It's no secret. When engineers built Google+, they constructed an SEO juggernaut to dominate search results above all other social platforms. Although Facebook and Twitter are essential to marketing efforts, both restrict Google from accessing much of their data. This limits their SEO effectiveness.
Not so with Google+.
Here’s an experiment: If you use Google+, perform a search for your name and check the domain distribution of first 100 results. The graph below shows what happens when searching my own name.
Even though I use Twitter and Facebook far more often, Google+ dominates the search results. Google+ even beats SEOmoz and my own blog. Multiply this for 100's of millions of people, and you can begin to comprehend the scope of Google's platform.
Fortunately, there are several ways to take advantage of this SEO domination for your own benefit.
1. Follow your profile links
Consider this: at SEOmoz you must earn 200 Mozpoints before earning a followed profile link (submit good comments!) On the other hand, Google+ not only allows you to link to your other profiles across the web, but you can embed followed links directly into your bio with the anchor text of your choice.
The value of a link from Google+ is, in theory, like any other. It depends on the authority of both the page and domain. My own profile shows the following metrics:
- MozRank: 1.91
- PageAuthority: 49
- PageRank: 3
If you can raise your visibility by getting more people to engage with you, share your posts, or link directly to your profile, the more valuable your profile links become.
2. Embed post links
Like profile links, Google+ also allows you to insert followed links directly into your posts – as many as you want. Simply insert the full URL and Google will automatically format it as a link.
The value of these links increases the number of times the post is shared, linked to and +1’ed.
For example, check out this one sentence post from Alexia Tsotsis, which has a PageRank of 3 and is cached by Google every couple of weeks. (Even though PageRank is not highly correlated with rankings, for Google+ it’s often the only metric available.)
If your post goes viral or is reshared by high-authority profiles, the value of those links increases.
3. Optimize your G+ title tags
The first sentence of your Google+ post becomes part of the title tag, which is highly correlated with rankings and greatly influences click-through rates. Choose your keywords carefully and consider that the first sentence will be the first thing most people see.
Check out how this simple post from Danny Sullivan ranks for its title.
A widely shared post with a good title has an excellent chance of ranking for its given keywords.
4. Unlimited editing power
Google+ is just like your own mini personal blogging platform. This means you can fully edit any of your posts at any time. Not so with Facebook or Twitter. Facebook gives you only limited editing abilities. Twitter, after you tweet, only lets you delete.
This is important if your Google+ post goes viral and you want to make updates or changes. If need be, you can also update the title tag and any attached media as well.
You may not own the platform, but Google+ gives you a broad amount of control over your own content.
5. Index new content lightning fast
If you share new content on Google+, chances are that Google will index the page very quickly.
Rumor has it that new URLs are crawled almost instantly. This makes complete sense as part of the purpose of Google+ was to replace Twitter when creating Google's Realtime Search.
In the old days, if you wanted a website indexed you filled out a webform and waited several weeks. Today, it's as simple as pressing a +1 button.
“Google+ is the new Google Submit URL box.”
- Rand Fishkin, GROW 2012 Source
Share your new content on Google+, as well as your other social networks, for quick indexation.
6. Stalk Connect with influencers
Google+ lists 17 different notification triggers that can help you connect with influencers in your industry.
Depending on the individual's account settings, these notifications can take the form of an email, phone SMS, or the omnipresent red Google notification bar.
17 actions that trigger notifications:
- Mention them in a post
- Share a post with them directly
- Share a post and you're in a circle they subscribe to
- Comment on a post they created
- Comment on a post after they comment on it
- Add them to a circle
- Suggest new people to add to their circles
- Tag them in a photo
- Tag one of their photos
- Suggest a profile photo for them
- Comment on a photo after they comment on it
- Comment on a photo they are tagged in
- Comment on a photo they tagged
- Start a conversation with them
- Send them an invitation or update an event
- Remind them about events
- Any activity on events they created
Several folks have introduced themselves to me on Google+ by "gently" using the methods above.
Be warned: the few who crossed the line into spamminess have been banned from several inboxes forever.
7. Optimize your author pic for more traffic
Last spring, I performed a series of tests with my Google+ author photo that led to an increase in the click-though rate for my websites.
If you successfully implement the author tag and have a catchy photo, it often doesn't matter if you rank 2nd, 3rd or even 4th. With an eye-catching pic you can often grab free traffic away from even your competitor's #1 ranking.
8. Test drive a G+ social media dashboard
Google Analytics has progressed greatly with social media reporting, but if you live and die by social traffic you want to bring the information front and center.
Adam Singer created an awesome social media dashboard that you can use for free. At one glance you can view all your essential metrics from Google+ traffic and all other social networks including:
- On Site Social Actions, i.e. Google +1's
- Revenue per Visit by Social Network
- Overall Traffic Stats by Social Source
Bonus: Install this dashboard for free in your Google Analytics account by clicking here.
9. Check your CircleRank
My favorite new tool is CircleCount. Try it now by pasting in your Google+ URL to chart your daily follower growth, the virality of your posts, and even see your "CircleRank" score compared against all other Google+ profiles.
CircleRanks of note:
- Rand Fishkin: 2,214
- Barack Obama: 43
- Brittany Spears: 1
The election is over. Brittany won.
10. Be an awesome (Late) early adopter
Even with it's explosive growth, only 1 in 4 people use Google+ once a month. The rest log in even less, although this number is growing fast.
None of these tips matter unless you actually use Google+. Out of the 400 folks I've circled in my Google+, only about 75 actively participate. No surprise, these tend to be the more savvy SEO and media types.
There's still time. Folks are catching on. Yes, early adopters win the day.
You can do Google+ in less than 10 minutes a day. This means creating a few simple habits to fit it into your workflow.
- Press the +1 button to spread share worthy comment
- ... add comments on the truly great stuff
- Add +1 Buttons on Your Own Content
- Engage / Comment / Reshare / Start a Hangout / Create an Event
- Circle Great People
- Make it Easy for People to Circle You...
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Top-notch resources:
- The Ultimate Guide to Google+ SEO
- Author Rank
- Google+ SEO & Authorship
- Why Every Marketer Now Needs to Employ a Google+ Strategy
- GPlus Cheat Sheet
The first 3 belong to AJ Kohn, the authority's authority when it comes to Google+.
