Few marketers don’t practice Search Engine Optimization (SEO) nowadays, and even fewer skip social media marketing. When Google rankings affect online visibility so substantially, SEO is almost inescapably valuable. By the same token, social media offer access to vast new audiences for marketers to tap into, with notable results. However, assuming you’re engaged in both strategies, how can the two overlap and synergize? How can you sync your social media plan with your SEO and benefit both?
Those are great questions to ask, and we’re here to help answer them.
The relationship between SEO and social media
First, let’s discuss the exact relationship between the two and draw three actionable conclusions as our foundation. This subject has long stood at the center of many marketing debates, so it’s important to address it.
#1 Don’t try to fully fuse the two to sync your social media plan with your SEO
Regardless of where you stand on this debate or will stand by the end of this article, remember that the two are distinctly different. So, sweeping attempts to fully fuse the two can only end with subpar results, if not in failure.
Instead, consider ways to sync the two toward universally desirable goals, such as:
- Customer-centric marketing. When the flywheel model steadily replaces the sales funnel model, building a deep relationship with your clients is an excellent goal. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software can help you do so, as well as manage your social media activities under one dashboard.
- Enhanced lead generation. Similarly, boosting your lead generation strategies through both is always a constructive goal. You should, of course, adapt each to each campaign’s exact goals. Still, both SEO and social media marketing offer substantial benefits to online visibility and brand awareness, so you should rely on their inherent strengths.
- Omnichannel content marketing. Finally, remember that both serve to expand customer interactions across multiple channels. Enhancing the entirety of the customer journey by syncing them, especially in tandem with CRM assistance, can only benefit your content marketing strategies.
#2 Focus on quality, not social signals
The reason for these suggestions lies in the exact relationship between SEO and social media, which we can cover next. Here, we may draw two concrete conclusions:
- “Social signals”, such as likes and shares, are not direct Google ranking factors
- Social media engagement does affect rankings
These two may seem slightly contradicting, so let us cite a few sources to help explain it.
- On episode 366 of the EDGE on the Web podcast, John Mueller, Google’s Senior Webmaster Trends Analyst, repeated that social signals do not directly affect rankings. He did say, however, that social engagement insights can help refine website content.
- Matt Cutts, head of Google’s webspam team at the time, agreed in a Google Webmasters video. He repeated that social signals do not directly boost SEO, but that social engagement naturally benefits websites.
- A study by Hootsuite found a correlation between engagement and rankings and highlighted the benefit of backlinks acquired through social media marketing.
- A study by Semrush also acknowledged that social media indirectly affect rankings, and focused on traffic gains.
- Finally, a study by CognitiveSEO also confirmed the above, and delved deeper into specifics of their correlations.
So, the conclusion should now be clear. To effectively sync your social media plan with your SEO you should focus on quality, not social signals. Interaction and content quality will earn you traffic and backlinks, in turn benefiting your SEO and marketing efforts.
#3 Speak to your audiences’ tastes and needs
Finally, to execute the above effectively, it is crucial that you directly speak to your audiences. This hinges on what SEO dubs “search intent match”, and what general marketing simply dubs “personalization”.
In simple terms, this means your content marketing should center on such questions as:
- What are your audiences looking for, and why?
- What do they expect from communications with you?
- What brand image do you project, and how does it resonate with them?
To address these questions, you may use such tools as:
- Website analytics tools. Google Analytics, heat maps, and other solutions can help you gauge your website’s performance.
- Social media analytics tools. Such tools as Facebook’s Audience Insights and third-party software can produce insights on your social media activity.
- SEO tools. Then, such SEO tools as Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Hubspot can help refine your SEO. WordPress SEO plugins like Yoast SEO and AIOSEO can do so as well.
- Social media tools. Similarly, such social media tools as post-scheduling solutions can enhance your social media activities.
- Finally, CRM software can further align your marketing efforts, consolidate your channels, and improve customer relations.
5 ways to sync your social media plan with your SEO
Now, we may delve into more specific ways to sync the two. With the above in mind, let us explore five among the most valuable principles and practices toward doing so.
#1 Craft shareable content for the entire customer journey
The first and most fundamental way to do so is to create valuable, shareable content. Here, we may divide the two for clarity.
Valuable content
Content value depends on many factors, such as:
- Search intent match. Does your content match your audiences’ search intent? In other words, does it speak to their needs?
- Length and depth. Does your content have the depth and length to cover its subject and serve its purpose?
- Is your content formatted properly for easier reading?
Shareable content
Instead, content share ability refers to such elements as:
- SEO-friendly URLs. Are your URLs readable, and do they accurately reflect your content’s subject?
- Visual appeal. Does your content visually appeal to your audiences enough to be shared?
- Does your content seem accurate and trustworthy enough to be shared?
