One of the most comprehensive analyses of search engine optimization (SEO) strategies for Google rankings of U.S. websites was released this week by Searchmetrics.
The findings bring us closer to pinpointing Google’s algorithm and making smarter decisions to influence SEO results.
The study looked at an analysis of 10,000 selected top-keywords, 300,000 websites and millions of links, shares and tweets.
The result: social media is the #1 influencer for better SEO in the Google index.
“Social media signals show extremely high correlation: social signals from Facebook, Twitter and Google+ are frequently
 associated with good rankings in Google’s index.”
As you can see in this correlation chart, social sharing from Facebook and Twitter drive Google SEO. Google has also been very transparent about the high degree Google+ activity is factored into their search algorithm (which assigns value to YouTube, inflates +1’s, and promotes social search).
And specifically by the top 2 social sites:
Other key findings of the study:
“Too much advertising is detrimental: for the first time we are seeing sites with too many advertisements struggling to rank well.” (Much social media marketing can be done for free or little cost. Businesses who invest in advertising should chart return against social media to determine which is more effective.)
“Backlinks are still important but quantity is not the only important thing: even though the number of backlinks is still the most powerful factor, links with stop words and ‘nofollow’ should also be included in the link-mix.” (Adhering to organic backlinks is key, as they indicate high quality, engaging content.)
“Brands leverage classic SEO signals: apparently pages with strong brands do not need be as concerned with the areas of title tags, headings etc. According to our figures, this group operates under different rules.”
“Keyword domains still frequently attract top results: despite all the rumors to the contrary, keyword domains are still alive and well and are often in the top rankings.” (Visit https://www.liqui-site.com/Liqui-Site-Web-Evaluation to evaluate your brand keywords, SEO, and site performance for free.)
The data speaks for itself in this case, earning Searchmetrics its title of “the world’s experts in search analytics.” Dig a bit deeper into the data by reading the article on Searchmetric’s blog or download the whitepaper.
Companies who still believe they can achieve successful SEO without social media integration are simply doing themselves a huge disservice. Social media is imperative for driving traffic to a website and converting sales. Without any engagement with prospective customers on the social platforms where they spend significant time, the traffic to the site will be pulled solely from organic search and PPC. This isn’t the traditional SEO experience anymore- marketers must adapt.
