As we all know Google and Bing have confirmed the effects of social links on search engine rankings. This has been further confirmed by SEOmoz and in particular Jen with the awesome case study - A Tweet's Effect on Rankings. We all know that social links are powerful and hear terms like social rank, authority of user and frequency of tweets but what does it all mean in a practical sense to increase search engine rankings.

Both Bing and Google have confirmed that they take into account a person's authority when looking at social links. Therefore we need to either become an authority twitter user by having a huge online presence or by somehow getting high authority users to tweet our links and retweet our tweets. Let's look at the two -

1. In order to become an authority twitter user you will need to create a solid and substantial online presence. This can be quite difficult for a lot of people. One way is to create videos about your chosen niche and develop personal relationships with people. A person who grew into a huge authority figure due to this is the one and only Gary Vaynerchuck or Garyvee as we know him on the twittersphere.
    
2. If we look at trying to increase our twitter authority by being associated by high authority users we need to think about what makes them tweet what they tweet and retweet what they retweet. This process of trying to get high authority twitter users to share our links is similar to building backlinks from high authority sites. Instead of creating "linkable" content we need to think about creating "LIKEABLE" and "TWEETABLE" content. This could be text, videos, articles, infographics, comics, literally anything that you can think of that people will want to "Like", tweet and retweet. An example of this can be taken from Oli Gardner from Unbounce. He recently wrote a Youmoz post featuring an unbelievably huge infographic illustrating a six-month online marketing plan. This infographic was so engaging and interesting that the next thing we knew the link to Unbounce and the infographic was littered all across twitter with people tweeting and retweeting multiple times. This is a classic example of creating content that people will want to "Like" and "Tweet".

I have spoken to a lot of people in regards to social links and search engines using social data for rankings. A lot of people seem to dismiss this and say that this is an added search factor to think about. I honestly think as the search engines begin putting more weight on social data this will begin to disrupt the SEO industry.

It is funny because as time goes on the search engines are becoming more and more sophisticated but it seems as though they hitting a point where they are asking us what should be ranked. They are beginning to "crowdsource" their search results. With social data and click stream they are asking the masses what we think is important and giving the most weight to the sites that the most people are saying they like and share.

This can have big implications throughout all online marketing and SEO disciplines.

Content creation

In the past online marketers and webmasters have tried to master the art of creating highly relevant content that is keyword targeted. There have been numerous debates about keyword density and position of keywords. As we move into this social age online marketers and webmasters will begin creating highly interactive engaging content. Instead of keyword targeting people will be looking to add ways to encourage readers to share and like their content. There will be debates and studies around the best place to put "Like" buttons and "Tweet This" icons. SEOs will talk about the best content medium to encourage people to share and interact with it socially. Is it text? videos? or maybe infographics.

Link Building

In the past link building has been the currency of SEO and to a huge extent it still is. Moving forward "Likes", "Shares" and "Tweets" will begin moving in to claim that title of the currency of SEO. People have previously developed comprehensive link building campaigns in order to squeeze as much quality link juice as possible. There are SEO tools all over the internet used to analyse and compare competitor links. As the search engines begin asking the masses what sites should rank people will begin strategizing around getting readers to basically vote for their sites which will include "Likes", "Shares" and "Tweets. The major difference here is that you are targeting different people. Link building strategies target other webmasters in hope of building a high quality link on their site back to yours. These new social strategies target the masses and basically now everyone whether they are a huge internet name or a casual internet browser has the ability to choose whether or not a site is worthy of high search engine rankings.

We will see a whole range of new and creative social building strategies as more and more weight is being put on these social search engine factors.

As we can see search engines continue to evolve and change how they do things. As SEOs and online marketers it is our duty to stay on top and in front of what they do in order to optimize sites for high rankings. The important thing to remember is to be flexible and constantly trying new ideas as if you stand still in this fierce industry you will get left behind.

About the author: Read more at http://www.seomistry.com.