Why "Pointless" Social Media Shares Are More Valuable Than You Think

It‘s every content marketer‘s dream – you publish a new blog post, share it on social media, and within minutes it goes viral. Thousands of likes, comments, and shares are pouring in, and your website traffic is shooting through the roof.

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But what if I told you that even the social media shares that bring you almost no visitors can be just as valuable? In fact, a recent study by Ahrefs found that 66.31% of pages don‘t get any organic traffic from Google. And yet businesses and individuals continue to invest heavily in social media marketing.

As it turns out, there are some powerful hidden benefits to getting more social shares, even if they appear worthless from a referral traffic perspective. In this ultimate guide, we‘ll dive into the data and uncover why "pointless" shares deserve a prominent place in your content strategy.

Accelerate Your Indexing to Get Traffic Sooner

One of the biggest benefits of social shares is the ability to get your content indexed by Google almost instantly. When your post goes live, you want it showing up in search results as quickly as possible so you can start ranking and banking traffic.

However, Google has a limited crawl budget, meaning it can‘t instantly find and index every page on the web. This can result in delays of days or even weeks before your content surfaces in search.

But Google makes a big exception for one particular social network – Twitter. As far back as 2015, Google struck a deal to access Twitter‘s firehose, allowing them to index tweets in real-time.

Here‘s how you can use this to your advantage:

  1. Publish your blog post and grab the URL
  2. Craft a compelling tweet that includes the URL and 1-2 relevant trending hashtags
  3. Tweet it out to your followers (and email/message anyone who might want to retweet it)

That‘s it! By using a trending hashtag, you significantly increase the likelihood of your tweet getting found and indexed quickly. I‘ve personally had new posts start ranking on Google within 10-15 minutes using this method.

According to Google‘s Gary Illyes, tweeting or retweeting a post is equivalent to submitting a sitemap for faster crawling. Instead of waiting around for Google to eventually find your content, you can take matters into your own hands with a single tweet.

Unlock Indirect SEO Boosts from Likes and Shares

Getting your content indexed quickly is great, but are social shares actually a Google ranking factor? The short answer is no – at least not directly.

But before you write off social media as an SEO dead-end, consider this. A study by Hootsuite found that there‘s a strong positive correlation between social engagements (likes, shares, comments) and rankings.

Hootsuite social media SEO experiment

The key here is that more social shares leads to greater overall visibility and reach for your brand. Even if those shares aren‘t directly boosting rankings, they can spark a chain reaction of events that deliver huge SEO value.

For example, let‘s say an influencer in your niche with a large following shares your post. Chances are at least some of their followers will check out your content and potentially link to it from their own websites. Those high-quality links are like gold for improving your search rankings.

As SEO expert Britney Muller puts it, "Social media helps SEO in an indirect way. It‘s a way to get eyeballs on your content, earn links, and build your brand."

There‘s also the concept of co-citation and co-occurrence. When your brand is frequently mentioned alongside certain keywords, even without a link, Google starts to form semantic associations that can help you rank.

Think of it this way – the more your content is shared and discussed online, the more high-quality "votes" you‘re likely to accumulate for your website. Even if 9 out of 10 shares send you absolutely no traffic, that 10th one could be a huge difference-maker for your SEO.

The Untapped Revenue Potential of a Single Click

For certain industries and business models, even one or two clicks from social media can translate into significant revenue. In fact, a single customer from a "pointless" share could potentially generate more lifetime value than 1,000 visitors to your blog.

For example, I‘ve had a $40,000 client find me through a guest post I wrote for another website. That post was shared a handful of times and netted me around 50 total visits. Useless, right?

Wrong! My $40,000 client clicked on a link to my website and liked what they saw. They reached out, signed up for my email list, and eventually became one of my highest-paying customers.

