Social Signals

What?
A few months ago, it was announced that social media signals are an influence in the SERPs. Google and Bing have both confirmed this fact.

Why?
Before this mention, it was largely speculated that SEO was influenced by social media, but it was not clear exactly what factors of social media actually mattered. Gareth Owen, Head of Natural Search at Steak, wrote a great article about which social signals are the most impactful. Below are the top 10 social signals that have the most impact on the SERPs today.

How?

1. Number of Twitter Followers: The more Twitter followers you have, the more authority your Twitter feed will generate.  This will result your feed/URL to have more value.
2. Quality of Twitter Followers:  The better the quality of followers you have, the more authority you will create over time.
3. Relevance of Twitter Followers:  The more relevant your followers, the more likely it will be that they ReTweet your tweet.
4. Number of ReTweets: The more ReTweets you have, the more authority you build.
5. Number of Facebook Fans/likes: Similar to ReTweets, the more fans/likes you have, and the more authority your Facebook page will build.
6. Number of Facebook Comments: There’s really no use in having thousands of fans/likes if your public does not engage with you. The point here is to have your public generate valuable content about you that sparks conversation within your community.
7. User Youtube Comments: Youtube is about sharing videos and sparking conversation around the videos. Don’t forget to also leave comments on others videos as this will also help pass relevancy back to your Youtube profile.
8. References from Independent Youtube Accounts:  The more links to your Youtube profile from other independent profiles, the more authority and relevance your account will generate.
9. Title & Description of Video/pictures on Youtube/Flickr: Use keywords in your video and picture titles. Social media search engines as well as regular search engines (Google) are able to read and index this information. This will help pass authority and relevance.
10. % of Youtube Likes vs Dislikes: Similar to reTweets & FB likes, the more Youtube likes you have, the more authority will be passed to your account.

Conclusion:

Again, these are just some of the social signals influencing the SERPs. Overall, social media should be used to engage your community of followers and encourage two way dialogues. Chances are the more you accomplish this, the more Google will deem you and your social accounts as authoritative and relevant to your industry, resulting in higher visibility in the SERPs.

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Contributed by: Zulema Romero, eStrategist, Milestone Internet Marketing