Do you think Google+ will become a valued social media resource for small business in the near future?
Clarification added 10 months ago:
Thanks everyone for the excellent array of answers and sharing of experience and wisdom. The link to a post on the topic by Jay Baer, provided by Alex, got borked by the LinkedIn system. Hopefully this short version will work http://bit.ly/gplushammer
Answers (29)
Don't think so. For business not any of them can beat LinkedIn. They are and always will be the greatest professional social media site perhaps even for entertainment, games etcetera if people discover it and LinkedIn allows them.
Kenneth L.
Retired Aerospace Contracts Manager, MicroMentor Volunteer and Founder "Smalltofeds"
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It is too much like Facebook. Both are losers for business
Peter Q.
Looking for new Business Opportunities
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Valued? Maybe. Google has the engineering skills, data accessibility and critical mass to lead the market. The problem is, is that they are "late to the game. Linkedin certainly hold the game interms of business (large and small), but there are a range of other players (Xing et al). I now find that I am getting invites from people that I don't even know, to SM Hubs, that I have never heard of. interaction/interoperability between the products would be a wonderful than, and google may have the size to do that. When will this happen (near future) - possibly - given the rapid take up of Google-plus invites, there is some mass, perhaps enough to succeed. BUT.... it has been stated that this is potentially going more "head-to-head" with Facebook, than Linkedin and it's peers. As such, it's relevance to business will be reduced. Of course, then you have the age old networking (social or otherwise quandary) - There is almost a cultural thing that says "the more contacts, the better". I hate to think of how many times, I have spoke to someone, as said "you are a first point connection in Linkedin to Mr XYZ, can you introduce me, and better still give me a run down on what sort of person he is. Usually the response is "don't know him, just linked to him" - This degrades the value of a "link". IN fact, I was equally approached by a "real friend" a while back that asked my if I knew anything about Mr ABC - I did a quick google search - the guy had a glowing self description on Linkedin, but it turned out that he has been a director of two separate companies shut down for SEC violations, and was being chased across multiple states for Alimony. A smaller number of "good contacts" beats a large number of "unknowns" any day. In fact, when you look at Linkedin in particular, were there might be as many as 10 Million people in 3 degrees of separation (Friend of a Friend of a Friend) - it is far more appropriate to use that level of trust.
It will be interesting to see how G+ handles that.
It's also interesting to note, that in the last week or two, Google has pulled the pin on two great existing projects - medical records, and home power loads.
Bill V.
Former Executive Recruiter pursuing living life to its fullest
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I think so. I find the interface clean and functional, new features like video huddles or group video chat, simple to customize lists (as example I have a master list or circle called contacts that hold everybody but smaller circles for friends, business contacts, etc. that is so very easy to set up or change) which allows you to follow streams that combine the best of Facebook and Twitter. I'm not sure if G+ will replace FB or Twitter but it's becoming my tool of choice to follow specific streams or threads and I'm looking forward to testing the Video Huddle feature.
Phillip B.
Experienced web applications architect and open source solutions developer
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You can create custom circles, and add people to those circles based on their email address. So a small business can create multiple circles of their current customers, prospects, partners, etc. And of course none of these people know which of your circles they are in. By basing your ongoing interactions with these circles, you have essentially created your own custom networks.
Links:
Howard G.
President at the Harbrooke Group and Start Up Toolkit Blogger at Inc.Com
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I have to disagree with the people touting the value of LinkedIn and deriding Facebook for business.
Who better to recommend you business than real friends - which is where Facebook excels.
Linkedin - I keep only people I know, for real, in person, in my network. Others network to anyone anywhere.
Both of these networks need to bring in the concept of closeness, reputation and trust before they're going to truly see their value.
Google may be "late to the party" with G+ but they are clearly working to learn from LinkedIn and Facebook and innovate on their own mistakes with Buzz.
Add to that the fact that they can bring in Google Offers (local deals) that connect to Google Places (location, check in and verified business listings), search and advertising (including mobile ads) and you have a very powerful potential. I hope they can realize it.
Douglas K.
Helping companies reach their marketing potential
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It remains to be seen. I think the momentum of Facebook is going to be very difficult to overcome, but the opportunity to integrate it into search, maps, adwords, apps... really make it a compelling application.
