The New Google (+1) Button

THE Google ‘plus One’ (+1) Button in simple terms is a direct rival to Facebook’s Like Button.

When Facebook introduced the like button it was a huge success and millions of website owners around the world immediately placed the like button on their sites to improve their social media interaction and reach a wider audience within their markets. The practice spread like wildfire.

Each time a person likes a site using the Facebook Like button; the action is posted to that person’s Facebook wall and is visible to all their friends. This is a viral marketing goldmine!

Because of the huge impact that the Facebook Like Button has had on the social media marketing scene Google want to do the same with their (+1) Button.

At the moment, you can (+1) your search results in Google search. This will tell Google that this search result was preferred over other search results for the keywords you entered. Given that Google has been searching for ways to improve its search results by providing users with better content, this should serve Google very well. The (+1) button will tell Google “I like this search result.”

Now here’s the exciting part! Imagine your website has a (+1) Button that your visitors are clicking on. What do you think that tells Google about your website? Yep, you got it, people like your content!

It’s still a bit early to know for sure, but rumor has it that these clicks will have an impact on your future search engine rankings (the more clicks you get, the better it is for your rankings).

by Andy Smith of Bamboo Media
andy.s@bamboo-media.eu www.bamboo-media.eu