Social Media and SEO have never been more intertwined than they are today. Not only are social media elements like Tweets and reviews making their way into search results, but Google’s new social search is a clear indicator that social media’s effect on search is going to continue to grow in importance. By aligning your social media campaign with SEO best practices and your optimization strategy, you not only maximize the ROI of your social media program, but you begin to set the foundation for future organic search success.
2. Agenda
1. Intro
a) Who is This Presentation For?
b) History of Search
c) Convergence of Social Media and Search
2. How Social Media Affects SEO
a) Real Time Search
b) Content
c) Links
d) Brand Related Search
e) Directly (Tweets, Reviews, Etc) in Algo
f) Social Search (Google, Facebook, Twitter)
g) Reputation Management
3. Measuring Social Media’s Impact on SEO
a) Number of Links as a Metric
i. Challenges
ii. Tactics
b) Attribution Analytics
i. What it is / How it works
ii. How to Use it
4. Who This is For?
• Search marketers who want to understand how Social
Media affects SEO
• Social Media marketers that want to understand how their
efforts impact SEO
• Marketers who want to justify social media spend based on
SEO ROI
5. History of Search
• First Generation- On Page
(Meta and Title Data)
Web
2.0
• Second Generation – Off
Page (Linking = Google) Off
Page
• Third Generation- Web On Page
2.0 & User Driven Search
6. Convergence of Social Media and SEO
• Social Media has been creating links and content since the first forum
• Blogs became a huge force in the world of SEO
• Social news sites like Digg began to significantly influence links
• Universal search integrated Social Media components into search results
(reviews, videos, etc)
• Yelp reviews get pulled into Yahoo local search
• YouTube is now the worlds second largest search engine
• Twitter and Facebook search is very popular
• Bing incorporates Tweets into search
• Search engines adopt more ranking metrics based on Social Media mentions
and sentiment
8. Real Time Search
Google now incorporates real
time search results from the
following sources:
• Facebook
• MySpace
• FriendFeed
• Jaiku
• Identi.ca
• Twitter
• Yahoo Answers
• News Articles
• More
9. Content
• User generated content (UGC) can be
generated through social media in a
number of ways:
– Forums
– Blog Commenting / Guest Blogging
– Reviews
– Videos
• Exceptional UGC tends to be keyword
focused
• Authoritative communities generate
exceptional content and acquire links
• SEO friendly community platforms like
Lithium create content
10. Content Examples
http://forums.digitalpoint.com/ http://www.adobe.com
Threads: 1,521,781 According to Yahoo, Adobe has
over 20K links to their Developer
Posts: 12,365,175
Center.
Members: 332,739
Active Members: 59,307
11. Links
Social Media can produce both direct and indirect links:
• Direct Links:
– Some Social Media sites create link connectivity via profile links
– Some Social Media sites create link connectivity via posted links
• Indirect Links:
– Many links are generated as a result of increased visibility through Social
Media (Blogging, YouTube, Digg, etc)
– Some links are generated by asking for them through Social Media channels
(Twitter, Blogging, FaceBook, LinkedIn, etc)
• Avoid registering for Social Media sites solely
for SEO. Social Media sites that are used for
their intended purpose typically produce the
best SEO results
12. Links – Evaluating Social Media Sites
Each of these items has potential for SEO value.
When implemented –and integrated –correctly,
Social Media can maximize your exposure and
enhance your Search Rankings.
Things to Consider
• Are outbound links rel=nofollow?
• Do applications produce live links?
• Can you import your blog RSS feed?
• Do profile pages connect as a result of being
friends?
• What is indexed under public profiles?
• Can you customize link text?
• Can you customize page titles?
• Do pages from that domain rank well?
• How popular is the site?
13. Finding the Sweet Spot
Strong Social
Value • High Traffic
• Quality Audience
• High Participation
• High Authority
• High Number of Inbound Links
• Valuable Content
Poor SEO Strong SEO • Feature Rich Platform
Value • Analytics tracking
Value • Low Maintenance
Poor Social
Value
14. Brand Related Search
Challenges:
• The majority of corporate search traffic is brand specific
• Brand search has the highest propensity to convert
• No easy solution to understand which digital assets drive brand
related traffic from search—until now
Solution:
• Attribution Analytics can tie social media influence to brand
related search generation
• Social media ROI calculations should include brand related search
activity
15. Direct Influence
• Algorithmic ranking factors
for Google and Bing now
include social media metrics
– and are likely to be
included in future algorithm
updates.
• YouTube rankings currently
use social media metrics like
number of comments,
ratings, and video views.
16. Social Search
• YouTube search is the second largest
search engine in the world.
• Facebook and Twitter search are
becoming increasing popular.
