Matt Cutts is back with another very refreshing and informative session. Ever find yourself wondering if social signals from Facebook and Twitter are tracked by the Google algorithm?  At one time Google did track the signals, and  they used Twitter and Facebook links in rankings.

In this video, back in December 2010, Matt Cutts ,states that Google does use Twitter and Facebook links as as ranking signal, and therefore count as a factor in Google’s algorithm.

Yet as of January 2014, there has been a huge change:

Matt specifically states now, that Facebook and Twitter pages are treated just like any other  website pages in their index. If their page can be crawled, it will be returned in Google’s search results.

In regards to specific queries, like how many followers there are, there are no signals like that in Google’s web search ranking algorithms. 

The main problem is because Google crawls the web at limited times, while social networks are constantly being updated, the results could be one way when searching but change again a second later. The focus is not on if you see that something on Facebook is popular that means that the social network is being crawled, but that you have really good content, and

Matt still emphasizes the advantages of social networks and how they are an added value. The emphasis is on how they are a great way to bring visitors and traffic to your site and also an excellent way to spread news, BUT without the assumption that Google can access social signals.

Will this change affect your rankings?

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