Social media is great for building community and fostering conversations. Some of social media’s most untapped potential lies in its ability to influence search engine result pages, where two-thirds of all prospective students go to research colleges and universities. Learn the fundamentals of how search works and how social media can play a part in determining if you are lost or found.

1. How to Use
Social Media
to Influence
SEO
Patrick Powers

2. #mStonerSEO
@patrickjpowers
@mStonerInc

3. Our Mission
✓Review how search engines work.
✓Acknowledge SEO in HigherEd.
✓Understand how social media impacts
results.
✓Learn 20 tactics for improvement.
✓Discuss.

4. E
BL
SEO
SERP
H1 H2

6. Branded Searches
Non-Branded Searches
0% 25% 50% 75% 100%
39%
10%
11%
4%
15%
6%
35%
80%
First Position Second Position Third Position Everything Else
The Top Three

8. Are you an authority?
Are you relevant?

9. Authority
links time .edu
http://www.flickr.cophotosm//yandle/4337747398 | http://flic.kr/p/5PdB3C | http://www.flickr.com/photos/ccacnorthlib/4131837946/

10. Relevant
Content
URL
Page Title
Headline
Copy
Images
Description

11. IRL

12. What a browser sees ...

13. 21%
20%
19%
18%
11%
7%
4%
Trust/Authority
Engagement Metrics
Link Popularity
Inbound Anchor
Keyword Usage
Click-through Data
Registration/Hosting
Ranking
Signals
http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2065492/The-Role-of-On-Page-SEO-Content-Relevance-Not-Rankings

14. So why do we care in
higher education?

15. Academic Programs
Campus Location and Community
Cost and Financial Aid
10%
35%
38%
17%
45%
52%
Search Social
Best ways to learn?
http://omniupdate.com/_resources/pdfs/research/2012_eexpectations.pdf

16. 58%
42%
66%
34%
79%
21%
Yes No
Opportunity Exists
Are you investing in an SEO process to improve search results?
4-year private 4-year public 2-year colleges
http://omniupdate.com/_resources/pdfs/research/2012_eexpectations.pdf

17. What role does social
media play in this?

18. Matt Cutts
Google Engineer
“We do use Twitter and
Facebook links and ranking, as
we always have, in our
websearch rankings. But in
addition we are also trying to
figure out a little bit about the
reputation of an author or a
creator on Twitter or Facebook.”

19. •Number of follows/
likes/retweets/shares
•Authority of the
people sharing
•Speed of sharing
Google Knows

20. “We do look at the social authority of a
user. We look at how many people you
follow, how many follow you, and this can
add a little weight to a listing in regular
search results.”

21. “Yes, we do use [tweeted links and RTs] as
a signal. It is used as a signal in our organic
and news rankings. We also use it to
enhance our news universal by marking
how many people shared an article.”

22. Social Signals Rising
Facebook Shares
Number of Backlinks
Facebook Total
Facebook Comments
Facebook Likes
Tweets
% Backlinks rel=nofollow
Keyword in Domain Name
% Backlinks with Keyword
% Backlinks with Stopword
Image Count
Keyword in URL
Keyword in Description
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4
0.03
0.03
0.04
0.05
0.1
0.11
0.15
0.25
0.3
0.33
0.35
0.36
0.37
http://www.searchmetrics.com/en/searchmetrics/press/ranking-factors/

23. Takeaways
20

24. Create awesome
content.
1

25. Link to social accounts.
2

26. Make sharing easy.
3

27. Define objects/images.
4
Title
Description
<meta property=”og:image” content=”/mylogo.png” />

28. Conduct researh.
5

29. 6
7
Complete your profile.

30. Brand your posts.
•Help Google.
•Rank high on you.
8

31. Claim your place.
9
10

32. Name your place.
11

33. 12
Get on Google+.

34. Give authors credit.
“Within search results, information tied to
verified online profiles will be ranked higher than
content without such verification, which will result in
most users naturally clicking on the top (verified)
results. The true cost of remaining anonymous, then,
might be irrelevance.”
- Eric Schmidt, former Google CEO
13

35. 14
Geo-tag images.

36. Optimize file names.
Use closed-captions.
15
16

37. Tweet. Tweet. Tweet.
Cuts index time by
50%
17

38. Identify influencers.
18

39. Chase the numbers.
0
25
50
75
100
2007
2008
2009
2010
19

40. Create awesome
content.
20

41. Thank You
Contact us for more information aboutmStoner:
773-305-0537| mStoner@mstoner.com
Want to work with us? Contact Mallory Wood:
802-457-9234 | mallory.wood@mstoner.com
Patrick Powers