SEO ‘sSocial.The relationship between social
media + search results and performance<br />lauralippay<br />Feb 2011<br />Laura Lippay<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

who am i?<br />search +
social + integrated<br />marketing consultant<br />for<br />enterprise<br />agency<br />startup<br />@lauralippay<br />lauralippay.com<br />

How can social media affect
search? <br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

1<br />Owning search results through
social.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

What happens when you own
SERPS through social?<br />You control what people see in search results about your brand.<br />You have more brand impressions in search results.<br />You encourage direct traffic (to your site directly from SERPS) and indirect traffic (to your site indirectly trough a social network).<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Example: Specialty’s.(you’ll want to be
like these guys).<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

specialtys café = 1,300 searches
a month <br />specialtys bakery = 1,900 searches a month<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Local Chicago site<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Example: Kirby Vacuum.(you don’t want
to be like these guys)<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

kirby vacuum = 90,500 searches
a month<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

The website is listed three
times on the first page of SERPS. <br />Good.<br />Local Kirby stores and service centers appear in Google places results. Good.<br />Kirby vacuum images appear in SERPS. <br />Good.<br />But where are the social SERPS? Guess what’s below the fold…<br />

More page 1 SERPS:<br />People
bashing Kirby. No social presence.<br />Site with thread of complaints from their own salespeople.<br />Derogatory news investigation reports<br />Complaints on Consumeraffairs.com<br />

There are Kirby brand pages
on Facebook…<br />...none with many members or likes.<br />Tough for people or search engines to determine if any are official…<br />…which is likely why their Facebook page doesn’t rank as well as more content-rich slanderous forums (which are likely visited and shared more often).<br />

They don’t seem to have
an official Twitter account.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

2<br />Visibility in social can
= visibility in search.Optimize for social.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Social participation ≠ search visibilitySocial
success = search visibility<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Whole Foods<br />Whole Foods has
a blog, YouTube channel (and videos on their site), Twitter account (w/ 1.8 million followers), Facebook page, and forums on their site. They are extremely community-oriented and cross-promote their social networks.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Whole Foods social in SERPS<br
/>www.lauralippay.com<br />

OMG Facts<br />1.5 million followers<br
/>www.lauralippay.com<br />

OMG Facts social in SERPS<br
/>www.lauralippay.com<br />

Social factors for search performance<br
/>source: http://searchengineland.com/what-social-signals-do-google-bing-really-count-55389<br />

3<br />Visibility in social doesn’t
guarantee success from search. Optimize for search.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Example: Blendtec.Social/viral success influences search.Site
optimized for search.All channels optimized and cross-promoted.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

www.lauralippay.com<br />

Their videos inspired new searches<br
/>No one was searching for blending iPhones before the Blendtec videos. <br />(They’re still searching in 2011).<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

www.lauralippay.com<br />159 million upload views
on YouTube<br />

Sites are optimized, all channels
cross-promoted<br />BLENDER <br />SITE<br />FACEBOOK PAGE<br />VIDEO SITE<br />YOUTUBE CHANNEL<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Good incoming links: Blendtec.com<br />19,366
external links. To a blender site.<br />Links from valuable sites.<br />Links from relevant sites.<br />

Good incoming links: Willitblend.com<br />36,761
external links.<br />Links from relevant & valuable sites.<br />This stuff is sharable. <br />Lots of diggsw/ good titles<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

And they dominate the search
results<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Example: Mint.com.A great product =
natural search (links) and social (sharing) success.Content shared in social appears in & drives traffic from search.Social-focused content strategy represents the “new SEO”.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

THIS is (post-Panda) SEO.<br />Audience-driven
approach rather than strictly search-driven approach creates natural buzz around product which influences rankings without having to build content and links specifically for search engines.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Q&A: Search & Social Visibility<br
/>UGC question w/ dedicated URL on site.<br />Question asked on May 11, 2010<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Q&A: Search & Social Visibility<br
/>Well optimized Q&A pages allow Mint.com to appear in search results for popular financial questions and for tail queries.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Q&A: Search & Social Visibility<br
/>Q&A pages also appear in Google realtime search because people are tweeting the content. <br />Notice they’re still tweeting it 7 months later.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Hot infographics = social &
search visibility<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Infographics = social & search
visibility<br />People love infographics.<br />Mint.com prompts people to share them, <br />and they do.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Infographics = social & search
visibility<br />Popularity of this content in articles and social spaces created measurable buzz around the site. <br />And the page tops rankings for the query in web search.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Infographics = social & search
visibility<br />And in image search.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Infographics = social & search
visibility<br />And in realtime search.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