• Google Labs recently launched its
“Social Search” in Beta.
• Wikipedia owns many top search
result listings (in many languages).
17. Reputation Management
• Active Social Media sites that have link
connectivity, tend to rank well for
company name related searches.
• By maintaining a collection of
prominent Social Media sites,
including; Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter
and YouTube, brands can control a
majority of the top 10 listings for their
company name.
• Some link development to company
pages on these sites may be
necessary.
18. Social Media Tactics
• Social Media Sites (General):
– Interlink your social media profiles whenever possible to make it easy for your friends
to find you on other networks.
– Develop links to your social media sites.
– Create your own social media broadcast system by participating in your community and
learning where your community lives.
– Have a consistent participation schedule of important social media sites that are part of
your social media broadcast system.
– Be active and participate in your own community daily.
• Blog:
– Start a blog (preferably self hosted using WordPress)
– Update the blog consistently with thought leadership content that is keyword focused.
– Embed social bookmarking buttons for Twitter, FaceBook, Digg and Mixx on your blog
posts (the “Share This” button is also cool!).
– Interlink blog post content to your main site content where it makes sense for users.
19. Social Media Tactics (cont’d)
• Facebook:
– Start a Facebook page and add the
RSS Reader, Twitter, FriendFeed,
YouTube and Flickr applications to
your page.
– Keyword focus your About Box
– Assign Meta Data to Digital Assets
• Twitter:
– Start a Twitter page and sync it
with your Facebook status.
– Include relevant keywords in your
Tweets and FaceBook status
updates.
– Background design should
incorporate the brand’s numerous
social profiles.
– In the bio, use keywords that will
help your profile get found from
directories.
20. Social Media Tactics (cont’d)
• Videos:
– Upload Videos through TubeMogul to YouTube and other video distribution
channels.
– Upload your videos to MySpace and Facebook in order to gain maximum exposure
for traffic and links.
– Watermark all videos with URLs.
– Include annotations for video series. This optimizes the user path.
• Images:
– Upload pictures to Flickr, MySpace and Facebook separately to maximize viral
exposure.
– Customize your Flickr link back to your homepage.
22. Goals of Measurement
• Understanding SMO and
Attributing to ROI
– How Effective Social
Media Optimization is at
Acquiring Links
– Generating Brand
Related Search Activity
23. Links - Reporting
• Link Reporting Challenges
– Yahoo Site Explorer limited to 1000 links
– Google’s link command is broken
– Webmaster Tools is not complete
– Majestic SEO data is not complete
– Monitor analytics data
– Monitor Social Media with tools like Radian6
• Link Benefits
– Allows for Measuring Link Development Success
– Helps to Diagnose Ranking Changes
24. Attribution Analytics - Reporting
• Not everything can be measured by clicks
– Blogs, news sites or page with no links (i.e. YouTube)
– The more reputable the news outlet, the less likely to provide a direct
link
• Interest generated is often not immediate
• Sometimes requires multiple touch points for interest to
develop
• Complements traditional click-through reports
Attribution Analytics Webinar On-Demand:
http://www.businessol.com/forms/view-through-gaining-insight-data
25. Determine the User Path
SEO
Link to Teaser UI
Land on Squidoo
Whitepaper
Search “HR User Link to Watch UI Register to View
Interface” Demo on Scribd Full UI Whitepaper
Social Media
Link to Payroll
Link to Blog
Demo Information
See New Blog Post Watch Testimonial Register to view the
on Facebook Feed on Blog Payroll Demo
28. Attribution Analytics - Applications
• Search - Measure the impact of social media, PR and video on driving
brand related search activity.
• Social Media – Measure the impact of social conversations across all
traffic channels.
• Online PR – Measure the impact of online PR and news coverage across
all traffic channels.
• Bookmarks – Measure what portion of the bookmark traffic was
affected by social media, PR and video.
29. Conclusion
• Social media has a number of implications for SEO:
– Real Time Search
– Content
– Links
– Brand Related Search
– Directly (Tweets, Reviews, Etc) in Algo
– Social Search (Google, FaceBook, Twitter)
– Reputation Management
• There are a number of specific tactics that should be employed (as discussed in this
presentation) to maximize the SEO value of your social media campaign.
• Social media is one of the most effective ways to acquire links and drive brand
related search activity.
• Attribution Analytics is a new technology that can help tie multi-click attribution to
social media efforts.
• Using the SEO results of your social media efforts can help marketers get
additional budget (especially comparing link acquisition costs of social media to
paid campaigns).
30. Thank You!
Any Questions?
Contact: Ray “Catfish” Comstock: Ray.Comstock@BusinessOL.com
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