SEO is no longer just about making sure that your relevant keywords are included in the content that you publish. Today, successful and effective digital marketing requires both SEO strategies and social media to work in sync with one another.
And while social media might not be a direct ranking factor for search engine optimization, it’s hard to ignore the effect that it has.
With around 45% of the world’s population now using social networks like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn on a regular basis, it’s hard to ignore the fact that it has become one of the most important online marketing tools available.
How Social Media Relates to SEO
Websites that rank higher on Google will typically also have a strong social media presence. However, social signals such as followers, likes, comments and shares on social networks do not have a direct effect on search rankings.
But according to Hootsuite, social media marketing and SEO are closely linked, and ultimately, a strong social media presence will help you achieve something that does directly affect your Google ranking; an increase in traffic.
Using social media effectively helps you improve your online visibility by distributing content to a larger audience and directing traffic to your website.
When your social shares impact the right audience and lead to meaningful engagement, this can improve your link profile, boost website traffic, and in turn, improve your search ranking.
Quality Content
It’s clear to see that simply having a presence on social media is not going to do much in terms of your SEO. To get the best results and link your social media to your search ranking, it’s important to create content that provides value to your audience.
Blog posts, graphics, infographics and videos that help your audience learn something new or entertain them will stand out and encourage more traffic to your website.
It’s important to optimize all your social media content for visibility since most of the information that the brain retains is visual, therefore visual content is likely to get more attention and ultimately more shares.
Optimize Your Social Media Profiles
To get the best results for SEO from social media, you should start with optimizing your profiles and making sure that they are synced with your business website. At the very least, this involves including a link back to your website in the ‘about’ section of your profile and linking to your website with the content that you share.
Don’t forget to do the same on the other side and include links to your social profiles from your website itself. You should also use consistent branding across all your social channels and your website, and include relevant keywords in your social media bios.
Work with Social Influencers
Social influencers are everywhere these days, and these are people or social profiles that have a lot more expertise, authority and trustworthiness in a certain niche or industry compared to most.
Working with social influencers to get posts that relate to your business can help you increase interest and boost consumer confidence in your brand.
The easiest way to engage and catch the attention of social influencers and industry experts is to link to their work when you post. You can also partner with them and pay them to create content that is highly relevant to your target audience, on your behalf.
When working with influencers, be sure to find individuals and brands that are highly relevant to your industry and have high engagement rates.
Post Frequently
Setting up social media profiles and remembering to share an update every month or so is not a good strategy, and is unlikely to help you get very far when it comes to using social media to improve SEO.
Posting regularly is important to ensure that you present an active and engaged social media account. The amount and frequency of your posts will depend on a number of factors including the social network that you are using.
For example, Twitter does not actually have a recommended number of posts, but once a day is considered the best for Facebook or Instagram.
Remember that the content you share on social media may also show up in Google searches, so the more you post and the more brand mentions you have on social media, the more likely you are to come up in relevant searches that users make.
Engage with Followers
One of the biggest mistakes that you can make with social media is to use it for promotion alone. While you can post content that promotes something from your brand, the main goal should be to build and nurture relationships with your followers.
Most of the time, customers who are satisfied with the service or product that they have received from your brand can end up promoting your business on social media, and interacting with your customers online can attract even more customers.
Social media gives your business the chance to show its human side and build a strong reputation for being friendly and approachable.
Track Your Progress
Finally, bear in mind that both your social media and your SEO efforts are working towards the same common goal of increasing traffic and boosting sales for your brand.
Because of this, it makes little sense to have and implement a range of ideas and strategies if you are not tracking the impact that they are having. PWD offers SEO in Perth and will be able to help you put together an SEO and social media strategy that works for you.
If you are not sure how best to track your progress, PWD can help you determine the effect that your social media marketing efforts are having on your SEO results and make it easier for you to make decisions accordingly.
Find out more at https://pwd.com.au/seo/.
While social media might not be directly related to SEO, your social media marketing efforts can certainly have an effect on your Google ranking.
By producing content that is interesting and shareable, posting regularly and engaging with your followers, you can make social media work for you when it comes to SEO.