The process without the social
prompts<br />1) Page exists. Gets indexed by search engines.<br />3) Page will appear in search results. Ranking dependent on popularity.<br />2) People read it in their feeds. Some might link to it in article & share on FB and tweet it even without social share button prompts.<br /> = <br />average visibility & traffic.<br />But why settle for average?<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

The process with the social
prompts<br />6) More widespread popularity = higher search volume = more potential for visibility & traffic.<br />7) The page will rank better b/c of social signals and for more searches b/d of higher search vol.<br />8) It will also appear in realtime search and your networks social search results.<br />5) Page gets several times more visibility and links.<br />This influences performance in search results.<br />4) Social buttons prompt sharing.<br /> = <br />More popularity generally = higher search volume<br />More social popularity = better search performance<br />High search volume + high ranking = traffic<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Tip: Optimizing YouTube for search.<br
/>www.lauralippay.com<br />

YouTube & Video Optimization Tips<br
/><ul><li>YouTube accounts for about 28% of all Google searches

There are 11 billion searches
in Google in March

YouTube videos often appear in
Google SERPS

Create a branded YouTube channel
and put videos on your site - gives you two potential traffic drivers

Each video on your site
should have its own page, indexable by search engines

Write descriptive keyword-rich video titles
9on your YouTube videos and your site video pages) to appear in search results and compel clicks

Provide video descriptions for context

Cross-promote your website(s) and other
social channels</li></ul>www.lauralippay.com<br />

Tip: Optimizing Twitter for search.<br
/>

Set up your brand Twitter
account ASAP(and other social networks too).<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Leverage hot trends to appear
in realtime SERPS<br />

Leverage hot trends to appear
in realtime SERPS<br />Lots of people searching. Your tweet = visibility. (No tweet = nothing).<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Incorporate keywords & link<br />Keywords
in the post help the post appear in Google SERPS for those queries.<br />A link to your site in the post will take people from Google to your Tweet to your site.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Tip: Optimizing Facebook Like for
Facebook search.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

According to Facebook<br />Almost 65
million Facebook users “Like” things daily.<br />http://www.allfacebook.com/2010/07/almost-65-million-facebook-users-like-things-daily/<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

When someone “likes” your article,
these things happen:<br />The “like” activity appears on their Facebook profile page<br />The activity appears in the news feed of the liker<br />The liker’s friends click on the news feed<br />The friends “like” the article<br />The cycle continues<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

But that’s not all.<br />You
can appear in Facebook searches.<br />Links to Mashable articles from Facebook search.<br />Mashable article titles are optimized (relevant and descriptive). This can help clickthrough.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Optimize your ‘like’ for search.<br
/>Make sure your page titles are relevant, catchy and contain keywords.<br />Choose the type of content correctly, so it shows up in the right types of searches on Facebook.<br />http://developers.facebook.com/docs/opengraph/<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Different ‘types’ of Facebook search
results<br />Blog post title is used in the shared post title by default. <br />Meta descriptions are used in the shared post description by default.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Overwrite defaults by using open
graph protocol (og:). <br />This can increase clickthrough from social networks and search.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Tip: Writing a title for
visibility + clickthrough.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Let’s say you’re writing a
blog post* about Jennifer Lopez’s record-breaking sales of a newly-launched women’s sandal called “Lo”. What title would you use?<br />Jennifer Lopez Launches a New Sandal Called ‘Lo’<br />We Can’t Live Without These Shoes!<br />Jennifer Lopez’s New ‘Lo’ Sandals Stomp Shoe Sale Records!<br />J-Lo’s New Shoe Launch Breaks Sales Records!<br />* (that will likely be shared on FB & Twitter) <br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

A title should:<br />Directly tell
what the content of the page is about<br />Incorporate keywords relevant to the page content<br />Use relevant keywords with the most search volume (latter optional).<br />Attract attention<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Titles should tell what the
page is about<br />Search engines look at the title of the page to determine the context of the content on the page <br />“We Can’t Live Without These Shoes!”<br /><ul><li>Tells search engines that the page is about shoes people can’t live without,

but it’s not exactly what
the content of our article is about

and is not descriptive –
might be passed over in search results</li></ul>www.lauralippay.com<br />

