Why Social Media Matters for SEO
Your Social Media Presence
How Does Your Business Look Online? •  When was the last +me you took a good look at ALL your social media accounts? •  Do you know WHO has access to your accounts? •  Do you know WHAT they’re saying to THE WORLD? •  Are you sending the message you want to send with social? •  Have you integrated social media into your overall marke4ng strategy? If you don’t talk about you… somebody else will! Local SEO and Social Media
Your Poten5al Clients are Online Social Media and local SEO are intertwined: •  Check Ins, Pictures, Reviews are LOCAL and geo-‐tagged •  Google loves social so much they created their own social media network •  Local inﬂuencers online can aﬀect your business (reviews, sharing) •  Great followers give you authority h"p://www.searchenginejournal.com/ways-‐social-‐media-‐impacts-‐seo/48671/ Why Social Media Matters for SEO
Contribute to the conversa5on He’s a leader in my community She really knows her
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They always promote
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I know you had this
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Contributing to the Conversation
How to Contribute… Meaningfully? •  Share links, content, pictures from others – social is about SHARING, not about hogging the stage •  Don’t be too eager to promote yourself. If you get a ques+on, try to answer it without selling •  Be choosy about the content you share from your website – is it interes+ng, helpful, engaging? •  Share details about your employees, charity outreach, tes+monials from other clients •  Like and follow other local businesses! Social Pervades All Marketing Stages
Social Media Aﬀects All Stages Social gives you online visibility and brand awareness • AWract • Educate • Convert • Retain (and promote!) Do It Because Google Said So!
Google Loves Social Media •  Social media ac+vity is a TRUST SIGNAL to the search engines •  Share your GREAT, RELEVANT content with your local audience •  Contribute to the conversa+on -‐ social media is a two way street •  Re-‐tweets / shares can get content indexed faster – search engines care about content that people care about! •  Reviews… people trust other people! h"p://www.seomoz.org/blog/your-‐guide-‐to-‐social-‐signals-‐for-‐seo Protect Yourself
Protect the Online Iden5ty of Your Business •  Another company crea+ng a business page for you? Make sure they make you an administrator. If you ﬁre them or they go under, you’ll need access. •  DO NOT create separate websites just for social media •  Pay aOen5on to what companies post on your behalf •  Monitor your social accounts regularly and respond to posters. •  Don’t let ques+ons or comments go unanswered •  Respond to posi+ve and nega+ve reviews •  Don’t take cri5cism personally – every nega+ve comment or review is an opportunity – NO ONLINE WARS! Social Media Outlets That Matter
Social Media Sites to Use Google+ •  Google+ Personal for Authorship •  Google+ Business for Social and Publisher Authority •  Google+ Local for Reviews Facebook •  Facebook Business Account TwiOer (trends, soundbites, retweets) YouTube (the “long tail keyword killer”) FourSquare / Yelp (reviews, check-‐ins, geolocaLon) LinkedIn for Business (B2B can be a referral source) Google+
The Three-‐Headed Google+ Beast Google+ (continued)
Make Google+ Work for You •  The infant of social media world – expect GROWTH & CHANGE (and more change and problems and frustra+on and did we say change?) •  Google cares about USERS, not your business •  Google will ﬁnd a way to make G+ a social player – ﬁnd a way to make it work for you and get ahead of the curve •  Read the Terms: hWp://www.google.com/+/policy/content.html •  Why does G+ maWer? •  Users logged into G+ will see social search results •  Sharing ac+vity on G+ inﬂuences search results •  Reviews on Local inﬂuence local search results Google+ (continued)
Make Google+ Work for You •  Google+ Personal: use to establish AUTHORSHIP •  Authorship is a big TRUST signal for Google (you’re signing your name to the content you post) •  Authorship is a way to connect with your friends and followers (and stand out in search results!) •  G+ Business: the social page for your business •  Guess what! These may go away and merge with G+ Local pages, to create “enhanced local” or “social local” pages Google+ (continued)
Make Google+ Work for You •  Google+ Local •  Op+mize this page – it shows up in search •  Use high-‐quality, professional images •  Follow terms of use •  REVIEWS! Get them… give them… •  BEST KEPT SECRET: Business to Business Reviews •  Did you know that you can leave reviews for other businesses as your business? •  Leave HIGH-‐QUALITY, USEFUL reviews – don’t get voted down as providing weak reviews – get voted HELPFUL to rise in search! Facebook
Harnessing the Power of Facebook •  GRAPH SEARCH: no FB business page? You’ll s+ll show up if someone adds your business as a “place.” •  Read and understand the terms of use: hWps://www.facebook.com/page_guidelines.php •  Keep it light – would you talk about what to do aher a car accident or quote sta+s+cs at a cocktail party? (Even if you would, don’t!) •  You’re compe5ng for fan aOen5on in the news feed •  Provide content they’ll want to read and share with friends •  Share other content yourself – don’t just push your own content •  Interact with your followers – ask for input, like and comment on their posts •  TEST! Try images and copy, see what “s+cks” with your audience Twitter
Succeeding on TwiOer Find LOCAL inﬂuencers Retweet their Posts Get into the conversa+on Reply to others As with everything, think about who your perfect client is and follow people who would appeal to those clients •  Monitor the hashtags (#) that are being used in your geographic area for content and ideas for tweets • 
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YouTube
Make YouTube Work for You •  YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world! •  What ques+ons do your perfect clients have? Answer them… o[en! •  Op+mize your videos for longtail keyword searches •  Monitor the your video responses •  Leave video responses! Not many people do them, and they rank well. Making YouTube Work for You
Go A[er LONG TAIL KEYWORDS High-‐value medical websites rank ﬁrst YouTube video from Gerry Oginski! Review Sites
Why Review Sites MaOer •  Yelp and Foursquare are VERY GOOD at SEO – some+mes Yelp proﬁles OUTRANK a business’ own website! •  Bing uses review data from Yelp in local search results •  Have you looked yourself up on key review sites? •  Yelp and Foursquare “power users” can be very inﬂuen+al MORE TO COME ON REVIEW SITES IN FUTURE WEBINAR LinkedIn
LinkedIn Can Work •  Connect with other local business owners •  Connect with your peers and anyone who works in your industry •  Use this as a way to remind your friends / peers what you do & poten+ally get referrals •  This is where to show oﬀ your creden+als (ﬁnally!) •  Review / endorse others so they’ll do the same to you •  Social pos+ng on LinkedIn? Be interes+ng, funny, a liWle controversial – most people are boring, so it doesn’t take much to really stand out Social Media: Is It Working?
How Can I Tell If Social is Working? Create advanced segments in analy+cs to track social media referrals: •  Are visitors from social media staying on your site (+me of visit, bounce rate) •  Are they viewing a lot of pages? •  What content is popular with social visitors? •  Geo-‐loca+on for social visitors? h"p://www.dss-‐news.com/blog/creaLng-‐a-‐custom-‐advanced-‐segment-‐to-‐track-‐social-‐media-‐traﬃc-‐
on-‐your-‐website.cfm Psst…Content is still King
Got Content? You can sign up for every social media account under the sun, but if your content is… BORING REHASHED IMPERSONAL …you’re was+ng your +me and your fans will quickly lose interest. Last Words…
EXPERIMENT!
But…do not engage in random
acts of marketing!
Make a PLAN, MEASURE the
results, REFINE your approach
Social Media and SEO
Ques5ons?