In a word – yes.  Although some internet business strategists like to disparage social media as a medium that’s full of tire-kickers and conversationalists (compared to real, valuable buyers), there’s growing evidence that suggests your social networking profiles could play an increasingly important role in determining your site’s position in the search engine results pages.

The following are some of the mechanisms at work that make social media participation a good way to help boost your search engine rankings:

Social Media as a Ranking Factor

In the past, Google, Bing and the other search engines have been reluctant to give any weight to backlinks and mentions occurring from within social networking profiles.  However, as the size and influence of these sites have grown substantially, it’s only fair that they be considered in the algorithm that weights the SERPs results.

And in fact, both Google and Bing confirmed in a recent Search Engine Land article that social signals are being used to determine the order of the results the search engines display.  When asked whether or not Twitter tweets play a role in their ranking algorithms, Google responded by saying:

“Yes, we do use [tweeted links and RTs] as a signal. It is used as a signal in our organic and news rankings. We also use it to enhance our news universal by marking how many people shared an article.”

Similarly, Bing confirmed:

“We do look at the social authority of a user. We look at how many people you follow, how many follow you, and this can add a little weight to a listing in regular search results.”

Since the influence of social signals on search rankings has now been confirmed, it makes more sense than ever to focus on building an engaged, thriving social media profile.  But that’s not the only reason to do so…

Personalized Search

The launch of the new Google+ social network finally allowed Google to tie together a number of its services – including search, the Google Reader, the “+1” Button and others – in a meaningful way, called personalized search.  Now, instead of seeing whatever Top 10 results would ordinarily be displayed in Google as a result of the natural search algorithm, users might see content that’s recommended by friends and contacts from within their social networks.

For website owners, this is obviously a mixed blessing.  Although it may make focusing on traditional SEO in order to rank in the natural SERPs less important (as your hard-earned ranking might be bumped in your prospect’s searches to make way for their personalized results), it also opens up new opportunity for marketers who are willing to engage socially.

For example, say that you have always shielded away from engaging in social networking, while your competitor has taken a more active role in implementing these new marketing methods.  While you’re still relying on traditional SEO to land you in Google’s Top 10, your competitor – who has substantially more social networking connections easily breezes past you.  Because he has more contacts in whose search results he can appear, he is able to pick up additional traffic for multiple keywords, without having to go through the arduous process of optimizing his pages.

So what does this mean for internet business owners?  Well, it’s simple, really.  If you aren’t already engaging with social networking, now’s the time to start.  You don’t need to run out and spend hours a day on every single social media site that’s out there – instead, spend a little time analyzing where your audience hangs out by searching for your target keywords on each site and focusing your efforts on that site.

(Be sure to check out our article on how to “Automate Your Social Media Investment” for more tips on how to balance the demands of social networking with the other items on your to-do list.)

And if you are already active with social networking, now’s the time to step up your game.  Don’t sit back and assume that you’re good to go just because you’ve set up your profiles.  Instead, make sure you’re actively investing time in reaching out to new people and engaging them with helpful information in order to get the most benefit out of this new form of technology.

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In the wake of recent Facebook changes, which haven’t been well-received by the general public, the web’s newest social networking site – Google Plus – has been gaining traction in the competitive social space.  In fact, some experts even estimate that the site’s user base may surpass the size of Twitter and LinkedIn within the next 12 months.  Consider the following data from a recent Bloomberg/YouGov survey:

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that Google+ recently ended its beta stage and opened its doors to registration to everyone, or that the simplicity of information sharing on the site make it a welcome change from Facebook’s ever-changing privacy policy hoops.  However you look at it, Google+ is likely to be a dominant player in the social networking world, making it a great time for future-minded entrepreneurs to establish themselves in this new environment.

Here’s what you need to do to get started…

Setting up Your Profile

As with any social networking site, the first step to interacting on Google+ is to set up your user profile.  To be a member of Google+, you’ll need to have a Google Account, which you can register at the following link (if you don’t already have a Gmail account): http://www.accounts.google.com.