What's your favorite Google+ tip? Please share in the comments below.
Another tip that I do not see people use on G+ is using *Post Title* to create a bold heading in the actual post.
It a great feature. I use it all the time.John.
Awesome tip. Other formatting shortcuts you can use:
Bold= *Word*
Italics= _Word_
Strikethrough= -Word-
And #-tags and +people/pages directly in the post, of course ;-)
Guys title feature is not supported anymore
The tip about adding your links to your profile was great. So freakin' obvious but sometimes you just need someone else to remind you of the best practices. Thanks.
Couldn't agree more. Sometimes the obvious stuff is so hard to see....especially when it is right under your nose.
Awesome Cyrus, +1 + tweet + Like worthy article :)
cheers
My favorite G+ tip is having a G+ profile and earning 200 Mozpoints through commenting to have a followed SEOmoz profile link so I can have two followed links, Gangnam style.
+1 for finding a way to reference that video in your comment.
Nice one Cyrus.
The author image is great for click-through rate - my word of advice.
Colours get the clicks
Author photos that have stand out background colours (green, blue or in your example red etc), stand out most of all in SERPs and get way better click through rates than SERPs without images.
Nice post and tips here. "Google+ dominates the search results." Sorry for my pessimistic mood but it looks like big G monopolizes all and everything...
p.s. I tested G+ in serps with "acid" colors and it works :D
Can you clarify what you mean by "acid" colors?
Travis Van Slooten
Dark burnt colors that appeals to eyes.
great artical! esp for a relative noob to the G+ and IM world.. great info, thank you!
And..wish i could get my serps pic working! tried everything (website logo rel=publisher rather than rel=author) but still no luck!.
Fantastic tip, thank you. I've had my profile set up for a while now, but I suspected the image was a little bit too dark. Time to get a new picture!
I agree about the care you should take when choosing a profile picture, as a bad one can deter someone from clicking through. Why lose the advantage you just worked hard for?
Wow I have stumbled on to quite the productive conversation about color in profile pictures. Valuable stuff :)
Cyrus - what's your opinion on implementing authorship on a site's home page/site-wide, specifically when the site isn't a personal blog? It's clearly a manipulation of the intended use of the product (should be used only for articles / blogs where author attribution matters), but then again, it's hard to just give up that increased CTR. Moral dilemma. Thoughts?
Hi Cyrus,
Great post! Having been on the edge of Google+ until most recent, the greatest tip I would give is to Use Circles Effectively. What Facebook does badly and Twitter does via lists but doesn't foster conversation, but Google+ does very well is that if you can group your contacts into different 'circles' you can join/create conversations appropriate for that group of contacts. It means you can minimise the chances of missing out on valuable content from experts, on a laugh a day by meme generators and on personal talk from friends - but it becomes really easy to separate the two.
This, for me, has meant I can focus my energies on where I can engage rather than getting swamped by the noise of all my circles in the way that I can do on Facebook.
So use Circles well to help focus and foster discussion. :)
Good tip Martin. I admit I'm guilty of not using Circles well. It's the one big differentiator of Google+ and probably the hardest for me to get used to.
Remember watching one of Rand's SEO video, he did mention that submitting a link on to G+ will get it indexed.
But the link needs to be shared as a status message right, instead of just pressing the +1 button.
When Googling my own name, my SEOMoz profile dominates in the SERPs over G+, FB and Twitter (and I am reasonably active with all three.). Thanks for the love Roger. As for you Matt Cutts, not so much.
Thanks for the post, Cyrus! Several more SEO tips for using Google+ if you allow:
Brilliant post Cyrus.
Circled you on G+ and +1'd this post.
I have to say I've been a big fan of Google+ since it launched. Unfortunately I'm a Google Fanboy!
You've encouraged me by saying:
"You can do Google+ in less than 10 minutes a day."
As I've been very lazy when it comes to Google+. Every time I visit I enjoy the content being shared and there's a certain community feel that doesn't exist on Facebook or Twitter, but I've been struggling to fit in into my existing social media strategies.
How often do you post on G+. The question I always ask people is what % of your posts are sharing links and what % are just text / images of your own? Do you syndicate content across your social media channels?
I produce a lot of content for my other social networks, taking on another network where I have to produce yet more original content can be a bit daunting, as I like every post I make to be individual!
Thanks again for a great post.
How often you post depends on how often you enjoy it, and how much you want to get out of it. Most days, I do spend only about 10 minutes a day on Google+.
If a post gets exciting, or starts a discussion, it's easy to spend 30 minutes to an hour engaging.
The challenge is to find originality across each platform, especially if you are also active across other social media channels. Fortunately, the folks I engage with on Google+ are much different than who I follow on Twitter. It's hard to be unique, but well worth the effort.
Hello!
I know that this post it was written many years ago, but I have a question about google plus. Some people told me that if you make a post in google plus, and you put a link (in the link section), this is a do-follow link, but if you write de link of your web in the post, this link its no-follow.
So, my question is... is that true?
Thank you for your attention
I read about this in a website, but i cant verify this information. I ask some friends about this and then I speak with you :)
I'm been reading SEOMoz for over a year now and we always turned off by having to register to comment... This post pushed me over the edge.
If you're trying to market a business online is one of the MOST important posts you've read all year long.
I had to print it out so that I can implement this stuff moving forward. Some I was aware of but not everything.
Thank you!!!
Ryan H.
Ryan -- I understand why you hate to have to register with a bunch of different websites in order to comment, but I'd far, far rather register directly with a site than be shut out because of a Facebook-connection requirement. I refuse to connect my personal, private Facebook account to anything, and it seems that more and more sites are "Facebook or nothing." The only downside to registering here seems to be that once you register, can't get back to the blog post you were reading. That's a pain!
Hi Cyrus,
Great post. It actually prompted me to go back an read AJ Kohn's post on Authorship from last March. Hey, are you A/B testing your picture again? I noticed that the one at the lead of the article is a black & white without your glasses. I think I like the color one with your glasses better. Maybe just because that's the one I'm used to seeing? Anyway, if you are split-testing it I suppose we'll know which one wins by seeing which one pops up next to your posts in Google search results. Just curious :-)
P.S. Thanks also for the Google Analytics Social Media Dashboard tip and link. Very groovy. Already implemented it on the sites I manage.
