This has been discussed in the forum before.
I don’t believe that social shares/likes do affect actual ranking with regard to search engines. Although some correlation between ranking and social popularity has been observed. I would put this correlation down to quality of content. Google favours quality content, and real people “like” and will engage with and share quality content. Social can also be a useful medium to spread awareness of your site too. So even if it does not affect SE rankings, it can still be worthwhile for gaining traffic.
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