Social interactions like +1s on GooglePlus, Facebook comments, likes, and shares, etc. are called social signals.
Google has been tracking social signals as part of its ranking algorithm since late 2010.
Note: Google encourages businesses to build their brand on social media as a long-term investment to drive qualified traffic, instead of 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 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 real value normally develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the websites that Google wants to ascribe higher search rankings to.
Social Signals – Which Social Sites Matter?
Social sites that search engines like Google and Bing look to for measuring social signals include:
With more than 1.5 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the largest social media community in the world. It has been estimated that an average post can reach up to 150,000 users, so even if it seems like Facebook is not driving droves of customers to your website, don’t be quick to dismiss the importance of Facebook in your business strategy, as Google processes social data and information from Facebook to help determine your search rankings. In fact, research indicates 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 500 million tweets sent out each day. Twitter plays a significant role as a global influencer on the cybersphere and places great importance on tweeting posts that provide great value to followers over the number of tweets sent …
(Over half a billion tweets are sent every day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
Google+
As Google’s own social 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 actively using GooglePlus each month. Source: Internet Live Stats)
In addition to the big three listed above, there are a number of other sites that provide important social signals, like Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit, Digg, and StumbleUpon.
(A number of social media sites provide important signals that can affect your search rankings)
Which Social Signals Should You Pay Attention To?
Social signals tracked by search engines include:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook likes, comments, and shares a person has, growth rate of likes and shares, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. how many tweets and retweets your web page has, the authority of the person sending a tweet, trending topics, etc.
- GooglePlus – e.g. who is following you (high profile users), how many followers on Google+ your web page has accrued, amount of adds and shares, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. number of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, comments on StumbleUpon, etc.
- Other 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 improving clickthrough rate [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be of low quality by visitors [negative].
As a business owner, it’s important to not only grow your presence on major social networking websites, but also to be able to monitor, measure and analyze social media campaigns in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media can improve your business results)
Social media monitoring allows you to find insights into your company’s online visibility on social media, avert impending crises, spot potential market opportunities, measure the impact of campaigns, and spy on the competition. Additionally, social media monitoring can also provide you with valuable data about emerging trends and what consumers and clients are thinking about specific products, brands, topics, or businesses.
As a tool for business intelligence, social media monitoring is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, often carried out by various people including PR staff, marketing professionals, market research, social engagement and community personnel, professional sales reps, and social marketing agencies. Typically, many small businesses do not can’t afford to pay media monitoring professionals to track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately many technology companies have developed many affordable tools to facilitate the active tracking of a variety of social media channels, allowing you to identify and even predict what customers, competitors, critics, and supporters are saying about your products or brand so you can react to conversations and engage with consumers in various social media platforms.
We have written a detailed article on social media tracking tools that will help you identify new business opportunities, track competitor activity, see what online conversations are taking place that can affect your business,etc. Go here to learn more about this:
(Do you know how to effectively monitor social signals?)
In this article, you will learn about a simple social tracking plugin for WordPress and increasing your social media influence online.
Announcing …
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 presence in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple concept – Social Metrics Pro measures how each signal is performing and displays either a green or red indicator. The user’s task is to change red squares into greens.
(SocialMetricsPro provides a standard operating procedure that any user can follow … simply turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. This simplifies your social analytics with Excel-like conditional color formatting. Posts that get shared the most display 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 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 noticed 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, focusing on improving your social media marketing can can have a positive impact on your search engine rankings, traffic and revenue!)
For more details, visit the plugin site here:
Plugin Benefits
Here are just a few of the benefits and advantages of using Social Metrics Pro to track Likes, Tweets, +1s, Pins and more from your WordPress Dashboard on your web site:
Quick And Easy To Install And Set Up. Ready To Go To Work In Minutes.
Social Metrics Pro installs just like any plugin. Just upload a zip folder containing the plugin files to your Plugin folder via your WP administrator section and activate.
Really Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, your task is to convert all the reds into greens. SocialMetricsPro tracks and measures social signals so you know which campaigns require more effort and where to optimize.
Track Signals You Care About
Social Metrics Pro allows you to monitor social media activity across leading social media networks like Twitter, Google+, Facebook, Digg, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, and Pinterest.
SocialMetricsPro lets you easily answer questions like:
- Which social 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 SocialMetricsPro, all of this information can be accessed with just one click.
(Social Metrics Pro actively monitors social signals from the social sites that you care most about!)
Plugin Features
Social Metrics Pro offers a number of great features to web site owners. Below we have listed a few:
- Fast and simple to install and set up. Be up and running in minutes.
- SocialMetricsPro Is Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality with built-in and external widgets. Access the latest stats from your WP dashboard, display popular content on your sidebar or anywhere in your site using widgets.
- 1-click updates. You can update SocialMetricsPro in a single click via the WordPress Updates page, or update the manually manually. You can also choose to be notified via email when new plugin updates are released.
- Plugin uses minimal resources. The plugin can generate social metrics reports fast, consuming very little server resources. Report generation also includes the amount of time spent retrieving information and the server memory consumed when gathering and compiling data.
Additional plugin features include:
- Sort, Search And Filter Features: SocialMetricsPro lets you sort, search and filter your data however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study topic-related posts, and even filter the results by post authors, category, post type, or by publishing date.
- 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.
(SocialMetricsPro is really simple to use … just change all reds into greens!)
Feedback From Users
Here are a couple of the testimonials and comments that customers have submitted for the Social Metrics Pro plugin:
”Our entire marketing strategy relies on social media. Each post on the site has viral potential, but we needed one place to see which social networks are performing the best for us…We went ahead and got the PRO Version of Social Metrics.” Syed Balkhi, Founder of List25 and WPBeginner.com
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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
Social Metrics Pro Plugin – Useful Tips
A practical, step-by-step guide containing useful advice on how to optimize your site for social media success (i.e. how to turn reds into greens) is also included.
Plugin Support
SocialMetricsPro is well-supported, and comes with free lifetime updates and support, backed by a risk-free, 60-day, complete refund guarantee.
Software Pricing
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License Edition – This license option lets you run SocialMetricsPro on a single domain. It includes free lifetime upgrades and free support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Unlimited Sites License – This enables you to install Social Metrics Pro on unlimited sites that you own. Pricing includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Price = $47.00 (one-time).
Note: The price of the product depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. When we last checked, the plugin retails for the pricing shown above. This may or may not be the actual pricing charged by the plugin author when you visit the plugin site and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing:
Additional Information
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Download The Plugin
As mentioned earlier, with the growth of social sites like Facebook and Twitter, search engines are now taking into account social signals to help determine a website’s ranking.
No website owner can afford to ignore how important social media is to their online success. Social Metrics Pro solves the problem of how to find a simple, time-saving solution that gives WordPress users immediate feedback on the success of their social media marketing campaigns and guides them how to direct their efforts in order to improve their results.
Social Metrics Pro is an ideal tool for beginners and advanced WordPress users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WordPress dashboard.
We recommend getting SocialMetricsPro if you own or manage WordPress sites and would like to see measurable results.
For more information, visit the plugin website: Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics For WordPress
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