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SEO Research includes more items that are outside the usual processes such as Keyword and Competitor Research.
We have listed a couple items that can have an integral role during an SEO campaign which includes Social Media Research.
Social Media Marketing for SEO
The overall business culture of blue media is that SEO specialists should be conversion professionals first. Therefore, they must also be undisputed Social Media experts to truly understand the digital landscape.>
Social Media channels are a crucial resource to generate traffic, get attention, build a brand, deliver your message, and run exciting campaigns. That is why your Social Media strategy should be an integral part of your SEO strategy as well.>
Before Social Media can be integrated into an overall SEO strategy, acompany must have a goal. You should know which goals the ongoing Social Media campaigns need to fulfill, what the KPIs are – and most importantly: it has to have certain Social Media guidelines that ensure the ongoing quality of the campaign.>
Learn more about blue media’s Social Media Expertise:
The blue media team member Dr. Sen first started with Social Media Marketing back in 2003 when it was still called “Web 2.0”. The very first social listening tool was developed and engineered by the blue media founder, Dr. William Sen. It was eventually used for companies such as Bayer, Thomas Cook, 3M, Ford, Zurich Bank, and many more.>
Dr. William Sen was also the founder of the very first Social Media Magazine, and is one of the founders of the first curriculum for Social Media Studies. He was also the associate professor for the “Social Media Manager” program at Germany’s largest university: Technical University of Cologne.>
The blue media team has over> >15 years of Social Media Marketing experience>.>
Social Listening for SEO
Social Listening (also known as Social Media Monitoring) helps companies understand and actively participate in forming and influencing their brand, reputation, and product through Social Media.
Social Listening does not just consist of identifying and analyzing important Social Media channels. Most of Social Listening lies in taking content from places like independent forums, blogs, social networks like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Review Sites, Blogs, Forums and YouTube. It is understood as a concept which results in action, meaning the results must include the embedding of a brand, product or reputation within the social community through communication, by using all necessary measurements and tools of online marketing.
However, before an action can take place, it’s necessary to know where discussions are happening in the social space, which opinions prevail, who the target audience is, and ultimately what their behavior and culture looks like in specific online communities.
Social Listening consists of several measures and should go beyond a simple status-quo-analysis.
An important aspect of monitoring is Social Media Reporting.
Only a proper report can lead to actionable measures. The goal of continuous monitoring and reporting is to take further measures, which can influence the community’s overall opinion on brands, their products, and their reputation.
Learn more about blue media’s Social Media Listening Expertise:
The blue media team is one of the oldest experts in Social Listening and has been active in this field since 2005. The blue media’s team members have advised companies and delivered reports about what is trending on Social Media.
Social Listening Technology
Social Listening is realized with the help of Social Listening Technologies and Social Media Monitoring Technologies. Completely automated Social Listening tools often have the disadvantage that irrelevant content can make the search results unusable. Ideally, a mix of an automated search and intellectual evaluation is necessary in order to provide the best possible outcome. blue media does not use completely automated systems but has developed a hybrid model which includes automated indexation, alongside a manual effort to retrieve relevant information, which eventually provides extensive and actionable executive summaries.
The blue media Monitoring Concept
The Social Listening concept below was developed by the blue media team in collaboration with various universities and companies:
Social Media Audits for SEO
Social Media Audits should be a continuous part of any ongoing or new Social Media campaign. One of the goals of a Social Media Audit is to determine where the target audience is, and in the case of channels such as Facebook – it’s important to always define the target audience.
Idea Behind the Social Media Audit
Usually, if no specific Social Media channels were selected for a Social Media engagement, the Social Media Audit can be utilized as target audience identification research. An in-depth audit report will not only identify the target audience, but also reveal the behavioral characteristics of that audience in regards to consumption and engagement habits. The idea behind the Social Media Audit is that companies are not able to fully comprehend the vast number of users engaging in different Social Media channels.
Why Perform a Social Media Audit?
Social Media Audits are an excellent tool and are being used for many different purposes. For example, it is being used before a Social Listening campaign to ensure that the setup is based on knowledge and is not experimental. Otherwise, before knowing what exactly to look for, setting up a Social Listening campaign could be very costly. The same goes for any SEO or Social Media Marketing Campaign. The audit is the first step to understand and comprehend the vast sphere of Social Media conversations.
Creating a Social Media Strategy
If no goals were determined and the Social Media engagement is solely following the gut instincts of a Social Media expert, then it is important for the auditor to look for similar strategic goals elsewhere based on real numbers to build up a strategy for social media later.
For instance, if the company doesn’t have a social media strategy, then it’s important to look for the digital marketing strategy instead. And if that’s not available either, the auditor has to step it up a notch to look for even more generic strategies such as the marketing strategy. And if that even fails, it’s time to search for the overall company strategy. No matter where strategies are found, in the end it’s the duty of a Social Media auditor to point out which existing strategies from the company can be utilized to create a Social Media community. If a Social Media Strategy indeed exists, the auditor can move forward and revisit these strategies to determine if they still follow the other strategies of the company or not – or just move forward with the evaluation.
Evaluating Social Media Success
During a Social Media Audit, existing Social Media channels and their success should be evaluated. Usually if a Social Media strategy exists, they should be able to provide KPIs. Based on KPIs, the audit process determines whether these Social Media campaigns achieve the set of goals defined in the Social Media strategy or not.
Continuous Social Media Audits
A Social Media Audit should be done regularly to assure the quality, strategy, and compliance of any Social Media campaign. Besides, new technologies and Social Media channels spring up much faster than ever before. A Social Media Audit done 6 months ago can be obsolete in today’s fast changing digital environment.
The requirements and abilities to perform a Social Media Audit needs someone who is not just a Social Media expert, but also a researcher and a high-level manager, because it involves understanding and creating high-level strategies.
How to Find the Right Social Media Expert for an Audit?
It’s also extremely difficult nowadays to find people with these all-in-one capabilities to ensure a successful Social Media campaign with an Audit. Due to that lack of expertise, many Social Media campaigns are dependent on pure luck, rather than on researched results and defined goals. That’s where blue media comes into place: as we’re an agency and trusted partner to you – you don’t have to hire us to be your director of marketing or CFO to achieve such difficult tasks. We can be your service provider and perform all the hard work for you as an external agency and help you on your way to start and maintain successful Social Media campaigns.