Incorporate keywords relevant to post<br
/>Try to use specific keywords that are relevant to the content. <br />“We Can’t Live Without These Shoes!”<br /><ul><li>Post is about JLo’s sandals launching & breaking records, not shoes we can’t live without</li></ul>“J-Lo’s New Shoe Launch Breaks Sales Records!”<br /><ul><li>Close, but the post is about sandals, not shoes

This could show up in
search results for people searching for shoes she launched last year</li></ul>www.lauralippay.com<br />

Use relevant keywords with high
search volume<br />More searches = more opportunity for search traffic. <br />Make the best decision related to your blog post content. <br />Using Google AdWords Keyword Tool:<br />SEARCH<br />RESULTS<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Use relevant keywords with high
search volume<br />Still leaves these two headlines:<br />Jennifer Lopez Launches a New Sandal Called ‘Lo’<br />Jennifer Lopez’s New ‘Lo’ Sandals Stomp Shoe Sale Records!<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Titles should attract attention<br />Headlines
that attract attention tend to get a lot of clicks and oftentimes gain a lot of inlinks.<br />“Jennifer Lopez Launches a New Sandal Called ‘Lo’”<br /><ul><li>Ok, but not as good as:</li></ul>“Jennifer Lopez’s New ‘Lo’ Sandals Stomp Shoe Sale Records!”<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

We have a winner!<br />“Jennifer
Lopez’s New ‘Lo’ Sandals Stomp Shoe Sale Records!” <br /><ul><li>Directly tells what the content of the page is about.

Incorporates keywords relevant to the
page content.

Uses relevant keywords with the
most search volume.

Attracts attention on blog *and*
in RSS feeds, Twitter headlines, Facebook feeds, etc.</li></ul>www.lauralippay.com<br />

Tip: Widgets for links.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br
/>

Widgets can provide contextual, indexable
links in the copy & paste code. Be careful though. Spam is spam.<br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Widgets with links<br /><script type="text/javascript"
src="http://cdn.widgetserver.com/syndication/subscriber/InsertWidget.js"></script><script type="text/javascript">if (WIDGETBOX) WIDGETBOX.renderWidget('241866d6-7737-410b-af96-036a50675257');</script><noscript>Get the <a href="http://www.widgetbox.com/widget/health-news-webmd">Health News - WebMD</a> widget and many other <a href="http://www.widgetbox.com/">great free widgets</a>at <a href="http://www.widgetbox.com">Widgetbox</a>! Not seeing a widget? (<a href="http://docs.widgetbox.com/using-widgets/installing-widgets/why-cant-i-see-my-widget/">More info</a>)</noscript><br />www.lauralippay.com<br />

Tools for Optimizing Search +
Social<br />Gathering Insights<br /><ul><li> GOOGLE KEYWORD TOOL: https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

GOOGLE INSIGHTS: http://www.google.com/insights/search/#

WORDTRACKER QUESTIONS: http://labs.wordtracker.com/keyword-questions/</li></ul>Watching Hot Topics<br
/><ul><li> GOOGLE HOT TRENDS: http://www.google.com/trends/hottrends

TWITTER TRENDING (in general or
watch specific topical feeds like @cnnbrk)</li></ul>SEO Industry Trends<br /><ul><li> SEARCH ENGINE LAND:http://searchengineland.com

SEOMOZ: http://seomoz.org</li></ul>Some Specific Articles of
Interest<br /><ul><li> What Social Signals Do Google & Bing Really Count?: http://searchengineland.com/what-social-signals-do-google-bing-really-count-55389

Does Google use data from
social sites in ranking? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofhwPC-5Ub4

SEO Beginners Guide: http://guides.seomoz.org/beginners-guide-to-search-engine-optimization

SEO Ranking Factors (take w/
grain of salt): http://www.seomoz.org/article/search-ranking-factors

Study on brands + social
(what works): http://feed.razorfish.com/downloads/Razorfish_FEED09.pdf</li></ul>www.lauralippay.com<br />

thanks!<br />@lauralippay<br />lauralippay.com<br />