Social plugins: expand your outreach on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, et al.

Social signals are every­where online. Whatever website you’re on, chances are you’re not far away from a like, share, comment, tweet, retweet, pin or a +1 button. If you’re not sure what the sig­nif­i­cance of this is, chances are your follower base is still rel­a­tive­ly low — but it doesn’t have to stay this way. In this article, we will explain how to embed social media plugins into your website in order to expand the outreach of your content on social networks.

Social plugins are optional software modules that can be used to connect your website with your social media platforms. All of the biggest social net­work­ing sites and apps, such as Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+, and Facebook provide special plugins in the form of code snippets that enable internet users to share and react to online content across different platforms. If you embed these plugins in your website’s source code, you’ll benefit from the immense outreach of these networks. Most social plugins contain widgets. These are graphic elements that are in­te­grat­ed into an area of your website in order to provide users access to certain functions. The best-known widget of this kind is Facebook’s ‘Like’ button. With this, your website visitors can share your content with their friends with a single click. This provides the basis of viral marketing. Facebook alone boasts over 1.8 billion active users every month. More than 85% of these users are outside of the United States and Canada. Against this backdrop, it’s hardly any surprise that social plugins have become far more visible on the World Wide Web in recent years. The use of social signals such as likes, shares, and comments act as a kind of word of mouth promotion. The goal of  social media marketing is to direct this publicity as part of an ongoing marketing strategy. Social plugins help you create positive in­ter­ac­tions and strength­en your online presence in Web 2.0. The available options vary according to the target platform.

Social networks now offer an extensive portfolio of plugins that allow website owners to create content that is suitable for cross-platform pub­li­ca­tion. In order to reach out to a target group that is competent and active on social media, content must be easy to share, comment on or to subscribe to. In addition, many platforms offer the pos­si­bil­i­ty to embed content from social networks into their own website. We have brought together the best solutions from the best-known providers: Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest and LinkedIn.

The in­ter­na­tion­al social net­work­ing platform, Facebook, is an in­sti­tu­tion in the world of social media. In the face of ever-growing com­pe­ti­tion, the website remains the undis­put­ed favorite for the vast majority of social media users. With the following social plugins, you can also allow visitors to interact with content on your website through Facebook.

To link your website with Facebook using social plugins, it’s necessary to take the following three steps.

1. Define the URL of the web page: first, choose the URL of the website that requires the plugin.

2. Generate an embed code: enter the desired URL into the Facebook code con­fig­u­ra­tor and adjust the widget settings to suit your aims.

3. Copy plugin code into the source text: Facebook now offers two options for embedding elements into your website.
1. JavaScript SDK: if you want to embed a social plugin using the JavaScript Software De­vel­op­ment Kit (SDK) from Facebook, two pieces of code are required. The first downloads JavaScript SDK and is inserted into the body tag of the page that is to be linked with Facebook. The second im­ple­ments the social plugin and is inserted wherever the widget should appear on the website.
2. Iframe: you can al­ter­na­tive­ly embed the social plugins using Facebook’s iframes.

Facebook also provides a cross-platform login function for app de­vel­op­ers. This enables users to sign into a pre­vi­ous­ly existing Facebook Account via various webpages. A cor­re­spond­ing software de­vel­op­ment kit (SDK) can be used for this purpose and is available for iOS apps, Android apps, web apps and mobile web apps, Windows Phone, Desktop apps, and smart devices (including smart TVs and the Internet of Things). A manual check through Facebook is required for apps that use any data beyond the user’s profile, e-mail address, and friend list. Facebook also offers a login review, which ensures that the app meets the platform guide­lines as part of a practice test.

As before, if you want to transfer Facebook content to your own website, the im­ple­men­ta­tion involves only three simple steps:

1. Determine the URL of the Facebook content: select your chosen Facebook content. Whether it is a post or comment, a picture, a video, or an entire Facebook page, it should be publicly ac­ces­si­ble.

2. Generate embed code: enter the URL for the chosen content into the code con­fig­u­ra­tor available in the Facebook for De­vel­op­ers site. Click ‘Generate code’.

3. Enter plugin code into the source code: integrate the JavaScript SDK and the plugin code or iframe into the source code of the target web page. Here it’s important to note that the code for the JavaScript SDK is only im­ple­ment­ed once for each web page, re­gard­less of how many Facebook plugins you wish to embed.

It’s not always necessary to use the code con­fig­u­ra­tor; an embed code is already included in the drop-down menu in the upper corner of much Facebook content. In this case, Facebook only displays an iframe. For further in­for­ma­tion on how to integrate Facebook buttons, check out this helpful guide.