Once you have your account, navigate to Google+, where you’ll have the option to upload a profile picture and add information about your personal and professional life.  Keep in mind that the more details you enter here, the more likely people will be to connect and engage with you.  At a minimum, write up an introduction that summarizes your business accomplishments and add details about your current business in the “Employment” section to attract potential customers.

Adjusting Your Privacy Settings

Since most of the controls on information sharing within Google+ exist on the “Circles” level, you won’t need to adjust that many privacy settings to ensure that information is only available to the people you choose.

However, if you want to adjust the default Google+ settings for things like network visibility and how your Google+ profile appears in the search engines, you can do so by clicking on the gear icon in the upper-right corner and clicking on “Privacy”.

Connecting with Others Through Circles

Once your profile is set up and you’ve made any desired changes to your privacy settings, it’s time to start adding contacts.  In Google+, this is done by adding a contact to a “Circle” or group of contacts that all share a common factor.  Google+ offers a few default circles (including “Friends”, “Family”, “Acquaintances” and “Following”), although you can certainly add other circles depending on your needs.

One of the key distinctions to make between Facebook and Google+ is that you don’t need to wait for a contact to accept a friend request in order to add them to one of your circles.  Simply adding contacts to your circles won’t allow you to see their updates, unless they – in turn – add you to their own circles.

As a business owner, it’s a good idea to set up at least one business-specific circle.  As prospects and customers find you online and reach out to you through this social networking site, funneling these contacts into a business-specific circle will allow you target them directly with your marketing messages – without having to bother your Aunt Sheila every time you send out a new coupon code.

Adding Content to the Stream

Just like any other social networking site, simply setting up a profile and forgetting about it isn’t enough.  Google+ is all about encouraging conversation through a number of different mechanisms, so if you really want to use this tool to its best advantage, you need to be active in terms of posting information to your stream and interacting with the content that others in your circles share.

Unfortunately, it’s important to note that at this point, Google+ is open to individuals using real names only.  Profiles created under pseudonyms or business names will be deleted, although Google has promised that support for these options is coming in the future.

But even if you can’t set up a fan page for your brand yet, you can get a head start on building up your Google+ audience by developing a strong personal page to connect with your customers.  In the future, when this additional functionality is made available, transitioning your existing audience to your brand page should be a snap.

Running and marketing your business is challenging enough – adding social networking into the mix can seem overwhelming for many entrepreneurs!  If you’re having trouble managing all the various social media marketing recommendations out there, consider the following checklist to help you take charge of your Twitter and Facebook social networking campaigns.

Connecting on Twitter

The quick, interactive nature of Twitter makes it a great place to engage in quick conversations with your current and potential customers, as well as to respond to any mentions of your brand and answer questions about your products or services.  But to be sure you’re getting the most benefit out of this service, be sure to take the following steps:

ü  Complete your profile – Once you’ve registered for an account at Twitter, be sure to upload your picture and create a short bio for your profile.  Twitter users are significantly more likely to engage with others who have complete profiles.

ü  Follow industry leaders – The fastest way to get your Twitter profile noticed is follow the leaders in your industry.  Subscribing to their Twitter streams and responding to their updates will increase your visibility amongst your target customers and result in more people following your profile.

ü  Schedule regular tweets – If you aren’t able to spend all day on Twitter, use a service like the Buffer App to keep your Twitter stream full of interesting updates even when you aren’t around.  Just be careful, although this can be a convenient way to automate your social networking on Twitter, the real value of this service is with the direct person-to-person interactions it encourages.  Don’t rely on these automated messages to be your only type of tweet.

ü  Set up keyword searches – Download a tool like TweetDeck, which will enable you to set up Twitter searches that alert you whenever your chosen keywords are mentioned on Twitter.  Set up searches for your brand name, your product names and any other relevant keywords in order to find new prospects to connect with.

ü  Check Twitter once per day – Aim for at least 10-20 minutes on the site each day and use this time to respond to any keyword search results that come up, any @ messages directed at you and any direct messages you’ve received throughout the day.

Engaging with Facebook

Facebook is a great site for connecting with your prospects on a deeper level.  Compared to Twitter, Facebook lets you share more in-depth messages and more types of media, including pictures, links, videos and more.  In addition to simply soliciting new customers, you can use this service to conduct market research, build brand loyalty and provide additional resources to your most loyal subscribers.

