Social media optimization can simply be explained as a newer medium of business promotion & branding, which aims at inviting targeted potential customers to the website with the help of online discussions, debates and many more user-engaging activities (and hence showing them their business-product-services etc). Although Social Media Optimization emerged as a form of cyber socialization and online information gathering but now-a-days it is primarily used for business promotion, branding and expansion. Over the years SMO has turned out to be one of the most widely accepted forms of business promotion which allows people to meet new members online i.e. on the forums, listen & voice different opinions and in the due time promote their business.

Well, now that we are clear about social media optimization, let’s move on and understand what Return On Investment in SMO is !

In the last few years, it has been observed that social media optimization has been hugely successful in providing numerous business opportunities to online business owners and for this reason now-a-days most of the businesses find participating in social networking activities mandatory. However, very few of them have realized that conducting social media campaign and participating in media activities can be a business expense which is in the form of time. However, for the companies who hire media experts and professionals for conducting SMO campaigns, the expense can also be in the form of money.

Moreover, you will find it very strange that according to a survey conducted by marketer.com it has been found that almost 80% of the online business owners have never even calculated the amount of money that goes in conducting social networking campaigns and their ROI on social media optimization. The most common reason for this is that people think, checking Return On Investment on social media optimization is almost impossible as there is no such method by which it can be calculated. This belief is wrong because even Geoff Ramsey, eMarketer CEO once stated “marketers believe that measuring true ROI for social media is difficult,” but this belief is relatively wrong because there are many metrics available with which it can be easily measured.

So the question is, if the companies want to measure their ROI on SMO, then how should they do it?

So here are a few tips which will help you in doing so !

- One of the most common methods is to simply calculate the amount of traffic that your website is receiving from different social media networks.

- Use the simple formula which is ROI = (x-y)/y – here x is final value and y is starting value. For example if your investment value is $ 20 and what you have got back is $ 60 then your ROI on SMO will be: (60 – 20) / 20 = 2 times your initial investment. Though in financial sense ROI is calculated completely in the form of dollars and cents but the capital can refer any form of investment – monetary or not.

- Metrics tool- It is accepted that ROI ? metrics but when it comes to ROI on SMO you can rely on the metrics like traffic counts, social media followers and fans, comments etc. Here, the main idea is not to go by the numbers but to identify what is the reaction of people, what are they ending up with and are they agreeing to what you are saying?

- Google Analytics- it is a free option for the measurement of ROI, but one should never go by the free tag because it can really provide a strong baseline for checking numerous factors like backlinks, users’ activity and many more.

- PostRank analytics- it is a bunch of tools which help in measuring social engagement on other platforms and services. The only good thing about it is that, instead raw numbers you can get to see compliments and comments from other sites that contribute to your statistics. It is also a powerful tool for checking the sentiment analysis.

You can also use tangible metrics form like:

- Number of increased visitors
- Number of returning visitors
- Number of page views
- Average time spent on the site
- Total amount of Adsense revenue &

Intangible metrics forms like:

- Customer satisfaction
- Improved communication with the members and customers
- Quality reviews
- Increased sales and quick brand perception

The above mentioned are some of the easiest ways by which you can measure your ROI on social media optimization.

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So for all such people who lack in proper knowledge that can make their blog a popular and successful one, we have mentioned some information which will prove to be useful.

Have a read-through:

Publish more frequently- Always remember, the more posts you publish on your blog, the more authenticated and reliable one your blog will be considered by Google. It means if there is a 2 years old blog site which publishes 1 post every month or every 2 months and there is your blog which is just half-an-year old but on it 2-3 posts are published every week, then chances are quite likely that your blog will be considered as more matured and trusted one by the search engine and its page rank will also be higher than the older one. So make it a point to publish as many posts as you can and as frequently as you can.

Quality is more important than Quality- Although as mentioned, it is very important for a blog to publish posts frequently in order to remain in the good books of Google however, not to undermine is the fact that quality is more important than quantity and always be so, not only for Google but for every other search engines. So when you are publishing posts on your blog, make sure you are not being driven by the time factor and compromising on the quality. Ensure whatever you are posting has quality and is worth being posted on your blog, thus they are unique and informative.

