How Google Works Part 5: Social Media Marketing

Does Social Media Matter for your Keyword Rank? 

The final part of the How Does Google Work series addresses social media, which may or may not be a ranking factor. Google has said it is and they’ve said it isn’t. As we’ve discussed previously, they don’t share their, “secret sauce” with the industry, so no one knows for sure. What we do know, is there are definite benefits to being active in social media. And considering Google owns YouTube we can guess that YouTube activity matters. 

Do Social Signals Matter?

The truth is we’re not sure if they impact our rankings. However, we know social engagement is important. There’s a lot of speculation as to whether social signals are part of the algorithm or not.

Even if social signals aren’t part of the algorithm, they are essential to your content marketing plan and your overall success. When your content is shared, liked, or commented on within the social media channels, you are exposed to a wider audience. You have the chance to reach a new audience and build your brand awareness. You also can earn more links to your content, and we know links are a ranking factor.

While we’re not sure if the direct social interaction is a factor in keyword rank, we’ve seen sites with more active social channels and better social engagement rank high in the search engine results. Now, this could be for several reasons. It could be because the engines look at social interaction as a ranking factor. It could also be that the sites that are focused on social are focused on their SEO and digital marketing in general and as such, see the benefits.

Why Social Matters Either Way 

Social Media should be a key part of your overall content marketing and SEO strategy, whether it helps with keyword rank directly.

Social Media channels have a huge number of very engaged users visiting daily. You can reach new audiences and build your business.

There are 3 billion+ searches per day on Google, the social channels aren’t far behind.

Facebook processes 2 billion searches per day and Twitter handles 600 million searches per day.

That’s a lot of searching. It’s more searches per day than Bing. Google still is the powerhouse search engine, but the social channels are catching up. So whether or not your ranking depends on the social signals, your overall business does.

So how do you rank on Google?

As we wrap up this series, let’s recap what we know. Google has over 200 items within their ranking algorithm. We understand that a technically sound website is critical if Googlebot can’t search our site, our content can’t be indexed. We know that high-quality content is important to us. Google wants to provide the best answer they can for their customers, so they keep coming back. Google has traditional and non-traditional competitors they must provide a great service for their customers. And finally, we think social signals are a ranking factor, even if they aren’t they’re important to your overall business success.

If your website isn’t ranking where you’d like in the search results, contact us for a free SEO and content review. We’ll customize a plan for your business based on your needs and budget. You can rank better on Google.