Social recommendations like Facebook shares, comments, and likes, +1s on Google+, etc. are called social signals.
With the increase in importance of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Google and Bing now take into account a range of social signals when determining website 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 media, as so many things change quickly on social media. Without a reliable ‘map,’ Google is understandably reticent to assign more importance to social signals over other aspects of their search algorithm. In summary, Google’s strategy is a sensible one - “wait and see” how things develop over time, as websites that provide value tend to develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the websites that Google wants to display higher in its search results.
Social Signal Sources
Social sites that search engines look to for measuring social signals include:
With almost 2 billion active users, Facebook is the most dominant social media community in the world. It has been estimated that an average post can reach up to 150,000 users, so even if no one is buying your products or services on Facebook, don’t be quick to dismiss the importance of Facebook in your online business strategy, as Google processes social data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, research shows that Facebook seems to have the most influence on search rankings of all social media sites, like Google+ or Twitter.
(Number of monthly active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the second biggest social media site in the world, with over 600 million tweets sent out each day. Twitter has a significant amount of influence on the cybersphere and places great importance on tweeting posts that provide great value to followers over the amount of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million tweets are sent every day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
Google Plus
As Google’s own social site, GooglePlus naturally carries a significant degree of authority online, even if it is still a fledgling online community compared to sites like Twitter and Facebook.
(More people are interacting socially on Google+ each year. 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, Digg, StumbleUpon, and Reddit.
(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 like Bing and Google include the following:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook likes, comments, and shares a person has, growth rate of likes and shares, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. tweets and retweets, the number of people sharing your URL, trending topics, etc.
- GooglePlus – e.g. who is following you (high profile users), how many people are following you, number of adds and shares, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. number of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, upvotes on Reddit, etc.
- Other signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious social media-related signals that can indirectly influence search rankings and traffic. These include positive and undesirable factors, such as improving clickthrough rate (CTR) [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be of low quality by site reviewers [negative].
As a business owner, it’s not only important to find ways to grow your social media presence, but also to be able to monitor, measure and analyze your social media performance in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media can help improve your business results)
Monitoring social media activity allows you to gain insights into what people are saying about your brand, products, or company on social media, help you take preventative measures if you detect negative comments or feedback by disgruntled customers, spot opportunities for engagement, measure the impact of campaigns, and spy on the competition. Additionally, social media monitoring can also provide valuable data about emerging trends and what consumers and clients think about specific businesses, topics, brands, or products.
As a tool for business intelligence, being able to monitor conversations, activity, and trends 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 groups that include PR staff, market researchers, marketing teams, sales teams, social media marketing agencies, and social engagement and community staff. Typically, many small businesses do not can’t afford to pay media monitoring professionals to track their coverage in the and actively monitor their online reputation.
Fortunately various technology companies have developed a range of affordable and even free tools to facilitate the active tracking of a wide spectrum of social media channels, enabling you to identify and even predict consumer behavior around your brand so you can respond to conversations and engage with consumers in various social media platforms.
We have written a detailed article listing several social media tracking tools and technologies that are worth checking out and knowing about. See this page to learn more:
(Can you track social signals effectively?)
This article explores a simple, yet effective social tracking plugin for a WordPress-based digital presence and increasing your social media influence.
Presenting …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics WordPress Plugin
Description
SocialMetricsPro is an easy-to-use social analytics premium WordPress plugin that is designed to make growing your social media influence online uncomplicated. It is built on a simple concept – SocialMetricsPro measures how each signal is performing and displays either a green or red indicator. Your objective is to turn all the red squares into greens.
(SocialMetricsPro provides a standard operating procedure that anyone can follow … simply turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. This simplifies your social analytics with Excel-like conditional color formatting. Posts that receive the most shares are colored green. Posts with low social media activity show up amber and red.
The developers of SocialMetricsPro tested their plugin on a network of over two thousand 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”. 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 Social Metrics Pro developers, improving your social marketing can significantly impact your search rankings, traffic and revenue!)
More info:
Plugin Benefits
Below are just a few of the benefits of using SocialMetricsPro to track Likes, Tweets, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WordPress Dashboard on your site:
Quick And Easy To Install And Set Up. Be Up And Running In Minutes.
Social Metrics Pro installs like every other WordPress plugin. Simply upload a zip folder containing the plugin to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate.
Really Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, your goal is to change all reds into greens. Social Metrics Pro tracks and measures social signals the way Google sees it so you know where to put more effort and which need to be better optimized.
Select Only Signals From Social Networks You Care About
Social Metrics Pro provides a powerful dashboard to centrally track and monitor social media activity from networks like Facebook, Twitter, GooglePlus, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Digg, and Pinterest directly from your WP admin area.
SocialMetricsPro helps you get answers to questions like:
- Which social networks work best for my site?
- Which posts 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 is available on-demand, with just one click.
(Social Metrics Pro constantly monitors social signals from the social media sites that you care most about!)
Plugin Features
Social Metrics Pro provides WordPress users with many features. Here are some of those features:
- Quick and simple to install and implement. Ready to start using in minutes.
- Widgets And Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality with external and built-in widgets. SocialMetricsPro displays the latest information right on your WordPress admin bar, display popular content on your blog sidebar or anywhere in your site using point-and-click widgets.
- One-click upgrading. You can update Social Metrics Pro with a single click via the WordPress Updates page, or update it manually. You can also choose to receive an email notification when new plugin updates are released.
- Minimal usage of hosting resources. Metric reports are generated very quickly, using little server resources. Reports also include the amount of time spent retrieving the information and the server memory consumed when gathering data.
Additional plugin features include:
- Sorting, Searching And Filtering Features: Social Metrics Pro lets you sort and filter information however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by post authors, publishing date, category, or by post type.
- Export Data To Excel: You can export data 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.
(Social Metrics Pro is simple to use … just convert red squares into greens!)
Feedback From Users
Below are a few of the testimonials that users have written about Social Metrics Pro:
“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
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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
SocialMetricsPro – Useful Tips
A practical guide containing useful advice on how to optimize your campaigns and improve your social media strategy (i.e. turn reds into greens) is also included.
Support
SocialMetricsPro 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 Licensing – This allows you to configure Social Metrics Pro on 1 web site only. Includes free lifetime updates and support. Price = $27.00 (one-time).
- Unlimited Sites Edition – This allows you to configure Social Metrics Pro on multiple domains that you own. Includes free lifetime updates and free support. Cost = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: The price of the product can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. Currently, the software is selling for the prices shown above. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the software developer 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 current pricing details:
Additional Plugin Information
SocialMetricsPro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Get The Plugin
As mentioned earlier, with the rising importance of social sites like Facebook and Twitter, search engines now take into account social signals to help determine a site’s ranking.
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 instant feedback on the success of their social marketing strategy and guides them where and how to improve their results.
SocialMetricsPro is an ideal tool for beginners and advanced WordPress users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WP dashboard.
We recommend Social Metrics Pro if you own or manage WordPress sites and would like to avoid wasting resources on over-optimized social campaigns.
For more information, check out the plugin here: Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics Plugin
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