Social interactions and recommendations like Twitter retweets and mentions, Facebook likes, comments, and shares, etc. are called social signals.
With the growth of social sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Google and Bing are now taking into account various social signals to help determine website ranking.
Note: Google encourages businesses to build their social media 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 social signals, as social trends and relationships can change at a moment’s notice. Without a reliable ‘map,’ Google is understandably reticent to assign more importance to social signals 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 sites that provide real value normally develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the sites that Google naturally wants to ascribe higher search rankings to.
Social Signals – Which Social Sites Matter?
Social sites that search engines like Google and Bing look to when measuring social signals include:
With almost 2 billion active users, Facebook is the most influential social media community in the world. Research shows that an average 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 site, don’t be quick to dismiss the importance of Facebook in your business strategy, as Google processes data and information from Facebook when determining your search rankings. In fact, Facebook seems to have the most influence on search rankings of all social media sites, like Google+ and Twitter.
(Number of monthly active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the next largest social media site in the world, with over half a billion tweets sent out every day. Twitter has a significant amount of influence online and places great importance on tweeting posts that provide great value to followers over the volume of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million tweets are sent each day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
Google Plus
As Google’s own social networking site, Google+ 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 socially on Google+ every day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big three social media giants listed above, there are a number of other social sites worth getting to know, such as Pinterest, LinkedIn, Digg, Reddit, and StumbleUpon.
(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 shares, comments, and likes 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 followers on GooglePlus a URL has accrued, number of adds and shares, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. growth rate of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, upvotes on Digg, etc.
- Not so obvious signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious factors that can indirectly influence search engine rankings. These include desirable and undesirable factors, such as improving clickthrough rate (CTR) [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be irrelevant by site reviewers [negative].
As a business 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 performance in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media can help improve your business results)
Tracking social media activity allows you to find insights into your brand’s online visibility on social media, measure the impact of campaigns, spy on your competitors, help you take preventative measures if you detect negative comments or feedback by online users, and spot opportunities for engagement. Additionally, monitoring social media can also provide vital information about emerging trends and what consumers and clients think about specific products, brands, businesses, or topics.
As a business intelligence tool, being able to track social media channels like blogs, internet forums, social networking sites, micro-blogging platforms like Twitter, Tumblr, etc., discussion groups, 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 marketing professionals, online reputation management (ORM) agencies, market research, agencies, sales teams, and social engagement and community staff. Typically, smaller businesses do not 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 technology providers have developed tools to facilitate the active monitoring of a variety of social media channels, allowing you to track consumer behavior around your brand allowing you to respond to conversations and engage with consumers in various social media platforms.
Go here for a detailed article on social media tracking tools and technologies that will help you manage, measure, and analyze your social media marketing initiatives:
(Are you searching for an effective tool that can help you measure social signals?)
In this article, you will learn about a simple social media monitoring plugin for a WordPress-based digital presence and growing your social media influence.
Our Featured WordPress Plugin …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics For WordPress
Description Of Plugin
SocialMetricsPro is an easy-to-install social analytics plugin that is designed to help users increase their social media influence online in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple concept – the system measures and tracks how each signal is performing and displays either a green or red indicator. Your objective is simple … turn all the reds into greens.
(Social Metrics Pro provides a standard operating procedure that any user can operate … just turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. This simplifies your social analytics. Posts that receive the most shares are colored green. Posts with low social media activity are colored amber or red.
The developers of Social Metrics Pro tested their plugin 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 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 marketing can significantly impact your search rankings, web traffic and revenue!)
Learn more here:
Benefits
Here we have listed just some of the many benefits and advantages of using Social Metrics Pro to track Likes, Tweets, Pins, +1s and more from your WP Dashboard on your web site:
Fast And Simple To Install And Use. Ready To Start Using In Minutes.
Social Metrics Pro installs like every other plugin. Simply upload the plugin file to your Plugin folder via your WP dashboard and activate.
Really Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s job is to turn more red squares into greens. SocialMetricsPro tracks and measures social signals so you know which social campaigns need you to invest more effort and which ones need to be better optimized.
Choose Only Social Signals From Social Networks You Care About
Social Metrics Pro lets you monitor social activity across leading social media networks like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Digg, and StumbleUpon.
SocialMetricsPro lets you easily answer questions like:
- Which social media 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 Social Metrics Pro, all of this information can be accessed with just one click.
(Social Metrics Pro constantly tracks the sites that you care most about!)
SocialMetricsPro Features
SocialMetricsPro offers many great features to WP users. Below we have listed just a few:
- Fast and easy to install and set up. Be up and running in minutes.
- Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend its functionality using built-in and external widgets. Access updated information right on your WP dashboard, add popular content to your blog sidebar or anywhere in your site using point-and-click widgets.
- 1-click updating. You can update Social Metrics Pro in one click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update the manually manually. You can also choose to receive an email notification whenever a new version is released.
- Minimal server resources use. Reports are generated in seconds, using very little server resources. The tool also displays the amount of time used to retrieve the information and the server memory consumed when gathering and compiling data.
Additional features include:
- Sort, Search And Filter Features: Social Metrics Pro lets you sort and filter your data as you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by post type, category, post authors, or by publishing date.
- Export Data: You can export data to Excel for further analysis. Data can be exported in tab-delimited and comma-separated file formats, and imported to Excel or the spreadsheet application of your choice.
(Social Metrics Pro is really simple to use … just turn all the red squares into greens!)
Feedback From Users
Here are a couple of the testimonials plugin customers have submitted for Social Metrics Pro:
”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
SocialMetricsPro Plugin – Useful Tips
A practical, step-by-step guide on how to optimize your site for social media success (i.e. how to turn reds into greens) is also included.
SocialMetricsPro Support
The software is well-supported, and users get lifetime software updates and new releases for free with their purchase, backed by a risk-free, sixty-day, complete money-back guarantee.
Plugin Price
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site Edition – This enables you to use Social Metrics Pro on one web site only. Includes free lifetime updates and free support. Price = $27.00 (one-time).
- Unlimited Sites License Edition – This edition lets you set up Social Metrics Pro on multiple websites that you own. Cost includes free lifetime upgrades and free support. Cost = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: The cost to purchase the Social Metrics Pro plugin can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. Currently, the software retails for the pricing shown above. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the plugin seller when you visit the plugin site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing here:
Additional Information
SocialMetricsPro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
We Recommend
As mentioned earlier, social signals impact search engine rankings and Google has been tracking 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 you immediate feedback on the success of your social media marketing strategy and guides you where and how to improve your 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 Social Metrics Pro if you own or manage WordPress sites and would like to shave years off your social media marketing learning curve.
To learn more, visit the plugin website here: Social Metrics Pro – Social Analytics For WordPress
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