Social Media SEO in 2013

How Will Social Media play into SEO in 2013?

By Graham Ware
Connect with me on Google Plus at +Graham Ware
Utilizing social media is no longer an option for businesses that want to succeed online in 2013.  With the expansion of Social Media influence, it is everywhere, and everyone is using it. It has become an essential component to increasing website traffic and, ultimately, business conversion and online reputation. That’s because social signals are affecting SEO right now.

What is a Social Media Signal?

Whenever your followers on Facebook or Twitter (or YouTube, LinkedIn or Google+ or Pinterest) likes, shares, comments, re-posts or retweets your content, it sends out a “social signal” to search engines (sort of like sonar). Because search engines are starting more and more to identify and evaluate these social media signals as “recommendations,” they assign a value to them in their ranking algorithms.  This is a factor in the holistic and overall SEO efforts by sending more and better qualified traffic to your brand’s website.

In June of 2012, Searchmetrics released this data on ranking factors for search in the U.S.

 As you can see, social media was already a big player in search engine rankings. In 2013, it will continue to grow in importance as more people use social media in their daily lives to share their experiences, products they recommend and reviews of businesses.  Be it a restaurant check in and review, or sharing of a business offering discounts by doing so.

Increase Your SEO With Social Media

Let’s say a member of your Facebook community shares your post or picture/check-in with a friend on the same network. This actually performs a double benefit because this interaction/engagement passes along your information as a “word of mouth” referral and it boosts the credibility of your website in the eyes of search engines (if you have a link back to your business or the business you are posting about). The “share”, as shown in the graph above, is one of the most valuable social signals your company can receive.
Similar boosts to your SEO can happen through “likes” “retweets”, “+1” and like-minded recommendations, which show consumer confidence, trust and loyalty. They also increase your inbound links (still one of the most important ranking factors).

What these social signals do for your SEO over time is very beneficial. Not only can you drive traffic to your website this increasing your chance for conversion (recommendations from friends are far more valuable than recommendations from search engines), but it will also benefit from more time on the site and a decreased bounce rate.

What to Do Right Now

If you aren't social its time to sign up, I would recommend getting the following accounts:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• Pinterest
• Google+
• YouTube

Then, publish unique content or updates in a consistent manner on each platform. If you don’t have the time or staff to dedicate to these activities, then hire someone to do it for you, but make sure they are doing it right (meaning appropriate for what your business seeks). This will help increase your business brand’s visibility which in turn can generate likes, shares and comments (i.e. social signals) to help with SEO, and more visits to your website.

Next, set up a blog on your company’s website and publish to it at least once a week. Last year, Google shared that it was including Authorship in its algorithm, which recognized authors with quality content and passed more value to the outbound links within the content. You should consider publishing original content to your Google+ account as well to establish Authorship.

Finally, set up creative ways to engage your existing customers and get them to join your social media.  If you have any traffic in and out of your business, why not offer a "discount if you like or check in" as customers visit your establishment.  Offer incentives appropriately and doing so will help bolster those social media signals you need.

Good luck!

About the Author: Graham Ware is a recognized #SEO expert with over 5 years of digital marketing experience. Naturally this article is connected to Grahams Google+ profile. It also links to Twitter but that has nothing to do with authorship.