Social interactions like +1s on GooglePlus, Facebook likes, shares, and comments, etc. are called social signals.
With the rising importance of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, search engines like Bing and Google are now taking into account a range of social signals to help determine website ranking.
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. Google’s own head of the web spam team Matt Cutts has stated that Google takes a cautious approach when it comes to assessing social media signals, as social trends and relationships tend to change too quickly to fully map out. Without a reliable ‘map,’ Google is understandably reticent to assign more 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 normally develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the websites that Google wants to rank higher in its search listings.
Social Signals – Which Social Media Sites Matter?
Social media sites that search engines like Google look to when measuring social signals include:
With over 1.5 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the most influential social community in the world. It has been estimated that a single post on Facebook can reach over 100,000 users, so even if it seems like Facebook is not driving droves of customers to your website, you should not be quick to dismiss the power of leveraging Facebook, as Google uses data and information from Facebook to help determine your search rankings. In fact, research indicates that Facebook seems influence website rankings more than other social media sites, like GooglePlus and Twitter.
(Number of active Facebook users. Source: Statista.com)
After Facebook, Twitter is the next biggest social media site in the world, with over 600 million tweets sent out every day. Twitter plays a significant role as a global influencer online and places great importance on the authority of tweets posted 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 great authority online, even if it is still a fledgling social community compared to sites like Twitter and Facebook.
(More people are interacting on Google+ every year. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big three listed above, there are a number of other social media networks worth getting to know, such as Pinterest, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon,Reddit, and Digg.
(A number of social sites provide important signals to search engines that can affect your rankings)
Social Signals – Which Ones Should You Pay Attention To?
Search engines like Bing and Google track a number of social signals, including the following:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook shares, comments, and likes you have, growth rate of likes and shares, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. how many tweets and retweets a web page has, how influential the person sharing your URL is, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (influential users), how many followers on Google+ your web page has, number and authority of +1s, 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 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 business owner, it’s not only important to find ways to develop your social media presence, but also to be able to track, measure and analyze your social media in order to improve your business results.
(Using social media marketing can help improve your business results)
Tracking social media activity allows you to find insights into your company’s overall visibility on social media, spot opportunities for engagement, take preventative measures if you detect negative comments or feedback by dissatisfied users, measure the impact of your marketing campaigns, and spy on the competition. It can also provide you with valuable information about emerging trends and what consumers and clients are thinking about specific businesses, products, topics, or brands.
As a tool for business intelligence, the ability to track social activity on social media channels like blogging, forums, news sites, micro-blogging platforms, message boards, video/photo sharing websites, and user-generated content (UGC) 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 online reputation managers, market researchers, marketing teams, agencies, professional sales reps, and social engagement and community staff. Typically, small businesses don’t have the budget to pay social media monitoring professionals to continually track their coverage in the and actively monitor their online reputation.
Fortunately a number of service providers have developed affordable tools and solutions that facilitate the active monitoring of a variety of social media channels, enabling companies to identify consumer behavior around their products or brands so they can respond proactively to conversations and engage with online users in various social media platforms.
We have created a comprehensive article where we explore a number of social media tracking tools and technologies that are worth knowing about. See this page to learn more:
(Can you track your social signals effectively?)
This article explores a simple social media tracking plugin for a WordPress-based website and increasing your social media influence online.
Presenting …
Social Metrics Pro – Social Media Analytics For WordPress
Description Of Plugin
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-install social analytics WordPress plugin that is designed to help users increase their social media influence in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – Social Metrics Pro tracks how each signal is performing and returns either a red or green indicator. The user’s objective is to change reds into greens.
(Social Metrics Pro provides a system that any user can operate … turn reds into greens!)
Colors indicate relative popularity. Posts that receive the most shares are colored green. Posts with low social media activity display amber and red.
The plugin developers tested SocialMetricsPro on a network of 2,000+ 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 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 Social Metrics Pro developers, focusing on improving your social media marketing can result in better search engine rankings, more web traffic and more revenue!)
Learn more here:
Benefits Of Using SocialMetricsPro
Here we have listed just a few of the benefits of using SocialMetricsPro to track Likes, Tweets, Pins, +1s and more from your WP Dashboard on your website:
Fast And Easy To Install And Set Up. Ready To Use In No Time.
Social Metrics Pro is really easy to install. Simply upload it to your Plugins folder via your administrator section and activate.
Very Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s goal is to change reds into greens. Social Metrics Pro tracks and measures social media signals so you know where to apply more effort and where to optimize.
Choose Only Social Signals You Care About
SocialMetricsPro lets you centrally track and monitor social activity across leading networks like GooglePlus, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Digg, StumbleUpon, and LinkedIn directly from your WP admin area.
Social Metrics Pro lets you easily answer questions like:
- Which social media 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 on social media?
- And more …
With Social Metrics Pro, all this information can be accessed with a single click.
(SocialMetricsPro constantly tracks social signals from the sites that you care most about!)
SocialMetricsPro Features
Social Metrics Pro provides many great features to web site owners. Below we have listed just some of these features:
- Quick and simple to install and configure. Ready to use in very little time.
- SocialMetricsPro Is Widgets And Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality with built-in and external widgets. SocialMetricsPro shows the latest stats right on your WP dashboard, add social content to your blog sidebar or anywhere on your site using point-and-click widgets.
- 1-click auto-updating functionality. Update Social Metrics Pro in a single click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update the manually manually. You can also choose to be notified via email when a new version is released.
- Plugin works even on the smallest hosting. Reports are compiled fast, consuming minimal hosting resources. Reports also display the amount of time it took to retrieve information and the server resources consumed when gathering the data.
Additional features include:
- Sorting, Searching And Filtering Features: SocialMetricsPro allows you to sort, search and filter the information as you like. You can perform keyword searches to study posts related to certain topics, and even filter the results by category, post type, post authors, or 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.
(Social Metrics Pro is simple to use … just convert more red squares into greens!)
Testimonials
Below are some of the testimonials plugin customers have written about Social Metrics Pro:
”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
***
”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
Plugin Tips
Social Metrics Pro includes a step-by-step, practical guide showing you how to optimize your site for social media success (i.e. turn reds into greens).
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, full money-back guarantee.
Software Cost
SocialMetricsPro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site Licensing – This edition allows you to install Social Metrics Pro on a single site. It includes free lifetime upgrades and free support. Price = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multiple Sites Licensing – This edition allows you to configure SocialMetricsPro on unlimited domains that you own. It includes free lifetime upgrades and free support. Price = $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 special offers. Currently, the software retails for the pricing shown above. This may not be the actual price set by the product developer when you visit the site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for the current price:
Additional Info
SocialMetricsPro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
Install This Product
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 the importance of social media. Social Metrics Pro solves the problem of how to find a simple, time-saving solution that gives website owners immediate feedback on the success of their social media marketing campaigns and shows them where to direct their efforts in order to improve their results.
Social Metrics Pro is ideal for beginners and advanced WordPress users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WP admin area.
We recommend SocialMetricsPro if you own or manage WordPress sites and want to reduce your social media marketing learning curve.
For more information, visit the plugin website here: SocialMetricsPro – Social Analytics Plugin For WordPress
***
***