Do you realize that if you don’t integrate your social media with your SEO, you throw away tons of traffic and sales?
Social media actually doesn’t cause high search rankings. Focus on that keyword “cause.” However, websites that rank well have powerful social media presences too.
SearchMetrics found a high correlation between social media and search rankings. So while social media doesn’t cause high search rankings by itself, it’s certainly an important factor.
Taking a look at the reverse side of the coin…how can you actually hurt your search ranking when using social media?
Learn a few lessons by checking out these tips:
You Don’t Use Social Media to Get as Many Quality Links as You Should
The power in social media isn’t in the amount of links you get. Yeah, it absolutely can generate hundreds of links.
But you miss the real value of social media if that’s your focus.
With social media, you want to build relationships with the powerhouse influencers in your niche. Because everyone else with quality websites follows them.
And just a share or two can lead to several high-quality links.
In SEO, those links have much more value than winning hundreds from moderately-known websites.
You Create Just Another Profile Where You Share The Same Old Content
You’ll get some value from this. But only the bare minimum. So you hurt your SEO because you don’t take full advantage.
Basically, you’ll keep pace with your competition. Or stay slightly behind.
Most companies create yet another blog post on the same old topic. They offer little new or valuable information. And they share the same from third parties.
To drive your social shares through the roof, you need to be different. If you’re in a niche where literally the same old stuff comes out all the time and you truly don’t have anything new to say, present your content in a different way.
A 2000-word blog post (once per month) chock full of videos, images, diagrams, data tables, actionable tips, humor, fierce opinions, or challenges to conventional thinking sets you apart.
Few companies have the patience to do anything like that. And most think you need to be short and quick to capture attention (which isn’t true).
Your social posts should have emojis, hashtags (not appropriate for every network), and a chatty, personal message (versus just the title of the content being shared).
That’s how you max the SEO value of your social posts.
You Focus Too Much Time on Follower Count
It’s the most obvious way to measure success, isn’t it?
Follower count, unfortunately, only appears to show a measurement of success. But in reality, it doesn’t do anything for SEO.
Google’s Matt Cutts, the former head of web spam and SEO, explains Google doesn’t use social signals because it can’t measure things like follower count:
What should you do instead?
Use social tools to figure out what content people in your niche like.
Create your own unique version. Share it.
Keep chipping away to see what earns the most shares. Content which generates shares also gets links. Followers will come. And links boost your SEO.
Social Media’s Now Your SEO Ally, and Not a Time-Sucking Enemy
Done right, you can manage your social media profiles in just minutes per day. It takes time to optimize to that level of efficiency.
Done wrong, however, and social media consumes hours per week while failing to yield any real results.
Keep these three tips in mind. They’ll generate you a flood of value over time with the consistent application.
