How SEO and Social Media Can Work Together

When discussing advertising and marketing strategies, it’s not uncommon to find business owners pursuing either social media or search engine optimization (SEO). While these two channels and disciplines can yield lucrative benefits and returns, the time to view them as siloed activities has well and truly passed us by, now. 

SEO and social media complement each other in more ways than you might expect, offering a symbiotic relationship that has the potential to be incredibly powerful and rewarding. So, let’s discuss how SEO and social media work together, their potential impact, and how to incorporate both to your advantage.

Omnichannel strategies affect the customer journey

Modern omnichannel marketing isn’t simply a case of choosing between channels, but rather aligning multiple ones to give your business the best possible chance of achieving its goals, whether that’s growing your brand, branching out to newer markets, or simply improving your bottom line. 

The integration and alignment of SEO and social media are powerful and often underutilized opportunities for business growth, brand awareness, lead generation, and market authority.

For business owners intent on elevating their online presence, drawing the attention of more of their target audience, or generating more online sales, understanding when and how these two channels work in harmony is essential. Together, they create a virtuous cycle, with strong social engagement signals to search engines that content is relevant and valuable, and with higher search rankings driving more traffic to your social profiles, thus expanding your reach and influence even further.

The modern customer journey is complex and involves the discovery of your business at multiple touchpoints. Your prospects may discover you through an organic Google search of a key term, engage with something you share on LinkedIn, come across a sponsored ad on Instagram or Facebook, and then return to your website to make a purchase decision. 

With that in mind, let’s explore some common points of overlap between optimizing your website for organic search and leveraging social channels effectively.

Content for SEO and social media engagement

Successful, ambitious entrepreneurs with a healthy growth mindset don’t view content as a means to an end, but rather as currency that can be dispensed across platforms seamlessly. Content encompasses a wide range of material, such as:

• Interviews

• Blogs

• Lists

• Guides

• Videos

• Infographics

• Directories

• Photos

• Interactive emails

• Mailshots

• Polls

• eBooks

• Podcasts

• Webinars

• Case studies

• UGC (user-generated content)

• Influencer content

Your business may be best suited to a range of content, but the key is not to view each piece as something reserved for one specific channel. For example, an article, case study, or blog post is not simply something to put on your website; it becomes transferable to a series of social media posts and perhaps even video content. It can be used to generate backlinks that improve domain authority (DA), drive engagement in posts on LinkedIn, and even create a series of infographics or images that can work in print material. 

Modern consumers crave visual content like images, graphics, videos and infographics. These often perform well on social media platforms, and if enhanced with effective calls-to-action (CTAs), they can improve your website’s user experience (UX) and search performance. The key is to ensure any visual assets are optimized for both website speed, search visibility, and social sharing. This boils down to ensuring that images can be adequately sized and still of good quality, which can be easily achieved with the right file type. The helpful image file format guide by MPB explains how to achieve the ideal balance of quality, UX and speed. 

To create content that works across both channels, it’s important to establish pillars that serve multiple purposes. A comprehensive piece of evergreen content on a vital area of expertise can, for example, be broken down into LinkedIn posts, Instagram carousel posts, X (formerly known as Twitter) threads, and YouTube videos. All of these specific social media assets can drive traffic back to your website as you build topical authority across the web.

Social media and Google profile optimization 

Each social media platform offers an opportunity to act as an extension of your website, which is effectively your digital business card. LinkedIn, for example, given its main user base of entrepreneurs, business leaders and professionals, is a great place to share valuable thought leadership content. Quality content here can rank well in organic search too.

Conversely, TikTok or Instagram, being predominantly visual and image-led tools, are more suited for showcasing brand personality and striking an emotional connection with your audience. Smart brands also use these tools to drive traffic to key website pages through strategic links in bios, sponsored ads or paid partnerships that guide users to conversion-focused landing pages. These types of social media ads (be they paid or organic) work much the same as PPC (pay-per-click) search or display ads on Google. Another way to foster genuine relationships with specific prospects or customers, or even build an organic community presence is to join Facebook groups and pages. In turn, directing people to specific geo-location pages on your site will establish local authority in your target area(s).

By extension, your Google Business Profile (GBP), formerly known as your Google My Business (GMB) profile, deserves attention as it bridges the gap between SEO and social media. This platform works like a social profile on its own merits while directly improving local search presence, and it’s very easy to claim and create a GBP. Optimizing your GBP with regular posts, reviews, testimonials, and local relevance signals can dramatically improve your visibility. 

Using strong, relevant keywords

Successfully aligning SEO and social media involves the natural, organic use of keywords without sounding like a robot. Long gone are the days where stuffing keyword after keyword into content was deemed ‘SEO’; search engines are also now considering this to be a ‘black hat’ tactic. Instead they are rewarding sites that prompt authentic, original, relevant, and engaging content.

In other words, if you deliver something primarily for the user, rather than the search engine, then you’ll be rewarded by the search engine.

Ask yourself what your ideal customers talk about when it comes to their challenges or pain points. These natural phrases can become your keywords across search and social media content. Authentically addressing these topics will ensure you’re creating content that serves the user’s purpose first, and the search engine algorithm will take notice, particularly if it’s garnering clicks, impressions and engagement. 

Establishing authority

Your brand's authority compounds when your message remains consistent across all touchpoints. This doesn't mean posting identical content everywhere, but rather ensuring your expertise, values, and unique perspective shine through regardless of platform.

Search engines increasingly consider brand mentions and social signals as indicators of authority and trustworthiness. When your content generates conversations, shares, and mentions across social platforms, it creates a web of relevance that search engines recognize and reward.

The advantages of aligning SEO and social media

While many businesses still operate in silos, forward-thinking entrepreneurs who embrace integrated SEO and social media strategies are giving themselves a valuable competitive advantage. They're not just creating content; they're establishing authority with every piece of content, which works harder and delivers greater returns with every view, click, and impression. 

When you successfully align these powerful marketing channels, you create a business known for its expertise, and one that drives sustainable growth, builds lasting authority, and transforms your knowledge and insights into undeniable market leadership.

The question isn't whether you can afford to integrate SEO and social media, but whether you can afford not to.