Social signal can come from various sources, for example Facebook Like, Retweet, Google +1, etc. Think about the following scenarios:

* If a lot of your friends “Like” Malaysia Brides Facebook Page, when you search Malaysia Wedding Forum or Malaysia Bridal Forum, shouldn’t MalaysiaBrides.com rank higher in the search result because your friends recommended(the signal) the site indirectly to you and there is a high chance that your friends are members of that forum as well.

* If Matt Cutts retweeted my post about SEO or Social Signal, shouldn’t my page rank higher for such search term because the Guru in the field has recommended me.

Similar to PageRank, the quality of social signal counts. The search engines nowadays are smart enough to give weightage to the person behind it. That’s the reason where Google trying to get to know a person more by starting Google+. Matt also confirmed that Google started to extend the use of social signal(initially was meant for real time result).

Below are Q&A compiled by Danny Sullivan.

1) If an article is retweeted or referenced much in Twitter, do you count that as a signal outside of finding any non-nofollowed links that may naturally result from it?

Bing:
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. It carries much more weight in Bing Social Search, where tweets from more authoritative people will flow to the top when best match relevancy is used.

Google:
Yes, we do use it 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 [NOTE: see the end of this article for more about that].

2) Do you try to calculate the authority of someone who tweets that might be assigned to their Twitter page. Do you try to “know,” if you will, who they are?

Bing:
Yes. We do calculate the authority of someone who tweets. For known public figures or publishers, we do associate them with who they are. (For example, query for Danny Sullivan)

Google:
Yes we do compute and use author quality. We don’t know who anyone is in real life

3) Do you calculate whether a link should carry more weight depending on the person who tweets it?

Bing:
Yes.

Google:
Yes we do use this as a signal, especially in the “Top links” section [of Google Realtime Search]. Author authority is independent of PageRank, but it is currently only used in limited situations in ordinary web search.

4) Do you track links shared within Facebook, either through personal walls or fan pages?

Bing:
Yes. We look at links shared that are marked as “Everyone,” and links shared from Facebook fan pages.

Google:
We treat links shared on Facebook fan pages the same as we treat tweeted links. We have no personal wall data from Facebook.

5) Do you try to calculate the authority of someone on Facebook, either say via their personal wall or their fan page.

Bing:
We don’t do this on Facebook. On Facebook, we only get what’s public, only updates and things you’ve posted to everyone as viewable. We don’t get things only shared with friends, so we don’t know how authoritative you are on Facebook. There isn’t the whole convenient retweet mechanism we see on Twitter.
We do see valuable content shared by Facebook users, even though we only get what’s public. For example when Gary Coleman died we saw a video from Different Strokes, saying his favorite line “what ya talk’in ’bout Willis” gain popularity. It happened to be what a lot of people are sharing on the day he passed away.

Google:
Again, the treatment is the same as for Twitter. And we have no personal wall data from Facebook.

6) Do you calculate whether a link should carry more weight depending on the person who shared it on Facebook?

Bing:
We can tell if something is of quality on Facbook by leveraging Twitter. If the same link is shared in both places, it’s more likely to be legitimate.

Google:
Same as question 5.

7) And just to be really clear, the new Facebook data is not yet being used in ordinary web search, right? (asked only of Bing, because it was only relevant to them)

No.

www.facebook.com/malaysiabrides
www.facebook.com/malaysianbabes
www.facebook.com/setiatropika

Next batch is coming . . . .

In short:

Why are we doing this?
Two reasons: first, users have the best experience when they don’t have to wait a long time for landing pages to load. Interstitial pages, multiple redirects, excessively slow servers, and other things that can increase load times only keep users from getting what they want: information about your business. Second, users are more likely to abandon landing pages that load slowly, which can hurt your conversion rate.

And it means:

After the one month review period, this load time factor will be incorporated into your keywords’ Quality Scores. Keywords with landing pages that load very slowly may get lower Quality Scores (and thus higher minimum bids). Conversely, keywords with landing pages that load very quickly may get higher Quality Scores and lower minimum bids.

Basically the the shorter loading time, the better position and lower minimum bids you might get. May be is a good news for web hosting companies as well?? LOL

I’m wondering will this affect Adsense users eventually. Say if my site has shorter loading time, isn’t it give Adwords users a better platform to show their ads as well? Should I be rewarded as well?

ad:tech – 26/27 June 2008
ad:tech brings together brand advertisers, traditional & interactive agencies, portals, on-line publishers and technology providers. With the rapid growth in technology and use of digital media, ad:tech offers an unrivalled opportunity to discover new practices and technologies, and to learn how many of the great names have utilized the net, built brand recognition and immersed themselves in digital technologies. Companies are realizing the meaning of ROI on ad spend like never before.

Exhibiting companies

• .FOX Networks
• 88DB.com
• Acronym Media
• AD2ONE GROUP
• adma
• Admax Network
• Aktiv Digital
• Charged Media
• ColorZip Singapore
• dgm Asia Pac
• Easy Ad
• Eyeblaster
• Friendster
• Google, Inc.
• Hong Kong Association of Interactive Marketing Limited (HK)
• i-POP
• Innity Sdn Bhd
• Internet Industry Association of Singapore (IIAS)
• Interwoven
• m.Net Corporation
• Marketing Institute of Singapore (MIS)
• Nielsen
• NTT Resonant Inc
• Omniture
• Premiere Global Services
• Recruit.net
• RedHat Media
• SEMPO
• Singapore Press Holdings Limited
• Sivrin Technologies
• StrongMail Systems
• Verztec Consulting Pte Ltd
• WebDNA
• XM Asia Pacific Pte Ltd
• Yahoo! SEA

Venue

• Suntec City Convention Center

See you there !!!