Google Plus for Business: 3 Reasons to Get Excited

Google took a big step toward becoming a social branding channel by launching Google Plus Pages for Business this week. Will they succeed in attracting brands to set up their own identities and getting consumers to engage? Here are 3 reasons why it would be tough to bet against them.

REACH
Google.com attracts over 1 billion unique visitors per month. It's the web's most visited website. If we think of Google Plus as the social child of this immensely popular parent then we see a platform set up for success if the relationship is strong. And thanks to Direct Connect, it works well.

Type "+Pepsi" in the Google search field and you'll see their logo, name and description in the dropdown. You can't miss it; the row is twice as tall as the autocomplete results underneath and the logo adds the only color in the field. This open door to Pepsi's Google Plus brand page is the layup and the prompt that follows -- "Add this page to your circles?" -- is the slam dunk. It's a heavy enough push to a brand's Google Plus page that some are even raising the anti-trust flag.

TARGETING
The web's early promise to advertisers of hyper-targeting based on demographics and location never really came true to the extent we thought it would. Targeting paid ads in Facebook is easy but when it comes to Page content, most brands are blasting the same status update to their entire audience -- or at best, countries and languages.

Google Plus makes it pretty easy to sort followers into groups (they call them Circles) and send targeted, relevant messages to these smaller audiences. Brands can create robust content calendars with posts intended just for certain cities, ages, gender and languages. Imagine Pizza Hut sending a family dine-in update to 35-year-old mothers in Toronto and a take-out offer just to 22-year-old guys in Thunder Bay. To brands, that's gold.

DESIGN
Remember how shockingly simple Google looked in the early days 10 years ago compared to other sites? Their logo and clean white background stood in stark contrast to other search engines with 600 words cluttering the page. Google Plus looks to maintain that clean design and simplicity by showing just 4 tabs and 1 or 2 posts. The comment threads are compressed to a few lines and users can only respond, not post, so there's no spam or angry uploads cluttering the wall. It's easy-to-use and intuitive. They have a few bugs to iron out but overall this has been a solid launch.

Unprecedented reach, breakthrough targeting, and simple design. Add in the engagement potential of Google Hangouts, the social power of the Plus-1 button, and the possibility of a robust Google Plus Analytics package and you have the makings of a massive, effective, and unavoidable brand channel.

 

Follow Andrew Cherwenka on Twitter: www.twitter.com/cherwenka

Comments

[Muntakim Sumon]

10:41 PM on 11/26/2011

with the notification that I (or rather, Google) should now be using quotation marks instead.pluserize.com

[Mukty]

09:11 PM on 11/22/2011

yes g+ is much more effective on security......also easy for a beginner ................

[David Vynerib]

02:46 PM on 11/17/2011

As an entrepreneur Google is just simply amazing - From Gmail (creating filters), to Google Documents (multiple people being able to work on a document simultaneously) , Youtube to Picassa - their suite of services is just unbelievable. The Former CTO, Douglas Merrill, wrote a book: Getting Organized in the Google Era - It's a must read.

[Golden Gate]

12:37 PM on 11/15/2011

Google plus for businesses will produce a new offspring of social media opportunities. As creative people join forces to eek out ways of churning value to their circles (no pun intended), my prediction is that Twitter will lose market share and maybe even be a candidate to use synergetically with G+. Unlike Facebook, you can add "business friends" and build relevant networks to spread worthy information at the disposal of those who may be seeking your information.

We hope to see our own paradigms continue to change as Google + proves itself beyond what we would have imagined. Join our business page https://plus.google.com/118352059380667627669 and best wishes with your Google+ pight.

[t desmet]

03:13 AM on 11/11/2011

If you start your google+ brand page, you might want to make it look nice with the images on top of the page! If so, you can use this photoshop template to do so. It makes it really easy :)

Google+ brand page template: http://blog.kooaba.com/2011/11/photoshop-template-for-google-to-create-a-good-looking-brand-page/

[Mahesh Makvana]

05:32 AM on 11/09/2011

Yup, Google+ has all the features that a business person would look for. And after the launch of Google+ Pages, it has become more useful than before.

Some of the Google Plus tips are given here: http://www.geeklisten.com/tag/google-plus

[GreenReaper]

01:55 AM on 11/09/2011

That's great . . . but until it can import from our existing RSS feeds, it's not much use. We're not going to go out and create whole new content just for Google - it's merely another avenue of distribution and interaction to reach those who prefer it.

[Badhon Hossain]

11:12 AM on 11/09/2011

Today in every website google plus votes is used.It is increasing their popularity day by day.If you want anything about google+ here I am showing a way to find google+ related blogs,article,forums etc.

The best google+ search engine to search on google plus is www.pluserize.com