How to Increase Your SERPS Ranking with Social Media

For many businesses, it is essential to obtain leads on a consistent basis. Unless they’re provided a personal recommendation, people often turn to the internet to find local specialty products and services like bail bond agents, drum handling devices or roof repair specialists. As a result, the difference between success and failure for these kinds of companies can be contingent on search engine visibility.

To maximize your potential for high placement in the SERPs (search engine results pages), business owners should tinker with several things on social media, which can have a significant influence on where your site appears in search results.

Check into Your Office on Facebook and Foursquare

An office address should be visibly prominent on every company’s web site, but that often isn’t enough for Google to verify the address. Checking into a location via Facebook and Foursquare, on an account representing the business, has been shown to positively impact Google’s perception of a company’s location. This recognition increases the likelihood that a correct address for your business will appear more higher-up in search results.

Start Connecting with Industry Contacts on Google +

Google + may not seem as appealing as Facebook and Twitter but its search engine impacts are more significant than any other social network – primarily because it is valued most by its developer, Google. In addition to posting any blog content from your company’s site on your Google + profile, it’s recommended to start connecting with others in industries similar to yours.

By obtaining many industry-relevant Google + contacts and applying the appropriate Authorship tags to your company’s web site and blog posts, your Google + headshot and the number of Google circles you’re in will appear alongside your business’s web site in search results. This tactic can also help your rank higher in SERPs.

Similarly, if you can convince or pay an author with a high ranking on Google + to write an endorsement for your company, you will have multiple exposure benefits via social media and its consequential positive impact will help your rankings.

Shares, Likes and the Number of Followers Matter

Your number of Facebook followers is more than just a superficial boast. It also is a useful SEO tactic, informing search engines of the popularity of a brand or business. Search engines recognize if a certain page is Liked by thousands of users on Facebook. Have tons of Likes and followers will re-assert to users the prestige of the company in question. Since reputation is extremely important for companies who want to acquire more clients, having an active user base and consistent engagement on social media is very important.

Attempt to Go Viral on Mobile Social Networks

Creating a viral video is easier said than done, but that still doesn’t mean a viral video is out of the question. Incorporating something humorous about your staff or office can be one idea, as is a humorous twist on your company’s industry.  Another idea is to create a video entitled “What (YourCompanyHere) Professionals Do When Not at Work.” This humorous tactic can showcase professionals of any industry and add that contagious, funny twist that it takes for many pieces of content to go viral.

How you want to format these videos will depend on the social network you plant to post them to. On Vine, where videos are only six seconds long, the video can be segmented into different steps or listings. On Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, a full video can be posted. If these videos go viral across a variety of social media networks, search engines are bound to recognize the viral video and the brand or company associated with it.

If your company’s SEO is in need of a tune-up, implement some – or all – of these social media tactics to rank higher in the SERPs. In many cases, even if your ranking doesn’t improve much, you still gain a huge amount of brand exposure from these strategies, which can also cause more leads to come in.

Guest Post: Courtney Gordner is a passionate blogger/journalist. Read more posts from her at TalkViral.com.