Proper Interlinking- Efficient linking is as important as posting. No matter how many posts you publish every week, it will be of practically no use if your blog is not interlinked- read more and keyword based linking. Interlinking of the inner pages of the website with the home page with high page rank and keywords within the content linked with other relevant content always proves to be beneficial as it shows the vastness of the blog and gives an impression of the detailed information it contains.

Keep the fundamentals correct- Make sure you never loose out on the basics of content. It means, while writing the content for the post, ensure that the basics of content writing – keyword density, keyword proximity, keyword prominence etc are kept intact. Being SEO friendly is a very important thing to be for the blog contents. And last but not the least, neither ignore the keywords nor be over-obsessed with it. What precisely I mean is that the content for the blog post should be unique, informative, grammatically correct, rich and social media as well as SEO friendly. Intact

For information regarding SEO/ SEM/ Web Design/ SMO/ Online Advertising/ Web Hosting/ Web Maintenance etc, please visit:

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In simple language ‘GIP’ can be explained as a simple application which acts as the addition to the Google Instant Makeover and gives to the user, the benefit of getting a preview of the website while rolling the mouse over the search results and much before opening any particular site. In other words it can also be said that Google Instant Preview is an add-on which gives a graphic representation of the web-page in reference to the keywords or in accordance to the highlighted word or group of words within the search query. And with the facility, the addition-to-the Google enables search-engine-users to immediately compare the search results and thus save time (it helps them in saving time because the user does not have to open each and every site to see what they are looking for, is there or not…).

Now moving on lets discuss the already much discussed topic… “Does Google Instant Preview” affect search engine optimization of a website at all…? There has been much discussion and debate over the above mentioned topic however, still not many are aware of what has been the outcome of all of those, so let’s understand now:

See, it is very clear that with the help of the add-on, people will not have to open as many links as they used to when the instant-preview option was not available. Hence the number of websites, people generally open while browsing will naturally get reduced, as searchers will be able to see what the site is all about and whether it is helpful for them or not. Now…, this also meas that the webmasters/search engine optimizers will have to ensure that their website is performing its best in every ways, whether it is about giving information with the help contents, graphic representations or imagery displays etc. It is also important that the content of the website is based on most relevant keywords according to the theme of the site (as they help in getting traffic) and moreover, the website regularly updated so that it doesn’t give an impression of stagnation to the online searcher. Even the Meta descriptions which play a very important role in the process of SEO should be made highly relevant and the over all look and feel of the website should be attractive enough to catch the attention of the users.

Thus, we come to believe that as a matter of fact, every addition or change in Google have some consequences on the SEO mechanism and Google Instant Preview is no exception however, it will not make that huge of a difference, provided one takes the necessary precautionary steps in advance.

For information regarding SEO/ SEM/ Web Design/ SMO/ Online Advertising/ Web Hosting/ Web Maintenance etc, please visit:

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Those words or group of words (phrases) that you typed (or people type) to retrieve information are the keywords. Thus in short keywords can be explained as the elementary components that drive traffic into a website. By optimizing keywords, which is one of the most important aspect of the search engine process, one can drive maximum traffic to one’s website, blogs videos and even articles (if you are engaged in Article marketing and want to make a lot of money from it). And increased traffic will subsequently help you in increasing and improving your page ranks/web rank. Not only these, but with the use of relevant keywords you can also ensure that relevant quality traffic is coming to your website/articles/blogs etc. And last but certainly not the least, using and targeting the right keywords or the keywords best suited to your business theme & goal will efficiently determine the success of your website/online business.

Now you must have understood the basics of keyword and why they are considered an indispensable part of SEO and moreover must be thinking, how can one get the perfect keywords for their website or business and how to go about the keyword research process… So remember, the best way to do a keyword research is to use online tools or Google keyword research tool because they will easily help you in knowing the popular words that most of the internet visitors use for getting results. However, there are a few other factors you need to keep in mind during the keyword research process. They are:

• First of all, very clearly define and understand the theme and motive of your business. Never mix goals. For example, if your are into buying and selling of used motor bikes then choose words like second-hand bikes or used bikes rather than going for generic words like bikes or automobiles.
• Keyword phrases are always better than single words because they are less competitive yet they give defined results. However, never go for long sentences that have more than 3 words.
• If you have a specifically targeted audience then be very particular about the geography while selecting the keywords.
• Neither go for highly competitive keywords nor choose the least competitive ones.
• Last, remember Keyword research is a continuous process and so you should do it periodically to keep your site ranking high.

