Business social media is a tricky little world. While many SEO marketing consultants have been emphasizing for years that simply having an active social media account can boost rankings, recent studies are revealing that it’s untrue. That doesn’t mean, however, that social media marketing can’t lead to more website traffic. Here, we’ll look at what social media marketing can do for your business.
News flash: the internet is immensely popular. We’re talking almost 2,000 searches a second. A large number of those users, 43% to be exact, are social media fans and followers, making social media marketing a natural fit for businesses hoping to expand their audiences. In order to understand how social media marketing can help boost search rankings as well, however, we’ll have to sneak a quick peak at search marketing.
Search Marketing Basics
Maybe it goes without saying, but just in case you’ve been living under a rock, ranking highly on Google without resorting to paid ads is a big deal. A large majority, 80%, of search engine users say they ignore sponsored links and only look at organic results. For the most part, users only even bother with the organic results on the first page. So how do they get there? There’s a very complex algorithm used to decide which sites are most relevant, and a large component of it is related to the number of links back to a particular site embedded in relevant content. We now resume our regularly scheduled programming.
How Social Media Marketing Influences Search Rankings
Social media platforms are ideal places to get backlinks. It’s not enough, however, to spam user walls with links. The real key is, as always, great content. Businesses that do search marketing right have a process that looks something like this:
- Produce unique, quality, industry relevant content in the form of an explainer video, a great article, or even an image.
- Share that content with fans and followers via multiple social media platforms.
- Engage with users who comment about it.
Once you’ve shared truly quality content, users will share it with one another, maybe even linking to it on their blogs. Those links are what bring you better search results. The bad news in all of this is that social media marketing takes a little work. The good news is that it provides a double-benefit. You get better rankings all while improving your relationship with customers.
The Moral of the Story
Content marketing is what matters for social media. Many companies don’t really have the time or skills to devote to it, however. Many social media marketing firms are available who can manage profiles as well as work hard at producing great content. You can’t afford to pass on social media, though, so whether you DIY it until you’ve got the capital or take the plunge into working with a professional, get it done. You’ll be glad you did. Continue.