What would you think if I told you there was a social media network that had 359 million active individual users (up 33 percent in less than a year) and 135 million business listings, and yet nobody you knew was using it? Would you be excited to use it? What if I told you it was managed by the biggest search engine out there and that they were pouring resources into integrating it into every service they owned?
There is such a network, managed by Google, called Google+. And it’s your secret social media marketing weapon.
Quick, do a Google search on a few businesses in your niche. How do they show up? Now search for your business. How do YOU show up? Want to be better? Google+ can be your answer.
What does better look like?
First, it means a better result on the right side of the Google search results. In time, you will show up on the right side of the search engine results with a full color picture, a map to your location, reviews and more. You can do it by completing your profile and verifying your physical address with a postcard mailed to you. It typically takes a few weeks to show up completely, but it could be faster.
Second, it means you can integrate ALL of your online profiles into your Google+ business page. The more links to other platforms, the more reviews of your business on other platforms, the more you create other places, the more you can link to on your Google+ page.
Third and most importantly, it means you’ll show up higher in the search engine results for the key phrases you want to rank for if you use them correctly. As you might expect, Google rewards Google, so getting a completed Google+ page will show you up ahead of your competitors’ incomplete, or worse, MISSING Google+ pages.
So what are you waiting for? Get started using Google+ today at http://plus.google.com before your competitors take advantage of this now not-so-secret secret weapon.
