Tag: Google

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What About Google+?

If you are involved in marketing your products and services do you need to keep a Google+ page updated along with Facebook and Twitter? If you have the time, you should consider setting up and maintaining at least a minimal profile and business page at Google+. Am I recommending that you spend the same amount of time and money on Google+ as you invest in exposure on Facebook and Twitter – no I am not. At least not at this time.

I am watching Google+ carefully, but have not rolled out a service offering on the program yet. Although I think that Google+ and Google+ Pages may be good for businesses, for now there is not enough mainstream consumer or business to business activity there yet to warrant a strong financial investment in maintaining your presence. I am mostly seeing professionals such as myself in the Google+ world. There is simply not a strong vibrant consumer or business selling presence on Google+ yet…

What I do see is that Google is integrating Google+ into nearly all of their properties as they continue to roll out enhancements and improvements to the application. The next hurdle will be the authorization of third party API apps that will allow scheduling of status updates. HootSuite is just one of the companies that Google has selected for testing. With the ability to schedule updates and manage multiple accounts Google+ will grow quickly.

I recommend that for many businesses starting now on Google+ to build a presence for the future is a very smart move. I have several clients who started using Twitter right when it came out and now have follower bases of over 2,500. These high follower bases have given these accounts an unusual amount of clout in their industry. Their updates are routinely retweeted reaching an astronomical number of readers. I expect in the long run Google+ will follow this same growth trend.

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Now You Can Create a Badge for Your Google+ Business Page

Just this past week Google rolled out a badge maker for your Google+ Business page. You can find the creator here: https://developers.google.com/+/plugins/badge/config With the free creator you can make a badge for your Business Google+ page just make sure to insert the correct ID that you can find in your page’s URL.

For example, here is my Google+ Business page address: https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/111658254454469926987/#

See this number 111658254454469926987 right in the middle of the URL, that’s the number you grab and put in the badge creator tool in the spot it asks for it. Then you can select your size icon like the one at the top right of our post that is red. You would then insert your code into your website in two places or send the code to your webmaster to install for you.

Now you can let the world know where to connect with you on Google+. For me, connect with my business here:

https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/111658254454469926987/#

I’ve been taking another careful look at Google+ and I feel that you should too. There is just too much money behind this site to discount it too early in the rollout. Google+ is also testing scheduled updates with one of the tools we love HootSuite. Stay tuned on that topic!

 

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Google+ Requires Another Look

I was an early embracer of the Google+ platform, and then I grew tired of it. Google simply did not move fast enough to engage me in the long run. Issues were that I could not schedule my updates, the people who I wanted to connect with were not on Google+, it seemed like just another attempt to coral my time on a social platform, and there were no tools for businesses.

I have to say that Google+ is winning me back bit by bit. First, just this past week Google+ released the ability for businesses to set up Google+ Business Pages. Then AdWords has allowed the integration of Google+ Business Pages to your AdWords account.

Wow, those are very important new and exciting features. Additionally now on many websites and blogs, you can click the Google+ button and Google allows you to post an immediate post to your Google+ page making social interaction more immediate. These are all very good things! In fact so good that I am taking a much more careful look at Google+ again and how I can use it to connect with others, improve my organic placement, and promote my business.

First, here are a few articles you may also want to review about these new changes on Google+

Connect your Google+ Page to your AdWords campaigns
This article gives a screen shot and information on how to connect your Google AdWords program to your Google+ account for your business. You use the new ad extension called “Social Extensions” and enter the URL of your Google+ Business Page.

Get closer to your customers with Google+
This article gives you the information about how you can promote your business on Google+ and a link to go to set up your own Google+ Business page. It is very simple and is tied to your own personal Google+ account.

What is important to know is that first, by connecting your Business page to your AdWords account, you will be able to benefit from all your Google+ activity and likes both from your ads and your website. You will also be able to review your statistic of engagement in one location.

Google has been very clear that this social activity (clicks on your +1 button) will be factored into their organic search algorithm. It behooves all business owners to keep a very careful eye on what Google is doing with Google+. Just like early embracers of Twitter are reaping organic benefits from Google and Bing’s new SocialRank metric, Google+ activity, although seemingly unimportant right now, may translate into big gains and improved search placement for those businesses that are working the Google system now. We’ll be one of those businesses working the “Google System” for sure! What about you?

 

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The Truth on Affiliates for AdWords and Organic Placement

I was asked this question recently:

“Writing for healthcare websites is one of my specialties. An owner of a start-up company in the field wants me to work for him part-time. The company is an affiliate site and makes money from a third party whenever somebody fills out a form at his website. Is it worth my time and effort? Will this site make money?”

That’s an interesting question. Google has long had a “hate” relationship with affiliate sites both organically and on Google AdWords. In fact Google will only show one site, either the parent site or one of the many affiliate sites on a search query for Google AdWords. The key penatly appears to be a duplicate content both in the organic and paid search arena.

The truth is that it is very hard for a website to place when it is an affiliate site both organically and in AdWords. The only way an affiliate site will rank is if the look and feel of the site is very different from the parent site AND the content is different from the parent site. Unfortunately, this is typically not the case. So, do I recommend investing time and money in affiliate websites and investing in promoting them with Google AdWords? No I don’t.

If you are thinking of investing in an affiliate online business. Be very cautious, you may spend a lot of money and find out that Google is simply filtering out your site from the results both organically and in paid searches.