Incorporating Social Media as Part of the SEO Strategy

There are three main components of a strong SEO strategy – quality content, link building, and social media. While most marketing managers are aware of the importance of quality content and link building they have yet to grasp the importance of social media. However, search engines have changed their algorithms – the way in which they rank websites – to include social media as well. This makes it very vital that marketing managers pay attention to social media when designing an SEO strategy in 2014.

Social Media More Than an Additional Platform

Social media was not available when SEO strategies were first being implemented for online marketing. However, in the past year, social media use and availability among target customers has grown exponentially, making it important that marketing managers plan content for this platform as well. However, your social media strategy should be integrated into the overall marketing strategy as search engines determine the quality of online content by evaluating the number of mentions and links that social media provides to a particular brand. This means that you can use social media to drive visitors to your website directly and also use it to improve search engine rankings, increasing your website visibility indirectly. In 2014, companies that use social media in a large way in their marketing campaigns are likely to see better results than those that continue to ignore this platform.

Link Building

A more traditional way of increasing search engine rankings is by using link building. This is simply the number of hyperlinks other websites have to your site. Search engines rank websites with a greater number of inbound links higher than others, though the quality of the sites that provide the inbound links also matter. Link building is time consuming and requires patience – however, the results are worth it. One effective way of building links is to agree to write guest posts for blogs where you can provide links to your website or other blogs and content you have written.

Quality Content

The third component of an effective SEO strategy is the creation of quality content. You need to ensure that the content created meets the needs of the target audience and engages their interest. For this you need to have a clear picture of the target audience and put yourself in their shoes to understand their needs. Before creating quality content, you also need to research keywords and ensure that there is relevant content for all keywords. You can distribute your content among blogs, articles, white papers, and ebooks as long as the content is useful for the audience you have in mind. For instance, when you are creating content for a children’s clothing website, you can include information that is relevant to parents – safety of children as they play, pesticide free clothing, toys, and so on, relevance of color in stimulating a child’s curiosity, and so on. By providing content that is not just pushing the products but also informing the audience about issues that interest them, you will be able to hold their attention.