No Google+ business page yet? Maybe time to think about it!
Social media is sometimes over-hyped and too much influence given to it, by what appears to be an increasing number of experts and gurus, some of whom just jump on any passing new bandwagon, and start to lay down untested and unverified rules of engagement!
However, Social Media is not going to go away and indeed is a valuable asset to any business wishing to maximise their online presence and improve the returns on their inbound & internet marketing activities.
Social Media not the end game!
Social networking is just one part of the puzzle making up a far more complex inbound marketing jigsaw and by itself will not show substantial benefits and not an end in itself.
Your website is still the hub of your online marketing activities; all the recent, new and even future platforms and applications that become available are all additional pieces to fit into your marketing jigsaw.
Not all will fit and finding just the right piece to complete the picture will be an ongoing process and indeed a never ending one as this particular jigwaw has no real outer boundaries and will itself continue to expand.
Some pieces may be more important than others
Part of the jigsaw is search engine optimization (seo) and together with blogs, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, email and a good many others depending on your business model and demographic all work together to attract interested customers and clients into your website sales or lead generation funnel.
None individually are the panacea that some often tout they are but some can have a larger impact than others.
Google+ may just be one that could impact more than others and particularly in relation to SEO, a still important aspect of internet marketing. In the last week, Google announced a major update to how they deliver search results.
The update is called Search Plus Your World
Still in its infancy, Google+ with an estimated 100m users to date, continues to grow and has been getting increasing coverage and comment in a number of quarters.
The update makes search results much more personalized displaying private content you’ve previously shared with your network through Google+. When signed in with Google+, you’ll find personal results and profiles of people you know or follow.
Google informs us that search will get better by including photos, posts and more from you and your friends and offer the possibility to even expand your world by discovering people related to your search.
Growing importance of Google+
Search Results including
Whether we like it or not, with Google’s dominance in search and neither Facebook nor Twitter content being displayed in Google’s search results other than the specific home page, Google+ content items are the only social network being prominently displayed in Search Plus Your World results.
Google’s argument is that Twitter failed to renew the agreement that was in force to display twitter generated content, in addition to Facebook refusing to share its user content in search results.
Got your Google+ Business Page yet?
It’s becoming increasingly clear that unless the landscape changes dramatically marketers, who have until now been unwilling to allocate resources, will have to reconsider their position, bite the bullet and take another look at Google+ and how that will affect their social media marketing plans.
