Does Social Media hold value with SEO? If so then how?

[rpaiva]

Hey So I've been doing some research and it looks like theres a "human authority" and a "Page authority". I dont know if it is still relevant or if it has all changed because of Panda.  Does social media still hold any SEO value? Do social media platforms like Pinterest and Youtube and twitter drive any valuable Anchor texts to your domain boostin your domain's authority or the page that it is linking to's authority?

[rpaiva]

Wow! Jennita that was a spectacular Link to a very through share slide THANKS!

[rpaiva]

Do you think it would be fair to say that Twitter and Facebook do not hold any value with Ranking in SERPs with google but they would influence the PA & DA?

[jennita]

Totally agree with Ken. I actually did a presentation recently about Social's influence on search, it might be a good one to check out: http://www.slideshare.net/jennifersablelopez/social-medias-influence-on-search-going-beyond-rankings.

Thanks!

[Kenn_Gold]

A couple answers are applicable here, because the bucket "social" might be a little broad to answer this.

For G+:  Engagement (shares, +1s, etc) does affect rankings for those people who have your G+ page and search relevant content to what you are posting on your G+ page, if they are logged in and getting personalized results. Additionally, if you are logged in and getting personalized results, your network (pages you have in a circle) on G+ who have liked, shared, engaged with content also seems to rank higher on your SERP.

Additionally, there is a strong correlation between high engagement on FB and Twitter posts (comments, likes, shares RTs) and ranking....but there is no definitive causal link that I am aware of. If you create good content that does well in social media, it is probably being linked in other places, and therefore will rank well.