The mi­croblog­ging service, Twitter is a platform that enables people to share their opinions and ex­pe­ri­ences in short tweets. These short messages are similar to Facebook status updates, but they are limited to 140 char­ac­ters. Twitter is a major player in the world of social media, with around 313 million active users per month writing or retweet­ing. With its enormous outreach, Twitter is the ideal platform for content writers to share their work beyond the bound­aries of their own website. Like Facebook, the mi­croblog­ging service also offers a variety of social media plugins that allow website visitors to tweet content.

The embed code for these in­ter­ac­tive social media buttons is available from publish.twitter.com. The process of in­te­grat­ing this button is very similar to the Facebook function.

1. Select your chosen Twitter button: select the desired button from the selection of Twitter plugins on offer.
2. Configure button: configure the button as required via publish.twitter.com and generate the plugin code.
3. Enter the embed code into the website source code: insert the code in the place where you want to have it appear on the website.

Twitter content can also be in­te­grat­ed into your website quickly and easily via the social plugin, either as in­di­vid­ual tweets or in the form of a Twitter timeline.

The mi­croblog­ging service also provides website owners and app de­vel­op­ers with a cross-platform login feature. Using ‘Sign in with Twitter,' any website visitor can obtain a reg­is­tered user account without the un­nec­es­sary hassle of reg­is­ter­ing sep­a­rate­ly with each app. All data required for the au­then­ti­ca­tion of a new account (i.e., name, e-mail address, etc.) are managed centrally via the user’s Twitter account. ‘Sign in with Twitter’ can be used as a login al­ter­na­tive for websites and iOS apps as well as for mobile and desktop ap­pli­ca­tions.

Embedded tweets and the Timeline widget can also be con­fig­ured in­di­vid­u­al­ly via publish.twitter.com:

1. Define the URL of the Twitter content: first, enter the URL of the Twitter content you wish to embed into your website.
2. Choose a social plugin: select the desired social plugin at publish.twitter.com, copy the URL into the input mask and click on Preview.
3. Transfer embed code to the website: copy and paste the embed code generated by Twitter into the source code of your website.

Google+ is a social media platform created by the search engine, Google. Unlike Facebook and Twitter, Google+ contacts are divided into so-called circles. When posting anything to the social network, users first select which circle they want to share their content with. It is also possible to add non-reg­is­tered users to Google+ circles. In this case, Google+ sends an email notifying the user of the post.

Like other platforms, Google+ also offers a wide variety of plugins that allow website owners to share content on social media in a variety of ways. As with Twitter and Facebook, these in­ter­faces also allow you to integrate text, images, and video content from Google+ into your own website.

Google+ offers the following social media plugins, among others:

If an internet user shares a link to your website on social media, Google+ au­to­mat­i­cal­ly adds a preview, known as a snippet. It comprises of a page title, a short de­scrip­tion, and a thumbnail. This data is extracted from the page content of the shared URL. The following tech­nolo­gies can provide this in­for­ma­tion:

• Microdata markup through Schema.org
• Open Graph protocol
• Title and meta-de­scrip­tion

Google uses these with de­scend­ing priority. If the in­for­ma­tion cannot be read in the preferred format, Google attempts to generate the title, de­scrip­tion, and thumbnail from the website content.

As with Facebook, Google+ requires a JavaScript SDK in order to integrate in­ter­ac­tive social media plugins into a website. The embed code should be placed before the closing body tag of each webpage that is to be linked to Google+. You can then add as many plugins as you like on the re­spec­tive pages. The required codes are available for con­fig­ur­ing in­di­vid­u­al­ly at de­vel­op­ers.google.com/web.

Pinterest is a social network that enables users to collect images with captions and arrange them the­mat­i­cal­ly into virtual pinboards. The popular image-sharing platform now offers five different social plugins that allow website owners to expand the potential outreach of their online content. Al­ter­na­tive­ly, content uploaded to Pinterest by other users can be in­te­grat­ed into your website as pins.

Before you integrate social plugins into your online projects, you need to implement a JavaScript library for Pinterest in each of the relevant webpages. A cor­re­spond­ing code snippet is then provided by the Pinterest widget builder. This is where you also create the embed codes for in­di­vid­u­al­ly con­fig­ured buttons and pins, as well as board and profile widgets.

With 467 million users worldwide, LinkedIn is the biggest social network that centers on building pro­fes­sion­al re­la­tion­ships. Rather than gaining friends, the purpose of the platform is to help users find contacts and con­nec­tions in their area of work. Another aspect that makes LinkedIn unusual among social net­work­ing sites is the option to describe and present your own company. For en­tre­pre­neurs, the network opens up an important com­mu­ni­ca­tion channel through which in­ter­est­ed parties can be scouted by both potential col­lab­o­ra­tors and employers. They can also find relevant brands, products, services, and career op­por­tu­ni­ties. LinkedIn also provides the following range of sharing functions:

LinkedIn also offers a code con­fig­u­ra­tor for each of its social media plugins. Unlike Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Pinterest, however, un­reg­is­tered users only have access to the embed code for the share button; all other social plugins require users to have a LinkedIn profile. The in­te­gra­tion of this widget is analogous to the other platforms using a JavaScript SKD and an ap­pro­pri­ate plugin code.

