Social recommendations like Twitter retweets and mentions, Facebook comments, etc. are called social signals.
With the rise of social sites like Facebook and Twitter, search engines like Bing and Google have started taking into account a range of 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, instead of aiming for short-term benefits like search ranking placement. Google’s own head of its web spam team Matt Cutts has stated that Google takes a cautious approach when it comes to social media, as social trends and relationships tend to change too quickly to fully map out. Without a full ‘map,’ Google is understandably reticent to assign more importance to the social sphere over other aspects of their search algorithm. In summary, Google’s strategy is a sensible one - “wait and see” how things develop over time, as websites that provide real value normally develop longevity, trust and authority, and these are the websites that Google naturally wants to display higher in its search results.
Social Signal Sources
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 media network on the planet. It has been estimated that one great post can reach up to 150,000 users, so even if no one is buying your products or services on Facebook, 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 to help determine your search rankings. In fact, Facebook seems influence website rankings more than other social media sites.
(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 readers over the amount of tweets sent …
(Over half a billion tweets are sent every single day. Source: Internet Live Stats)
Google+
As Google’s own social media site, GooglePlus naturally carries a significant degree of authority online, even if it is still a fledgling online community compared to sites like Twitter and Facebook.
(More people are starting to interact socially on GooglePlus every day. Source: InternetLiveStats.com)
In addition to the big three social sites listed above, there are a number of other social media networks that provide important social metrics, like Pinterest, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Digg, 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?
Social signals tracked by search engines like Google and Bing include:
- Facebook – e.g. how many Facebook likes, comments, and shares a person has, growth rate of shares and likes, etc.
- Twitter – e.g. how many tweets and retweets your web page has, the number of people sending a tweet, trending topics, etc.
- Google+ – e.g. who is following you (influential users), how many people are following you, amount and authority of +1s, etc.
- Other sites – e.g. growth rate of Pins and re-Pins on Pinterest, upvotes on Digg, etc.
- Other signals – In addition to the above, there are other not so obvious social media-related signals that can influence search engine rankings and traffic. These include positive and undesirable factors, such as improving clickthrough rate (CTR) [positive], and whether your site is deemed to be of poor quality by site reviewers [negative].
As a website owner, it’s not only important to develop your social media presence, but also to be able to monitor and analyze your social media performance 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 what people are saying about your brand, products, or company on social media, spy on your competition, spot opportunities for engagement, be alerted to crises, and measure the impact of campaigns. Additionally, monitoring social media can also provide you with vital data about emerging trends and what clients and consumers think about specific brands, products, businesses, or topics.
As a tool for business intelligence, the ability to track social media channels like blogging, internet forums, social networking sites, micro-blogging platforms, message 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, often carried out by a cross-section of groups that include online reputation management (ORM) agencies, market researchers, marketing professionals, sales teams, social media marketing agencies, and social engagement and community personnel. Typically, small businesses don’t can’t afford to pay a media monitoring service to track their coverage in the media.
Fortunately a number of service providers have developed a range of tools that facilitate the active monitoring of a broad range of social media channels, enabling companies to identify what is being said online about their brands allowing them to respond proactively to conversations and interact with online users in a timely manner.
We have written a comprehensive article where we explore over 30 social media measurement tools that are worth checking out and knowing about. For more information, go here:
(Do you know how to effectively track social signals?)
In this article, we review a simple, yet highly effective plugin for WordPress users for monitoring social media signals and growing your social media influence online.
Our Recommended WordPress Plugin …
SocialMetricsPro – Social Media Analytics WordPress Plugin
Description
Social Metrics Pro is an easy-to-use social analytics WordPress plugin that is designed to help you increase your social media influence in an uncomplicated way. It is built on a simple premise – SocialMetricsPro tracks and measures how each signal is performing and displays either a red or green indicator. The site owner’s goal is simple … turn all red squares into greens.
(A system that any website owner can operate … turn all the 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 SocialMetricsPro on a network of 2,000+ sites over a period of 3 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 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 they also experienced a 310% increase in revenues.
