Even though Google announced that it doesn’t consider social media signals for SEO, marketers know that these signals have an indirect impact on your website’s ranking. Social media platforms are vital for the success of any digital marketing strategy. And if you don’t use them for your small business, you’ll miss out on many benefits. These platforms have humongous reach. Facebook alone gets 2.27 billion active users per month whereas Twitter has 320 million monthly users.
How does Social Media affect SEO?
When Google doesn’t consider social media signals then how do they affect SEO? To find the answer to this question, we searched for a brand. Let’s take General Motors for example. When you’ll search for General Motors, you’ll see their website as the top result and all of its social media profiles following it.
This means social media pages rank on search engines just like a website. If you want to increase your organic traffic and SEO, you’ll need to work on your social media presence. You may ask, how? Well, we’ve got you covered. Here are the top social SEO tips for small businesses you should follow:
Have an Optimized Profile
Your business profile is vital for your brand’s social media presence. It informs people about your brand, its purpose, its experience, and message. Your business page will appear in the search results for your brand name search as well. To make sure that your business appears in the top results, be sure to add some relevant keywords. Use the primary keywords for your brand and add them to your business page. You can use these keywords in your business description or bio.
Pro Tip: Use the keywords you use on the homepage of your business. They will be the most effective ones because search engines can easily associate them with your brand.
Publish Optimized Content
These platforms are not for creating a profile but for sharing content with others. Your business surely shares a lot of content on these platforms (if you don’t then start now). However, make sure that you use keywords and tags to keep your content optimized. Using relevant keywords and tags in your content will help people in finding the same. For example, if you publish a post about carpentry, be sure to use tags such as #carpentry, #carpentertips, etc.
Pro Tip: Search for the most relevant terms for your business on the social media platform you want to target. Go through the posts ranking for this term and see the tags they are using. It will help you get tagging ideas.
Get Maximum Shares
Social media shares help you increase your brand reach without putting much effort. These shares will also let you rank higher in social media search results. How do you get social media shares? It’s easy. You only have to publish high-quality content which people like. Your content should stand out and provide value to the people. When someone finds a great piece of content, he or she feels great to share the same.
Pro Tip: You can write amazing posts, create infographics or create videos. They all are great ways to increase the number of shares on your social media profile. Don’t forget to use keywords.
Engage with the Community
Don’t just publish content. Interact with the people present on the platform. Even big brands focus on interacting with the community. Yours is a small business so you should definitely focus on this aspect. Social media platforms are perfect to increase your brand engagement. You can do so by commenting and sharing other people’s posts. You can also reply to the comments of the people on your posts. Such interaction will increase the visibility of your brand on these platforms.
Apart from that, it will also encourage others to share your business and its posts with others. This will help you boost your website’s SEO.
Pro Tip: Take a look at the Twitter page of Wendy’s. See how they interact with their customers.
Stay active on your Google My Business Page
Every small business has a GMB page (if you don’t have one then set it up). But having a Google My Business page is not enough. You should stay active on the platform as well. How to do that? By using Google posts. They enable you to post small pieces of content regarding your business. Be sure to publish this content regularly to keep your page’s visibility high.
Pro Tip: Optimize your Google My Business Page. Use relevant keywords in the content you publish.
Keep your Brand Consistent
Branding works only if it’s consistent. All your SEO efforts will be in vain if you don’t keep things consistent. The following points will help you:
– Use the same business name for all social media pages
– Target the same (or similar) keywords on different social media platforms
– Keep your brand voice the same as that on the website
– Follow the same pattern for your visuals as you do on your website
Brand consistency will help the search results in associating the relevant terms with your business.
Summary
Leveraging social media for SEO isn’t difficult. You can easily get ahead of your competitors and attract organic traffic by following the above tips. What do you think of social SEO? Do let us know. If you have any questions regarding the tips we discussed or social media marketing, feel free to ask us.
