Social recommendations like Twitter retweets and mentions, Facebook shares, likes, and comments, etc. are called social signals.
With the increase in importance of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Google and Bing have started taking into account social signals when determining a website’s ranking.
Note: Google encourages businesses 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. 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 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 a sensible one - “wait and see” how things develop over time, as sites that provide value tend to 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 look to for measuring social signals include:
With more than 1.5 billion active users, Facebook is the most influential social network on the planet. Research shows that one great post can reach over 100,000 users, so even if it seems like Facebook is not driving droves of customers to your site, don’t be quick to dismiss the importance of Facebook in your online business strategy, as Google uses data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, Facebook seems influence website rankings more than other social media sites, like Twitter orGooglePlus.
(Number of active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the next biggest social media site in the world, with over 600 million tweets sent out each day. Twitter has a significant amount of influence online and places great emphasis on tweeting posts that provide value to followers over the volume of tweets sent …
(Over half a billion tweets are sent every single day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
Google Plus
As Google’s own social site, GooglePlus naturally carries great authority online, even if it has not reached the same level of growth and take up as Facebook and Twitter.
(More people are actively using Google+ every day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big three social sites listed above, there are a number of other sites worth paying attention to, like Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit, Digg, and StumbleUpon.
(A number of social sites provide important signals to search engines that could affect your rankings)
Which Social Signals Should You Pay Attention To?
Search engines like Google and Bing track various social signals, including the following:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook comments, likes, and shares a person has, growth rate of shares and likes, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. tweets and retweets, how influential the person tweeting is, trending topics, etc.
- GooglePlus – e.g. who is following you (high profile users), how many people follow you, number and authority 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 factors that can indirectly influence search engine rankings and traffic. These include desirable and negative factors, such as links from authority sites (backlinks) (not as important as they once were, but still a factor) [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 grow your presence on major social networking websites, but also to be able to track and analyze your social media in order to improve your business results.
(Use social media to improve your business results)
Social media monitoring allows you to gain insights into your company’s online visibility on social media, avert crises, identify new opportunities for engagement, measure the impact of your marketing campaigns, and spy on your competitors. Additionally, social media monitoring can also provide you with vital data about emerging trends and what consumers and clients think about specific brands, businesses, products, or topics.
As a business intelligence tool, social media monitoring 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 marketing professionals, market researchers, online reputation management companies, social marketing agencies, social engagement and community personnel, and professional sales reps. Typically, smaller businesses don’t have the budget to pay social media monitoring professionals to continually track their coverage in the and actively monitor their online reputation.
Fortunately various service providers have developed affordable tools that facilitate the active monitoring of a variety of social media channels, enabling companies to track consumer behavior around their products or brands so they can respond to conversations and interact with online users in various social media platforms.
We have written a detailed article listing a number of social media measurement tools and technologies that are worth knowing about. To learn more, visit this page:
(Are you monitoring social signals effectively?)
In this article, we review a simple, yet effective social media tracking plugin for WordPress and improving your social media exposure.
Let’s Review …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics For WordPress
Description
SocialMetricsPro is an easy-to-use social analytics plugin for WordPress that is designed to help you increase your social media influence 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 red or green indicator. The user’s goal is to change more reds into greens.
(SocialMetricsPro provides a system that any user can operate … just turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts that receive the most shares show up green. Posts with low social media activity are colored 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 they also experienced a 310% increase in revenues.
(According to the plugin developers, improving your social marketing can result in better search engine rankings, increased web traffic and increased revenue!)
For more details go here:
Benefits Of Using Social Metrics Pro
Here are just a few of the benefits of using SocialMetricsPro to track Tweets, Likes, +1s, Pins and more directly from your WP Dashboard on your website:
Quick Installation
SocialMetricsPro is very easy to install. Just upload the plugin file to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate.
Really Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s goal is to change reds into greens. Social Metrics Pro tracks and measures social signals so you know which social marketing campaigns need you to invest more effort and which need to be better optimized.
Track The Social Signals From The Networks You Care About
SocialMetricsPro allows you to monitor social activity across leading networks like GooglePlus, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Digg, LinkedIn, and StumbleUpon directly from your WP dashboard.
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?
- And more …
With SocialMetricsPro, all this information can be accessed with a single click.
(Social Metrics Pro constantly tracks social signals from the sites that you care most about!)
Product Features
Social Metrics Pro offers many great features to website owners. Below we have listed some of those:
- Quick and easy to install and implement. Be up and running in no time.
- Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend its functionality with built-in and external widgets. View the latest stats from your WP admin bar, add popular content to your blog sidebar or anywhere on your site using widgets.
- One-click updating. Update SocialMetricsPro in a single click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update it manually. You can also choose to be notified via email whenever new plugin updates are released.
- Consumes minimal hosting resources. Reporting is very quickly, consuming minimal hosting resources. Reports also include the amount of time used to retrieve the information and the server resources used to gather data.
Additional plugin features include:
- Sorting, Searching And Filtering Features: SocialMetricsPro allows you to sort and filter the information as you like. You can perform keyword searches to study topic-related posts, and even filter the results by post type, category, publishing date, or by post authors.
- Export Data To Excel: You can export filtered, sorted data and custom queries to 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 very simple to use … just convert more red squares into greens!)
Testimonials
Below are a few of the testimonials users have submitted 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
***
“Social Metrics Takes WordPress Stats to the Next Level.” Lorraine Ball, Creative Director, Roundpeg
Product Tips
A step-by-step, practical guide showing you how to optimize your site for social media success (i.e. turn reds into greens) is also included.
Support
The software is well-supported, and comes with free lifetime updates and support, backed by a no-risk, 60-day, complete money-back guarantee.
Software Cost
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License – This edition enables you to run SocialMetricsPro on one domain only. Includes free lifetime upgrades and free support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multiple Sites License Edition – This enables you to set up Social Metrics Pro on multiple websites that you own. Cost includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Cost = $47.00 (one-time).
Note: Pricing details of the Social Metrics Pro software can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. Presently, the product sells for the pricing shown above. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the product seller when you visit the plugin site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after your purchase.
Check the plugin’s website for the latest pricing here:
Additional Info
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
We Highly Recommend This
As mentioned earlier, 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 you immediate feedback on the success of your social marketing strategy and shows you where and how to direct your efforts in order to improve your results.
Social Metrics Pro is an ideal tool for beginners and advanced WordPress users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WordPress dashboard.
Get Social Metrics Pro if you own or manage WordPress sites and want to shorten your path to success with social media marketing.
For more details, check out the plugin here: SocialMetricsPro – Social Media Analytics Plugin
***
***