Social recommendations like Twitter retweets and mentions, Facebook comments, likes, and shares, 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 website owners 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 reliable ‘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 real value develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the websites that Google wants to rank higher in its search engine results.
Social Signals – Which Social Media Sites Matter?
Social sites that search engines like Google look to when measuring social signals include:
With almost 2 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the most influential social network on the planet. Research shows that one great post on Facebook can reach up to 150,000 users, so even if it seems like Facebook is not driving a massive amount of sales on your website, you should not be quick to dismiss Facebook as an important part of your online business strategy, as Google processes social data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, Facebook seems to have the most influence on search engine rankings of all social media sites.
(Number of 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 the authority of tweets posted to readers over the amount of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million 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 interacting on Google+ every week. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big three social sites listed above, there are a number of other sites worth getting to know, such as 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?
Social signals tracked by search engines like Google and Bing include:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook shares, comments, and likes a person has, growth rate of likes and shares, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. how many tweets and retweets a URL has, the number of people tweeting, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (high profile users), how many people follow you, number of adds and shares, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. number of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, comments on Reddit, etc.
- Other signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious signals that can indirectly influence search engine rankings and traffic. These include desirable and undesirable factors, such as age and authority of your social media account [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be irrelevant by visitors [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 marketing in order to improve your business results.
(Use social media to improve your business results)
Social media monitoring allows you to gain insights into what people are saying about your brand, company, or products on social media, assess competitor activity and market dominance, identify opportunities for engagement, measure the impact of your marketing campaigns, and take preventative measures against the spread of negative comments or feedback by online users. It can also provide you with vital data about emerging trends and what consumers and clients are thinking about specific topics, businesses, brands, or products.
As a business intelligence tool, being able to monitor social media channels like blogs, internet forums, social networking platforms, micro-blogging platforms like Twitter, Medium, etc., discussion boards, video/photo sharing sites, and user-generated content (UGC) is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, often carried out by various people including market research, marketing teams, online reputation management (ORM) agencies, social engagement and community staff, social media marketing agencies, and professional sales reps. Typically, many small businesses don’t can’t afford to pay a social media monitoring service to continually track their coverage in the and actively monitor their digital reputation.
Fortunately a number of service providers have developed tools to facilitate the monitoring of a variety of social media channels, allowing companies to identify and even predict what customers, competitors, critics, and supporters are saying about their brands allowing them to respond to conversations and interact with consumers in a timely fashion.
We have written a comprehensive article about social media tracking tools and technologies that are worth knowing about here:
(Are you searching for an effective way to monitor your social signals?)
This article discusses a simple WordPress plugin for monitoring social signals and improving your social media presence.
Our Recommended WordPress Plugin …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics For WordPress
Plugin Description
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-use 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 concept – SocialMetricsPro measures how each signal is performing and displays either a red or green indicator. The site owner’s job is simple … turn all reds into greens.
(Social Metrics Pro provides a system that any user can operate … turn all the reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts with the highest number of shares show up 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 sites 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 a 360% improvement in traffic for their top 10 performing sites, 410% more keywords ranked in the first page of Google and their revenue increased by 310%.
(According to the plugin developers, improving your social media marketing campaigns can result in higher search rankings, increased web traffic and increased revenue!)
More info:
Benefits Of Using SocialMetricsPro
Here are just some of the many benefits and advantages of using Social Metrics Pro to track Likes, Tweets, +1s, Pins and more from your WP Dashboard on your website:
Easy Installation
Social Metrics Pro is really easy to install. Just upload a zip folder containing the plugin to your Plugins folder via your WP admin user account and activate.
Really Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, your objective is to convert all red squares into greens. Social Metrics Pro tracks and measures social signals the way Google sees it so you know where to apply more effort and where to optimize.
Select Only Social Signals You Care About
SocialMetricsPro lets you centrally track and monitor social activity across leading networks like GooglePlus, Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Digg, LinkedIn, and Pinterest directly from your WordPress admin area.
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 is available on-demand, 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 provides many unique features to WP users. Below we have listed some of these:
- Fast and simple to install and set up. Ready to use in very little time.
- SocialMetricsPro Is Widgets And Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality with external and built-in widgets. SocialMetricsPro displays updated information right on your WordPress dashboard, add socially popular content to your blog sidebar or anywhere on your site using point-and-click widgets.
- One-click updating. Update SocialMetricsPro in one click via the WordPress Updates page, or update it manually. You can also choose to be notified via email whenever new versions are released.
- Utilizes minimal resources. Reporting is very quickly, using very little hosting resources. The tool also displays the amount of time spent retrieving the information and the server resources consumed when gathering data.
Additional plugin features include:
- Sorting, Searching & Filtering Features: SocialMetricsPro lets you sort, search and filter information however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study topic-related posts, and even filter the results by category, publishing date, post authors, 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 very simple to use … just turn more red squares into greens!)
Testimonials From Plugin Users
Below are a couple of the testimonials and comments that plugin users have provided for SocialMetricsPro:
”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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”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
SocialMetricsPro comes with a practical guide containing useful advice on how to optimize your campaigns and improve your social media strategy (i.e. how to turn reds into greens).
Support
The plugin is well-supported, and users get lifetime software updates and new releases for free with their purchase, backed by a risk-free, sixty-day, full refund guarantee.
Software Price
SocialMetricsPro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License – This license lets you activate SocialMetricsPro on one site only. Price includes free lifetime updates and support. Price = $27.00 (one-time).
- Unlimited Sites Licensing – This license option allows you to configure Social Metrics Pro on unlimited sites that you own. Includes free lifetime updates and support. Cost = $47.00 (one-time).
Note: Current pricing for the Social Metrics Pro software can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The above reflects the current pricing at the time this content was written. This may or may not be the actual pricing set by the software developer 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 price:
Additional Information
SocialMetricsPro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Get This Plugin
As mentioned earlier, with the rise of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Bing and Google are now taking into account various social signals when determining website 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 you immediate feedback on the success of your social marketing campaigns and shows you how and where to direct your efforts in order to improve your results.
Social Metrics Pro is ideal for beginners and advanced users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WP dashboard.
We recommend this plugin if you own or manage WordPress sites and would like to avoid wasting resources on over-optimized social media campaigns.
To learn more, visit the plugin website here: Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics Plugin For WordPress
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