Dana
Something that goes a long way on G+ is hash tags. Even if you following isn't as big. If hashtagged and shred correctly, you will easily see a jump from 5 shares to 20.
My recommendation is:
Share through your own G+ and make sure to tag industry people, or people you know will be interested in your content.
I've seen it countless times... big jumps in +1's. However, just like in twitter, don't go crazy!
Cyrus -- Very interesting and helpful post! I'll be sharing it.
Is Brittany related to Britney, the singer and X Factor judge? I guess misspellings rank well. :-)
Brilliant article, thanks.
One other Google+ tip to help increase engagement and followers is to tag your content using hashtags, you'd be surprised how well this works - good for brands starting out too.
lol google + did Matt and co pay for this article :D
Yeah, I deserve the ribbing. :)
You raise a good point. There are many things I both like and dislike about Google, and I didn't want to come off as a FanBoy. But as an SEO I see that Google+ drives so many search results, in both visible and hidden ways, it's become the backbone of Google's search engine
You don't have to like the rules that Google sets for the game, but understanding the rules helps you win. Goolge+ just announced 400M users. If you are in SEO and not investing in Google+ then what game your playing?;-) Thanks for helping us understand the rules.
Very timely considering I'm in a Pubcon presentation about social signals influencing SEO. The speaker backs up Cyrus - get on board G+! They did a test and G+ signals far outweighed those from any other social media platform.
I have been using Google+ with some success. I usually copy and paste my whole article on Google+ and then link to the article at the end. This somehow gives more ranking power to the actual article.
Awww it's Britney not Brittany!
Otherwise, this is a great post! I definitely am going to take advantage of some of these things.
Lolz .. Peter Vogel beats Danny Sullivan for his comment " Look out Tumblr, here comes Pinterest. ".
Good stuff Cyrus. The most actionable post I've read in a while. Good tip on the first line being the title tag.
Thanks for the info! Just created my first Google+ account!
Hey Cyrus your article is really really awesome and these are not dead tips, these are fabulous. Thanks for sharing great info.
Hey Cyrus, really great post and a good reminder to update my Google+ Profile. I've finally included links to both my personal and business website. Thanks for the tips!
Fantastic & timely post. I like this type of post that accumulates all the data & ideas for one source to help you optimize that source. We had a post like this for FB about a week ago now and I really enjoyed both. Thx for the ideas and the work! :)
Great post, Cyrus! Hey, how do you add all those cool extra fields (Bragging rights, Other Profiles, etc.) to your About tab?
Addendum to my question above: I realized after the fact that I was asking about a PAGE that I administer, not my personal profile. It looks like there is less flexibility with the PAGE PROFILE compared to a PERSONAL PROFILE that has all those fields you have set up. Anyway, just wanted to mention that.
This was a great post! Implementing a few of these things right away!
Great post Cyrus, it's time for me to fix my google+ profile. Especially like embedding links in my profile. THanks
Cyrus, I have a question about posting to personal profiles and/or pages...
I've created a "brand page" for posts from my website, but I also post my articles to my personal profile. Is it a good or bad thing to post to both? My profile has a number of associates already, my page, about 1/2 that.
So my worry is getting "Google-dinged" if I post to both. What are your thoughts on this issue?
Should I focus all my content (multiple sites) to my profile and/or profile/pages?
Thanks for your time.
-Bruce
Awesome tips, Cyrus. Thanks! Question: In your opinion, what are the best times & days for businesses to post their own content on G+?
10am - 12pm and early evening work best for me. You can try the Google+ timing app to see when your most viral shares get posted.
Over the last few months I've witness companies using Google + in increasingly creative ways to boost their SEO efforts. Granted, these are search and social marketers organizing Q&A's and hangouts. However, as we shift from the (late) early adopters to a majority, Google+ could really present some interesting channels of communication for a broader set of companies seeking unique means of engagement. And in turn, their SEO could improve from such engagement.
I've been using Google+ since Beta and am heavily involved in Social Media. However, when I do a Google search, my Google+ profile does NOT show up in search. Instead I see Facebook, Twitter, LinkeIn, etc etc. I'm more active on G+ than any other channel and am not sure why it's not showing up - my profile is public and so are my posts. Anybody have any thoughts to what the problem could be?
Just looked at your profile. Not sure why at first glance on my mobile. Website redirects to your reader profile. Why not link it to your page on your site and verify the link.
Not sure what you mean about directing you to my "reader profile." I've listed my Google+ profile under "other links." Where exactly are you saying I should be linking to and from?
When I do a non-personalized, logged out search, your G+ profile/posts come in at #9 and #10 - https://www.google.com/search?q=Charise+Strandberg&pws=0&gl=us
Could it be a strange personalization issue?
I dont know why i didnt get involved in SEOmoz sooner, i have just got into google+ and i have been told that its good for SEO but didnt know where to start, so thanks a lot cyrus, big help
"Rumor has it that new URLs are crawled almost instantly. This makes complete sense as part of the purpose of Google+ was to replace Twitter when creating Google's Realtime Search."
I haven't been looking at it like this, but I feel like it's definitely something I should test! The way I see it, if Google created a social network we should all just assume it's going to impact SEO one way or another. Without access to Twitter or Facebook data, Google almost had to create their own social network to stay in the game. I think Google+ is worth a quick check every day, even if it's just to post your own content.
Checking my statcounter account immediately after posting a link on my G+ page is see the google crawler in my stats instantly about 3 out of 5 times, but it varies. Sometimes there is no activity.John.
Google plus is just like fuel for seo of the content and I think future of seo will highly dependent on Google plus this is the top among all advantages of Google plus for the web masters & bloggers. Cyrus your views are just similar to me. Thanks for your valuable post.
I recently have been paying much more attention to G+ so this post came along at the perfect time! I've been experimenting with the best ways to find cool people to encircle and improve the amount of good content coming through my feed. One of the things I've been looking at are some of the large public circles because they allow you to bring in a bunch of people who relate to a topic all at once.
For example, the Super Science Circle has a few hundred people who are all posting and discussing the latest science content on the web. In one click I can add this circle and have a steady stream of cool science info coming in. I've looked for a similar thing for SEO but haven't found it yet. Opportunity?