(According to the plugin developers, improving your social media marketing can positively can have a dramatic effect on your search engine rankings, traffic and revenue!)
For more details, visit the plugin site here:
Plugin Benefits
Below are just some of the benefits and advantages of using Social Metrics Pro to track Likes, Tweets, Pins, +1s and more right from your WordPress Dashboard on your web site:
Fast And Simple To Install And Use. Ready To Use In No Time.
SocialMetricsPro is very easy to install. Simply upload the plugin file to your Plugin folder via your admin user area and activate.
Simple To Use
As mentioned earlier, the user’s objective is to convert all red squares into greens. The plugin tracks and measures social media signals so you know where to put more effort and which campaigns need to be better optimized.
Choose Only Signals From Social Networks You Care About
SocialMetricsPro lets you centrally track and monitor social activity from networks like Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Digg, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and StumbleUpon directly from your WP admin area.
SocialMetricsPro lets you easily answer questions like:
- Which social networks work best for my site?
- Which social campaigns are performing the best on these social networks?
- Which are my most popular posts?
- And more …
With Social Metrics Pro, all this information can be accessed with just one click.
(SocialMetricsPro constantly tracks the social media sites that you care most about!)
SocialMetricsPro Features
Social Metrics Pro provides web site owners with many great features. Below we have listed just some:
- Fast and simple to install and set up. Ready to start using in no time.
- Social Metrics Pro Is Widgets And Extensions Ready. You can extend the plugin’s functionality with built-in and external widgets. Access the latest information from your WordPress dashboard, display socially popular content on your sidebar or anywhere on your site using widgets.
- 1-click updates. You can update SocialMetricsPro in one click via the WordPress Updates screen, or update the manually manually. You can also opt to be notified via email whenever new versions are released.
- Low-resource consumption. Reporting is very quickly, using minimal server resources. Report generation also displays the amount of time it took to retrieve the information and the server memory consumed when gathering the data.
Additional features include:
- Sort, Search & Filter Features: Social Metrics Pro allows you to sort and filter your data as you like. You can perform keyword searches to study topic-related posts, and even filter the results by post authors, publishing date, post type, or by category.
- 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.
(SocialMetricsPro is really simple to use … just convert all the red squares into greens!)
Testimonials
Below are some of the testimonials that users have written about the SocialMetricsPro plugin:
”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
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”Social Metrics is one of the recipes for Social WordPress. You can integrate it quickly and easily on your WordPress site to view your performance on social networks” Jean-Francois Arseneault, Arseneault Consultation
Social Metrics Pro Plugin – Tips
A practical, step-by-step guide containing useful advice on how to optimize your campaigns and improve your social media strategy (i.e. turn reds into greens) is also included.
Support
Social Metrics Pro is well-supported, and comes with free support and free lifetime updates, backed by a no-risk, 60-day, full money-back guarantee.
Plugin Cost
Social Metrics Pro plugin is available in two editions:
- Single Site Licensing – This license allows you to run Social Metrics Pro on one website only. Includes free lifetime updates and free support. Cost = $27.00 (one-time).
- Multi-Site License – This license allows you to configure Social Metrics Pro on multiple web sites that you own. Cost includes free lifetime upgrades and support. Cost = $47.00 (one-time).
Note: Price details for Social Metrics Pro depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. Currently, the software is being retailed for the pricing shown above. This may or may not be the actual pricing charged by the software author when you visit the website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after your purchase.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details:
Additional Product Info
Social Metrics Pro requires a self-hosted installation of WordPress and can be instantly downloaded after purchase.
We Recommend
As mentioned earlier, with the increased importance of social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, search engines like Google and Bing have started taking into account various social signals to help determine 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 instant feedback on the success of your social media marketing strategy and guides you where to direct your efforts in order to improve your results.
SocialMetricsPro is ideal for beginners and advanced users alike. It tracks Tweets, Likes, Pins, +1s and more right from your WP dashboard.
We recommend Social Metrics Pro if you own or manage WordPress sites and want to make social marketing measurable.
For more details, visit the plugin website here: SocialMetricsPro – Social Media Analytics Plugin
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