why search needs social (wappow)
DESCRIPTION
Rand Fishkin's presentation from the May 26th Wappow social media meetup. on why search engines need social data and how the two are merging together to create exciting opportunities for marketers.TRANSCRIPT
Why Search Needs SocialAnd how marketers can gain a competitive advantage in both
Download: http://bit.ly/mozsearchsocial
Rand Fishkin, CEO & Co-founder, SEOmoz
May 2011
Google’s had many other big shifts over the years, but I wanted to call out these specifically. See http://www.toddnemet.com/timeline/ for more.
2004
1998
2001
2003 2005
2007
2009
2009-10
2011
PageRank
WebSpam Team
Florida Update
Sandbox
Nofollow
Maps + Local Results
Vince (Brands)
A Little Google Algo History
Caffeine(Freshness +
Speed)
Panda/Farmer
What is Google Trying to Do?
Unfortunately, none of these are comprehensive or accurate enough to fulfill what I’m looking for (and many use affiliate links, calling into question their motives.)
Make Better Results
I’m actually looking for a good
grill for this summer. Google’s not very helpful.
Why Social?
Social signals – Facebook Likes, Shares, Comments; Twitter tweets; LinkedIn Status Updates; even references from smaller social platforms (Quora, StumbleUpon, Flickr, Blogs, etc.) can help Google gain more relevancy by showing what users really enjoy and share!
These results are quite good; mostly because I’m connected to people who share useful, interesting
stuff in this niche. I need to find some grilling experts.
Let’s explore how search and social are
merging and talk about some cool tactical wins
for marketers, too.
You can see and connect your own social accounts to your Google profile via https://profiles.google.com/connectedaccounts
Google’s Accounts Deliver Social Integration
You can see and connect your own social accounts to your Google profile via https://profiles.google.com/connectedaccounts
Now When I Search…
Geraldine’s blog is awesome, but it would never rank on page #1 for this query without
the power of the social connection.
More info on the Bing/Facebook integration: http://searchengineland.com/bing-now-with-extra-facebook-see-what-your-friends-like-52848
Bing Does this Too (at least with Facebook)
Wait… Doesn’t that mean?
Bigger Social Network +
More Social Sharing
=
More Search Traffic & Better Rankings
That’s Not All…
Controlling for links, social metrics are well correlated with higher rankings in Google. This strongly suggests a direct influence. More http://www.seomoz.org/blog/facebook-twitters-influence-google-search-rankings
Social Signals are Likely to Be Directly
Influential, Too
Let’s Expand Our Network!
Using the query string parameter for profiles, you can find people to connect with across networks who will then see your shares in Google, e.g. http://www.google.com/search?tbs=prfl:e&q=seattle+blogger
FollowerWonk makes it easy to find and connect with Twitter users in the same fashion: http://followerwonk.com
Using http://bit.ly for tracking can help us see when/where we’re effective with shared content and track clicks that Analytics can’t. BTW – You can use + with goog.gl or bit.ly to see other people’s shared links, too, e.g. http://goo.gl/BMIGz+
By aggregating your metrics from bit.ly (and twitter/facebook/etc), you can see patterns that can suggest better ways to share content. More here: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/calculating-and-improving-your-twitter-clickthroughrate
Analytics on Socially Shared Links Matters
Speaking of analytics, Facebook’s Insights widget can be installed on your site to see data about your visitors who are logged into FB: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/4-facebook-marketing-tactics-you-might-not-know-about
Facebook Offers Direct Insights
Namesake is an emerging discussion network that looks very promising: http://namesake.com/
Newer Networks Offer Outsized Returns
Answering a few questions on http://www.quora.com send us several hundred visits a month already
Newer Networks Offer Outsized Returns
Tools like http://trunk.ly and http://summify.com can help you discover great content to share + spread, as well as learn what types of content performs well in your niche.
Check out http://blog.okcupid.com/ and http://www.conversationmarketing.com to see these in action.
OKCupid has this awesome drop-
over box after you finish reading,
encouraging you to share.
Ian Lurie’s blog uses a subtle, single message that “likes” his whole site’s profile, so that anything he shares in the future appears in your search results.
The Possibilities for Social + Search
Synergies Have Never Been Better.
Rand Fishkin, CEO & Co-Founder, SEOmoz
• Twitter: @randfish
• Blog: www.seomoz.org/blog
• Email: [email protected]
Try SEOmoz PRO free!
http://www.seomoz.org/gopro
Download: http://bit.ly/mozsearchsocial