How could this apply to SEO?
Great post Cyrus, +1 from me, it is really interesting post bout the features of Google +. You have described all the points and ranking actors of Google plus, i think these all pints are really helpful for us to improve our site influence in Google plus and getting followed links from Google. I think by optimizing title tag we can get high ranking in Google. It is best platform to promote our business, the one one of the most useful factor is Google authorship. These all are great feature for SEO and as well as social media. Thanks Cyrus for providing us this great content.
Good Article. Im always learning with this posts from SEOmoz. Even when I think I know most of things, I always learn a little detail that I didnt notice.
Awseome as always :)
Hmmm, Google layout just doesnt cut in compared to Facebook in usability or look. I bet Facebook and Twitter has won more customers with the integration and directness of those systems than Google+ anyday. Those may outweight the SEO boost that + gives in terms of new client take up compared to the others. Not forgetting Linkedin with networking for new clients.
Take up for + is poor, so the jury is out. I hope it fails. I hope Google fail. They are now evil.
I guess this is something you said in your #Mozcon presentation as well that Google+ is not really acting like another social network but its acting more like an innovative blogging services so something similar...
I am still in a doubt about the advantage of getting link from Google+ profile page but I defiantly use this for fast crawling and trust me the results are super phenomenal...
Good post i must say!
Excellent information. I can feel the trend and as google+ starts to really give major authority to those who have google+ accounts, I see google+ taking over the social media world. Those who want to rank will have to have accounts and therefore the content shift will start pointing to google +!
Indeed. Watching my statcounter live I can see the google crawler coming in almost instantly (Maybe 2 out of 3 posts) when I post a link on my google page for my Aran Islands website.
John.
Extremely useful information Cyrus. We are working on our social media presence and this certainly helps give credence to certain priorities.
Thank you,
Don
This is an excellent post : )
"What's your favorite Google+ tip?"
Here are some tips:
Excellent Post! Jam-packed w/ information and tips. Thanks much for the rich resource.
Just yesterday I added the author tag to all my clients websites - can't wait for Google to crawl and see how it effects our websites.
Your 10 tips a excellent! Some good advice for beginners who are still trying to figure our Google+
I never really touched my + account just due to massive inactivity everywhere. I always knew it would take off one day so thanks for the article, think I might log in tonight
I am a huge Google Plus enthusiast, I only wish I had more time to be active with my personal account. The page title of posts is something I knew about but never really put 2 + 2 together on, really valuable stuff.
As Always thanks for the post Cyrus!
Great post Cyrus, I'm a complete Google+ novice so it was interesting to read about how much potential the platform has. I still feel like I'm missing a trick though - exactly how beneficial is Google+ in terms of ROI and lead generation?To date I haven't come across any figures to support the encouraging points made by bloggers, so at the moment it seems like just another social network in a world where other ones do the same kind of thing. Is Google+ worth my time?
This was brilliant.. the social media dashboard and the circle finder site.. WOW..I'm now following and sharing from your circle. :)
Cyrus, thanks so much for the post. I haven't really been participating too much in SEOmoz lately, but posts like yours ALWAYS make me excited. Also, when I see you on my G+ feed, I normally read your posts because you write about good stuff. While I read Danny Sullivan's posts too, your posts seem to make more sense for my situation. Thanks.Cisco
Amazing article..love the social media dashboard.
Thanks for this post. Certainly going to distribute internally as we need to get on our G+ page! Great reference.
I have only about 10 people/organizations following my Google+ account and practically no back links to my actual website yet (Not yet a priority, but will be soon).
I was just added to a Google circle of a big time organization. Does Google recognize this organization's "link juice" via Google+ the same way as an actual back link coming from that organization's site to mine?
I'm guessing it's not equal, but will my site be more relevant now because of the circle I was unexpectedly added to?
Thanks for any insight.
Just circled you! Thanks for the post!
why does google show my profile image for ONLY SOME pages
Here's my example:
- 1. search for my main site - Google: lasvegasacts - (I'm number one -WITH PIC )
- 2. search for string: Google:
corporate entertainment washington DC corporate comedian entertainer (I'm number 6 with NO pic for- a blog post from Dec 2012) - https://www.lasvegasacts.com/las-vegas-corporate-entertainment-entertainer/
-3. search for Google: hawaii corporate entertainment (I'm number 2 WITH PIC for a blog post from mid-Jan 2013 https://www.lasvegasacts.com/corporate-entertainment-hawaii-orlando/
Can anyone help me figure out why this is happening?
- P.S. some related results are from some old html pages that don't have the 'auth' code yet. - I am asking about the wordpress / pages.
THANK YOU, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!
Larry
Great Post Cyrus. I always love content that is imformative (educational) AND practical. I found it because I was wondering the exact thing you write about = are G+ links dofollow when you post updates to your personal and company pages. Seems like this would be a great place to consistently drop in exact and phrase match longtail KW. Thanks again ~
This is a great article. Even though Google Plus is on the rise to many times people focus to much attention on Facebook and Twitter. Thank you!
Very good information for SEO regarding the social media platform like google+. Will implement on my blog posts. Thanks.
Thanks for this awesome post. Worth a hundred optimization posts on google plus.
hey man, great read, but I have a question, I understand for a personal blog, or a teaching blog where a person links his site with his personal google+ profile which happens to have his real name and real picture, just like what you do in here, and when we search your page, your personal photo will appear just like the screenshot, but my question is this.
what if I have a niche website about health care for example and I don't promote myself in there, its just some information and products, an affiliate website mainly, and I don't think it will help to link that to my personal profile, is it ok to create a new gmail account with that sites name, then create a google+ page (also with the site niche name) then link all together with a youtube (Site name) and twitter too (site name) link them all, will that be fine too?
I ask this because I don't want to get penalized if google doesn't allow creating a google+ with a site name, and putting all website information in the profile settings, let me know, thanks.
Thanks for this post. I just added the rel author tag.
What a great post. I will definitely be using the steps and look forward in seeing the results. Much appreciated.
Love the social media dashboard from Adam Singer, thanks for sharing Cyrus! (everyone else, it literally takes 10 secs to install, give it a crack)
G+ Superb.. Its really very effective to improve site serp results..I will try to do this experiment.
Well worth the G+ :)
Is G+ something I can do, or will I need a SEO person or company?
