SEO and Social Media New and Exciting SEO-Social Opportunities

1. SEO and Social Media New and Exciting SEO-Social Opportunities Zahin Ali, SEO Consultant May 19, 2011

2. O v e r v i e w • What is social media? • Making the Case: Why Social Media for SEO? • 5 Ways Social Media Helps SEO • Signals: The Evolution of SEO and Social Media • Authority: Social Media Ranking Factors • Example: Google +1 • Social Media and SEO Need each other • Cycle of Social and SEO • Roadmap and Steps to Success • Recommendations • Sources 2

3. Social Media in the SEO Framework SOCIAL MEDIA 3

4. Skeptic? “It’s a waste of time” Selecting Focus Groups “140 characters or less?” “We don’t need friends, we need sales!” Developing Questions “Social Media is about being cool and hip” An effective business marketing channel to support your SEO efforts and bring in meaningful ROI. 4

5. Why Social Media? 5

6. Social Media is Hot • Convergence • Democratization • Lines are being blurred • Social search alongside search results • New challenges and opportunities • Traditional SEO is easy to game • Likes/Shares are real time user feedback • Levels the playing field 6

7. 5 Ways Social Media Helps SEO 1. Getting quality, relevant inbound links • Potential for thousands of new inbound links • Genuinely curious users • Inbound links most important thing to impact rankings • Unpaid/unsolicited for veracity 7

8. 5 Ways Social Media Helps SEO 2. Ranking Pages on Social Media Sites • Twitter links are incorporated into Google’s algorithm to impact rankings • Social media sites rank well on search engines • Authority figure buzz supports organic search presence • Great for new launches 8

9. 5 Ways Social Media Helps SEO 3) Reputation Management • Get positive comments on well ranking social media sites • Good references off a search result • Anyone can post anything • Monitor and convert enemies into allies 9

10. 5 Ways Social Media Helps SEO 4. Personalized Communication • Individual communication with customers. • Greater trust/understanding leads to conversion. • Ultimately become ambassadors/marketers of your organization to their friends via social media. 10

11. 5 Ways Social Media Helps SEO 5. Social Media Sells/Converts • Critical mechanism to influence and drive business objectives. • Combine marketing, promoting, communicating, rankings into a successful SEO campaign. SEO managers who understand best practices can engage prospective customers on social sites and improve their business impacting metrics such as rankings, site visits, conversions, and ultimate sales. 11

12. 5 Ways Social Media Helps SEO Strong Evidence: 67% • of Twitter users who become followers of a brand are more likely to buy that brand's products. • of Facebook users who become a fan of a brand are more likely to recommend that brand to a friend. • in ROI reported by CMOs • in Revenue for 2011 60% 95% $4B 12

13. Signals: The Evolution of SEO Before: Get on the front page of Digg/Redditt Use Twitter/Facebook for Public Relations outreach Ranking Factor 13

14. Signals: The Evolution of SEO • Deters spammers • Public can vote freely for content • Easy to express opinions - webpage popularity • Less dependence on crawl of bots • Less elitism between website owners sharing links • More power to the user • Accelerates rate of discussion • Complements links as ranking factor User tested feedback and opinions about your product 14

15. Signals: Tablet PC 15

16. Authority: Social Media Ranking Factors How does social media affect what search engines care about? Links Followers/Shares/Tweets 16

17. Authority: Social Media Ranking Factors How does social media affect what search engines care about? 17

18. Authority: Social Media Ranking Factors How does social media affect what search engines care about? 18

19. Example: Google +1 Valuation tool to demonstrate users feelings with one click “I think this is cool!” Social Media Pressures White Hat SEO 19

20. Social Media and SEO Need Each Other Optimization: On Site Efforts Pure SEO SEO-Social Social: Users Search: Bots Old online marketing Pure Social Media Marketing: Off Site Efforts 20

21. Social Media and SEO Need Each Other SEO Needs Social Media • Depends on relevance and authority • Relevance from fresh original content: Blogs • Authority comes from links and bloggers (Digg, Stumbleupon) • Social media components add to website’s vitality Social Media Needs SEO • Requires exposure • Need to rank high on search rankings 21

22. Social Media and SEO Need Each Other Bad Example: Student LoanDown • Cannot implement social media marketing without optimizing content first • Blog identifies 29 keywords in Keyword Meta Tag • Doesn’t rank in Google’s first page for 26 of them. • Fix via simple blog template organization by leveraging keywords [3] 22

23. Social Media and SEO Need Each Other Good Example: Blendtec • Has attracted over 6,000 links resulting in a top ten ranking on Google for the word, “blender.” Content + Links = Search Engine Success [3] 23

24. Cycle of Social and SEO [4] 24

25. Roadmap and Steps to Success [3] 25

26. Roadmap and Steps to Success • 1. Find your Audience • Understand their likes, preferences, methods of publishing, and sharing. • You need to know what channels they typically use and you want to get in there. • Many companies track their audiences via social media monitoring software identifying keywords, conversions, and influencers. 26

27. Roadmap and Steps to Success • 2. Define Objectives • Traditionally defined by sales/marketing • Role of SEO in a social media effort is to directly influence discovery of social communities or content via search • Searching Zappos gives more than just shoes •  blog, Twitter, Youtube, etc. 27

28. Roadmap and Steps to Success • 3. Strategize • Focus on content and user interaction • Must be discoverable and shareable • Keyword focused: publish new content or consumer generates content 28

29. Roadmap and Steps to Success • 4. Create a Tactical Mix • Content creation and promotion • Know what platforms your audience use • Investment in time and relationships • Optimizing content for keywords [3] 29

30. Roadmap and Steps to Success • 5. Measure your goals • Need to roll up to original objectives • Social media monitoring and web analytics • Constant self evaluation • Are you doing this right? 30

31. Recommendations 31

32. Sources Enge, Eric. "The Evolving State Of Social Media & SEO." Search Engine Land: Must Read News About Search Marketing & Search Engines. Search Engine Land, 2 Mar. 2009. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://searchengineland.com/social-media-and-seo-16643>. ian"You Can't Separate Social Media and SEO." Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing. Conversation Marketing, 2 Oct. 2010. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://www.conversationmarketing.com/2008/07/you-cant-separate-social-media-seo.htm>. Lee, Odden. "Social Media and SEO: 5 Essential Steps to Success." Social Media News and Web Tips – Mashable – The Social Media Guide. Mashable, 15 Apr. 2009. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://mashable.com/2009/04/15/social-media-seo/>. Lee, Odden "Social Media SEO." Online Marketing Blog. Top Rank. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://www.toprankblog.com/2010/08/content-marketing-social-seo/>. Olthuis, Cameron. "3 Ways Social Media Marketing Helps SEO." Search Engine Land: Must Read News About Search Marketing & Search Engines. Search Engine Land, 13 Mar. 2007. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://searchengineland.com/3-ways-social-media-marketing-helps-seo-10715>. Randfish. "Google + Bing Confirm That Twitter/Facebook Influence SEO | SEOmoz." SEO Software. Simplified. | SEOmoz. SEO Moz, 2 Dec. 2010. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://www.seomoz.org/blog/google-bing-confirm-twitter-facebook-influence-seo>. Sheridan, Crispin. "4 Reasons Your Boss Should Care About Social Media for SEO | ClickZ." ClickZ | Marketing News & Expert Advice. ClickZ. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://www.clickz.com/clickz/column/2039633/reasons-boss-care-social-media-seo>.