Google Plus Pages – Its impact and how to incorporate it into your digital presence
Ok, it’s here. And once again businesses are scrambling on what to do.
Google Plus
Hopefully for Thanksgiving 2011 internet pundits took a break after spending the last few weeks assessing Google+ Pages. On November 7th, Google released the platform, a competitor to Facebook Pages and Linked In, after requesting businesses to not create a Google+ page as a business page. Zimana has launched its Google+ Pages – you can see and plus the page here.
Is Google+ Pages it better than Facebook Pages? Not necessarily. Platforms are really a matter of choice.
Further, I feel there are a few shortcomings that show at launch, but are recoverable over time.
One is a lack of an audience base that spends 1 of 8 social media minutes on its platform – this s a Hubspot stat on Facebook engagement according to Hubspot. Currently with 40 million users overall, Google+ stats will be more widely known with study, particularly if Google includes third party apps and developments in a manner similar to its Droid operating system.
The second shortcoming is that the page can only be managed by one administrator vs Facebook’s two or more admin selection capability. This can be a headache if the person managing this page disappears entirely.
But the anticipation for Google+ Pages lies in its significant potential search influence. A Google+ page can be linked to your website through Direct Connect. Direct Connect is based on search user typing a + before the brand name; When this happens, the Google+ Page shows in the SERP alongside other results. Linking your Google+ page and your site gives Google a relevant connection between your site to a user query in Google Web Search.
To establish the link, a business employee or manager must first establish a Google + account. A Google+ page can be then created (You can have more than one page, but again, only one administrator at this writing).
Next, a link to the company website is needed to make Direct Connect viable. This requires inserting a “rel=publisher” code in the main website page. The instruction can be found at this Google Webmaster page.
A second consideration – none of the Google+ Pages have a customizable URL. This is a missing advantage on business cards and on websites – who wants to share a URL with a series of numbers. Facebook offers a customized pagename features for pages with at least 25 followers.
But there is a work around. A few Google+ enthusiast are sharing a website, gplus.to , on which users can creates an unique URL to use on the aforementioned business cards, webpages, and other marketing tools.
This is still not as comparable as renaming the page itself – think of a rename as a SEO opportunity to include a keyword- but gplus.to does becomes handy for removing the long numerical URL when a short handle is more memorable.
Finally, Google+ Pages does not have a direct connection to Google Analytics. Currently you can add a Google +1 button to your site to see how your site is shared through the Google+ platform. Google Webmaster can also provide some data, but its reports activity significantly different from GA. Although Webmaster reports on all +1 activity, a GA account only reviews what is tagged to the website.
Most importantly, Google+ Pages serves a reminder of the importance of images and content labels. Like Facebook, Google+ users can be tagged – This alerts the tagged persons when sharing occurs and can spread the awareness of your business.
In a recent social media white paper, Hubspot noted that much of pre-shopping research starts with search and that social media also increases the likelihood of a purchase. Reports from Forrester and eMarketer also agree that customers research, be it B2B or B2C, rely on a search and social media presence for a purchase decision. With Google+, Google has made the combination of a social network and a search engine more convenient for researching offerings. It’s this research that will ultimately make your business a success.
Tic Toc Entertainment continues its growth with Zimana-enhanced sites for Midwest DJ and Karaoke & TTE Studios
If there is one thing about Greg Crook, he understands timing is everything. Even the name of his company, Tic Toc Entertainment, has been a reminder of that timing is essential for success.
Greg Crook has been running Tic Toc Entertainment on perfect timing for the past 12 years. Tic Toc Entertainment consists of a recording studio, a roster of Chicago recording artists and live musicians, the band Night Fever (in which Greg is a keyboardist), and Midwest DJ and Karaoke, a DJ service that covers events such as weddings and corporate parties (and karaoke as well). The business has served not only Chicago but the Midwest in general. A consummate musician and Gary, Indiana native, Greg has been working to elevate the online exposure for his businesses to reflect their past history and future.