Great to leverage on Google Plus.
Gonna look on and leverage on it right now Thank you for this great content. Awesome.
Thanks for sharing your tips.As iam new to SEO, these tips will definetily help me.Thanks alot.
I must admit I'm warming to Google+ ever since Facebook started putting sponsored stuff in the stream. G+ seems cleaner and more social somehow.
...that are Google+ members.
lol
I've been sleep on Google+. I have the app on my phone and iPad so I'll have to go ahead and add this to the regimen..
My thing is almost every time I log into my account, I see a notification saying someone added me to their circle.
But in my author tag, the number of "people who have you in their circles" never goes up or down...
What's up with that?
I agree .. and special thanks for Google +1 (author markup).. My blog about Latest Job Vacancies in Malaysia are growing up.. And now with the best keyword for "jawatan kosong" and "job vacancy" its me.. (jawatan kosong its mean job vacancy in Malaysian Language). if you see me in google Malaysia (google.com.my) careeron9 appear in Page Number One.. and ranking No1 or No.2..
Here I link to my blog: https://careeron9.blogspot.com
Please review and comment..
just Blogger in Blogspot...
Normizan Nordin.
Ok, after reading this article, I will spend more time on Google +. Thank you for these info :)
Can someone pls explain/answer these two questions? 1. when you click a G+ button like on a blog post, is that the same seo weight to that blog post as if you logged into G+ and shared that blog link? 2. When we share a blog post link via G+ does that create a 2nd search results for that blog post but is labeled as the G+ results, and if so, do we want to try to get that happening for our blog posts(meaning the original post and the 2nd G+ version? Ok, and one more followup, we have seen the G+ search result not click to a real page- it will 404 error ( i think it was 404). Does anyone know why? Thanks very much! stan
you are great, from many days i was seeking the way of optimizing G+, but it is my luck that i got in one place, more than i expected.Thanks to you Cyrus
Thank you very much for sharing great stuff. Like me many people think that in the world of social networking only Facebook and Twitter both can generate huge social media traffic. But through your post I know reality of Social media world. From today I start my site link and content posting on Google +.
Ive been working on the rich snippet tool. Here is a link for the structured data testing tool.
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/richsnippets
Your information is adding to my already social connections. Im just learning how important Google + is going to work with my Twitter and Linkedin sites. Im hoping to be able to add some helpful info around here.
Smarty has a great post about using heatmaps to help determine which profile photo is best. It turns out that where the eyes in the photo are "looking" is where the user looking at the screen looks also. Lucky for me I have a profile Google+ image in which my cyborg eyes are looking at the title of the post.
This is a great post! I stumbled across it while reading your "Amazing Correlation Between Google +1s and Higher Search Rankings" post from today. I have to admit, I'm one of the late "early adopters". Spent the last hour getting my G+ profile going a little more and adding some good links. Thanks again for helping those of us who are "newer" to the industry.
Good one. I have been trying to learn more about Google+. Your post has been quiet helpful in understanding the capabilities of Google + from SEO point of view.
Great article (even now) for the non-tech lawyer in me that continued to wonder about the usefulness of G+. You made it very clear, thanks. However one questions maybe others would like to know as well. When you talked about using a social media dashboard, are you suggesting that we paste the analytic code on google plus? If so where? Or are you suggesting we place it in our social network platforms like facebook etc.
You made me into a fan, and follower. Hope you share more observations as things progress.
The blog information inspire me on Google plus how to create & optimize the Google plus page. Thank you so much for G+ tips.
Very nice tips, I am using social dashboards from many days, I found same on some other site :)
CircleCount.com is very useful website, thanks for sharing.
These are really critical tips, Cyrus. Google+ is already an indispensable tool for marketers nowadays and this reference is highly useful to those who really find it complicated to learn. It’s quite a challenge for business owners to connect with their target audience through this channel. Thanks for this handy reference.
Will hiding my email address on Google + affect my authorship?
Thanks for this valuable post. Good original content, well implemented on page optimization and a solid link building campaign is usually more than sufficient for SEO.
Simply very helpful tips. Thanks a lot!
Good Job, guy! Learn a lot about how to post interactive post in google plus
great post i definitely use Google plus thanks for sharing such a good post
Hey friends, I am running a blog named Tips2secue , based on blogging and SEO tips, also on online earning sources and some other tips and tricks. But many peoples are saying that this domain is not good for blog. I have to choose some other domain without any numerical in domain, and i am getting daily 500 views approximate on this blog, but mostly traffic is from social sites like facebook and stubmleupon,very little or say only 5-10 views from google, i also working on getting backlinks. So my question is here why google not sending organic traffic on my blog? What i should do for getting organic traffic. As i already following all the tips given on this moz site. So kindly any SEO expert check my domain (www.tips2secure.com) and blog and advice me about what i have to do??? Should i change my blog domain or not??? Please give your value able reply. Thanks
Hi there! Actually, this question is better-suited to our Q&A forum. If you ask there, you should e able to get some help. :)
I agree with the tips. It is important to know how to create contents that add value to the readers and easily attract effective quality back links.
Full and full nice article for G+ benifits, Some times Google search also our post to ranking good one Cyrus. Thank you
Yes SEO is changing rapidly. Nowadays it is not just about links. In my opinion people are still struggling to understand what Google want from us.
Great article. Thank you. Especially the info regarding analytics.
Found you through this site: https://bit.ly/1qYLaqM. Although they helped with at least one referral (me) but I thought it was strange they do not mention "Cyrus Shepard", Moz.com, or any of your social media accounts. Figured you should get credit on their summary page.
Great post, I hadn't realized the SEO potential of G+ although now it seems obvious I should have seen it (Doh!).
One concern that I have though is that I am currently trying to get my personal website ranked higher than my social media sites when people search for my name. Although currently I am fighting my LinkedIn and especially my Facebook which I don't want high, I am worried if I use some of these tactics I will beat my own website with my G+ !
Do you have any suggestions regarding this or regarding fighting your website with your own social media accounts in general?
Overall great post, I appreciate the depth.
