This time around we are going to take a break from Twitter and talk all about Google+ and why it is important for your marketing strategies.   Hopefully most of you already have a presence there and for any of you thinking you don't need Google+, I hope this article changes that opinion.  Google+ may very well be the most important marketing tool at your disposal and knowing how to use it effectively is absolutely a priority.

Recently Google changed its algorithm that determines how search rankings are calculated to include a strong influence from the website or article's +1 count.  Basically, this means that your +1 count is going to become increasingly important if you want to get your content noticed.  You can add sharing buttons to your websites and blogs which is an absolutely good idea.  However, +1's are built into Google+ and if you are not putting content there, then it is missing out on a lot of clicks and may suffer in search results.  The overall message from this is that you have to have a presence on Google+ to compete with your competitors.

After that last paragraph you may be thinking that good old Darth Google has you by the throat with a force choke hold.  Luckily, Google+ is a really great social media platform and I, for one, do not mind being forced to use it.  The interface is easy to figure out and it has so much versatility compared to Facebook.  It lacks the character limits that Facebook enforces which opens up a lot of possibilities when it comes to marketing.

Much like Facebook, you can have a personal Google+ page as well as an attached page you can use for your product/brand which in my case, I use to highlight my  books.  They both act as individual accounts meaning you can have your own set of circles for each and can +1 different articles on each.  Obviously, you may find cat gifs funny on your personal account but I would not recommend sharing them on your brand page unless you are in a cat related business.  Always keep in mind that your brand page is the landing point for your customers and you want to ensure that their first impression of you is in line with your brand.

On your brand page, you want to ensure that your profile is completely filled out and you will want to use the picture banner area under your brand name effectively.  In my case, I put a picture of my current book in the first slot and followed it with quotes from reviews in the other four slots.  It ensures for me that my novel is front and center and the quotes give my visitors some idea of the responses to the book so that they know they are going to get a great story if they decide to buy it.

Once you have your brand page up you might begin to think about filling up those customer circles.  Before you do that, be sure to add some content rich posts first so that your new potential customers have something to read and engage with.   Here is one of the huge winning points of Google+.  Your posts can be as long as you want them so you can really create very good detailed posts that can be isolated into a page for sharing outside of Google+.  Once you make a post, if you click on the little gray arrow in the top right area above the post, one of the options is to link to the post.  You can then use the link to send people to that specific post which can be very useful.

Another great feature of Google+ is a little thing called hangouts which is a great way to connect with your potential customers face to face via their web cams.  If you host a hangout, you can then invite in or leave it open for people in your circles to join you in an info-session or maybe just an informal conversation.  It is an absolutely amazing feature and it will even allow you to email a link to someone you want to join in and you can even have customers phone in as well.

Circles are another strong point of Google+ as they allow you to separate your followers into specific categories which can be very useful for marketing.  As an author, I would have a circle for fans and also one for potential readers.  The fan's circle may want different content that the potential readers would rather not read and as such I could limit some content to the fans only.  Another useful thing about circles is that you can share them which other people.  For example, if I created a circle for my author friends and wanted to introduce them all to each other, I could share the circle to the circle.  You also can have people in multiple circles as some of my author friends could also be potential customers.

I will be revisiting Google+ again in a future post to look in more detail as this post is intended to be more of an overview.  I hope you will return to read some of the great content I have planned for my future posts and feel free to subscribe to this blog for an email notification so you won't miss a thing.  I am an author as I mentioned above and like to finish my posts with a small request of you guys.  My book, The Daughter of Man, is a sensational paranormal thriller that I would love for all of you to take a look at.  They have a free sample over there at Amazon and quite frankly a story of this caliber for $2.99 for your kindle is a real bargain.   Thank you for visiting with me today and please feel free to leave some comments below.