How Does Social Media Work With SEO?Social media V SEO, how do they work together or compete?
Social media and search used to be two separate beasts.
Two things that were in their own spheres doing two separate things. However, now social media marketing sites are being read by search engines, they play a big part in the whole optimisation arsenal.
It was only recently that search engines started to read and take note of social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook and all the alternatives.
The reason was because of the massive amount of information and traffic social media sites were getting, it was crazy for search engines not to get involved.
They did used to monitor and take note of them in the early days (assuming they would fizzle out).
But as the social scene grew, they started to read them and index them also. Google now has an algorithm to read pictures and map users from the pictures they load.
So if someone puts a picture of Abraham Lincoln onto Facebook, search engines will read it as a picture of Abraham Lincoln. This will be logged into Google Images.
SEO or search engine optimisation is all about creating engaging content that people find useful and search engines recognise as authoritative. The key is utilising your long tail and short tail keywords, creating authoritative backlinks to your content and using your meta tags and headers.
SEO V social media and what it means for your business.
Due to the fact that social media sites are being read and indexed, it is important for businesses to be active on social media.
Search engines can tell the difference between self promotion and media buzz.
So businesses that are tweeting about themselves and flagged, and ones that are mentioned by others and in the limelight are flagged as something different.
If your business is not making use of social media, then you are missing out on an important SEO channel.
There is a difference between the goals of SEO and social media.
SEO or search engine optimisation is about enhancing your website content so that the website as a whole climbs the search engines and attracts the right sort of website visitor.
Social media marketing is about creating engaging content that enhances your brand and builds followers. Search engines do monitor your ‘social media footprint’ and rank your website based on how social media users engage with you.
Search engine optimisation allows you to target your audience based on the keywords you use on each web page. For example if you are a dog walker and wanted to target people looking for you in Stockport, you would create a page titled ‘dog walkers in Stockport’ or ‘dog walking services in Stockport’.
Social media is different in that you target demographics based on their behaviours and interests. Social media platforms rely on their users to complete their profiles to show what TV shows they like, where they have visited, their age, books they have read etc.
How SEO works is an unknown in many ways, since search engines do not tell of how they rank websites. They modify their search algorithm on a regular basis so that search results will vary.
Like much of website optimisation work; there is no direct cost.
However the downside is that it takes time (like any search practice).
SEO prices only kick in when you use an agency.
The issue with social media is that it requires constant interaction.
Companies have to update twitter/facebook/other sites they are on on daily and interact with their social community in order to build their networks.
Search engines see this continuous activity and take note.
There are specialist marketing companies that will take control of your social media and handle all Facebook updates, Tweets etc.
Like with SEO, there is no direct cost to tweeting on X, posting articles on Facebook or videos on Tik Tok.
There are ‘social media influencers’ and ‘content creators’ who’s full time job is to create new content for you to boost your social media presence.
You can pay social media marketing companies to do this for you also, but you are paying them for their time and perspective on what will be of interest or not.
If you have time, you can post tweets, articles or even videos yourself, which is free of charge.
Your website content is in line with your service/product. Updating website content and creating new website content is important for your websites overall search engine rankings.
Search engines need to see your website growing rather than standing still.
Social media trends do come and go. There was the ‘ice bucket challenge’ on Facebook back in 2014 and attracted 17 million people dumping cold water on each others heads.
Tik Tok also has different trends going on from time to time, from lip sinking to dancing to trending music.
Keeping up with both is necessary in our new digital world.
Social networking is one area that does not require the involvement of an optimisation expert.
Anyone can start up a facebook account/twitter account, and start twittering/facebooking.
Just go to the social media site that is of interest, and get going.
Both social media marketing and search engine optimisation are an unknown to many of us.
The search engines do not let us know what constitutes the ‘gold standard of SEO’ to get you onto page 1. Many SEO companies claim to be on the knifes edge in delivering on point SEO, but do they really know? Are their websites at the top of the search engine?
Social media platforms like LinkedIn and Tik Tok also have their own algorithm for ranking your digital content. Again, they to will not reveal exactly how they rank digital content
Social media agencies and SEO companies are also on this learning curve, to find out what works and what does not work.
We live in an ever changing fast paced digital world that is for ever evolving as technology moves forwards.
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