31 May Social Media and SEO: Benefits of Optimizing Social Media
Although social media does not have a direct impact on SEO, you can optimize your social media channels to drive traffic to your site, share your content and build an audience. Social media has plenty of opportunities to indirectly boost your site’s SEO.
Tactful Placement Using Social Media
One of the best things about social media is its ability to place you in front of the people that matter most to you: your target audience. It’s important to know who you’re trying to connect with and how they engage with brands on social media sites. Social media not only gives you a platform to build your own targeted community, but it gives you a personal connection to them. Brands need a human or personal connection to its audience, and social media serves as a bridge between brand and buyer.
How does that help your SEO? Brand awareness can affect what you rank for on Google. With an increase in mentions on social media, your site can start to rank for other keyword searches that it previously didn’t.
Social Media as a Search Engine
Social media profiles rank in search engines. If you Google search a brand name, it’s likely a few of its social media accounts will rank on the first page of the search. While social shares may not do much for your SEO, your social media profiles will affect your brand’s search content.
Social media channels are search engines and should be treated as such. Using keywords and posting about relevant news increases your chances of being found through a social media search. A more common practice of this is the use of hashtags on Instagram or properly categorizing your pins on Pinterest.
Optimizing your social media for social media searches is actually huge. Facebook gets over one billion queries a day while YouTube gets about four billion a month. If you’re a smaller business, you should optimize your chances of being found through a search. You can do this by tagging your location and/or participating in local events. When someone searches the local event, they will see your business’ post.
Preparing For SEO’s Future
Google’s algorithm is ever-changing. Maybe in the future Google will begin to rank sites based on its social presence. It doesn’t hurt to prepare and build your brand up on social media in case the rules change. If Google changes its rules and you have a decent following with great content, you’re set.
Takeaway
Consistently posting quality content that’s interesting and engaging will increase your trust and credibility within your community. The more people talk (or tweet) about you, the more people will want to learn about your brand. In turn, this results in an increase in Google searches and traffic to your site.
While social media doesn’t control your SEO, it’s a great way to get your name out there and share your services to the right people. Social media is the best marketing tool you have, and it’s a necessity if you want people to know your brand.
We have been featured as a Top Software Development Company on SoftwareDevelopmentCompany.co.