As a matter for fact, in today’s cut-throat competition it is almost imperative for a business to get noticed if it wants to be successful and if you have an online business then Keyword research is one activity which will take you a few steps closer to your goal.

For information regarding SEO/ SEM/ Web Design/ SMO/ Online Advertising/ Web Hosting/ Web Maintenance etc, please visit:

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Let us first make a comparison based on various aspects between the two:

On Page Elements:
SEO – The search engine rankings are dependant on title tags, bold texts, headers, image titles and above all, the keywords.
SMO – Striking visual representations can grab the attention of the visitors and that influences the most, even more than coding and tags.

Titles:
SEO – The title tag carries a lot of weight in the rankings just because it tells the search engine what the page is all about.
SMO – Attractive headlines and titles capture a lot of attention and get the users click through.

Content:
SEO – The content needs to be easily readable by the search engines. This means that the quality content should have relevant keywords which are important for the page to rank well.
SMO – The content has to be in easy language for easy insight of the human readers. Moreover, it should also contain attractive statements that can hold the readers’ attention and make them convinced about what you are trying to say.

In addition to the Content:
SEO – Along with the content, the structure of the site also needs to be sound enough.
SMO – Your profile in the social networks need to be more attractive and appealing and this will surely make a big variation in SMO.

Link Building:
SEO – The links that are connected to our website are the inbound links and these links in turn help in increasing the rankings of your site in the search engines.
SMO – If you are successful in your SMO activity, you will definitely benefit with your SEO for your website.

The comparison says that SEO and SMO are built on different platforms but from this comparison we can even come to a conclusion that the two work together rather than separately. One of the best ways to draw visitors to your new website or blogs is through SMO. This activity will definitely have a long-lasting effect on the search engine rankings as well.

It is only a few years that the social networks evolved and Social Media Optimization came into existence. When people became familiar to both the concepts of SEO and SMO, they even came to know the importance of traffic to any website. Thus when compared, we see that the traffic that comes from SEO is more steady than the SMO. But when social networks are used efficiently for business, they are able to draw more traffic to their websites and convert their visitors to potential customers. In other words, the social media sites attract traffic with their brilliant networking profiles and Search Engine Optimization increases visibility on search engines with keyword ranking.

Wanna give your views to it? You are most welcome..

By: Shabana

Tactics of deciding on the right keywords:

Take a note of a few things that you should keep in mind while choosing the right keywords –

• First of all, try to do a swapping business. Think yourself to be a customer and make a research on the keywords you will use in the search engines to find your website.
• There are many keyword tools specifically designed to assist you in your search for keywords. These tools include Google Adwords Keyword Tool, Google Insights, Wordtracker, etc. These tools will tell you how popular your keywords are, in which region of the world it is mostly searched for, and also displays similar keywords.
• Also, get ideas from everyone and everywhere you can find (don’t forget your competitors’ sites) and list them all.

Keyword density:

The relevance of a web page is determined by means of its keyword density. The standard keyword density for major keywords is 3-7% and that of minor keywords is 1-2%. If the percentage of keywords is too high, the search engines consider it to be a spam and if it is too low, the keywords will not be very effective. Although there are no strict rules, 5-10 keywords in each page is considered to be a reasonable count.

Placing of the keywords:

Although the quantity of keywords is important for effective SEO results, the quality is equally important. There are certain placements of keywords that the search engines reach easily. Lets check for keyword placing starting from the top of the window:

• Place 3-5 keywords in the URL because it tells all about your website.
• Another unique place for locating your major keywords is the page title; because it usually gets displayed in search engines.
• If the paragraphs are lengthy, place the main keywords on every paragraph; and if they are short, place them after every 2nd paragraph.
• Try to place the keyword at the concluding sentence of your content.

If your potential customers are unable to find you, your website cannot be considered to be great however content rich it might be.  So, make some effort at the beginning to allow positive results continue.

Why not try on these guidelines for valuable traffic roll in to your website!

We welcome your thoughts and views…

By: Shabana