Here’s what you need to do to be sure you’re getting the most out of your Facebook account:

ü  Sign up for an account – On Facebook, you’ll need to create a page for your business, which means first choosing between “Local Business or Place”, “Company, Organization or Institution” and “Brand or Product”.  Each structure has different advantages, so be sure to do your research first in order to choose the one that’s right for your business.

ü  Complete your profile – As with Twitter, you’ll find that people are more likely to engage with your business page when it’s full of pictures and information.  The specific type of information you’ll be able to share will depend on the page type you choose, but whatever kind of page you’ve created, take the time to fill out as many fields as possible.

ü  Install an iFrame opt-in app – The number of “likes” your page has on Facebook, the greater the clout your page has online.  And the best way to encourage visitors to “like” your page is by setting up an iFrame opt-in app that requires visitors to click that little “thumbs up” button in order to access premium content.  Check out this article for instructions on how to set this up.

ü  Post regular updates on your page – Setting up a Facebook fan page and then letting it languish is one of the fastest ways to turn off potential subscribers and customers.  Instead, take the time to engage your Facebook fans by posting regular status updates to your page.  These could be coupon codes, company news, important announcements or even questions designed to get your readers more involved with your business.

Social networking doesn’t have to be complicated, and it doesn’t have to be something that eats up days at a time.  By following the checklists described above, you’ll be able to set up profiles that people want to engage with while keeping your daily time investment on Twitter and Facebook to a reasonable level.

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Stumbleupon is a web browsing and social bookmarking service that allows readers to indicate whether or not they like a certain page and discover new web pages based on their demonstrated interests.  Because of the size of the service and the level of engagement of its users, Stumbleupon can send thousands and thousands of visitors to your site, making it an ideal place to solicit viral traffic.

However, most of the articles that are submitted to this site wind up buried in the index without ever being stumbled or viewed by a single user.  To prevent your article from dying this slow death and improve your chances of picking up massive traffic from this site, check out the following tips:

Tip #1 – Write Really Good Content                                                                                                                                      

The biggest key to succeeding with Stumbleupon is to draft well-written, informative content.  Simply posting a link to your sales page or to any other generic blog post probably isn’t going to get the job done.  Instead, write the kinds of articles that you’d like to read.  They can be short or long, humorous or informative – just be sure that you’re explaining your topic thoroughly and providing a good experience for your readers.

Also, keep in mind that there are some types of content that naturally tend to perform better on Stumbleupon than other article formats.  According to SEO strategist Jeremy Morgan, the following types of articles tend to get the most traction in this community:

• Photoshop Tutorials
• Programming Tutorials
• Photography
• Design Articles
• Humor
• Videos
• Unique Content

While it isn’t necessary to submit one of these types of posts to succeed with Stumbleupon, you might want to give one of them a try if you aren’t initially getting traction with the site.

Tip #2 – Engage with the Community

Many website owners approach Stumbleupon as if it’s just another marketing tool.  They post link after link back to their sites and are surprised to find that they don’t automatically receive tons of traffic back to their sites using this approach.

The truth is that Stumbleupon is a closely-knit community that values integrity and ethical content sharing.  Instead of spamming this environment with constant backlinks, consider investing a little time in actually using the site and engaging with your fellow Stumblers.  It doesn’t take long to set up a profile and stumble a few sites on your own, and you’ll likely find that this effort is rewarded with increased attention to your own submissions.

Tip #3 – Encourage Stumbles

According to Intuit’s Website Services division, if you hope to generate additional traffic to your site via Stumbleupon, one of the best ways to shoot yourself in the foot is to fail to place any kind of “Stumbling” button on your site.  Your readers aren’t going to go out of their ways to copy and paste your links into Stumbleupon.  Instead, you need to make it as easy as possible to share your content on this site so that readers who are engaged with this community will be able to bookmark your links as quickly as possible.

If your website is based on WordPress or any other blogging platform, this can be easily accomplished by installing a social sharing plugin like Digg Digg or Shareaholic on your site.  If your website runs on HTML, you can still add a Stumbleupon button, although you’ll need to manually paste the button script that Stumbleupon provides into your site’s code.