Zimana’s involvement was creating four websites on a very limited budget – this was done to focus on updated content, as well as a establish a baseline of analytics measurement, which would give Greg guidance on which marketing effort needs adjustment. Site templates were modified, with Javascript codes incorporated to rotate picture images of the musicians and studio (even the images were hand selected for size and conveying the Tic Tic story). For the Night Fever site, Zimana created a video montage that conveyed the sounds of a the group, using past images, a current video, and sound bites from each source. Customer recommendations were added into three of the sites, to reflect that company history. Finally, a Gigbuilder music selector was incorporated into the Midwest DJ site; Zimana also worked to update the music database for the client so that customers can search music by album title as well as by song.
While finishing touches to the studio site and Midwest DJ and Karaoke are being completed, the sites are creating more qualified leads, as well as increased interest for all of Tic Toc Entertainment services. For more on Tic Toc, view the Tic Toc Entertainment site, the Nightfever site, Tic Toc Studios site and Midwest DJ and Karaoke Services.
Small Business Technology Tour is a great way to get your business more tech savvy
Ramon Ray, founder of Small Biz Technology, is embarking on the first Small Business Technology Tour, a series of informative panels in five cities. The tour is a showcase of how small businesses can leverage technology to increase productivity, sales, and customer satisfaction. Ramon is no stranger to the small business technology space, having written in major publications and sites such as American Express OPENForum as well as having consulted on the subject for years.
The Taste of Tech tour starts Sept 28th in Mountain Valley, California and runs through Salt Lake City, Washington DC, Boston, and Atlanta in October. For more information, check out the Small Business Technology Tour.
Taste of Technology Small Business series kicks off its sessions with cloud computing
This week in New York I had the pleasure of sitting in one of several Taste of Technology sessions. Held at the Samsung Experience retail store in the Time Warner building and hosted by Small Biz Technology editor Ramon Ray, the Taste of Technology sessions showcase new tools to help small businesses integrate technology in a meaningful, practical way and to discuss the direction the technology industry is heading as a whole.
The May 2010 session panel consisted of Jonathan Rochelle, Group Product Manager for Google; John Conklin, Business Productivity Solutions Specialist for Microsoft; and Steve Greenwood, Head of Products for start up DropIO. Each covers how their products rely on the cloud to deliver quality service. Highlights included a review of Google Apps, discussion on the upcoming SkyDrive for Office Live (my personal favorite, it is additional storage and free features with Office 2010), and an explanation of DropIO, a new online storage service in which uploaded files & video which can be shared regardless of file format. Given the Apple-Adobe battle over Flash (A reminder was announced today as NBC and TBS declined to place their content on the iPad: see the Marketwatch article), DropIO gives a means to share video without concern about the format available to the user, although DropIO is used privately and meant for a few user, as opposed to video sharing sites like YouTube.
Much of the discussion turned to browser usage, with many questions from the audience regarding reverse compatibility and how much that reverse compatibility — browser, internet capability — may hold back some segment of internet users. Security of course came up as well.
There are other Taste of Technology Small Business sessions planned through the year, in New York City and soon to be announced locations. For more information, take a look at the Smallbiztechnology site for details. Ramon is a great guy and excellent host, having attended the Small Biz Technology Summit earlier this year, which featured Seth Godin and a wide range of speakers.
Reading of "We Shall Overcome" by Stuart Scott for Black History Month
[tweetmeme source=zimanablog]
It’s not everyday one gets to share a book on which a client help create, so I am figuring a healthy shout-out is in order here.
Stuart Scott created a coffeetable book called We Shall Overcome: A Song That Changed The World. The book tells the story of how the famous song played a galvanizing role in the civil rights movement, as well as other social events during the period. There is a CD recording of the song included with the book.
Terrance Cummings, a former Zimana client, created the illustrations for the book. Cummings is an award winning illustrator, an art director, and a former teacher at Parsons School of Design. He has illustrated several books in his past, along with managing catalog layout design and graphic design projects for corporate clients. He has a studio in New Jersey, just outside of New York City.
Stuart Scott’s appearance will be at Politics and Prose in Washington DC on February 11th (click here to learn more) . You can purchase the book via Amazon (click here for purchase). The Amazon site also has a cool video to accompany the post.
I wish the very best to Stuart and Terrance.
And I wish the very best to all during Black History Month.
Pierre