To add "Like" and "Tweet" buttons - or not to add?

[Hugene]

Hello

My 8 year old site is a mostly a content site, a side project that I've kept alive over the years with very little work on it. It is not my source of revenue, but it is a little side project that I rather keep than fold.

It is well spidered, well ranked and it does drive good traffic (for the market it is in) and I can also use it to quickly prop up other sites, just because of the sheer linking volume my site can generate.

But obviously, because the lack of work I put on it, the traffic has reached a plateau. And the whole social internet/web 2.0 has passed my site by: very few people comment, or email it, and I have AddThis widget on which I get maybe 1 share per month.

A few months ago I theorized that social media links could not be such a god idea, if you have very little of them that is.

But is this really true? Basically, what I wonder is, if I put a "Like" and "Tweet" button, and no one uses them, does this become a negative signal for Google?

What do you think? I will experiment by implementing the buttons and share the results here.

[Planet13]

I was late to the Social Media game myself - just put a Facebook like button up last year.

Hence, i don't have a TON of likes (one site's home page has 48, the other site's home page only has 21). There are a lot of other pages that have only one or two likes to them.

I would say if they are good quality pages (i.e., you are proud of the content) then people will "like" them - even if no one else has.

BTW: If you visit a lot of blogs and other sites, you will se that some sites will get tons of FB likes and only a couple of tweets. Some sites will be exactly the opposite: 50 tweets / retweets for every FB like.

But either way, my site has lots more FB Likes than inbound links.

[Hugene]

What I am wondering is if it worth to deploy a "Like" or "Tweet" button, if you end up having very little activity on them? Could this actually be detrimental to your ranking? Could Google infer that your site is not "popular".

[Planet13]

What I am wondering is if it worth to deploy a "Like" or "Tweet" button, if you end up having very little activity on them? Could this actually be detrimental to your ranking? Could Google infer that your site is not "popular".

I don't think anyone could answer that question short of a google employee...

Maybe someone has a test case out there where they removed their facebook like or tweet buttons and all of a sudden, they climbed up in the serps?

[TheMadScientist]

Which does more for your site's exposure? 1 single tweet or like or 0.
Are you closer to a site with 500 tweets and likes with 1 or 0?

Add 'em ... +1

[Bewenched]

I'm always cautious about those since that button will put more load time on your page and it has alot of javascript.

We had them for a while, but decided to take them off, 1 because of the code weight and 2 because if something glitches with facebook or twitter then your page may not load.

[TheMadScientist]

Oh, I don't recommend using their code ... Adding the ability for a visitor to tweet or like is another story. ;)

[Dan01]

I think it is a good idea to add the functionality. Also, create a Facebook page with your site feed on it. Then link from you site to the Facebook page (Make a button that says "find us on Facebook"). And then, if they like that Facebook page, their Facebook feed will be updated with your new articles (the first paragraph with a link to your article). I think this is better than a Like button on your site.

On Twitter, there are three things they can do - follow you on Twitter, find you on Twitter and tweet (retweet) your content.

[Dan01]

Oh, I don't recommend using their code ... Adding the ability for a visitor to tweet or like is another story. ;)

Some are safe, but if they require you to input your Twitter or Facebook password to function, that could be a problem.

[piatkow]

Remote linked twitter and facebook buttons are treated as attempts to access blocked sites by our office firewall. Luckily nobody checks the logs.

[maximillianos]

We don't use them due to slow load times on our big site. Though we are thinking of trying the iframe version of the like button. Thought it might help page load issues since the page does not have to wait for an iframe to load.

We do use them on some smaller sites. They drive a little traffic. I think the real value lies in the links you get from Fb when someone likes your page. Those add up. Even though they are no followed, I think they count a little bit.

[netmeg]

(I would think this would go in the social media forum, but here it is, so I'll answer it here)

First of all - I wouldn't be worried about the button's showing not much usage - you can pick buttons that don't show numbers.

There are reasons to use the "official" buttons from Facebook and Twitter.

The official Twitter button allows you to configure a suggestion to follow a user on twitter - so, for example, if you have a Twitter button on a page, and someone uses it, the button can detect whether or not that user is already following whatever twitter handle you specify, and suggest that they follow it. If you do maintain a corporate Twitter account, that's an easy way to pick up new followers.

The Facebook like button code has recently been updated into something really useful - "like" and "share" has pretty much been merged, so that, if configured correctly, if someone 'likes' your content, it shows up pretty much the same as if they'd posted a link on their own page. You can even specify the graphic that appears - a picture from the page, or your logo. And if you configure the Open Graph stuff in the headers of your page, you get what passes for Facebook analytics as well.

So yea, I think it's worth it. All it's going to cost you is time.

(Depending on your platform, there are a number of tutorials out there on implementing these social media buttons - but if you do a search, make sure you narrow the time frame to the past month or so, because things change quickly)

Now, the other option is the Facebook Like Box - where you have an official "page" on Facebook for your business, and a Like Box (or button) on your site asking people to like your page on Facebook.

I set up a Facebook Like Box last week for my sister, who is a musician, and she got all huffy with me asking why she needs this. And what I told her was, while it's great that she is adding new content to her website about gigs and CD releases and whatnot, she's still depending on people to stop by regularly and check out what she's doing. Whereas, if they 'like' her official page on Facebook, she can fill them in on what she's doing there, by just posting to her Facebook page. It's sort of like an opt-in email list - they've signed up to get her updates in her Facebook stream (as long as she doesn't go overboard with it). Her website is pull, Facebook is push.

I think most people should use both.

(And, for what it's worth - I really *hate* the "Like Box" version that shows the faces of your Facebook fans - but I cannot argue with its success. On every site where I have implemented it, the 'Likes' have gone through the roof. People see their friends there, and click, that's all I can figure)

[Planet13]

People see their friends there, and click, that's all I can figure)

One thing you learn from being a photojournalist is that people tend to focus in on faces. So a site might have graphics and photos that don't get noticed right away, but the faces do tend to attract attention.

So it might just be that Like buttons without faces just aren't seen as readily.

[Hugene]

I don't have a Twitter account, so there is nothing for me to recommend people to follow. As for FB, my site is custom built, and doesn't have a feed, so I don't think I'll be making a FB Page.

I wasn't aware that the buttons can interfere with page load, but it makes sense, considering how often Twitter and FB are down. So I will go with the iframe option.

I was also thinking that a count of 0 might be good to see, it could encourage people to be the 1st to Like.