For an added Stumbleupon traffic bump, consider adding a call to action to each post on your site encouraging readers to share your content on this specific social networking site.  Something as simple as, “If you liked this article, please take a second to share it on Stumbleupon” paired with a Stumbleupon button could be extremely effective in increasing the overall traffic to your site.

Overall, Stumbleupon can be a great way to generate viral traffic to your site, with top articles on the site receiving thousands of hits each day.  However, earning recognition on this site isn’t as simple as posting a few links back to your site.  Instead, you’ll need to commit to producing quality articles, engage with the Stumbleupon community and encourage readers to share your content on this site in order to take advantage of this great viral traffic source.

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In some ways, LinkedIn is the most powerful social network to use to promote your business online.  Unfortunately, you wouldn’t know it from looking at the site, as it isn’t nearly as user-friendly and intuitive as the more popular social networking destinations, Facebook and Twitter.  So how can you get the most out of this site?  Let’s look at a few tips…

First Steps: Complete Your Profile

Before you can start reaching out to new leads, it’s critical that you take the time to fill out every element of your profile.  This can take some time, as LinkedIn offers many more fields to customize than other social networking sites, but the time you invest in this process will pay off, as people are more likely to do business with people and companies that have complete profiles.

Pay special attention to the work history section, as this is your chance to show off your best work to prospective clients!

LinkedIn Answers: Demonstrate Your Authority

LinkedIn’s Answers feature is an extremely underused opportunity for you to demonstrate your authority in your industry to potential customers, as well as to conduct market research to inform your future product offerings.

To get started, navigate to http://www.linkedin.com/answers while logged into your profile.  From here, you have two options – you can either search for questions to answer or post your own questions in order to tap into the collective brainpower of LinkedIn’s subscribers.

If you want to show off your industry knowledge, use the “Browse” box on the right-hand sidebar to search for questions in your market.  Be sure you’re looking at “Open Questions”, as you won’t be able to post an answer to closed questions.  Simply find a question that you can answer, click on it and share your opinion via the “Answer Question” button.

Alternatively, if you’d like to post a question in order to learn more about your target market, navigate back to the Answers home page and type your question into the “Ask a Question” dialogue box that appears in the upper-left hand corner of the main screen.  You’ll be prompted to associate your question with an industry in the next screen, but once you publish your question, you can expect to receive plenty of helpful answers that can uncover untapped markets or help you choose what product or service to launch next.

Advanced Search Features: Zero In on Key Prospects

While LinkedIn can be a great way to post information about your business and your achievements, its true strength lies in its ability to connect you with potential customers.  To find the people who will be most interested in your products or services, use the LinkedIn Advanced Search feature.

To get started, click on the “Advanced” box next to the search field on the far right-hand side of the screen.  This will launch a page that’s full of different criteria you can sort by:

For example, suppose you wanted to identify people within a 50-mile radius of your hometown in a given industry who are at least 1^st or 2^nd level connections with you (meaning that you have a common friend or friend-of-a-friend).  Entering these values into the Advanced Search feature would give you a list of these professionals, who you could then connect with through LinkedIn.

LinkedIn Groups: Social Networking for Business Professionals

According to the Social Media Examiner,

“Creating a LinkedIn group gives you the ability to generate an amazing number of leads from high-end decision makers.  If your sales funnel is set up correctly, you will have more than enough prospects to grow your business.”

To harness the power of these online professional networking groups, you can either join an existing group or start your own.  There are currently plenty of interesting LinkedIn Groups to join (some of the most popular include the “Social Media Marketing” and “On Startups” communities), which will give you access to already-established communities full of people in your market.

Alternatively, if you aren’t able to find a LinkedIn Group that meets your needs, you can always start your own!  If you do decide to create your own group, be sure to use your target keywords in both the group’s title and description, as this will help your community get noticed on LinkedIn and in the search engines.  As you begin to attract members, keep things active by tying your site’s RSS feed to your group and sending out regular messages to your subscribers to provide value for their memberships.

While it’s true that LinkedIn does have a bit of a learning curve, it’s still a great place to find qualified leads for your business.  Give it a try today and harness the power of traditional business networking online!

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