No API yet, so Entrepreneurs arent going to jump on to add value to attract more then the early adopters at this stage.
Then again, why would Google be worried about Small Business?
Lucio D.
Internet Marketing Strategist, Social Media Strategist and Online Reputation Management.
Des, I guess you could break down the question in 2 different queries.
1) Do you think Google+ will become a valued social media resource...?
and
2) DO you think Google+ will HELP small business in the future?
My opinion goes to the query 2, and the simple answer is NO, it won't help, it will indeed harm small businesses.
Businesses depending on Search traffic might see traffic dropping heavily.
Google is pushing hard on identity to try to make search more social, with authorship markup & author highlighting within the search results.
Google launched their Google+ social project & their +1 votes increase organic CTR (but highlighting that trend with "analytics" is almost like it is out of "Lying with Numbers" as one would expect a higher CTR since those who "vote" for you are more likely to be fans, who tend to be repeat visitors to your site , bla, bla.
(from SEOBook.com)
Like any of the brand-related signals Google has been leaning into for the past couple years, the +1 button will favor big brands.
The impact & effect is so obvious that Google's help docs contain the following question: "Will the +1 button make it harder for my small business to compete with larger companies?"
Their answer to that question is generally "no" but that they would even ask themselves that question is fallacious Orwellian duplicity.
Would you trust the local plumber to work on your house if he was posting "exciting viral content" online about how some projects went astray? Now every plumber needs to become a marketing expert to not get driven off the web by chain-styled companies that can collect +1 signals from all their employees & some of their customers across the country or around the world.
Google today is saying that "social media is important." Just look at their wave of product announcements & their bonus structure ( http://www.businessinsider.com/larry-page-just-tied-employee-bonuses-to-the-success-of-the-googles-social-strategy-2011-4?op=1 )
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Gautam G.
HR, Social Media and Marketing
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Yes, I think so :-)
Vijaykumar N.
SME's/ Entrepreneur's Outsource your business challenges to us we help you to grow your business
Linkedin started as a value added Recruiter and face book is all about being cool. When the investors came in naturally these a head. I believe Google will add value too. But still with too much of social media's why should I go for one more is a big question. People will also loose privacy because of few features which are also there in other sites too.
yes, honestly this may just be the facebook killer.
Yes and No. I think that the circle feature has a lot of potential for helping small businesses operate on a day to day basis, from keeping team members on board to coordinating with vendors and maybe even clients in some cases so from an operations standpoint yes. However, where it is lacking when compared to Facebook is marketing potential. Facebook not only has user profiles but also allows businesses to have their own presence and use it to highlight their services and offerings as well as offer fun and engaging applications that help drive awareness, loyalty and ultimately purchase if done correctly. Google + does not seem to have this same marketing ability that Facebook provides. I do caution and say that I would see some changes coming before it is launched to the public and if they figure out a way to allow business to market to consumers the way Facebook has then it has a chance to be a killer.
It covers all the bases for me.
I recently moved my adwords spend to fb ppc as it was slowly dying.
The results were great, but now social relevance is back in adwords and people's eyes will be in google more which means more exposure to adds and sites dished up by google and more relevance to small business. The answer is most definitely yes, those not embracing it will make things cheaper for early adopters. It's a good time to build your network/list/customer base.
Let me caveat my answer with something first: I've spent very, very little time in G+ as of yet.
That said, let me say that my initial reaction about this project is one of extreme hesitation. Google isn't known for its fundamental product management skills or user centric design. They've largely gotten away with this because of the amount of time generally invested to elevate from rough early product to usable product (gmail) or because they've been dealing with generally data oriented products (Docs) or are simply replicating existing UI metaphors on the web (Reader).
To succeed with a product like G+, they will need to get much, much better about understanding user needs, spoken and unspoken. Much of the privacy controls, in theory, are a good counterbalance to Facebook's design philosophy that largely tosses privacy concerns to the wind. But if they're so hard to fundamentally understand and/or actually use, then the advantage is generally a moot point.
