Social Media can Improve your SEO & SEM

A common question that decision makers ask when referring to a social marketing strategy is a very simple and appropriate one: Why?

Although we are starting to see more and more concrete examples around the ROI of social programs, it has still been a struggle for people to quantify the value of a good social media strategy for brands. Companies are used to seeing the value out of a good SEO or SEM program, because of the direct data analysis that corresponds with them. So here are few reasons of how a good social marketing strategy can affect these more understood initiatives.

Search is becoming social. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is changing and will have to change around the social graph. The reason for this is that the goal of Search Engines is to deliver the best result based on any given search. SEO strategy plays off of this by structuring & optimizing your content and links so that the SE's can read it. However, content is changing from static content to real-time social content. So SEO will have to change around social because the Search Engines are having to change around social media. Bing recently announced a deal with Facebook, where in the Search Results you will see Facebook likes from your friends related to the results. You can imagine the benefit to those companies that have a large or targeted fan base. Google has been testing other social elements, including "tweets" within the results based on keywords. The web is being rebuilt around people and dynamic real-time content, and therefore the strategies for your brand must adapt as well.

As search becomes social, naturally Search Engine Marketing (SEM) will be affected. Aside from the obvious benefits if SEM platforms start adding social elements within the ads or delivery context, there are other benefits. "Trust Elements" such as Badges, Testimonials and Word-of-mouth conversation are some of the most important factors when building quality landing/conversion pages, therefore they can have a significant impact when measuring SEM conversion rates. As you pay to drive clicks to a certain landing page, showing that you are engaging with current customers via social channels can be a statistically significant influence on your conversion rates for this traffic. In past SEM campaigns I have run, I saw conversion rates jump by over 30% by clearly showing we were actively social, and allowing clients to read the natural conversation taking place around our brand and products. We also included 'twitter testimonials' on our conversion pages with the twitter handles so people could validate the claims, because the conversations are live on the web.

So not only will social marketing add tremendous value independently of Search Engines, it can also add measurable value to the current programs you have in place within the more understood "search" environment.