{"id":962,"date":"2013-10-04T18:00:01","date_gmt":"2013-10-04T18:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.markerly.com\/?p=962"},"modified":"2013-10-04T18:00:01","modified_gmt":"2013-10-04T18:00:01","slug":"why-cant-we-be-friends-social-sharing-and-seo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/why-cant-we-be-friends-social-sharing-and-seo\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Can’t We Be Friends: Social Sharing and SEO"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reading Time: <\/span> 3<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Screen<\/a><\/h3>\n

<\/h3>\n

No one can seem to agree, is SEO out of date and obsolete, or still worth it? And what are social\u00a0signals? What’s going on? I’m going back to bed.<\/p>\n

SEO and Google<\/h3>\n

Google doesn’t seem to like SEO much, which is understandable. So-called \u201cblack-hat\u201d
\ntechniques (simply bad SEO practices) have made it their business to dupe search engines for years to
\nget their clients in the top rankings and first pages of results. That bad name given by these techniques
\nhas pervaded SEO to the point that using SEO makes some companies uneasy and worry about its
\nlegitimacy as a method to getting more .<\/p>\n

Content and Social Signals<\/h3>\n

Google’s phasing out of SEO means they have turned to other means to populate the top
\nrankings, in this case social signals. The rule of thumb of social signals is the more times a piece of
\ncontent is shared (the more likes, mentions, tweets, retweets, +1’s, etc.) the higher quality content it is,
\nand generally the higher in the rankings it will show up. In fact, about half of the traffic to sites is now
\ncoming from social sharing instead of searching.<\/p>\n

Creating quality content which is ALSO popular is not easy, but it is a more consistently reliable
\npractice which makes sense to people. People like something, they share it, it’s a pretty simple concept,
\nas opposed to monkeying around with technical SEO terms that they don’t understand and which seem
\nto insist on changing anyway.<\/p>\n

Marrying The Two<\/h3>\n

So the two have their differences, but it’s easy to see that social sharing and SEO affect each
\nother. Their relationship is becoming intertwined, so what’s an entrepreneur\/blogger\/business owner to
\ndo?<\/p>\n

As long as searching is still around, (and I’m pretty sure Google isn’t taking a vacation anytime soon)
\nwon’t SEO always be necessary? In that case, what still matters when it comes to SEO? To create
\nharmony between the two groups, here are some areas where to marry SEO AND great content for
\noptimum results.<\/p>\n

(If you haven’t already, go take care of your content. Seriously. Social sharing is great, but it’s not king.
\nContent is.)<\/p>\n

1. GREAT Headlines<\/h4>\n

The function of a truly great headline is that it grabs, intrigues, and entices you into reading the
\nfull piece, usually in 8 words or less. A tall order, especially when stats say only 20% of people read
\nyour piece past the headline. No pressure or anything. But headlines are also a great opportunity to
\nstate clearly what your piece is about, and the words you select are a big contributing factor when it
\ncomes to online searching.<\/p>\n

Tips<\/strong>: Personally, I’m not a fan of \u201cshocker\u201d headlines, because after reading, I often feel
\nmanipulated, meaning my perception of the headline did not align with my perception of the article.
\nYou don’t ever want to give your audience a feeling of being used. They will determine that you are
\n\u201cnot worth it\u201d and they won’t come back.<\/p>\n

2. Keywords<\/h4>\n

Carefully selecting keywords will really help out the people who are trying to find you, but it
\nalso helps you narrow down what your post is actually ABOUT. Sometimes, you start off having no
\nidea what you’re talking about until the end, when the big picture slowly comes into view and you
\ngrasp it. Kudos for that, keywords!<\/p>\n

Tips<\/strong>: Longer phrases often help out more than shorter ones. Competition for one or two word
\nphrases can be extremely fierce, so the more specific you are, the more likely you are to to bring in the
\nkind of traffic you’re looking for.<\/p>\n

3. Images<\/h4>\n

When choosing titles, captions, and alt text for your images, make sure they are tightly relevant
\nto your topic and this could help bump up your content even more.<\/p>\n

Tips<\/strong>: Blocks of text can be scary and intimidating to the reader, but engaging images keep the
\neye flowing through the entire piece, especially if they’re funny images or have funny text.<\/p>\n

4. Video<\/h4>\n

This one may surprise you, but stats show that video automatically ranks higher in Google
\nSearch over any other type of content. This a huge plus for your rankings, but having video content also
\nsets you apart by switching up the medium of your content, making it more exciting for your regular
\nreaders.<\/p>\n

Tips<\/strong>: Show your personality and be engaging in how you move and talk. Try to turn off your
\nanxieties about being in front of the camera and always focus on how to best help people.
\nSo as always, keep your content fresh and lively, because that’s what matters the most. But
\nusing some of the tips shown above can make sure you’re found by the right people, while keeping your
\ncontent prevalent on social media. See? They don’t have to fight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reading Time: <\/span> 3<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span> No one can seem to agree, is SEO out of date and obsolete, or still worth it? And what are social\u00a0signals? What’s going on? I’m going back to bed. SEO and Google Google doesn’t seem to like SEO much, which is understandable. So-called \u201cblack-hat\u201d techniques (simply bad SEO practices) have made it their business to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1328,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[6,10,19,34,124,141],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/962"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=962"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/962\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.markerly.com\/pulse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}