The real question here is not whether or not we believe it can or cannot be successful for small businesses. The bigger, and far more fundamental question to ask is: How does this help Google in the search world. Everything Google does is about improving search, and therefore driving ad sales. Can G+ help with that? If so, then they are likely to stick to it long enough to make it work. If it's not immediate return on search value, then... we'll see.
Alex G.
Marketing Ideas for Smart People
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Yes.
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Paul C.
Internet Marketing Consultant, Trainer, and Speaker
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I believe it's too soon to tell. A couple of years ago, no one thought Facebook had the potential to be used for business and look what has happened with it.
So far it looks like it will do a better job than Facebook. It will be hard to top Linkedin!
Google+ may become a valued resource for small business, but I think it will take a while. Businesses that are using Facebook and Linkedin may not feel they have time to start something new. I am sure it will grow in the long run.
Daniel G.
Simplifying Digital Marketing for Small Business | Digital Marketing Strategies | CEO
Des
I think it will, initially I thought that people would not want to share more information with Google, but FaceBook is damaging themselves, and the response has been very positive
See http://timhogansays.com/2011/07/03/why-google-works/
Dan
Yes, especially if you don't think of it as a broadcast/marketing/advertising tool -- which Facebook has become. As a tool for collaborating with defined groups of people inside and outside the organizations -- which is how the real world operates -- I think it has great potential.
Links:
- http://www.ddmcd.com/going.html
- http://www.ddmcd.com/content.html
- http://www.ddmcd.com/relevant.html
Clarification added 10 months ago:
I've given the question more thought and have added a new blog post to the links attached below -- my post "Why Google+ is Relevant to Enterprise Collaboration" expresses why I think that Google+ is significant for the enterprise.
Trevor K.
Social Media Consultant & Private Lender
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I think Google+ will have to prove that it is here to stay before it can be very powerful for businesses. With the way Google Buzz and Wave went it's still up in the air if Google+ will ever take off. It's had a good introduction to the Social Media world though and seems to be gaining popularity. If the general public continues to join the network and spend more time on it then businesses will naturally join as well. It's will be the same reason businesses are on Facebook, they go where their customer base goes.
Also, Google announced they are working on a business profile for Google+, this should make the network more powerful for businesses. I think the main factor is how quickly the network grows. If users are spending time on Google+ then businesses will as well.
- Trevor Kohlhepp
Business Owner
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Warren W.
Radio Show Host at BlogTalkRadio "Social Media Profits" Show
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No. Great tech from Google, but they are not a people company... It will take a lot more than an announcement of a beta to affect the world in any significant way
Dave M.
Professional trade show booth traffic builder and party entertainer. Corporate and private sector events.
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Not happening if you have to be invited in...
The primary benefit as of now to a small business owner using Google+ has to do with how Google+ interacts with Google Places, Google SEO and Google Adwords. While the impact isn't entirely clear, ads, places and search results that have been given one or more "Plus 1" are more prominent than those without any. From a 10,000 foot perspective, Google+ is just another example of how any business needs to focus on making their brand, their ads, and their content relevant enough to earn positive consumer feedback. If anyone needs help getting +1 setup or if you would like an invite, use the resource links included:
Links:
Ed B.
CEO of Goozleology | Specializes in SEO. SEM, Social Media Marketing and Mobile Marketing
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It's certainly to early to call. I was over at WarriorForum.com and from what I've been hearing is that the people that have been invited to use Google+ have been very impressed. Basically, what they've said is that Google+ combines the best of both worlds from Facebook and LinkedIn. Whereas Facebook is a personal social network and LinkedIn is a professional social network, Google+ can be both.
It can be both because it allows you to group people together such as businesses and business partnerships, sports leagues and best friends. Basically create a group for just about anything and only people in that group will have access to your group.
Plus Google has the money and the reach to take on both Facebook and LinkedIn and completely dominate. It will simply come down to how good their program is.
Jim S.
Helping business executives improve their team and their own performances, leading time and project management workshops
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Who would have thought MySpace would shrink? Or that Facebook and Twitter would come to be used by business? Ultimately it depends on whether enough people use Google+ and whether business can see ways to contact people easily and cheaply.
PS and I suspect we're going to have a lot of people using Google+...
I think that it will be, particularly because you can target your audience specifically. The more friendly privacy policy is also a plus :)
