How to use Twitter to increase your Google search visibility

Do social networks impact SEO?

If so, how?

These have been controversial questions in the digital marketing community for a long Now.

This may not come as a surprise to most SEOs, but in my opinion, the answer is: “It depends.”

What I mean by that is that while social media may not be a direct ranking factor, it does have an impact on Google’s search visibility.

And it certainly affects others crucial Classification factors.

This issue became even more debatable in 2015 when Google and Twitter struck a deal that gave Google access to Twitter’s network of live tweet data again.

Over the years, we have seen Google close countless offers that have allowed the collection of more and more data.

This agreement, in particular, was seen as a mutual benefit for both companies: placing Twitter in front of more people (and new users) and allowing Google to index tweets in real time for search engines.

Ultimately, this made Twitter an even more essential platform for companies to increase Google search visibility.

Let’s talk a little more about that and discover the key ways you can use this social media channel to increase your search presence.

1. Develop your brand identity and awareness

Here is a fun exercise:

Google your brand name.

What appears

Most of the time, you will see something similar to this on the first page of search results:

What you’re looking at is Google’s Twitter carousel.

This can be extremely beneficial for users to get to know a brand by browsing through some of their most recent tweets.

This gives us direct control over what appears in search results around our brand name.

That’s a huge agreement!

How often do we have the opportunity to control what users see in search results?

Never.

Note: If you don’t have a carousel for your brand yet, this article gives you some helpful tips.

In addition to being able to convey a positive message in front of the new eyeballs, it is another way to create awareness, strengthen thought leadership and humanize the brand.

This is another reason why it is important to share relevant content that your audience will find interesting and valuable, show your personality, and ensure that your tweets align with your brand messages and the overall business mission.

This brings me to the next point.

2. Take advantage of Twitter carousels

Find ways to make the most of your Twitter carousel.

There are numerous tactics that can be implemented; however, these are some of the most important to consider:

Discussing fashion topics

This is your opportunity to attract the attention of new audiences. Make sure your tweets reflect how timely, interesting and modern you are!

Deliver content that interests your audience

In addition to being fashionable, be sure to share content that is extremely relevant to your audience.

Consider your day-to-day challenges, your key responsibilities, and what’s going on in the industry at large.

Mention other accounts and encourage other accounts to mention you

Interacting with other relevant accounts and tagging them in tweets will help increase search presence.

Think about the key posts, opinion leaders, and influencers in your space, and make sure to regularly engage with them on Twitter.

Use relevant and popular hashtags

Incorporate relevant hashtags into your tweets.

This will also give you an opportunity to appear in the search results there.

Exemplify your brand message

You need to make sure that your audience is not confused by the tweets you are sending.

They must clearly understand what their brand is about and why they should care.

Using targeting keywords will also help grab your attention.

Encourage team members to share content

The Twitter carousel also appears for people.

With this in mind, encouraging internal team members to promote content can also impact your brand’s search visibility.

3. Stay active and build your followers

Staying active on Twitter is essential to keep your audience engaged.

Out of sight, out of mind, right?

The key is to make sure the tweets are relevant and valuable, and that you’re not just tweeting just for tweeting.

Backlinko recently explained the importance of the legitimacy of social media and its potential impact on Google’s rankings.

At the most basic level, a social media account with 10,000 followers and 2 posts probably looks very differently than another strong account of 10,000 followers with constant interaction.

What’s even more interesting is that Google recently filed for a patent to determine if the social media accounts were real or fake.

Also, building a following and building a wider audience should be an approach.

By doing this, you can increase the likelihood that users will know your brand and trust and click your content in search results.

You know what it does directly affect Google rankings?

Click-through rates.

4. Promote content

Using Twitter to distribute content and promote it over the long term is essential.

This requires more than just sharing content on the day or week it is published.

Promoting perennial content for a month, or even a year, will help gain additional visibility on social media and in search results.

Generating actions on social media will help from a link building perspective.

The more reach you have on social networks, the more opportunities users will have to see your content, like and be motivated to link it.

Links too directly impact Google rankings.

Again, encourage your internal team members to promote your content as well, especially to anyone who has established thought leadership in the space.

This will help reach new and relevant users and will also appear in those people’s search results.

5. Optimize your social media bio

Last but not least, it is important that you optimize your Twitter bio.

Considering that your Twitter profile often appears on the first page of Google, you want your first impression with new users to accurately describe your brand and mission.

This presents an opportunity to provide a succinct description of your brand, incorporate keywords and hashtags that will grab your attention, and link to your website.

Ending

Twitter can be used in many ways to increase Google search visibility, and these are just some of the most important.

Remember, Google uses more than 200 ranking factors in its algorithm.

And we probably won’t forever know what exactly those factors are.

It is very possible that the search engine incorporates some of the Twitter data that it has access to as ranking signals in its algorithm.

For now, Google has repeatedly told us that social media signals are not a direct ranking factor. What you think?

More resources:

---

Image credits

All screenshots taken by the author, May 2020