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Last Updated on October 25, 2024 by Work In My Pajamas
Despite Google mixing up the way it ranks content every now and then, SEO is still one of the most viable tools you have in your arsenal when it comes to your website’s ranking. Unfortunately, for most online businesses SEO is just one, albeit a crucial one, out of 200 different factors Google takes into account when deciding how to rank your website.
Another thing that can improve your ranking if done properly is the presence of your business on social media. Although there is no obvious connection between SEO and social media, these two are linked in more subtle ways, which means you can use your social network activity to boost your SEO. Here are some of the ways you can do it.
In This Post:
1. Build Your Online Presence and Your Brand
When presented with a list of search results, people will always be inclined to click on a link to the site they are familiar with, and a name that can be trusted. It is exactly the same case with linking. Using your social media accounts to increase your presence online and build a brand, while at the same time establishing credibility in your niche, will inevitably encourage people to post links to your website or blog. There is also the fact that pretty much everyone is on social media these days. If you want exposure, social network is where you would find it. More exposure means higher probability of receiving a backlink.
Steven Wright, who works as SEO specialist over at EduGeeksClub, credits the social media for the success of his company:
“Our target audience are college students, and we realized early on that social media is the way to go if you want to attract more visitors/customers.”
2. Build Relationships in Your Niche
One of the ways you can boost your SEO is by building relationships with influencers and other content creators inside your niche. For example, you can identify all the key influencers in your niche, and start following them on Twitter or Facebook. You can then like, retweet, or comment on their posts. Also, take the time to reach out to them and let them know that you’ve appreciated one of their latest posts. This will open up the door for future collaborations. Guest posting is one of the most powerful ways you can boost your SEO and build backlinks to your website.
You can also publish high-quality posts where you mention them, and let them know about it. If it’s good, they will be more than likely to post a link to it on their blog or one of their social media accounts, which will expose you to an entirely new audience. Even experts think that social is the way to go:
“Social is the way our work gets discovered. Content that is truly exceptional, unique, and useful can earn tremendous awareness through social media, and that social amplification often leads to great links, which leads to great rankings.” ~ Rand Fishkin, CEO/Co-Founder, Moz
3. Make Use of High-Ranking Social Media Pages
Major social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn have very high domain authority and ranking. This means that some pages will have it easy when it comes to ranking, provided that they contain targeted keywords. Building your profile by including trending keywords will help you attract more visitors, and in time, rank higher. Again, it will help you build your reputation as a trustworthy source, as mentioned earlier, and people will be more likely to visit your website or blog.
4. Invest in Your Social Media Future
While social media presence doesn’t impact your rank directly right now, as confirmed by Google, that is very likely to change for several reasons. First of all, social media is showing no signs of slowing down, which means Google and other search engines will need to do something about it. They’ve already begun to include other types of links into their searches, such as video, images, and maps. Second of all, guest blogging, while useful now, will become less effective at some point, and Google will have to rely on other factors which prove a person’s or a website’s authority.
Finally, Google and Bing have already begun to include Facebook and Twitter pages into the search results, which means they treat them just like plain links, but they still say that social media is not a ranking factor. This is very likely to change, so don’t neglect the power of social media when it comes to ranking, even when it doesn’t have a direct impact on in. Yet.
Conclusion
Even though there isn’t a direct connection between your SEO with social media, rest assured that they are linked in other ways which you can use to your advantage. Start building your social media presence today and you will be able to see the difference.
They’ve already begun to include other types of links into their searches, such as video, images, and maps