Social interactions and recommendations like Facebook comments, likes, and shares, Twitter mentions and retweets, etc. are called social signals.
Google has been elevating the importance given to social signals as part of its ranking algorithm since late 2010.
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. Google’s own head of the web spam team Matt Cutts has stated that Google takes a cautious approach when it comes to social media, 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 social signals 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 develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the sites that Google naturally wants to display higher in its search results.
Social Signal Sources
Social media sites that search engines look to when measuring social signals include:
With almost 2 billion active users, Facebook is the most dominant social network on the planet. Research shows 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 power of leveraging Facebook, as Google processes social data and information from Facebook when determining 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 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 day. Twitter has a significant amount of influence on the cybersphere and places great emphasis on the authority of tweets posted to followers over the amount of tweets sent …
(Over 500 million tweets are sent every day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
Google Plus
Google’s own social media site naturally carries a significant degree of authority online, even if it has not reached the same level of growth and take up as Twitter and Facebook.
(More people are actively using GooglePlus every day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
In addition to the big 3 listed above, there are a number of other sites that should not be ignored, such as Pinterest, LinkedIn, Digg, StumbleUpon, and Reddit.
(A number of social media sites provide important signals to search engines that can affect your rankings)
Which Social Signals Should You Pay Attention To?
Search engines track various social signals, including:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook shares, comments, and likes you have, growth rate of shares and likes, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. tweets and retweets, the authority of the person sharing the URL, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (influential users), how many people follow you, amount and growth rate 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 factors that can indirectly influence search engine rankings. These include desirable and negative factors, such as improving clickthrough rate [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be of poor quality by site reviewers [negative].
As a website owner, it’s important to not only 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.
(Use social media marketing to help improve your business results)
Tracking social media activity allows you to gain insights into your brand’s overall visibility on social media, spy on the competition, measure the impact of campaigns, spot opportunities for engagement, and help you take preventative measures against the spread of negative comments or feedback by dissatisfied users. Additionally, social media monitoring can also provide valuable information about emerging trends and what clients and consumers think about specific brands, businesses, topics, or products.
As a tool for business intelligence, social monitoring is invaluable. Using social media monitoring as a form of business intelligence, however, is a complex undertaking, typically carried out by various groups that include market researchers, online reputation management (ORM) specialists, marketing professionals, sales teams, social media marketing agencies, and social engagement and community staff. Typically, smaller businesses do not can’t afford to pay social media monitoring professionals to track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately different technology providers have developed affordable tools and solutions that facilitate the monitoring of a variety of social media channels, enabling companies to track consumer behavior around their brands or products allowing them to react to conversations and engage with online users in various social media platforms.
We have created a detailed article where we explore over 30 social media tracking tools that will help you manage, measure, and analyze your social media marketing initiatives. More information:
(Can you monitor social signals effectively?)
This article discusses a simple WordPress plugin for tracking social media signals and increasing your social media exposure online.
Presenting …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics Plugin For WordPress
Description Of Plugin
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-use social media analytics plugin that is designed to make growing your social media influence uncomplicated. It is built on a simple premise – the system tracks and measures how each signal is performing and displays either a red or green indicator. The site owner’s job is to convert all the red squares into greens.
(Social Metrics Pro provides a standard operating procedure that any website owner can follow … turn all the reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts that get shared the most display green. Posts with low social media activity are colored amber and 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”. 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 their revenue increased by 310%.
(According to SocialMetricsPro developers, improving your social marketing campaigns can result in higher search engine rankings, increased web traffic and more revenue!)
For more details, visit the plugin site here:
Benefits Of Using SocialMetricsPro
Below are just a few of the benefits of using Social Metrics Pro to track Tweets, Likes, +1s, Pins and more right from your WordPress Dashboard on your website:
Be Up And Running In No Time
SocialMetricsPro installs like every other plugin. Simply upload it to your Plugins folder via your dashboard and activate.
Really Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s job is to change more red squares into greens. The plugin tracks and measures social media signals the way Google sees it so you know which social campaigns require more effort and where to optimize.
Choose Only Signals You Care About
SocialMetricsPro lets you centrally monitor social media activity across leading social networks like Twitter, Google+, Facebook, Digg, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, and Pinterest.
Social Metrics Pro 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 of this information can be accessed with a single click.
(Social Metrics Pro actively tracks social signals from the sites that you care most about!)
Product Features
Social Metrics Pro provides WP users with many unique features. Here are just some of these:
- Quick and easy to install and set up. Be up and running in minutes.
- SocialMetricsPro Is Widgets & Extensions Ready. You can extend its functionality using built-in and external widgets. Social Metrics Pro displays updated stats right on your WordPress admin bar, display social content on your sidebar or anywhere in your site using point-and-click widgets.
- 1-click updates. You can update SocialMetricsPro in a single click via the WordPress Updates page, or update it manually. You can also choose to receive email notifications when a new version is released.
- Plugin works even on the smallest hosting. The plugin can generate reports in seconds, consuming minimal server resources. Report generation also includes the amount of time used to retrieve the information and the server resources used to gather and compile data.
Additional features include:
- Sorting, Searching And Filtering Features: Social Metrics Pro lets you sort, search and filter the information however you like. You can perform keyword searches to study topic-related posts, and even filter the results by post type, category, publishing date, or by post authors.
- Export Data: You can export and plot filtered, sorted 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.
(SocialMetricsPro is really simple to use … just convert all the reds into greens!)
Feedback From Plugin Customers
Below are a few of the testimonials users have published about the SocialMetricsPro plugin:
”Social Metrics is the easiest way to see at a glance which posts have performed well on social networks.” Kevin Muldoon, Founder of WPMods.com
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”If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve.” Goes one of the most important sayings in business. And this is particularly true for tracking of your social mentions I found. There were two things that helped me a great deal to increase sharing after installing Social Metrics: First, I was able to see that some of my articles would perform much better on networks I wasn’t particularly using, such as StumbleUpon for example. Secondly, I could filter out the best performing content more easily and analyse what makes my readers share. Since then I have focused strongly on producing and replicating those posts that performed best.” Leo Widrich, Co-Founder of Buffer
Social Metrics Pro Plugin – Tips
A practical, step-by-step guide on how to optimize your campaigns and improve your social media strategy (i.e. turn reds into greens) is also included.
SocialMetricsPro Support
Social Metrics Pro is well-supported, and comes with free support and free lifetime updates, backed by a risk-free, 60-day, complete refund guarantee.
Product Pricing
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site License – This lets you set up Social Metrics Pro on a single web site. Includes free lifetime updates and free support. Price = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multiple Sites License – This allows you to set up SocialMetricsPro on unlimited sites that you own. It includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Cost = $47.00 (one-time).
Please Note: Price details for the SocialMetricsPro software depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The above reflects the price when this review was published. This may or may not be the actual pricing set by the product seller when you visit the plugin site and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for the latest pricing:
Additional Product Information
SocialMetricsPro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Get The Plugin
As mentioned earlier, with the rise of social sites like Facebook and Twitter, search engines like Bing and Google have started taking into account social signals when determining website ranking.
No website owner can afford to ignore the importance of social media. Social Metrics Pro solves the problem of how to find a simple, time-saving solution that gives WordPress users instant feedback on the success of their social media marketing strategy and guides them where and how to improve their results.
SocialMetricsPro is ideal for beginners and advanced WordPress users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more directly from your WP dashboard.
We recommend getting this plugin 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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