I am new Google+ and newer still with SEO, since i'm a full time working for real estate web site. And once reading this, I ne'er thought however powerful social media sites will be for SEO, that truly terribly useful if you have got a good variety of loyal followers. this text simply unfolded a brand new chance on behalf of me. With a straightforward alteration on however I share things over Google+ this prospect would look excellent for a beginner like me. Thanks a lot.
This post was written before the most recent Google+ change: does Tip #1 still apply? Are all links still "followed" in the "about" section and others?
Simple and easy guide, learn something new about Google+ SEO from this article. Your tips are useful for the bloggers that are looking to use Google plus for better search engine optimization.
Added quite a few Google +1s to my site https://www.MarineHQ.com (feel free to pile on). Will be comparing this month to next month in search rankings, alexa, etc. Want to see how much it helps, since there is so little information about how it effects the algo. Definitely know I'm competing against some big boys in the boat and marine supply industry, but I think I have enough metrics to see if it helps. Already +1'd about 300 people...Would like to get over 1000 by June 1...heck make that 2000!
So far, our natural rate of growth has been 20% per month, but we are doing adwords and some traditional advertising, so I can't tell if any traffic is from the google +1's. We are in the process of building a lot of external links to our boat products and marine parts website https://www.MarineHQ.com, but have not had a jump in the rankings. This will naturally happen as we begin blogging on our own site, other sites, and create links back to our MarineHQ page. Will see if there is any way to track website growth to google +1s...just haven't noticed a trend yet.
Hi Cyrus,
Great info as always. I have a question maybe you can help answer and will hopefully be informative for others having the same issue.
Since I've added the Publisher Tag to my footer I noticed I jumped to page 1 in Google for several key terms. Prior to this I used the Author tag like so many others, but I didn't think it made sense to use an Author tag for my company pages. So while the change has given me great results, it has also created an issue.
That issue is, now that I've added the Publisher tag, my Author tag no longer works on any of my blog post articles showing my picture in Google.
Thoughts, advice?
Great article and with the risk of looking bad, I am fairly new to Google+ and have a couple questions. For one, based on what you suggest above, the <title> tag does not seem to work. Using an *title* does. Am I missing something and need to use code tags?
One other thing is what is the point in a business page when everything I share goes to my personal account and not my business page. I could care less about traffic on my personal page and have to copy and paste article url's to share on business page. Forgive me if I'm missing something but so far seems pointless. Could sure use some clear views on this. Thanks in advance for any and all support!
Here's my question and dilemma:
Suppose there's a site which many authors and each author has listed the site in their "contribute to" section. Is there a way to search how many and which plus profiles link to the target site?
It's a forum site - where there are N authors and several of them are now pointing their plus profiles to their forum profile in the "contribute to" section.
Any ideas?
great article Cyrus. thank you.
Really excellent information. These 10 tips to take advantage of Google+ for SEO is informative & helpful.
Cyrus, this was by far one of the most helpful articles I've read about Google+. Thanks for sharing the great tools as well!
The more I learn about Google+ the more powerful I think it is.
Great article. I am looking to see how Google+ can benefit SERPs in addition to authorship. Some great advice and will be checking out the linking asap!
I wanted to revisit an older post that was popular. This post had over 190 comments, so I decided to read it. This definitely gave me a refresh course on the basics for Google+ and as I read over it, I took action and implemented the techniques taught onto my own Google Plus account. These are my favorite types of posts on Moz.
Just the Title makes you want to click on this. "10 Dead Simple Tips to Take Advantage of Google+ for SEO". Anyone looking to grow their online marketing skill will click on this type of title because the title basically tells you that this page will teach you tips that you can implement immediately onto your Google Plus account.
Google+ was created by Google. Are you looking rank on Google? If so, then don't you think that putting more attention on Google+ over Twitter, Facebook, etc.. Would make sense? That is what this page made me think after reading it.
I will now share this page with others on Twitter!
I also emailed this post to my marketing department and I will be sure that all employees read it. My team is required to read a Moz blog post at least 3 days out of every week. This blog is like an online marketing school.
The own products for google itself and should be benefits for seo and other marketing access to google
hey, any chance we could get the " G+ social media dashboard"as a google Analytic "Custom report" instead ?
Thanks,
Antoine
Great post Cyrus. The Company I work for uses a Wordpress blog which sits on their site. We're considering changing the way we publish blog posts with the increasing importance of G+ in mind. I was wondering is it best to continue posting blogs from wordpress as usual while posting the same content on G+. Is this considered duplication by Google?
Great article Cyrus! Those are some good Google+ tips; I also just installed the Social Media Dashboard (on Analytics) and it looks really useful. Thanks again!
Great article. I just set up my G+ account and putting you tips into practice as I type this. Keep the knowledge comming.
Great post Cyrus. You've made it very easy for anyone to easily take the full advantage of Google+ and its power for SEO. Thanks for your tips/advices!
I have a personal G+ account and also a G+ page. When should i carry out the above techniques as my page and when as the page? How would you approach SEO for both of these types of accounts to ensure greatest benefit and least amount od duplicate effort, etc?
Great post, +1-d!
How do you feel about the author tag for ecommerce sites? It is already a little confusing because just like with Facebook you have to tie an ecommerce busines page to a personal account. Does it make sense to promote the author tag on the ecommerce site or the ecommerce site's associated blog. Do we create a fake author to keep things consistent and so that regardless of who makes the post on the ecommerce site's blog the same author tag would apply? I would love to hear from other ecommerce site owners on this.
Thanks. Solving the mysteries of using social media for SEO purposes is getting tougher and tougher.. but you really simplified this one :)
Great Post Cyrus, Thanks for Sharing :) G +1 is a great 'tool' and is now a key part to my SEO plan and these tips will be very useful. Love the Social Media Dashboard as well
Great post. Adam Singer's social media dashboard for GA is very nice.
I'm still struggling to find credible data on improved click-through rates for authorship images in SERPS but I do know that clients LOVE it
Hello Cyrus,I hope you are well! I used Google + for my website https://www.evomantra.com/. This is a fabulous article covering all the aspects of Google + and specially its applications. I look forward to use these for my future work. Thanks!
Great Article....very new to Google +, will test this all out with my next post.
Thanks Cyrus
Thanks a lot Mr. Cyrus for sharing such nice post I have a question in G+ profile in about there is an option to add your links can you please describe the worth of added links here !
