manually. You can also choose to receive an email notification whenever a new version is released.
- Plugin uses very little hosting resources. Reporting is very quickly, consuming little hosting resources. The tool also includes the amount of time it took to retrieve the information and the server resources used to gather and compile data.
Additional features include:
- Sort, Search And Filter Features: SocialMetricsPro lets you 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 publishing date, post type, post authors, or category.
- Export Data: You can export data 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.
(Social Metrics Pro is really simple to use … just convert all reds into greens!)
Testimonials
Below are a couple of the testimonials that plugin customers have published 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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”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 includes a step-by-step guide showing you how to optimize your social media strategy (i.e. how to turn reds into greens).
SocialMetricsPro Support
Social Metrics Pro is well-supported, and comes with free support and free lifetime updates, backed by a risk-free, sixty-day, complete money-back guarantee.
Software Price
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site Licensing – This enables you to configure SocialMetricsPro on a single website. Includes free lifetime updates and support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multiple Sites Licensing – This license enables you to configure SocialMetricsPro on unlimited websites that you own. It includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Price = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: Price details for this product depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The price shown above was correct when this article was written. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the product seller 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 the current pricing here:
Additional Information
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Download This Product
As mentioned earlier, with the rise of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Google and Bing now take into account social signals when determining a website’s ranking.
No website owner can afford to ignore how important social media is to their online success. SocialMetricsPro 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 strategy and guides you where to direct your efforts in order to improve your results.
SocialMetricsPro is ideal for beginners and advanced users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WordPress admin area.
We recommend getting Social Metrics Pro if you own or manage WordPress sites and would like to avoid wasting resources on over-optimized social media marketing campaigns.
For full details, check out the plugin here: Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics Plugin
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