Are you using social SEO to grow your small business? If not, you may be curbing its growth potential.
As of 2021, 4.6 billion people worldwide use social media sites, a number that’s set to rise to 6 billion by 2027. That means, although there’s no direct connection between social media and SEO, social channels can indirectly give your small business much-needed traction and indirectly help your SEO efforts.
This article delves into the ins and outs of social media SEO. We explain what it is, how it can benefit your business, and reveal some effective strategies you can apply as a business leader to start seeing growth.
What Is Social SEO?
Social SEO is the practice of using social media to boost your search engine optimization. Based on what we know so far, there’s a clear relationship between social media and SEO. Google has been found to index some social media content. A brand’s social media profiles may appear in Search Engine Results Pages.
That’s not to say there’s a direct relationship between social media and SEO. What social media does is that it gives you enough exposure for people to want to interact with your brand outside of those social channels for SEO.
Simply put, an increase in social media signals such as likes, shares, and comments won’t directly translate to a higher ranking in SERPs. However, more likes on Instagram, increased Facebook shares, and a boost in user’s comments means you can reach more people with your content. These can result in more people linking to your website, making branded searches leading Google to associate a specific keyword with your brand, among other things, which, in turn, will boost your search engine rankings.
Social media can indirectly help you in your SEO efforts, but make sure you still follow traditional SEO strategies for the best results. So, you still have to choose the right keywords to use in your blog posts, optimize your pages for speed and mobile devices, and use title tags, among other strategies.
4 Ways Social SEO Can Benefit Your Small Business
You’re probably wondering how social SEO can benefit your business. Here are four you wouldn’t want to pass on:
Establishes Authority: When you post valuable content to your social media platforms that resonate with your audience, they’ll share it widely with their networks.
If the content gains an increased online presence and goes viral, authority sites will link back to the original content on your site. This can increase your site’s domain authority, a Google ranking factor. Thus, the next time someone makes a relevant query, your site may appear higher in search results.
Can Drive High-Quality Traffic to Your Website: Social media can help drive high-quality traffic to your website. High-quality traffic is more likely to stay longer on your website and convert. This may signal to Google that users like what they see. As a result, you may rank higher in SERPs.
Boosts your Branded Searches: A by-product of building your brand's reputation through content marketing on social media is that it boosts your branded searches.
When your potential customers see your brand enough times on social accounts, they’ll develop an awareness that drives them to type its name directly as a search query. If this is done enough times, Google may associate a specific keyword with your brand. So, when people make a relevant search query, your site may rank higher in SERPs.
Helps Gain Customer Insight into Your Business: Social media analytics can tell you what content resonates with your audience. This is content you can then publish on your website. Since it’s something people want and engage with, authority websites may link to it, boosting your SEO.
Now that we know how social SEO can help your business, let’s learn about the strategies you can implement for SEO success and, ultimately, business growth.
4 Social Media SEO Tips You Can Follow
Here are five social media SEO strategies you can implement to put your small business on the proverbial map and ensure growth.
- Create High-Quality Content: If you want increased social shares and to make your content viral on social platforms, you have to make it high-quality. Moreover, if you have an international website, it is crucial to have content that is specific to each country. To overcome geographical restrictions, familiarizing yourself with the concept of what is a VPN can prove to be an effective solution. You also need relevant content for a wider audience to consume it in the first place.
Of course, that doesn’t mean you have to come up with unique content every time. Obviously, native content helps, but it can be expensive to produce native content for each platform. Therefore, you can produce quality content for your website and repurpose it for each social platform. For example, you can turn an insightful guide into a brief twitter thread or LinkedIn slideshare. For example, you can turn an insightful guide into a brief Twitter thread, LinkedIn Slideshare, or Carousels for Instagram, like the one below, by simply using infographic templates.
The key to creating quality and valuable content is understanding your audience, particularly their motivations and pain points.
- Optimize Your Social Media Profiles: An optimized social media profile is key. Without profile optimization, your target audience may not engage with your social content and make it viral in the first place.
In addition, Google indexes social media accounts. When people search for your brand, your social media profiles appear in search engine results pages. If your accounts look bare, forget about authority sites going to your site and linking to your piece of content.
You can optimize your social media profiles by uploading high-quality profile pictures, and populating your bio with info that tells visitors about your brand.
- Build a Strong Network: Building a strong network can help you increase your business’s exposure. You can follow reputable accounts and influential people in your industry, engage with their posts, and get your business in front of their followers. When you consistently apply this SEO strategy, it won’t be long before curious people check your social media content. If it’s any good, they’ll share it and make it viral.
- Encourage Social Sharing: A good way to increase your content’s traction on social sites and make it viral is to encourage social sharing.
Instagram, Facebook, and others do half the work for you by including share buttons into their applications. However, these social media channels provide additional ways to share content that require you to be explicit in your encouragement. For example, encouraging your Instagram followers to tag their friends can help to give your social media posts more online visibility.
With the above strategies, you have higher chances of your small business website ranking in SERPs.
Conclusion
If you want to grow as a business, social media SEO is something you shouldn’t ignore. Although there’s no direct relationship between social media and SEO, you can use platforms like Facebook and Instagram to gain traction for your brand that can help boost your search ranking.
Make sure to create high-quality content. Optimize your social profiles, build a strong network, and encourage your followers to share your content.
Once you adopt the above strategies, you’ll soon find your small business website at the top of search engine results. You’ll be well on your way to success.
Author Bio
Harry leads the digital marketing team at Twicsy, a site providing services to Instagram users. He enjoys travelling and relaxing with friends in his spare time.
