Social Signals And How They’ll Drive Traffic to Your Site

Google makes 2-3 changes in its algorithm per day. With nonstop change, SEO marketers must constantly update their tactics to keep pace with the rules. Yet, despite all the cynics and doomsayers, SEO is alive and kicking and still an essential for today’s online business.

When SEO meets social media marketing, the combination is cheap yet powerful. Networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter require zero cash investment and minimal time to manage. Their real value, though, is that the social connections and their user behavior patterns reflect what’s actually going on in the real world. As real people like, tweet, and share insights can be mined and used. Businesses that possess social signal data, arm themselves with powerful insights into what customers wants, like, and are talking about.

Why You Should Use Social Signals

As socialites, proof from our peers greatly influence our buying decision. We trust our friends, and when they like or recommend something we’re at least comfortable in having a glance. In fact, 80 percent of people are influenced by their friends to buy something.

Signals come in many forms across the platforms. There are shares, likes, tweets, etc and they require lest effort to track or use. Admittedly, they’re not as authoritative or convey the same sense of influence as experts do, but for the masses they count for something.

Social clicks are also harder to spam because the behavior of users is easier to spot and measure.

The Benefits of Social Signals

Businesses that target social media have a lot of room for trial and error. Monitoring user behavior such as how many times a visitor has been to the page, how long they browsed for, and which links they clicked on next give endless opportunities for experimentation and optimization.

For example, two sites with bounce rates of 44 percent and 57 percent, respectively, can measure the effectiveness of content and how well it grabs the audience’s attention. The former would be a better page to show in response to a user’s queries or interests. If a visitor clicked on a page, then a few seconds later closed out or clicked elsewhere, its safe to say the page is not of good quality.

How Social Signals Drive Traffic to Your Site

Facebook is by far the most popular social networking platform on the web. Many businesses know its value, but there are many still that take it for granted.

Facebook links on public profiles are visible to search engines. Not only does this broadcast your site to the news feed of the user’s friends, it also attracts users outside the profile’s circle of acquaintances. Likes also work likes votes. More likes ranks the content higher and draws more people into clicking. This is an exponential driving force as it motivates users to follow the hundreds of others before them to check out the buzz themselves.

Facebook also has a high branding impact in that it’s a great way to engage and connect with consumers. While requiring less SEO, building a following through brand ambassadors creates a strong relationship with customers, making them more likely to share and recommend your content to their friends.

If you want to know more about these social signals, and how combined with SEO they make for a powerful tool that drives real traffic to your website, contact us today and talk with one of our experts.