The convergence of SEO and social media should not come as a surprise, considering that data from social media is now being used to personalize search results as well as providing indicators of what content is popular with actual users. Additionally, Facebook Likes and Twitter feeds are now being incorporated in Google’s SERPSs. Google has also recently launched Google +1, wherein users can vote for pages and search results. Even Bing has entered the ballgame, expanding its reach by partnering up with Facebook to personalize search engine results and using Facebook Likes to establish the authority of pages.
Guillaume Bouchard of Searchenginewatch.com gives helpful tips on how to send the right “social signals” to make your site rank higher in search engines.
1. Tweets help increase rank. While search engines monitor age, new back-links also carry relevance because they show that sites and pages continue to be popular. With Google and Bing using social signals as a factor in rankings, it is important to make SEO strategies get tweeted and retweeted. SEO contents that are tweeted should also have the appropriate keywords in them to optimize rankings.
2. Modify content strategy by updating content. SEO contents should be interesting enough to go viral, at least in the niche your business belongs to. Content should go beyond ordinary press releases and blog posts but rather should be extraordinarily entertaining. Keep in mind that SEO contents should be retweeted by other users who are in the same business as yours for more relevance.
3. Go the extra mile by having tweets retweeted by those who really matter. Interesting SEO content should not only be reposted by fellow users, content should be retweeted by those who are influencers because they are the ones who are most likely to get retweeted. The social authority of the user matters, even more so as it has been confirmed by Google and Bing, who count tweets toward rankings.
4. Facebook Likes are important in Bing’s ranking algorithm. Bing’s exclusive deal with Facebook factors in a website’s Likes towards its ranking. While Bing has exclusive access to Facebook’s data, Google also includes Facebook Likes and shares into its SERPs which may ultimately be more important.
Socializing SEO and content strategy is something internet marketing practitioners should consider in this day and age where Google has recently updated its algorithm to include real time feeds from social networking sites. Though traditional internet marketing techniques such as creating back-links and writing blogs are still important processes in SEO, it is time to amp up your rankings by using social media and SEO content.
