Social networks: boost your social media strategy with SMO!

In a previous post, we explained how to create an effective social media strategy. In this new article, our social media agency gives you another key to increasing the visibility of your brand or business through social networks. This solution is Social Media Optimization, or SMO. This very powerful technique consists ofusing social platforms as a search engine optimization (SEO) lever. How exactly? We'll explain that right after this!

SMO or Social Media Optimization

Definition

SMO, or Social Media Optimization, refers to a set of methods and actions carried out on social media to develop the visibility and awareness of a brand or company.

How does it work?

Social Media Optimization (SMO) involves attracting visitors to your website by leveraging social media. By doing so, you generate traffic to your website and simultaneously send a strong signal to search engines about your popularity. Indeed, the more traffic your site receives, the more credibility Google and other search engines will grant you, ranking your site higher in their search results.

In practical terms, for a brand, this means publishing strategic content on social media to encourage followers to visit its website. This can be done through news posts that you share on your social networks. You can also tease content such as white papers, in-depth articles, promotional offers, and so on. Essentially, it encompasses anything that can entice your followers to visit your site.

Which social media platforms should be prioritized for SMO (Social Media Optimization)?

The answer is simple: ALL of them, without exception! Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, Twitch… whatever the platform, you can use it to encourage your community to visit your website and thus generate traffic. With the multitude of social media platforms, brands have a whole host of potential levers at their disposal to develop their reputation and therefore their visibility.

What is the link between SEO and SMO?

Social media optimization (SMO) is indirectly linked to search engine optimization (SEO), or organic search engine ranking. In other words, SMO complements SEO. In fact, SMO indirectly boosts a brand's website's SEO by increasing its share of traffic (its organic audience).

Important to remember : social media alone is not a ranking factor for search engine algorithms. Therefore, having a large following or high engagement (likes, shares, interactions, etc.) won't automatically improve your brand's website ranking in search results. It's the traffic they generate that ultimately determines your website's ranking.    

How to create an effective SMO strategy?

To optimize your search engine ranking, you need to implement an effective digital communication strategy, using social media as a platform. This involves several possible actions , which we detail below. 

Optimize your social media profile

Your company's profile on social media platforms is the cornerstone of your SMO strategy. If it doesn't reflect your brand identity and DNA, your entire social media optimization strategy will collapse. 

So there's no choice! You have to resign yourself to improving your social media profile. To do this, we recommend several actions:

• Add a profile picture: put the company logo for example! The idea is to create brand content that is consistent with all other communication materials.
• Duplicate your username across all your social media platforms in line with your branding strategy.  
• Create a compelling biography that encourages further exploration: this involves storytelling by clearly outlining the company's activities and, most importantly, integrating targeted keywords into the editorial content. Including a call-to-action (CTA) link is also recommended if you want to redirect users to your brand's website. 

Quality content to inspire desire

A good SMO strategy involves distributing high-quality and, above all, highly engaging content to convert your followers into visitors to your website.  

Your articles, news, products, events—all your posts can be showcased on social media. You can share them on each platform, remembering to adapt the format to each network. For example, don't hesitate to ask questions to spark discussions. It's a way to engage your community and show them you care. Ideal for gathering feedback on products and services!  

Content curation to create virality

An excellent way to attract visitors to your website from social media is through content curation. Widely used in social media strategy, this involves selecting, editing, and sharing content on the web related to your field of activity. It's an excellent SMO technique for adding value to your content and increasing its visibility! 

In this context, the quality of links and hashtags also plays a crucial role. To help you find the right hashtags, you should also consider the keywords and phrases that will help your website rank better in search engines. 

Publish a lot, often, everywhere

Finally, in 2022, we also know that the trend is towards omnichannel lead generation , meaning that social media users are increasingly present on several different networks. As a result, brands need to publish more, everywhere, all the time.

Often, to help brands create a continuous flow of high-quality content, the best solution is to outsource their social media management. In addition to the time and cost savings a specialized agency will bring, they will also provide expertise to implement an optimal SMO strategy.         

Conclusion

And there you have it, you now know what the acronym SMO stands for and what its objective is: to increase a brand's visibility on search engines through social media. It's therefore a very useful tool that adds to the range of web marketing levers for improving your digital presence and more easily managing your online reputation. 

Thanks to our social media expertise, we help brands and businesses create that delicate balance between their websites and social networks. To further boost your ROI, our social media agency can also help you combine SEO, SMO, and SEA (paid search advertising such as Google Ads).

Want to use SMO techniques to boost your visibility? Contact So Bang ! 

To learn more about SMO, also read Social media: the contribution of organic marketing to brand visibility and audience.