Social recommendations like Twitter retweets and mentions, Facebook comments, etc. are called social signals.
With the increased importance of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Bing and Google are now taking into account a range of social signals when determining a website’s ranking.
Note: Google encourages businesses 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. 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 full ‘map,’ Google is understandably reticent to assign more importance to the social sphere over other aspects of their search algorithm. In summary, Google’s strategy is to “wait and see” how things develop over time, as sites that provide value develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the sites that Google wants to ascribe higher search rankings to.
Social Signal Sources
Social media sites that search engines like Google and Bing look to when measuring social signals include:
With almost 2 billion active users, Facebook is the most influential social media network in the world. Research shows that an average post can reach up to 150,000 users, so even if no one seems to be buying your products or services on Facebook, don’t be quick to dismiss Facebook as an important part of your business strategy, as Google processes data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, Facebook seems to have the most influence on search rankings of all social media sites, like Twitter andGooglePlus.
(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 importance on tweeting posts that provide great value to readers over the volume of tweets sent …
(Over half a billion tweets are sent each day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
Google+
As Google’s own social site, Google+ naturally carries great 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 Google+ each year. Source: Internet Live Stats)
In addition to the big three listed above, there are a number of other social sites that provide important social signals, like Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit, Digg, and StumbleUpon.
(Social media sites provide important signals that can affect your search engine rankings)
Social Signals – Which Ones Should You Pay Attention To?
Search engines like Google and Bing track various social signals, including:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook comments, shares, and likes a person has, growth rate of shares and likes, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. tweets and retweets, how influential the person sending tweets is, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (influential users), how many people are following you, number 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 indirectly influence search rankings. These include desirable and negative 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 other users [negative].
As a website owner, it’s important to not only grow your social media presence, but also to be able to monitor and analyze your social performance in order to improve your business results.
(Use social media to improve your business results)
Monitoring social media activity allows you to find insights into your brand’s online visibility on social media, avert disasters, measure the impact of campaigns, spy on the competition, and identify opportunities for engagement. It can also provide valuable information about emerging trends and what clients and consumers are thinking about specific products, topics, businesses, or brands.
As a tool for business intelligence, social media signal monitoring 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 marketing teams, market research, PR agencies, social engagement and community staff, sales teams, and social marketing agencies. Typically, many small businesses don’t can’t afford to pay social media monitoring professionals to track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately a number of technology companies have developed a range of affordable and even free tools that facilitate the active monitoring of a broad range of social media channels, allowing companies to identify and even predict consumer behavior around their products or brands so they can respond to conversations and engage with consumers in a timely manner.
We have written a detailed article about social media tracking tools and technologies that are worth knowing about. Go here to learn more about this:
(Are you measuring social signals effectively?)
This article discusses a simple, yet highly effective WordPress plugin for tracking social media signals and increasing your social media exposure online.
Our Recommended WordPress Plugin Is …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics WordPress Plugin
Plugin Description
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-use social analytics WordPress plugin that is designed to help you increase your social media exposure online in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – the system measures how each signal is performing and displays either a green or red indicator. The user’s task is simple … turn all the reds into greens.
(Social Metrics Pro provides a standard operating procedure that any user can follow … just turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts with the highest number of shares show up green. Posts with low social media activity are colored amber and red.
The plugin developers tested SocialMetricsPro 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 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 their revenue increased by 310%.
(According to SocialMetricsPro developers, improving your social marketing can significantly can have a positive effect on your search rankings, web traffic and revenue!)
For more details, visit the plugin site here:
Benefits
Below we have listed just a few of the benefits and advantages of using SocialMetricsPro to track Tweets, Likes, +1s, Pins and more right from your WP Dashboard on your site:
Fast Installation
SocialMetricsPro installs just like every plugin. Simply upload the plugin file to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate.
Very Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s job is to turn all the reds into greens. The plugin tracks and measures social media signals the way Google sees it so you know where to invest more effort and which ones need to be better optimized.
Track The Social Signals From Social Networks You Care About
Social Metrics Pro lets you monitor social media activity across leading networks like Twitter, GooglePlus, Facebook, Digg, StumbleUpon, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.
Social Metrics Pro 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 Social Metrics Pro, all this information can be accessed with a single click.
(Social Metrics Pro constantly monitors social signals from the social media sites that you care most about!)
Social Metrics Pro Features
Social Metrics Pro offers a number of great features to web site owners. Below we have listed some:
- Fast and simple to install and configure. Be up and running in minutes.
- SocialMetricsPro Is Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend its functionality using external and built-in widgets. Access updated stats right on your WordPress admin bar, display popular content on your sidebar or anywhere in your site using point-and-click widgets.
- One-click auto-updating functionality. You can update Social Metrics Pro in a single click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update the manually manually. You can also choose to receive an email notification whenever new versions are released.
- Minimal use of hosting resources. The plugin generates reports in seconds, using little server resources. Reports also include the amount of time it took to retrieve information and the server resources consumed when gathering and compiling data.
Additional features include:
- Sort, Search And Filter Features: Social Metrics Pro allows you to sort, search and filter information as 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 To Excel: You can export and plot filtered, sorted 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 very simple to use … just turn red squares into greens!)
User Testimonials
Here are a couple of the testimonials that customers have provided for Social Metrics Pro:
”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
Plugin Tips
SocialMetricsPro includes a step-by-step guide on how to optimize your campaigns and improve your social media strategy (i.e. 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, 60-day, complete refund guarantee.
Plugin Cost
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License – This edition lets you set up SocialMetricsPro on one website only. Includes free lifetime updates and support. Price = $27.00 (one-time).
- Unlimited Sites License – This license option enables 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 the Social Metrics Pro software depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The above reflects the price when this article was written. This may not be the actual price charged by the product seller when you visit the plugin website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the current price:
Additional Info
SocialMetricsPro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Install The Plugin
As mentioned earlier, 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. SocialMetricsPro solves the problem of how to find a simple, time-saving solution that gives WordPress users instant feedback on the success of their social marketing campaigns and shows them where 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.
We recommend getting Social Metrics Pro if you own or manage WordPress sites and want to shorten your social media marketing learning curve.
To learn more, check out the plugin here: Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics Plugin For WordPress
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