It's On: Google Plus Launches Pages for Business
It's been a lo-o-ong wait (since June 28, to be exact) for us marketers, but on Monday, Google finally launched Google+ Pages, which allows businesses and other organizations to create proprietary outposts on social media's newest network.*
The good news is that setting up a Google+ Page for your business is dead simple. The flipside of that is that the page itself is ... well, dead simple. Logo, name, basic info, and whatever content you've posted. In other words, it looks a lot like a Google+ personal profile page:
So if Facebook's endless parade of bells and whistles have set your expectations for what a social page should be, you might be mildly disappointed. On the other hand, if you think Facebook's become waaay too complicated, you might breathe a sigh of relief.
As for me, I'll be curious to see whether Google starts piling on the features or keeps Google+ Pages simple, as a foil to Facebook's cluttered hubs. But I digress.
Oh, and Google+ Pages can do a nifty little trick called Direct Connect. Try this: go to Google (not Google+, just plain ol' Google), type in +Pepsi, and click Search. What happens? You skip the search results and go straight to the Google+ Page.
This is a nifty feature that makes it way easier for your customers to find your page ... and as we all know, people will only find you if it's simple to do so. (Direct Connect is currently still in beta and will be rolled out for the rest of us once it's ready.)
So, are you ready to jump in and start swimming in the Google+ pond? To create your page, just go to plus.google.com/pages/create and follow the instructions. And if you need a little guidance, those super-helpful folks at HubSpot have posted a step-by-step guide.
Then leave us a comment telling us where to find your business on Google+ so we can circle you!
* For more on Google+, including how-to tutorials on creating and using Pages, check out my Scoop.it page All Things Google+.