One of the biggest dilemmas in the field of web marketing, as the utility of social networks in key SEO, or if Facebook, Twitter and company bring real benefits to improve a site’s ranking on search engines.
In many, as well as myself, in fact believed that spread or amplify a link on the various social profiles, bring benefits for the ranking of the page in question, both in terms of indexing , and the increase of page rank and link juice . Apparently, however, things are not right, or rather there are conflicting opinions that complicate the matter further.
The following considerations arise as a result of participation in the 2010 edition of the course Mothers SEO Web Marketing Experience of Henry Madrigano .
The topics ranged from an analysis of the algorithms over the years, that is, what and how they have changed, what would be the scenario of the future, up to web 3.0 marketing, or what lies ahead. My participation in the course, however, was dictated mainly by the fact that Madrigano would present the scientific tests regarding the significance of social networks in the field of SEO.
The Links Nofollow Influence of Social Search Engines?
As many of you know in the links placed on twitter and facebook is always automatically added the nofollow attribute ,which basically means “do not follow this link.” What we want to deepen in this post, is about this specific case, or whether the links nofollow in the various social are respected by Google, Yahoo and Bing.
Based on numerous tests carried out over several months shows an indisputable fact: the nofollow links are always ignored by the search engines ,that are not taken into account both for indexing the page, and not even pass PageRank and link- juice, so the link building activities conducted on the social network does not bring any results for the organic ranking .
Obviously this does not mean that social do not count in a web marketing strategy, indeed: they represent an important tool to increase the visibility ,are useful for relating with users and are essential for the web reputation ,a factor that will rely more and more in the coming years, since confidence in a brand born from the reputation and feedback online in any form.
Madrigano fact suggests adopting a reverse strategy with regard to the link: use their sites to place their profiles on social networking sites, increase traffic and users do viral marketing.
Indexing and Link Popularity: the Tests Mothers
The SEO strategy that is usually used, on the contrary, is based entirely on the belief that the social profiles with high PageRank ” distribute “at least a part of their ranking to the link nofollow.
The tests carried out by Mothers on Twitter, Facebook, Youtube and Wikipedia belie this assumption with the concreteness of the data: the links are not counted by any search engine, even if coming from pages or profiles with a strong Page Rank and Trust or if they are hosted by trusted domains!
These results represent a real breakthrough, suggesting other “best practices” for the placement of a site, relocating importance again the uniqueness and authority of the content.
In addition to the test on social, Mothers has determined that the rule would be respected even nofollow links from blogs and other websites on the domain “strong”: all links are equal, the anchor-text is ignored by Google is that Bing and Yahoo, while the anchor-text links dofollow ago to place the pages ,even if the keyword is not present in the linked page.
Trust is Good but it is Better Not to Trust
I believe Henry Madrigano one of the most competent in the field of SEO in Italy, but since I like to personally verify the claims of the people, I conducted a test identical to her the day after the course, linking to a page virgin and not yet indexed on our site ,from 4 different profiles with page rank between 3 and 5. To date, nearly a month after the page has not yet been spiderata and so this is proof of the goodness of test mothers.
Google and Bing Wink to Social Networks
It happens, however, that on December 1, Danni Sullivan of Search Engine Land has published a very interesting interview with Google and Bing, about the importance of social networks ,the contents of which belies partially tests Mothers or at least leaves open questions and thoughts on the subject .
The interview in question found that fully translated on TagliaBlog , highlights some fundamental aspects:
1. Links from twitter influence the results of google news ,bing social search and organic SERP
2. the links are valued based on the authority of the source of that tweet and the number of retweets
3. the links present on the facebook pages are evaluated by google and bing like those in twitter
4. bing does not calculate the authority of the links on the bulletin board in the personal pages, while Google does not extract data from the board of the personal profiles
5. google and bing have introduced two new terms relating to social sharing, respectively ” Author Authority “and” Social Authority “.
Google and Bing Wink to Social Networks
From here it is appropriate to rethink the SEO, and avoid wasting time and create an unnecessary “noise” on social networks, good allies for the web marketing only if used to establish and maintain relations with the authentic user, marked by trust and on the clarity of their role .
Author Bio: Ankur is the Digital Media strategist of SEO India Agency. He is also an active blogger and loves to share his experience and knowledge of the SEO India, Internet Marketing and reputation management.