Google+ and FriendsDavid Somerville, Fresh Egg

• Where is Google+ right now?• Why use Google+?• Profile Page checklist• Google+ and SEO• Google Authorship – Rel=Author and Rel=Publisher• Enhanced Listings• Direct Connect• Vanity URLs• Google Ripples• Google+ Tools

Today’s presentation

Where is Google+ right now?Google+ and Friends

Where Google+ actually is

Source: Trendstream, 2013

Where is Google+ right now?

• December 2012 Google reported that there are now 343 million registered profiles on Google+

• Gender split – 64.3% men, 27.86% women, 7.8% other/unknown

• Country distribution (% of population using it) – US 29%, India 20%, Brazil 8%, UK 3%, Indonesia 2%

• In Europe, Germany has the most pages, followed by the UK then Spain, Italy and France

• Most popular occupations of users in the UK: Student, Software Engineer, Engineer, Software Developer and Web Developer

Where is Google+ right now?

• Most popular profile – Britney Spears with 6,001,083 followers

• Most popular page – Coldplay with 4,193,554 followers• Cadbury UK has 2,843,799 making it eighth biggest

brand page in the world• Biggest Community page is ‘Space’ with 111,406

followers

Why use Google+?Google+ and Friends

• It allows you to find key, influential people across a broad area of industries and subjects

• It works well as a search engine – use it find out ideas for content, hot topics etc

• You can promote your content to specific groups (Circles)• You can join in with discussions, ask questions, interact

(Communities)• You can see how far your content has spread (Ripples)• Great for SEO• It’s owned by Google (who, like it or not, rule the search

universe)!

Why use Google+?

Personal Profile ChecklistGoogle+ and Friends

Profile page checklist

Here’s a checklist of what to do when setting up a profile:•Add a clear profile picture•Add a clear (and relevant) cover photo•Enter website URL (if you have a blog etc)•About section – Introduction (include links!), contact info, website (verify this by linking back from site), Links•Find a few relevant people (profiles) and add them to circles•Add photos and videos to these sections•Start to post regularly – ensure posts are not just links but use optimised copy

Google+ and SEOGoogle+ and Friends

Google says: “+1's from friends and contacts can be a useful signal to Google when determining the relevance of your page to a user’s query.

“This is just one of many signals Google may use to determine a page’s relevance and ranking, and we’re constantly tweaking and improving our algorithm to improve overall search quality.”

Some possible SEO benefits?

• Lots of indexable content – bio, full text of public posts, photos, all +1’d content…make sure they are optimised

• Fast indexation of content – posting a link to content has reported super-fast indexing of these pages

• Followed Link opportunities – these exist within your personal or brand profile pages, plus in posts

• Google Authorship

Some possible SEO benefits?

Google Authorship – Rel=Author and Rel=PublisherGoogle+ and Friends

“Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification, which will result in most users naturally clicking on the top (verified) results. The true cost of remaining anonymous, then, might be irrelevance”

Eric Schmidt, CEO Google, 2013

The sign of Author Rank being imminent?

Google Authorship

Rel=Author

• Part of Google’s Authorship program• Used to link PEOPLE to Google+ PERSONAL profiles• Provides rich snippet within the SERPs (not guaranteed), with

author photo, name and link to G+ profile

Rel=Author

• Benefits – results stand out more, therefore higher CTR; improved authority for writers

• Can be implemented manually or via a plugin (if using Wordpress etc) – added to every content page

• Make sure you link your Google+ profile to the sites you write for

• Used to link BRANDS to Google+ BUSINESS profiles• Several brands are implementing on site, but there are no

definitive sightings yet of brand logos appearing in SERPs• Some people suggest ‘Enhanced Listings’ are a result , however

some brands do not have it implemented yet this appears – is likely to be one contributing factor

• Implementation can be done manually or with a plugin – added to just the homepage

• Important to ‘close the circle’ by linking the brand Google+ page to the website and having this verified

Rel=Publisher

Benefits include: •Recognise your Google+ page as the "official" page for the brand, and give it search preference over any impostor pages.•Provide eligibility for Google Direct Connect•Provide increased +1s, as now all +1s done on the site, on the G+ page, in search results, and on AdWords ads, will be aggregated.•Begin to build a topical relevance and trust profile on your site as a brand, its web content, its Google+ activities, and other social media activity linked from its profile, which may influence search results.

Rel=Publisher

Enhanced ListingsGoogle+ and Friends

Enhanced Listings

Enhanced listing boxes appear for those brands that:* Have an active Google+ page * Are featured in high quality authority sites (such as Wikipedia and IMDB) * Post on a regular basis

• Appears at the top of the page on the right of organic listings

• Includes the brand logo, plus links to the Google+ page and a varying number of latest posts

• Can force down PPC ads in some cases

• Some believe that this can be forced to appear using ‘Rel=Publisher’, however for some brands without this implemented, this can still appear

Enhanced Listings

Direct ConnectGoogle+ and Friends

Direct Connect

• This allows users to search for brands on Google search, by using the ‘+’ operator

• Does not work for all brand pages – Google claim it’s determined “algorithmically, based on certain signals we use to help understand your page's relevancy and popularity”

• Implementing rel=publisher can help • Also requires Google+ page and website to be linked

Vanity URLsGoogle+ and Friends

Vanity URLS

• These replace the nasty current profile and page urls with a more attractive url, such as https://plus.google.com/+JUSTEAT

• They have only been rolled-out to certain brands – qualification is likely to be based on how active the page is or how often they post (or how much they spend with Google!)

• Even when you claim one there is no speed from Google to verify them

Google+ RipplesGoogle+ and Friends

Google Ripples

• Ripples show the flow and pattern of a trending topic within Google+ to give you statistics and the people who shared something

• A useful feature that lets you connect with highly influential people as well as get ideas for writing pieces that MIGHT go ‘viral’

• Also allows you to trace your posts – enter a URL to see who has publicly shared it and what comments they have made

Google+ ToolsGoogle+ and Friends

• Rich Snippets Testing Tool – allows testing for Rel=Author and Rel=Publisher implementations

• CircleCount.com – host of statistics for Google+ as well as tracking of your profile and pages. Handy ‘A vs B’ comparisons

• Socialstatistics.com – stats, plus Chrome extension to view graph of a profile/page growth on Google+

• Google+ Business – tips and resources http://www.google.com/+/business/

Google+ Tools

Thank you Questions?Twitter: @FreshEgg @southcoastdavid