Social media. It seems like just about everyone is getting as active as can be on all the different social networks on the web, but is this really a requirement if you want your website to rank well in Google? That's a question that was recently raised in the Webmaster World forums.

Traditional search engine optimization techniques may involve tweaking your site's code, attracting backlinks, and working on your keyword density, but it seems that Google is also looking at other signals to determine what content is the most relevant and the most useful to its users. And social media could represent one aspect of that. After all, if you're getting a lot of mentions on Twitter, there's a good chance that your site is important.

However, that's not necessarily to see that "going social" is an absolute requirement. User "netmeg" puts it quite well:

"I think about 'going social' the same way I think about 'going mobile' - where are my users? If that's where they are, then that's where I want to be."

Social networking may not be appropriate for all kinds of sites in all kinds of niches, but you could be missing out on opportunities if you do choose to bypass the social sphere. Let's not forget about all the indirect SEO goodness that comes with social media, like increased brand awareness and more links from influential people.

A poll was posted on SE Roundtable discussing exactly this and, as of the writing of today's post, nearly 60% of respondents say that social is required to compete in search rankings, whereas only 33% say that social isn't needed. What do you think?

Social media keeps rising in popularity. Just about everyone is on Twitter and Facebook these days. More people are jumping onto Tumblr to share even more content, so should we even bother will more full-blown blogs anymore? Internet entrepreneur Neil Patel certainly thinks so.

In a recent post on Search Engine Journal, the KISSmetrics founder outlines seven different reasons why blogging is still important in 2012. One of the biggest reasons is that a powerful blog will always serve as a great foundation for all your social media activities. Even if you are very active on Twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook, you still want somewhere that you can direct that interest and traffic.

A blog can do that. It's your home base and it's where you can drive that attention. By having that home base, you are better positioned to build your brand as an expert, build trust among your readers, and establish your legitimacy. Otherwise, you've just got pieces scattered all around the web with nothing to hold them together.

And let's not forget about the SEO benefits too. Sure you can have some eyes on your Twitter stream, but a consistently updated blog is a very good thing for search engine optimization. Google smiles upon dynamic content that is actually useful and having a blog keeps those spiders and bots coming back, better indexing your material and sending more organic traffic your way.

Blogging is still important and that's half the reason why we keep blogging here on Gseo. Do you keep a blog? Why or why not?

Online marketing takes on so many different forms, but social media marketing has really taken off in the last few years. Unfortunately, a lot of people aren't exactly doing it the right way.

Brian Carter of BruceClay.com just put up a blog post about the 10 biggest Facebook markteing mistakes of 2011.

So many companies have decided to jump onto the Facebook marketing bandwagon, just because they see everyone else doing it. Even people who are pretty good at utilizing Facebook from a social standpoint, the marketing side has been utilized in a less than ideal way.

Ironically, one of the mistakes Brian discusses in his post is that people overestimate the importance of Facebook pages. The assumption is that what you should do is build up that page and use it as a big marketing channel, but "less than 1 percent of page fans ever go back to your page." Are you wasting your effort?

Some of the other Facebook marketing mistakes include caring only about the number of fans, thinking about yourself instead of your audience, posting too frequently, and creating all the content yourself. Not surprisingly, one of the other big ones is ignoring your metrics. how else are you going to know if your marketing plan is working?

Do you do Facebook marketing? Has it been effective for you? Do you handle it in-house or do you outsource it to someone else?

Much earlier this year there was a news release on how Tulalip was purchased by Microsoft for future use. At this time a Microsoft employee had slipped the fact that "Socl" was a future plan to be their new social media platform.

Socl is going to be fully HTML 5 and have no silverlight or flash/Javascript components. Pretty slick huh? The integration of HTML 5 is not fully finished and there is little open source available for general use at this time.

But we are seeing a lot of major corporations and blogs start pushing toward incorporating HTML 5 templates and software in the future. Faster loading times, smoother integration with various languages and universal issues. It should also be much more secure than our current HTML versions due to its complicated code and future developments.

There will be all the mainstream social features such as video chat, live messaging, full profiles, walls, and more. For the most part pretty competitive with Google Plus and FB, almost standard features I guess. And, supposedly the HTML 5 does all of this very well and performs flawlessly with Chrome.

Microsoft's already entered into beta with Socl and some of the media is sayign that the user interface and communication is top notch, quality programs. I'm looking forward to seeing it.

About the Author:

Mason Stoller has been working in the internet marketing industry for over 8 years, starting with small business consulting and now working with major corporations across the United States with SEO Influence.com. Check out his personal SEO Tips blog.

Earlier this year when Google plus was first released there was a ton of hype about the amazing new social media site with cool circles for networking. Well no doubt, Google has made its point, Google Plus is here to stay and Google will become a major player in the social media game.

But what about businesses? Industry and market networking, marketing for companies through social media and more??

Google will release a "business page or profile" in Google Plus later this year.

This should incorporate new content and media areas for listing your companies profile with all products and services. Plus you'll have new spots to build networks of business clients and other connections. It will be important for you to get your business page up as soon as possible. Each niche and industry will fill quickly with new companies, and if you are able to get yours up very quickly a lot of new connections will be made as creators look to connect with others in their industry.

A major part of any successful SEO campaign is incorporating social media sites, you gain backlinks and reputation building that will help improve your rankings over time. Don't forget to constantly update these sources and profiles as you'll see more responses and interactions from the community. Both can boost your authority in your industry helping you rank higher on the specific social media websites as well. Great for helping people find your company and profile over others, so engage your community regularly for best results.

Keep your head up for news on Google Plus business pages and make yours as soon as its released. Start connecting and pushing your business further online, good luck and prepare for the future of social media search.

About the Author:

Mason Stoller has been working in the internet marketing industry for over 8 years, starting with small business consulting and now working with major corporations across the United States with SEO Influence.com, a California SEO Services company. Check out his personal SEO Tips blog.