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Social signals in SEO
Social signals refer to various interactions on social media that can provide contextual cues and endorsement to search engines. Signals like shares, likes, comments and mentions help search algorithms better understand a brand's influence and popularity.
Pages and domains that generate a lot of positive social activity likely have valuable, engaging content worth surfacing higher in search results. While social proof alone doesn't rank pages, signals enhance traditional ranking factors quality backlinks, freshness and relevance when integrated into an overall SEO strategy.
Various social platforms each provide unique opportunities. Facebook measures likes and shares, YouTube ranks comments and watch time heavily, while Twitter emphasizes retweets and mentions of URLs. LinkedIn shows thought leadership through shares of long-form blogs to professional connections. Brands must test engaging consistently across multiple networks to maximize signal coverage. Monitoring tools track key performance indicators to evaluate what resonates most.
Authentic social profiles and regular posting of optimized images, videos and articles builds followers and followership over time. Interacting with others through likes, comments and relevant replies furthers engagement. Social and SEO teams must align on improving and verifying off-site profiles plus deciding which pages benefit most from social promotion.
Strong social signals boost searchability and help search engines better understand a website's topical authority and importance. They complement quality technical SEO for fully-integrated organic optimization.