New Google and Twitter Deal Means New Twitter Search Strategy for Businesses
Recent news suggests the time is now to up your game and reassess your Twitter strategy.
Why, you’re wondering? Google and Twitter are slated to join forces in the first half of 2015. The deal will give Google access to Twitter’s firehouse, or data stream, allowing the search engine to index tweets in real time.
The deal provides a huge opportunity for companies that are active on Twitter. Not only does this deal offer a big chance to climb the Google search results, but also for allowing tweets to be seen by larger audiences, including people who don’t have Twitter accounts.
Google is not answering questions about the deal, so no one is really sure how Google plans to rank and serve up relevant tweets in searches. Google does already include tweets in their searches, but to a much lessor extent.
This deal is not Google’s first time indexing real-time tweets; but the company has not distributed tweets in this manner since 2011. Previously, real-time tweets were included in a service called Google Real Time Search. Don’t expect Google Real Time Search to be back though.
Since Google and Twitter are not stating exactly how these new real-time tweets will look on Google, the best bet is to define a Twitter strategy with a focus on increasing visibility.
Top Twitter Strategy Tips include:
Tweet regularly. Tweets will be served up in real time, so more recent tweets are likely to rise up in Google search results.
Use relevant keywords. Think about the words people use to search for company products and services. Use those keywords in tweets giving Twitter posts an added advantage to being found.
Grow a Twitter following. While no proof exists that a larger Twitter following increases the chances for a higher search ranking, a larger audience could potentially make a company seem more authoritative in Google’s eyes.
Encourage engagement. Active engagement is likely to be factored into Google’s algorithm when ranking. Tweets with images and videos tend to perform better than text tweets, so include a balance of images and videos as well as re-tweetable text posts.
Tweet interesting, relevant and helpful information. Encourage customer service tweets to answer customer and client questions. Respond to mentions by other people on Twitter. Links are always a top attention getter for Google search results, so linking to content others want is always recommended.
As the exact nature of the deal between the two online giants evolves, be sure any Twitter strategy in place is flexible and can evolve with additional changes. Relevance certainly remains a huge part of any social media marketing plan. Be sure to provide timely and interesting content that people want to see, share and favorite to help capture attention.
The new deal between Twitter and Google stands to improve getting companies seen in Google search results driving traffic to both Twitter accounts and business websites.
Is your Twitter strategy Google ready?
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