While the realms of social media networks and search engine optimization are changing on a seemingly constant basis, one single fact remains: website traffic, and therefore search engine rankings, matter more today than ever before.
While is already known that social media can affect your SEO, social media is seen as important for business growth – especially lately – it’s often placed in the “good thing to do, but not essential for SEO purposes” category. Recent trends suggest that this thought should be eliminated; Social media sites can actually boost your SEO efforts in more ways than many business owners and social media professionals had thought possible.
A recent study by Ascend 2 illustrates that 50% of the companies failing at SEO have something in common: they’re failing to use traditional social media in their SEO efforts. At the same time, 38% of the companies that rank highest in terms of successful SEO strategies are integrating social media extensively.
If you have yet to integrate social media into your daily business operations, or have not seen the link between social media and SEO, now is the time for a change. Below are a few reasons to think differently:
Social Media Drives Traffic, Traffic Drives Search Rankings
When looking for a way to connect with a target market, social media is the first choice for most companies and/or individuals. But, when looking to drive traffic to a physical website, it’s unfortunately often overlooked.
By sharing information that’s full of helpful content and taking the time to link back to your site, along with a clear call to action, visitors have a reason to visit your site. The more traffic your site has, the higher your search engine ranking. Using social media is a proven method for making it happen.
Crowd-Sourced Link Building Matters
Traditional link building has become an antique – a thing of the past. Google and other search engines caught onto the methods websites were using to build links, and did away with using the number of back links on the web to determine search engine placement.
While the method of link building has changed, it still matters… to an extent. Now, link building consists of getting real, true online exposure through the sharing of links. The easiest way to make this happen? Social media.
One inbound marketing company explains that using real people to spread links is just like crowd funding – you’re using a network to increase exposure and drive traffic toward a common goal. In this case, social media followers are sharing important or relevant information with your followers, but the benefit to your company is an increased number of links across the web.
Exponential Exposure Potential
Exposure is critical for any business. This has always been the case; from word-of-mouth marketing to billboards, television commercials and online ads, finding a way to get your brand in front of as many individuals as possible is the best way to increase exposure and web traffic, which affects search engine rankings more than any other factor.
This is where social networks come into play. By creating an SEO campaign that integrates with social media marketing, you’re increasing the size of your social footprint. The larger your footprint, the higher your search engine rankings and the more successful your SEO initiative will be.
The bottom line is this: social media and SEO can no longer be seen as separate efforts and entities. Instead, they should be viewed as partners that work together toward the same goal. If a company fails to see the connection, the eventual result is SEO failure. It’s a simple concept that should be embraced by businesses of all sizes sooner rather than later.
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See also: Why social media is essential when creating an SEO strategy
