Social interactions and recommendations like +1s on GooglePlus, Facebook comments, likes, and shares, etc. are called social signals.
With the rising importance of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Google and Bing now take into account social signals when determining a site’s ranking.
Note: Google encourages businesses 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. Matt Cutts, the head of Google’s web spam team has stated that Google takes a cautious approach when it comes to assessing social media signals, as so many things change quickly on social media. Without a perfect ‘map,’ Google is understandably reticent to assign too much 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 websites that provide real value develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the sites that Google wants to ascribe higher search rankings to.
Social Signal Sources
Social sites that search engines like Google look to for measuring social signals include:
With almost 2 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the most influential social media network in the world. Research shows that an average post on Facebook can reach over 100,000 users, so even if no one seems to be 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 to help determine your search rankings. In fact, research shows that Facebook seems to have the most influence on search engine rankings of all social media sites.
(Number of monthly active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the next largest social media site in the world, with over 600 million tweets sent out every single day. Twitter plays a significant role as a global influencer online and places great emphasis on tweeting posts that provide value to followers over the amount of tweets sent …
(Over half a billion tweets are sent every single day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
Google+
Google’s own social networking site 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 starting to interact socially on Google+ each week. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big 3 listed above, there are a number of other social sites that provide important social metrics, like Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit, StumbleUpon, and Digg.
(Social media sites provide important signals that can affect your search rankings)
Which Social Signals Should You Be Paying Attention To?
Search engines track various social signals, including the following:
- 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 sending a tweet, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (influential users), how many followers on Google+ your URL has amassed, amount and authority of +1s, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. growth rate of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, upvotes on StumbleUpon, etc.
- Not so obvious signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious social media-related signals that can influence search rankings. These include desirable and negative factors, such as improving clickthrough rate (CTR) [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 find ways to grow your presence on major social networking websites, but also to be able to track and analyze your social signals in order to improve your business results.
(Use social media to help improve your results online)
Tracking social media activity allows you to find insights into what people are saying about your company, brand, or products on social media, spot opportunities for engagement, be alerted to crises, spy on your competitors, and measure the impact of campaigns. Additionally, monitoring social media can also provide you with vital data about emerging trends and what consumers and clients think about specific topics, businesses, brands, or products.
As a tool for business intelligence, the ability to monitor social media channels like blogging, forums, wikis, micro-blogging platforms, discussion boards, video/photo sharing websites, and user-generated content is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, typically carried out by various people including online reputation specialists, market research, marketing teams, social engagement and community staff, social media marketing agencies, and professional sales reps. Typically, many small businesses don’t can’t afford to pay media monitoring professionals to continually track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately different technology companies have developed tools to facilitate the tracking of a variety of social media channels, enabling you to identify what is being said online about your products or brand allowing you to react to conversations and interact with online users in various social media platforms.
If you want to learn more about social media monitoring tools and technologies that are worth knowing about, refer to this article:
(Are you searching for an effective tool that can help you track social signals?)
In this article, we discuss a simple, yet highly effective social monitoring plugin for WordPress and improving your social media presence online.
Let’s Review …
SocialMetricsPro – Social Media Analytics For WordPress
Plugin Description
SocialMetricsPro is an easy-to-install social media analytics plugin for WordPress that is designed to help users improve their social media exposure online in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – SocialMetricsPro measures and tracks how each signal is performing and displays either a red or green indicator. The site owner’s goal is simple … convert all the red squares into greens.
(A standard operating procedure that any user can operate … simply turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts with the highest number of shares display green. Posts with low social media activity are colored 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”. 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 their revenue increased by 310%.
(According to Social Metrics Pro developers, focusing on improving your social media marketing campaigns can result in higher search engine rankings, increased web traffic and increased revenue!)
Learn more about the plugin here:
Benefits Of Using SocialMetricsPro
Below we have listed just some of the many benefits and advantages of using Social Metrics Pro to track Tweets, Likes, +1s, Pins and more right from your WP Dashboard on your site:
Installation Is Easy
SocialMetricsPro is quite easy to install. Just upload it to your Plugins folder via your dashboard and activate.
Very Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s objective is to change all red squares into greens. Social Metrics Pro tracks and measures social signals the way Google sees it so you know where to invest more effort and which ones need to be better optimized.
Track Only Signals You Care About
Social Metrics Pro lets you centrally track and monitor social media activity across leading networks like Google+, Twitter, Facebook, Digg, Pinterest, StumbleUpon, and LinkedIn.
Social Metrics Pro helps you get answers to questions like:
- Which social media 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 can be accessed with a single click.
(SocialMetricsPro actively monitors the sites that you care most about!)
Features
Social Metrics Pro provides website owners with many unique features. Below we have listed just a few of these:
- Fast and easy to install and set up. Be up and running in minutes.
- Social Metrics Pro Is Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality with built-in and external widgets. View updated stats right on your WP admin bar, display popular content on your sidebar or anywhere on your site using point-and-click widgets.
- One-click auto-updating functionality. Update SocialMetricsPro with one click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update the manually manually. You can also opt to receive an email notification whenever new plugin updates are released.
- Minimal usage of hosting resources. The plugin generates social metrics reports fast, consuming little server resources. Reports also display 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 lets you sort, search and filter the information as you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by category, publishing date, post type, or post authors.
- 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.
(SocialMetricsPro is simple to use … just change red squares into greens!)
Testimonials From Plugin Customers
Below are a few of the testimonials that customers have submitted for the Social Metrics Pro plugin:
“Social Metrics Pro is the essential plugin we use to monitor how our content performs on social networks such as Twitter and Facebook. It’s simple, neat and works precisely as you would expect it. When we work with our clients such as T-Mobile, the .Me domain name registry and others, Social Metrics Pro is the plugin we use to create reports as well as keep track on each bit of content to optimize it for future performance.” Ivan Brezak Brkan, Editor of Netokracija.com, TechCrunch EU Contributor
***
“Social Metrics Takes WordPress Stats to the Next Level.” Lorraine Ball, Creative Director, Roundpeg
Useful Tips
A step-by-step, practical guide on how to optimize your campaigns and improve your social media strategy (i.e. how to turn reds into greens) is also included.
Support
The plugin is well-supported, and comes with free lifetime updates and support, backed by a risk-free, 60-day, 100% refund guarantee.
Product Price
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site Licensing – This lets you use SocialMetricsPro on a single website. It includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multiple Sites License Edition – This edition allows you to activate Social Metrics Pro on unlimited sites that you own. Includes free lifetime updates and support. Cost = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: The cost to purchase the product depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The price shown above was correct when this content was published. This may not be the actual price set by the product developer when you visit the plugin site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing here:
Additional Product Info
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
In Conclusion
As mentioned earlier, with the increase in importance of social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, search engines like Bing and Google have started taking into account various social signals to help determine a site’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 WordPress users instant feedback on the success of their social media marketing campaigns and guides them how and where to direct their efforts in order to improve their results.
SocialMetricsPro is an ideal tool for beginners and advanced users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WordPress admin area.
We recommend getting Social Metrics Pro if you own or manage WordPress sites and want to make social marketing measurable.
For complete details, check out the plugin here: Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics Plugin For WordPress
***
***