Social Media Counts Towards SEO

The rapid growth in popularity of social media has caught the attention of the major search engines like Google and Bing. In October 2009, Google Social Search was launched, which delivers results for the terms you searched from within your online social circle. By October, Bing implemented a new feature that delivers ‘Liked by Your Friends’ in Facebook information along with the search results. Many website owners interested in achieving page one rankings in the major search engines for the terms important to them wondered if their popularity on the social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and others could or would influence their rankings.

Well as it turns out, it does to some degree. In a recent interview with search engine guru Danny Sullivan, quoted here at seomoz.org, a Bing representative stated the search engine does “look at the Social Authority of a user.

Tweets from more authoritative people will flow to the top when best match relevancy is used.” Google uses what it terms ‘Author Authority’ for both organic and news rankings. Google also looks to see how many people share a news article, much the same way Twitter ranks the top re-tweeted Tweets and Tweet topics. Google’s Author Authority and Bing’s Social Authority rank content according to their proprietary ‘authority’ scores. Google points out, however, that Author Authority differs from and is separate from PageRank, which impacts where on the search results pages a web page may be listed.

I highly recommend you read the post at seomoz.org for the ideas the author presents. Concerning search engine optimizing the social media content you produce, as always you want to include the keywords around which you are building your authority. You’ll want to keep your titles brief, containing only one or two keywords, so that the search engines can easily find your content.

Build your Followers by providing important content that is interesting to them. Reach out to new Followers both online and offline. Build a community among other “authoritative authors” who also write about the same subjects as you. And by all means, keep your social media sites, as well as your website, updated regularly with fresh, relevant and interesting content that makes readers want to share it with others.

Preparing for the Future of Google Search

In its never-ending quest to provide value to its end-users, Google is always looking for new and improved ways to evaluate relevance. Much has been said about the importance of website content, usability and backlinking. Where will Google turn its attentions to next and how could your search engine optimization initiatives prepare you for that new direction?

Google has resolved the issue of relevance by supplementing it to a degree with what is referred to as “popularity,” but what could also be called ‘authority.’

The great importance Google has placed on quality  inbound links, its foray into social networking, and the changes it has made to the newly named local business search tool Google Places, provide insight into the direction the search engine is likely to take in the near future.

In a nutshell, it could be described in the phrase “power to the people.” Using online reviews acquired from various social media and online marketing and advertising sites where consumers are able to post them, such as Google Places, Google may add an element to it ranking algorithm that factors in such reviews.  This seems to me like the logical next step.  Establishing your website’s authority ( and reputation) in the eyes of the buying public through online reviews and publications needs to be a consideration in organic SEO planning.

The first order of business, especially if you have a “local” brick & Mortar,  is to set up a Google Places account and encourage every single one of your customers to submit a review to establish your rating score. Next, use your social media accounts to engage customers in a conversation about your company and what you offer. Open a YouTube channel (yes, Google owns them too) and start placing fun and informative videos there that encourage users to rate them. Pitch a story to an online journalist and try to get them to write about you.

The point is to get others to start talking about you and rating you in a public forum. Consider it a new form of off-page search engine optimization designed to support other off-site and on-site initiatives that increase your popularity and authority in the eyes of Google. By quantifying consumer experiences in this way, Google is able to enhance user satisfaction by delivering relevant results based on input from its users.

I’m really interested in the new directions search is taking. It has made me think hard about how to approach search engine optimization so that given the ever-changing environment there is long-term value that can be counted on, providing on-going return-on-investment and the ability to build on a well-established foundation.