I was wasting my time on facebook. Now I am using Google plus to grow my blog. More the +1 better will be ranking on search engines.
Great Post Cryus, thanks for sharing :- google+ so best in SEO purpose and its tools are so easy and its look so good.
I never knew adding links to profile is beneficial, underestimated the value of Google plus, thanks for wake up call
Thanks, I'm sure most people can find a few things they didn't know here! Better start using G+ more I guess... Now it will have Google employees AND SEOs :)
I just added an anchor text link to my G+ profile. Also, I didn't know you get a do follow link in your seomoz profile if when you earn 200 mozpoints. I guess I'll stop lurking and actually start taking part in the moz community!
This is the future of SEO, social media. Glad to see these articles.
The bonus feature for installing the analytic dashboard 404s. Sad b/c I wanted some bonus stuff! Other than that, great article. I especially appreciated the author tag walk through. I was confused b/c I write a lot of blogs for my website which is linked with my Google + profile for the aforementioned reasons. But they weren't pulling in or being recognized and my author profile was still on the second page of results. Turns out there was an error in my author code that wasn't pulling in all the blogs I had written. Fingers crossed now that it's fixed. In the code my Google + profile URL is in there twice. Is that correct? It is a lot longer than the example given by Google. hmm. Anyway great post again !
Thank you for this post - I don't think many businesses have taken Google Plus seriously yet or at least in context of its link/search power.
Its always great when I read a post and feel my knowledge expanding. While I've kind of dabbled with a few things on Google+, you've made it very clear for me on the variety of other ways I can optimize these pages for both myself and my clients.
Thanks for the great post!
As a new small business owner, and a newbie to SEO and google + Thanks for the tips, Its clear that we need to look further than twitter and Facebook.
Thanks for showing me how to get a link and picture in the profile
Thanks for the article Cyrus - very useful for a G+ noob like myself.
Excellent article, Cyrus! I learned so many great tips in here. Thank you!
Cyrus, link to G+ social media dashboard seems to be broken, or was that just me?
It worked perfectly for me. I was logged into my Google account before clicking the link. It worked so nicely I used it on several Analytics accounts.
Simple, easy and got me some good points in less than 2 minutes... Perfect Cyrus :)
I think Google+ is actually a very effective "poor man's social CRM". For example, you can create Circles to qualify followers for link building. And you can pay attention and connect more with the more important prospects.
Has there been a test regarding indexing speed and G+ posts that confirms this hypothesis? I was just surprised not to find a link to an SEOMoz or other test.
Please tell us where to find influencers, and how to use? one more question if i follow influencer in Google+ or any other social network how they can help? They are also publishing or offering same services we are offering, i mean how we can get more clients for our firm with these strategies.
I find that Google+ isn't that great for finding influencers, per se. I'd use Twitter to find influencers, and connect through Google+ with them.
Also, it's more beneficial to connect with people who can either write about your company, or can be potential customers, rather than competitors.
Great question! Some folks in the SEO world have put together some terrific resources for finding influencers:
There's a lot of tools like Klout and FindPeopleonPlus.com, but probably the simplest way is to use the search function of Google+ itself.
Thanks for great resources Cyrus but my question is still up. How to use them?
You can use them to see what your competition is or is not doing and who has circled them, then try to do something different or better than your competition to earn their "circlers" to you.
How to use influencers? Very, very carefully. :)
Not sure I understand the question, but most people try to develop relationships with influencers for a variety of reasons: to share content, earn a link, get a job referral, or in your case, get more clients.
The best way to form relationships depends on your situation, but the first step is always to engage with the influencer in a friendly, non-committal manner, such as resharing or commenting on a post. Making connections this way is a time-consuming process, and not everyone is open to it, but there are folks out there who have built their entire careers this way.
Well, they say timing is everything...
Just yesterday at our weekly meeting we were discussing how we can make better use of both our business and personal Google + pages. Cyrus, it is as though you've read my mind and really helped us to get going with this.
Some really good stuff there and it is much appreciated!
Great post Cyrus, are you sure can we optimize G+ title tags is it possible?I think for every user it will be same as "User Name-Google+"Then how can we optimize... Could you please assist me on this.
Correct - the first part of the title tag consists of "User Name - Google+". It's the second part that you have control over.
Google will display different G+ title tags to different users, just like normal search results, and it's not uncommon to see the user name dropped in the SERPs.
Thank you so much for your reply Cyrus, I need to check this thoroughly and get back to you. if you have any sources regarding how to do second part to optimize Google+ title tags please share with us.
Thank you for putting this post together, Cyrus. Your pointers help us improve our approach for Google+ in reaching better rankings. I believe also, in addition to item #7, that if you use the same picture across the internet and practice consistency, you'd have better chances of people recognizing you at first glance - just one way of branding. Cheers!
Thanks for the useful post Cyrus, we are also currently working on our Google+ strategy but there are a few questions that we need help with.
1.One brand with multiple sites- How does one manage pages given each site is different in this case?2.Authorship images-Given we have a lot of people writing content for us, i.e. on our blogs how do we then approach the whole authorship stuff?
Hope my questions make sense.
1. I'm not an authority on brand pages, but I believe it's fine to have multiple websites associated with a single Google+ page - even if that means placing the same rel=publisher tag on each of the websites.
2. SEOmoz, TechCrunch and many other sites do a good job dealing with multiple authors. Digging into the code of these sites may reveal some valuable insights.
Wow, what a way to run through this. I must say, I was confused about using Google+ and tried to be "active" a few times but never really got into it. Facebook has been my domain for a long time. With the great ideas you have suggested here I can see that it's really simple.
Thanks for this!:
You can do Google+ in less than 10 minutes a day. This means creating a few simple habits to fit it into your workflow.
Great post Cyrus!! After reading this, I was inspired to build out and optimize my G+ profile!
Thank you
Interesting post you prove Google+ is really worthy and even the use of circles for you posts was good.
Great article, thanks for the tips!Seeing an increase in traffic is exciting even when its not any my properties.Cheers
Great article. I've definitely been using Google+ more simply because it boosts Google results ranking, but have both a work account and personal account and find that I'm having to follow on both, +1 on both, etc -- with no good way to reconcile the two. Oh, well.
Great article and the circlechecker is an excellent tool as well.
