Social interactions like Facebook comments, likes, and shares, +1s on GooglePlus, etc. are called social signals.
Social signals impact search engine rankings and Google has been elevating the importance given to social signals as part of its ranking algorithm for several years now.
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 social trends and relationships can change at a moment’s notice. 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 websites that provide value develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the sites that Google wants to rank higher in its search engine results.
Social Signal Sources
Social sites that search engines like Google and Bing look to for measuring social signals include:
With almost 2 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the most influential social media community in the world. Research shows that one great post on Facebook can reach over 100,000 users, so even if no one is buying your products or services on Facebook, don’t be quick to dismiss the power of leveraging Facebook, as Google uses social data and information from Facebook to help determine your search rankings. In fact, research shows that Facebook seems influence website rankings more than other social media sites.
(Number of active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the second largest social media site in the world, with over 600 million tweets sent out every single day. Twitter has a significant amount of influence online and places great emphasis on the authority of tweets posted to readers over the volume of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million tweets are sent each day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
Google Plus
Google’s own social media site naturally carries great authority online, even if it is still a fledgling social community compared to sites like Facebook and Twitter.
(More people are interacting socially on Google+ every year. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big 3 listed above, there are a number of other social sites worth paying attention to, 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 Pay Attention To?
Social signals tracked by search engines like Bing and Google include the following:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook shares, likes, and comments a person has, growth rate of shares and likes, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. tweets and retweets, how influential the person sharing the information is, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (influential users), how many followers on GooglePlus your site page has accrued, amount and authority of +1s, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. growth rate 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 influence search rankings and traffic. These include desirable and negative factors, such as backlinks from authority sites (not as influential 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 website 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 social media in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media marketing can help improve your results online)
Monitoring social media activity allows you to find insights into your company’s online visibility on social media, help you take preventative measures if you detect negative comments or feedback by disgruntled customers, spy on your competition, identify market opportunities, and measure the impact of your marketing campaigns. It can also provide valuable information about emerging trends and what consumers and clients are thinking about specific products, businesses, brands, or topics.
As a tool for business intelligence, being able to track volume and sentiments of social conversations, trends, and social activity on social media channels like blogging, internet forums, social networking platforms, micro-blogging platforms like Twitter, Medium, etc., 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 marketing professionals, market researchers, PR agencies, sales teams, agencies, and social engagement and community personnel. Typically, smaller businesses do not can’t afford to pay social media monitoring professionals to track their coverage in the and actively monitor their digital reputation.
Fortunately a number of providers have made available tools and solutions to facilitate the active monitoring of a variety of social media channels, enabling companies to track what is being said online about their brands so they can respond proactively to conversations and engage with consumers in a timely fashion.
We have created a comprehensive article where we explore many social media monitoring tools and technologies that you may want to check out. More information:
(Are you monitoring social signals effectively?)
This article discusses a simple, yet effective plugin for WordPress users for tracking social media signals and improving your social media exposure.
Presenting …
SocialMetricsPro – Social Analytics Plugin
Description
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-install social media analytics plugin for WordPress that is designed to help users increase their social media influence online in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – SocialMetricsPro tracks how each signal is performing and displays either a red or green indicator. Your goal is to turn red squares into greens.
(Social Metrics Pro provides a standard operating procedure that any user can follow … turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. This simplifies your social analytics. Posts that get shared the most display green. Posts with low social media activity show up amber or red.
The plugin developers tested Social Metrics Pro on a network of 2,000+ 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”. 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 their revenue increased by 310%.
(According to the plugin developers, focusing on improving your social marketing campaigns can result in higher search rankings, more web traffic and an increase in revenue!)
Learn more about the plugin here:
Plugin Benefits
Below are just a few of the benefits of using Social Metrics Pro to track Tweets, Likes, +1s, Pins and more directly from your WP Dashboard on your website:
Easy Installation
SocialMetricsPro installs like any plugin. Simply upload it to your Plugin folder via your WP dashboard and activate.
Very Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s goal is to turn more reds into greens. Social Metrics Pro tracks and measures social signals so you know where to invest more effort and which need to be better optimized.
Track Signals You Care About
SocialMetricsPro allows you to monitor social media activity across leading networks like Twitter, GooglePlus, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Digg, and StumbleUpon directly from your WordPress admin area.
SocialMetricsPro helps you get answers to questions like:
- Which social 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 of this information can be accessed with just one click.
(SocialMetricsPro actively tracks social signals from the social sites that you care most about!)
Features
SocialMetricsPro offers WP users with many features. Here are just some:
- Fast and simple to install and set up. Ready to start using in minutes.
- Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend its functionality with built-in and external widgets. SocialMetricsPro displays updated stats from your WP admin bar, display popular content on your sidebar or anywhere on your site using widgets.
- One-click upgrading. Update SocialMetricsPro in a single click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update the manually manually. You can also opt to receive an email notification when new plugin updates are released.
- Plugin uses minimal server resources. Reporting is very quickly, using minimal hosting resources. Reports also include the amount of time spent retrieving information and the server resources consumed when gathering and compiling the data.
Additional features include:
- Sort, Search & Filter Features: Social Metrics Pro allows you to sort and filter your data however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by post type, category, publishing date, or by post authors.
- Export Data To Excel: 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.
(Social Metrics Pro is very simple to use … just convert all the red squares into greens!)
User Testimonials
Here are a couple of the testimonials customers have provided for the SocialMetricsPro plugin:
”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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“Social Metrics Takes WordPress Stats to the Next Level.” Lorraine Ball, Creative Director, Roundpeg
Product Tips
SocialMetricsPro comes with a practical, step-by-step guide containing useful advice on how to optimize your social media strategy (i.e. turn reds into greens).
Support
SocialMetricsPro is well-supported, and comes with free support and free lifetime updates, backed by a risk-free, sixty-day, full money-back guarantee.
Plugin Cost
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site Edition – This edition allows you to configure SocialMetricsPro on 1 website only. Price includes free lifetime upgrades and free support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multi-Site License – This license option lets you use SocialMetricsPro on multiple web sites that you own. Includes free lifetime upgrades and free support. Price = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: Pricing for the SocialMetricsPro software can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. When we last checked, the plugin retails for the amounts shown above. This may not be the actual price charged by the plugin seller when you visit the product site and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details:
Additional Information
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
The Bottom Line
As mentioned earlier, social signals impact search engine rankings and 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. Social Metrics Pro solves the problem of how to find a simple, time-saving solution that gives users instant feedback on the success of their social media marketing campaigns and shows them where and how to direct their efforts in order to improve their results.
Social Metrics Pro is an ideal tool for beginners and advanced users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WordPress admin area.
Get SocialMetricsPro if you own or manage WordPress sites and would like to save time and resources by focusing on under-optimized social campaigns.
For full details, visit the plugin website: Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics For WordPress
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