By: Arthur Cooper
Submitted: 2011-01-25 13:15:24 | Word Count: 664
Bing has jumped on the social media bandwagon and introduced Bing Social Search, which integrates Facebook fan pages and Twitter tweets into your search index. Here are a few of the features:
Fan Pages: Your search index will now include relevant links, status updates and more from fan pages you follow. For example, if you type in “NBA Playoffs” you’ll get tons of up to the second information from Twitter as well as Facebook fan pages, and you’ll even get information from your local news stations on how the games are going.
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Shared Links: Bing will also target popularly shared links, meaning links that were posted within status updates or Tweets. They will not, however, share the profile information or any personal information for who posted the links. Bottom line, if a link is getting re-tweeted frequently and it is deemed relevant to your search terms, you’re going to see it ranked higher than if social media hadn’t been considered.
Bing Social Homepage: The Bing Social Homepage also provides a plethora of information for those who want a little more direction when they’re searching. It has a listing of hot topics at the moment, as well as news stories and tweets related to those topics. It’s a fairly minimalistic layout that places emphasis on social media and the information that can be found there.
Recommendations: Bing Social will also recommend Twitter users you may want to follow based on a social search. For example, a search of Apple brings up all the official Apple Twitter accounts. That way you can stay totally up to date with everything Apple – or whoever you choose to follow.
The push to integrate social media with a search index is nothing new. It provides users with a totally unique search experience. The difference between Bing’s Social Search and Google’s social media integration is that you don’t need a profile to utilize all aspects of Bing’s Social Search. You do however have to go to the social section of Bing to take advantage of it, where Google integrates their social media information right into your search index. Bing also provides a sort of ticker that constantly updates with the latest statuses and tweets pertaining to the topic you searched. However, Google provides a similar listing of information through their “real time” listings that can be accessed from the original search index. Google’s listings though, only contain Tweets.
The fact that big search engines like Bing and Google are integrating social media into their search indexes can only mean one thing. That businesses need to acquire social media accounts in order to get their name out there. Having a Facebook or Twitter account may seem like a lot of work, but it will help your business to show up in a search index and be ranked above those without social media integration, now more than ever.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is always evolving and Bing’s Social Search features just add another level to the importance of rankings and saturating the internet with your company’s name.
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