One thing that I don't think people take nearly as much advantage of is optimizing their profile. As a general annoyance, if a profile allows you to add links, then add links. These link opportunities are a great benefit for not only branding but for SEO as well.
Any specific tips on what could add most PR value to your google+ about page? What are some of the engagements that have worked best for you?
Great Post. I didn't know about inserting link in profile description of Google plus and about the follow link in the posts too. Though, I am doubtful about the value of the links in status updates. People share hundreds of links in updates, SNSs wouldn't give any value to those links I guess.
This is a really great, straight-forward article on using Google + for SEO. Thanks!
I am new to Google+ and newer still with SEO, since I am a full time web developer. And after reading this, I never thought how powerful social media sites can be for SEO, which actually very beneficial if you have a great number of loyal followers. This article just opened up a new opportunity for me. With a simple alteration on how I share things over Google+ this prospect would look very good for a beginner like me.
Thanks a lot.
Thanks for sharing! Good to know that there are even more possibilities for successful SEO!
Great list of really simple tipps, thanks for sharing!
This is really a golden nugget of information for SEO & Inbound Marketing for preparing for the future. Between AuthorRank and overall Social Cues playing more and more of a role in rankings, this should be a cornerstone of anyone's marketing strategy.
Thanks for the enlightenment!
great and nice sharing, i think these are the best tips, apreciated
Really enjoyable and actionable post Cyrus - great work, thanks for putting that together.
One thought: If you can embed follow links in your profile and you decide to pay yourself for those links and exact match anchor text them to and EMD forwarded to another G+ profile, do you enter some sort of SEO benefit/penalty paradox?
Second thought: Sop having friday thoughts on a Monday...
This is a very good information. Simply we can promote your website through social networking site..... Really Great...
Thanks Cyrus Shepard.....
Thanks for this post (found via Social Media Examiner). I've been rediscovering Google+ lately; it seems that I'm not the only one!
Many thanks for sharing a brilliant and useful tips.
That was awesome. I always tell my clients they need to think about using Google+ and usually they say they aren't interested in "chatting". I think people are confused on just how powerful it can be. Most people think of Google+ as a Facebook where people post about going to the bathroom or what color they are going to dye their hair, etc., etc. Thanks to your post, I now have easy reasons to show clients how they NEED to have a Google+ page.
THANKS!
Great article, I've been using G+ 'properly' since they opened it up to Google Apps customers, and in the past few months I've noticed some dramatic results since linking up all my social profiles and places I contribute to my G+ profile.
The fun task now is trying to encourage others to take G+ seriously!
Ruth
I started using G+ a few weeks ago because I saw how powerful it was for getting leads. When you share content, you can choose to send it to everyone's email who's in your circle(s).
Kinda knew it was good for SEO but not to the point of how you mention.
Great post. Really opened my eyes about G+
Interesting article - especially as our findings and results are very different...no surprise as we don't harness the power of G+
For me right now what annoys me a little about Google+ is the lack of nice URLs - if you run a brand page on, say, Facebook, you can do facebook/companyname thing and it goes great with your brand and is very social and trendy, same with Twitter or Pinterest. Google needs to do something like that so that you can promote in a simple, clean, non-geeky way
Lately I've been dedicating more attention to Google+. I think you are right that we can still be (almost) early adopters if we hustle.
This is a really great, straight-forward article on using Google + for SEO. Thanks!
Remarkable post cyrus...i guess we are so use to of new things that we lost to give attention to these simple tips.Thnx for drawing our attention.
This is a great post Cyrus. This is the perfect guide for people to follow so that they understand the need to make their content findable and relevant to all the platforms they are one. I am one of those unique fans of Google+, but given that it's search offering is number one there is a need to understand how to make G+ work for the user.
So far I've been focusing a lot on Facebook, but I guess I will combine efforts with Google+. For starters, I didn't know that links with in post were Follow! Now that's good.
Very good and complete post Cyrus. One question: how do you verify Moz metrics on a G+ profile page since it is an HTTPS URL? Opensite explorer allow only http, on not?
Good question. While I believe it's true that Linkscape only crawls http (at the moment), Open Site Explorer can still calculate incoming link metrics that originate from regular http pages. For example, check out PayPal on OSE. It has a ton of incoming links form http websites, so Moz is still able to calculate link metrics. The only metrics it can't calculate are from links originating from https.
Excellent, actionable post, Cyrus.
Did a domain distribution check on my own name with fairly similar results to you as well... must pay more attention to Plus!
I cant seem to figure out how to do this search! Can you help? I have google+ and I dont see any type of results like this.... Thanks in Advance!
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Very useful tips, no doubt. But every time i think i will give G+ more time, but don't know why is not happened every time. This time also i don't know what will happen. But i like to suggest other, that they should follow these, because G+ is google service and they really give preference to G+share. It really plays a vital role in ranking.
Excellent article. Might create a list of all the rankings of all the big influencers on my Google Plus account. Just after reading this article!
The Social Media Dashboard for Google Analytics is pretty amazing, thanks for the link to enable it.
Thanks Cyrus - very helpful. You busted me for not using the G+ title tags in the first sentence of my posts incorrectly. Much appreciated!
Good one Cyrus.. many of us never knew about a few things which get us advantage in SEO & here I must say a great tip to go...
Thumbs up for this article, yes Google+ is a good source of link building but, sometime i get confused to add people on circles.
Great article. I am starting to realize the importance of social media, especially G+.
Great stuff Cyrus! I'm definitely guilty of not using Google + enough. Going to have to remedy that quickly.
We have a learning center on our website; to maximize our benefit when we post information to G+, should we use a link to our website, or should we show the entire article, complete with keyword backlinks?
Thank you for an insightful presentation of G+'s capabilities. I do think it's unjustly overlooked by many an internet marketer. I think coupled with great posts, such as product videos which can be easily made with a tool such as Treepodia, it can be of immense value to savvy internet marketing enthusiasts.
I have 1,800 'friends' on facebook, 4 followers on G+.
While there are certainly some benefits from SEO perspective (super fast indexing, etc) reaching actual people is tougher.
Although I like it better than FB in concept, ll the things that are great about social media just seem to exist on a much smaller scale on G+.
thank you for all the amazing G+ resources, and that social media dashboard for GA was killer. Thanks everybody else for the G+ tips.