Social Media Marketing and SEO: How They Work Together to Boost Your Visibility

Inbound marketing leads come primarily from one place: the internet. Social Media Marketing (SMM) and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) are the main ways that interested parties learn about your business and the services that you provide.

Currently, there’s a lot of talk about the purpose of each type of campaign. Can you maximize one strategy to enhance another?  How do they coexist?

The Value of SMM

In the home care industry, the most popular social media channels are LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. Most people think social media marketing in home care consists of posting content on those platforms.  But there’s more to it than that. 

Social media marketing also represents a great chance for companies to showcase their brand personality. More and more, people want to give their business to companies that share their values. Social media provides a window into how you live your mission on a day-to-day basis.

Also, since the very nature of these platforms is interactive, social media marketing presents a valuable opportunity to directly engage with people interested in what you do.

Not Just for Connecting Anymore

Increasingly, social media has become a place where people find information. Businesses have capitalized on this, devoting major spending to advertising on these platforms. 

Consider that in the first quarter of 2021, Facebook ad revenue increased 146% compared to 2020.  All platforms now contain search functions, which can work to your advantage in two ways.

First, people unfamiliar with your company may search for a term related to the industry only to end up on your virtual doorstep. Or, you may actively seek out these same leads by searching similar terms and forge new connections. Either way, social platforms provide an easy way to network.

The Value of SEO

SEO, or search engine optimization, is the practice of increasing traffic to your company’s website through unpaid search engine results. Here’s how it works.

When users type a search query into a major platform, like Google, it reads through its internal indexes for the content it thinks will be the most useful to the searcher. Those findings are presented in order of perceived helpfulness, on their search results page.

To land near the top of a search engine results page takes deliberate and dedicated effort over time.

Websites rank higher in search engine results when they consistently provide quality, relevant content to users.

An Answer to a Problem

It sounds simple enough. But first, you need to anticipate what your audience needs as it relates to your company’s home care services. Then, publish content that offers sensible solutions to those problems and leads people back to your website. As you drive more traffic to your site, search engines will identify your site as authentic.

Once you’re established as a credible, reliable source, your content will show higher in the rankings, maximizing your exposure.

Can Social Media Marketing Boost SEO?

Clearly, both types of strategies are essential to your marketing plan. But to what extent can you use SMM to boost SEO? The short answer is, it depends.

Search engines, to varying extents, do consider some data from social media when formulating a website’s search ranking. But, how they use that information varies.

It’s All About the Signals

Social signals are data points that measure social media activity. The most common signals across platforms are likes, comments, votes, and shares of content. 

Google remains cagy about how social signals influence ranking.  However, likes, comments, and numbers of shares on social media are not thought to impact rankings.  Google sees many of these points as “vanity metrics,” data that can be too easily manipulated.

What is Google’s Primary Goal?

Remember though, that Google’s primary aim is to provide users with helpful information.

What does matter is when the user actually engages with content, by clicking on the shared link within those re-posts and re-tweets.  It’s the clicks, not the number of shares, that drives users to the company website. Technically, it's the result of the social media sharing that can influence rankability, not the initial share itself.

Social Media Marketing and SEO: Keys to Your Marketing Success

Know that both SMM and SEO should be key parts of your overall marketing plan. To leverage the best overall results, continue to study how people find content on the web and work to provide information that is helpful to them across channels.

Use social media to highlight your brand’s personality and to grow your network. Since you get boosted when users open shared links, make your content worth reading. Check too that the content will take the user directly back to your site.

The Heart of the Matter

Remember, the more things change, the more they stay the same. In our increasingly digital world, the same basic marketing tenants apply. We still need to understand: Who is your audience?  What are their pain points?  How can you work to provide them with value?

Need Help?

Schedule a free exploratory call with Home Care Marketing Pros to discuss your current Social Media Marketing and SEO strategies. We’ll match you with one of our home care marketing experts, and together, you can create a plan to best engage your audience and maximize your reach.