Xing is also a business network and a com­peti­tor of LinkedIn. Members of the online service use it for work-related exchanges in order to train them­selves pro­fes­sion­al­ly or to open up new career op­por­tu­ni­ties. Unlike the in­ter­na­tion­al­ly oriented LinkedIn, however, the platform is primarily geared towards German-speaking countries. Even if the mul­ti­lin­gual user interface covers all relevant markets, over 90% of all Xing traffic comes from the D-A-CH region (Germany, Austria, and Switzer­land). Nev­er­the­less, Xing’s user base of ap­prox­i­mate­ly 15 million  can prove quite useful for website operators. Par­tic­u­lar­ly if these German-speaking countries are relevant to your target group, it can be worth­while possible to link your Xing profile to your website.

Xing offers three social plugins that enable users to interact via the social network.

Xing also has a social plugin that enables your website’s visitors to log into your website or app using their existing Xing profile. With this plugin, users avoid a long-winded reg­is­tra­tion process — often the biggest obstacle in the reg­is­tra­tion process. To integrate a social plugin from Xing, you simply need to generate the required JavaScript code using the code con­fig­u­ra­tor at dev.xing.com/plugins/ and embed it into your online project. The code line should be pasted in the source text in the exact position that the button should appear on the webpage. In addition, Xing provides a social plugin for Microsoft Outlook 365 that allows users to import their current Xing contact data into the popular e-mail program au­to­mat­i­cal­ly.

Now that you’re familiar with the most important social media plugins and the various pos­si­bil­i­ties for in­ter­ac­tion these provide, all that remains is to ask yourself the following question: would these functions have a positive effect on the per­for­mance of my website?

One thing is for certain: the search engine market leader, Google, does not take social signals like likes, shares, tweets, or pins into account as part of the ranking algorithm. Matt Cutts, the former head of the Google Web Spam team, explains the reasons behind this decision in a 2014 YouTube video.

In the short video clip, Cutts explains that Google doesn’t consider the potential number of followers website owners have gained/could gain for their content as a relevant criterion for the Google rankings. Similarly, likes and shares are not taken into account for the po­si­tion­ing of search results.

The reason for this is simple: Google considers posts on Facebook, Twitter, etc., to be in­di­vid­ual webpages, which, in principle, can be indexed. However, social net­work­ing sites generate much more new content every day than tra­di­tion­al websites, and not all of these webpages are relevant. Google ul­ti­mate­ly works with limited resources, albeit at a tremen­dous­ly high level. It can be assumed that the search engine market leader does not attempt to crawl and index social media.

The web­mas­ters at Google have also con­sid­ered the fact that social media content and con­nec­tions are often volatile. Users are free to delete posts, change their re­la­tion­ship status, end friend­ships, unlike a page and un­sub­scribe from their contacts at any time. Each indexing would therefore only be rep­re­sen­ta­tive of a moment, carrying little overall weight. Google also does not nec­es­sar­i­ly have access to all content on Facebook, Twitter, or other platforms.

But that’s not to say that social plugins do not have an effect on the success of your website. In fact, there is an extremely strong cor­re­la­tion between social signals and the Google ranking position of that website, according to a 2016 Search­metrics study. This study proves the cor­re­la­tion is even higher than with any other factor that has an influence on the ranking. But cor­re­la­tion doesn’t au­to­mat­i­cal­ly lead to a causal con­nec­tion.

One ex­pla­na­tion for the fact that high-ranking websites often also produce a lot of social signals is as follows: the highest positions in the search engine results pages (SERPs) are usually occupied by well-known brands. These brands tend to have their own social media de­part­ment, whose primary aim is to maintain a dominant position in social media.

It would be a mistake to interpret a social plugin as a kind of SEO plugin. Instead of focusing on your ranking in the search engine, you should take into account the following effects that creating con­nec­tions to social media can bring:

• Social plugins can expand the outreach of your content and help to generate a larger reader base.

• Gen­er­at­ing new traffic through shares and likes on social media platforms directly increases traffic to your website at the same time.

• Having a strong presence in the most popular social net­work­ing sites increases awareness of your company, your brands, goods, and services.

• Every social media plugin acts as a point of contact with potential customers who are part of the touch­point man­age­ment and can be used to ensure a positive brand ex­pe­ri­ence.

You should, therefore, perhaps consider social plugins not, in terms of search engine op­ti­miza­tion but rather the potential effect on the brand name, rep­u­ta­tion, customer service, customer re­la­tion­ships, and re­li­a­bil­i­ty.