There are many ways social media can help your business; you can build relationships, attract the attention of parents using social media, increase exposure to your nursery, and communicate the services you have to offer. But did you know that your activity on social media can also help to improve your website’s search engine rankings? Social media is a really useful tool to help you with your SEO, here’s how:

Link Building

Links shared by yourself and others on social media increase the ranking of the page being linked to; if other users across the web deem your content to be a worthy source of information then they will share it. Search engines take this into account, it tells them that your content is a worthy source of information. Links to your content on social media help search engines understand what websites are credible and should be ranked for what keywords and phrases. Therefore, the more social shares a web page gets the more visible that page will be on search engines when people search for keywords or phrases related to your content. So, sharing links to your website or blog page is important to gain exposure online and so is building your following on social media as the more followers you have, the more people are likely to share your content.

Google Author Rank

Linking your content to your Google+ profile gives it authorship. Essentially, when your blog or webpage appears in someone’s search results on Google, your name, photo and number of Google+ followers will appear next to the summary of the page being linked to. This gives the impression to the reader that your content comes from a credible and reliable source, so they are more likely to click on your link over others. Plus, people generally engage more with posts that have images attached to them, so your profile photo accompanying the link will draw their attention.

Keywords

Search engines pick up on keywords from your social media accounts just as they do on a regular web page. Make sure your social media profiles contain relevant keywords and phrases, as well as key information such as your name and company name. Search engines particularly take into account the text contained in your profile name, the URL and your bio. So make sure you fit in any important keywords in your bio and personalise your URL. Also, continue to use keywords in the content you post but don’t force it; try to naturally incorporate them so that your content is still engaging to your target audience.

Be active

Google appreciates when a website is regularly updated with fresh and relevant content, this also applies to your social media accounts. If you post too infrequently or forget about your account then people will be less likely to find you this way through search engines, plus if someone comes across an account that has been inactive for a year they might just assume that the company it represents has gone out of business. The number of followers you have on your social accounts can also affect your search rankings. Accounts that have a lot of quality followers, that is followers that actually engage with the user, are more likely to rank on search engines for the content they post than users with a low number of followers, or followers that do not engage. This is because this kind of activity helps to determine whether you are a reputable source or not. So make sure to build up your followers and encourage engagement from them on a regular basis.

If you would like any help on improving your search rankings through social media then please get in touch by email info@192.168.1.71:8888/shake or call us on 0115 901 7357.

By Madeleine Helme