Here‘s the breakdown:

  • Guest post published with a link to my site
  • 12 social media shares (estimate based on BuzzSumo data)
  • ~50 visits to my website (based on Google Analytics)
  • 1 email subscriber
  • $1,500 initial project
  • $40,000+ in total revenue over 3 years

That means even if the other 49 visitors took no action whatsoever, that single email conversion was worth $40,000 to my business. Not a bad ROI for a "measly" dozen shares.

This is obviously an extreme case, but it illustrates an important point – not all clicks are created equal. Especially for freelancers, agencies, and other client-based businesses, a low-traffic social share could realistically turn into your biggest account.

I attribute a large chunk of my early freelance success to writing guest posts and being active on social media. Often my content would get shared and retweeted very little, maybe 10-20 times per post. But the brand exposure and referral traffic I earned led directly to booking enough clients to build a six-figure writing business in a matter of months.

Now I‘m not saying you should completely ignore traffic and chase after low-volume social shares. My point is simply that when evaluating the performance of your content and social activity, it‘s critical to look beyond surface-level metrics.

Break down the potential value of a new lead or customer compared to your average visitor. For many businesses, a single conversion can easily pay for your content and social media marketing costs several times over.

Strategic Takeaways to Maximize Social Shares

Hopefully this deep dive has convinced you of the immense potential upside of social shares, even when they seem worthless on a superficial level. But you might be wondering, "How can I get more people to share my content without annoying my followers or spending all day on social media?"

Here are some proven tips for getting more mileage out of every post:

  • Schedule at least 5-10 social posts per blog post, spread out over time
  • Experiment with different headlines, images, and post types (i.e. link vs. image vs. text)
  • Tag anyone you mention in a post and encourage them to share with their audience
  • Use Viral Content Bee or Quuu Promote to incentivize shares to relevant users
  • Make sharing as frictionless as possible with social share buttons and Click To Tweet widgets
  • Invest in paid social media promotion to amplify your best-performing content

Remember, success on social media isn‘t about gaming the system or hunting for vanity metrics. It‘s about consistently delivering valuable content that informs, entertains, and inspires your target audience.

Instead of obsessing over how many likes and retweets you‘re getting, zoom out and focus on the big picture. How are your social media efforts impacting your overall web presence, search rankings, and bottom line? Which shares are driving real business outcomes over time?

One surefire way to get more meaningful shares is to make your website a conversion machine. Encourage your social media traffic to sign up for your email list so you can build a true asset that gets traffic on demand. Every subscriber is a potential brand advocate ready to help amplify your reach.

The Compounding Power of Social Media Sharing

We‘ve covered a lot of ground in this guide, from the SEO benefits of social shares to their surprising revenue potential. Now I want to leave you with one final insight that pulls it all together.

Social shares are rarely an overnight miracle for your business. Sure, every now and then you might strike viral gold, but real progress typically comes from consistent effort over time.

Even a handful of shares each day, compounded over weeks and months, can snowball into a formidable web presence. According to Ahrefs, the average #1 ranking page also ranks for about 1,000 other relevant keywords. That‘s a lot of potential traffic!

Ahrefs average keyword rankings

In the short term, most of your social shares will seem insignificant or even pointless. But zoom out and you‘ll start to see an intricate spider web of links, mentions, and relationships branching out from every piece of content you share.

As SEO expert Rand Fishkin puts it, "Over time, social media builds up a network effect. More people see your posts, more people share them, and you earn more amplification with each share."

So don‘t get discouraged if you‘re not seeing an immediate surge of traffic from every tweet or Facebook post. Instead, focus on creating and sharing genuinely useful content that solves problems for your target customers.

That‘s how you build an authentic, engaged following that will stick with you for the long haul. It‘s how you earn the types of links and brand signals that Google loves to see. And it‘s how you maximize your chances of connecting with that one perfect customer or partner who could change your business forever.

Keep showing up, keep putting your best work out there, and keep engaging with your audience. The shares and traffic will inevitably follow.

And remember – even the most "pointless" social share is an opportunity to reach the right person at the right time with a message that resonates. When you play the infinite game of content marketing, every touch point matters.