For PR pros and marketing executives, it’s a growing challenge of online communications: wedding social media to SEO.
With social platforms now the digital entry point for more and more consumers, brand managers are scrambling to build better ways to meld their social media content with their SEO efforts.
Sahana Jayaraman, VP of digital and social at Eastwick, will tackle this subject during the “How to Apply SEO Tactics to Social Media Content” session at PR News’ SEO Boot Camp, which takes place on August 11 at the Westin San Francisco.
In an interview with PR News, Jayaraman provides a peek at what she has in store:
PR News: With Google’s increasing emphasis on “authorship,” how can PR managers enhance their social channels so that they are better tied to SEO? And what should PR managers make of “authorship” in the context of SEO?
Sahana Jayaraman: Authorship is no longer a “nice to have,” it is a “must have,” in my opinion. Google Authorship improves search rankings and allows individuals to brand themselves as thought leaders. If you are publishing blog articles or creating social content on an executive’s behalf, I’d recommend PR managers take the time to submit authorship. The feature on Google+ simply includes a picture that will appear next to search results of content they have created. Having this picture not only helps increase click through, but it also establishes trust when readers see an author they already know and respect has written multiple pieces of content. If you have trouble with implementing authorship, Moz.com provides some great tips that are worth checking out here: http://moz.com/blog/getting-authorship-to-work
PR News: What are some of the most effective third-party tools that PR managers can deploy to enhance their online presence and boost their Google rankings?
Jayaraman: The key to ranking is to pair great content with high-performing keywords that make it easy to find. This requires leveraging the right tools that are designed to help you understand your ranking better. I always recommend leveraging the free ones first to see what you can get. Google’s Webmaster tools, Google Analytics, Google Trends and Google Adwords Keyword Planner are great starting places. Depending upon your goals I’d also recommend cross-referencing using third party tools.
PR News: How can PR managers improve their social sharing techniques so they can ultimately enhance inbound links to the brand’s website?
Jayaraman: Social sharing is important to SEO. But, I preface that by saying that good social sharing starts with good content. Once you’ve published high quality content, then you can make it easier to find. This means your shares include meta titles and descriptions that closely match the content on the page.
In addition to pumping social content with metadata, I also suggest that PR managers consider paid content syndication through Outbrain to drive more referral traffic to the site. Outbrain is a content discovery platform that helps content creators connect their content with an engaged audience across a wide publisher network.
To learn more about SEO strategies and tactics tied to social media, register for PR News' SEO Boot Camp, which takes place August 11 at the Westin San Francisco.
Follow Matthew Schwartz on Twitter: @mpsjourno1
Follow Sahana Jayaraman on Twitter: @hellosahana