So initially, your audiences should find such qualities across your content. Then, your content should follow the entirety of the customer journey, from social media to your website to conversions.
In doing so, your social media marketing will fuel your SEO, by producing more traffic and backlinks. At the same time, your SEO’s keyword research and audience insights will help inform and enhance your social media activities.
#2 Maintain consistency in style and tone, and accuracy in information
The second way, in line with the first, lies in accuracy and consistency between the two. This, too, is a twofold concept.
Consistency.
First, address outreach and content consistency through as questions as:
- Is your copy style and tone consistent between the two?
- Is your visual identity, be it through logos or other visuals, consistent?
- Do the goals of the two align, and do they speak to similar customer journey phases?
Accuracy.
Then comes accuracy of information, which is simpler to examine. In brief, all information you present, whether it’s contact information, product prices, or anything else, should be identical. To do so, examine your online presence and activity across:
- Your website
- Social media profiles and posts
- Google My Business (GMB) and other listings
Addressing these is equally important, as inconsistencies in style and tone may reduce engagement, and information inaccuracies can incite mistrust.
Thus, in doing so, you ensure your audiences get a seamless, consistent experience across all interactions with your brand. This will yield notable benefits as regards lead acquisition from both SEO and social media marketing.
#3 Sync and diversify your organic and paid campaigns
Another excellent way to sync your social media plan with your SEO is to examine your organic and paid efforts. You may do so in a few different ways, so let us highlight the main ones.
- Sync your organic keywords. First, examine the insights that both provide. With these insights, you may refine your organic keyword research and use it to improve content marketing and SEO. As you do, examine if your SEO and social media effectively target the same organic keywords.
- Complement each with its paid counterpart. Then, you may engage in paid marketing, opting for Pay Per Click (PPC), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), and so forth. This may strain your budget, but will often be needed when you cannot organically compete for valuable keywords. Of course, paid marketing should only complement organic marketing, not seek to replace it.
- Align your paid keywords. Then, examine if your paid keywords between SEO and social media align. Some keywords may require that you target them through both, while others may do fine with one.
Finally, as regards both, it is crucial to also identify keywords you should stop targeting. Should the two align, you may use your newfound insights to identify them more easily, saving you effort and money.
#4 Optimize your images
Next, you may examine your images. Social media marketing hinges on visual appeal, and SEO calls for media enrichment for readability and engagement.
To optimize your images across both, you may consider such practices as the following:
- Use appropriate file names. Doing so helps contextualize your image and adds value for your audiences.
- Add captions. Captions help immensely with social media effectiveness, and also offer SEO value by including relevant keywords.
- Use relevant images. Finally, remember to use relevant images to provide substantive value, as irrelevant visuals can distract and diminish your content’s value.
Then, as regards your website specifically, you may continue with the following:
- Mind image size. Keeping your image file sizes under 100kB ensures fast loading speeds, which enhance SEO.
- Define height and width in HTML. Doing so helps avoid scaling issues, and reduces visual instability as pages load. The latter is especially significant due to Core Web Vitals.
- Add alt tags. Alt tags can also include your keywords for more visibility. Moreover, alt tags will help convey an image’s purpose if it fails to load, and allow screen readers to read it.
Of course, such factors as image relevance will rely on your own audience insights. As such, you may approach page optimizations on a case-by-case basis, using data to inform your choices.
#5 Use both to acquire audience insights and readjust
Finally, the most beneficial reason to sync your social media plan with your SEO is, arguably, what we’ve touched on before; insights.
Neither SEO nor social media marketing is ever complete, and both need monitoring and data-driven readjustments. This is especially true in such trying times. Fortunately, you may use both to acquire mutually beneficial insights. To do so effectively, you may consider such synergies between the two as:
- Use the analytics tools of both. From keywords to style, and from quality to output consistency, the analytics tools of both can help you immensely. Consider, for example, social media audience insights for keyword research, and website analytics for social media content marketing. You’re targeting the same audiences through both, so all their data should be actionable.
- Use social media feedback. Such social media feedback as reviews can also inform your SEO. Here, you may use social listening and social monitoring tools to examine unbranded mentions and discussions on subjects of value. You may also use social signals to gauge your SEO’s effectiveness, as highlighted at the beginning.
- A/B test your optimizations. Finally, you may use both to A/B test any optimizations you choose to implement. As with all A/B testing, remember to focus on individual elements instead of sweeping changes for maximum efficiency.
Such practices will, naturally, require some additional effort at first. However, as the two sync and align, it should soon become easier, yielding notable benefits in the process.
Conclusion
To summarize, it is certainly not easy to sync your social media plan with your SEO. It’s far from difficult either, however, as long as you approach it prudently and smartly. Doing so requires valuable, shareable content, consistency, and mutual optimizations. In return, you will acquire much deeper insights and higher lead generation rates from both, ultimately benefitting your business.
