Is Anybody Outside of SEO Industry Getting ROI from Google+ ?? Tell the truth!

[Mcarle]

What is your niche?

[Anthony_NorthSEO]

I have to agree with you on this one, I've barely heard a soul mention it outside of Digital Marketing circles.

There's actually a short promo spot on a popular radio station here in Atlanta that goes something like this:

Generic deep male radio promo voiceover with delay effects and heavy guitars

**"Like us on Facebook, Follow us on Twitter, and add us on Google Plus (whatever the hell that is)!" **

The Hangout feature can be a good tool if you're collaborating on a project remotely, but that withstanding I use Google+  SOLELY to boost SERP rankings for myself and my clients.

[EGOL]

Thanks.  There are very few in my niche and most of them simply have a google+ presence to claim authorship.

[EGOL]

(whatever the hell that is)

ha ha... that's great.  I wish I would have thought of a line like that!

[Anthony_NorthSEO]

I'll try to find a clip of it online somewhere and post a link to it here... I laughed so hard I almost crashed into the median the first time I heard it. But on a serious note, I think an advertisement like that sheds a lot of light on how the general public perceives Google+.

[EGOL]

Yes, I can imagine that guy with the million dollar voice saying that line.

[loopyal]

We started reasonably early on plus, and promote a lot of our stories there every day. From the very start, I thought the idea sucked, and I still do.

Our readership is generally older. Most have no idea what g+ is and they don't care. They also want to know why the hell I've put the g+ button at the top, above Facebook and twitter which A) get more than 10 times the attention B) seem to bring in 10 times the readers

I'm expecting google to limp along with g+ until they finally work out it is a waste of time. We have 250,000 readers per month. Since we added the g+ buttons, we've had maybe 2 million visitors, yet only 600 unique visitors have clicked the g+ buttons.

Google WMT says we have too little engagement to show stats So either this means our site is worthless and the 250,000 readers hate what we're doing, or g+ is only for geeks like Robert Scoble.

I have connected with some good people there, but getting interaction is hard. If you go look at what other people are posting, their g+ area is a wasteland, even if they have some god stuff. I do go and read and interact with others.

I'm not giving up on it yet, but then I didn't give up on gbuzz and they canned that.

I was really expecting to add 20-50% to our readership, so 0.0001% doesnt cut it.

The upside of google+ is the profile. I definitely think the rel author has value.

Google is definitely trying hard and putting big resources into g+ but it looks like a miserable failure to me, and that makes me happy, because if they can't get social working, with all of their money and resources, it tells me a couple of things. A) google really don't understand social B) the people who are making a success of social really do understand it C) people who have tried social and failed are no worse than google - it isn't easy D) when I said google doesn't understand my business yet they are telling me what to do, maybe I was right E) PhDs often have no common sense, no matter how brilliant they are in other areas

[Daylan]

Just going to echo Mcarle as far as photographers go.

A friend of mine is a great photogrpher but it's not since interacting with other photgraphers - sharing, commenting and being shared amongst influential circles has work really started to come his way.

Majority of the 'Hot on Google' posts i see in my feed are photography based posts too. The exposure is massive, but just like search you need to have the good content to make a dent. I love that there is little to no posts with 'instagram' type photos and the ones that do float to the surface are outstanding.

[EGOL]

Thank you for sharing your experience in such detail.  It sounds like you have a great site.  Congratulations!

[EGOL]

Thank you!  

[OptimizeSmart]

How you can get ROI from Google+ when the target audience is not there? I work in the fashion and medical industry and no one is on Google+, at least not in that numbers where i can think of running a social media marketing campaign. Google+ is predominantly occupied by the tech industry. Period.

[SEOSHARK]

Hey guys/gals, my experience, is to often look, listen, learn, before I get invested. Yes even with Google.

Like facebook,. I have NEVER received a single lead or for that measure a client form social "ANYTHING"..

G+ works great for picking up ideas as does FB and twitter, but to actually bring on business..... Not here, and would never PAY for such an environment.

I get more from network blogs like this than G+

Tom

[Anthony_NorthSEO]

Great point Tom, and great handle.

While I've gotten a few leads from Facebook and Twitter, the true reason for my investing any time at all in those outlets is that potential customers often check these places to validate the popularity, or even the success of a business. If a fan page on Facebook has 4 likes, or a Twitter account has 17 followers, it's not a good signal to a potential customer, especially one researching web marketing providers.

The fact that Google now incorporates social metrics into their ranking algorithm also had some bearing on the energy and resources I've allocated to increase my company's presence on FB and Twitter.

The problem with Google+...

Nobody looks. Nobody cares. That's my experience.

I've invested a very little bit of time and money to add a few +1s to my website in order to increase the rankings, but that's it. I did see an improvement in rankings, and there wasn't much work involved at all, so I consider it a win.

The problem, in my opinion, is Google's almost Narcissistic approach to Google+. It's a Google product, so it matters. Why? Because Google says so.

I can't remember a platform that has had such little impact in the lives of real world users, yet such an effect on website rankings. Could be a good strategy on the part of Google, could fade away... we'll have to wait and see.

[SEOSHARK]

Thanks Anthony,

HEY,  "ANYBODY GOT A SOCIAL BUTTERFLY" they want to sell???? 

I get it that Google is "PROUD OF THEMSELVES" with G+, and really do get good stuff from a few GURU's. For example, Cutts cleared up his comment about targeting over optimized sites by saying "what I was trying to say was" we are going after spam.... well, hasn't he always gone after different levels of spam....

I had a social butterfly working for me for about 5 months, traffic went way up, conversions went down..

end thought........  I do agree that people do look at your social status before doing business with you....

As a thought, it is likely a GREAT idea to target your social content around the actual BUYER, Become and actually be an authority on your site and social..

Be yourself.... That's who the client is looking for..

Good stuff guys.

Any good feeds on what Google is up to NOW..??

Tom

[JamesNorquay]

I think the best areas working for Google+ from my experience are people in the IT and Photography, yet I see an uplift in some work we do from a fashion front on the site.

But if you want an example of real world engagement look at H&M, they always have fashion fans on the G+ page, sure they do not have crazy numbers but it is enough for me to say hey this is interesting.

That been said I would not invest all my time into Google+ I would use it as a top 5 social sites strategy and put a few hours each month into it, and post content every 2 days from your brand.

[kbloemendaal]

I see this A LOT lately, and I have been using Plus since it started in beta.

You get what you put in to it. Period. If you only use it as a "megaphone" to self promote, who cares. If you use it like any other social network (to network and share) you will get something out of it.

Most of the people I see that say they don't get anything out of it, don't try. If you opened a Twitter account, followed 10 people, then sat and looked at it.... only sending out links to your own crappy content, you will get the same results.

I have found that by sharing content, videos, images, etc... and actually engaging with people like you would on FB or Twitter, you get more out of it.

That being said, Google has made it very difficult to get people to circle business pages, so I have learned a trick or 2 to help expedite that. I have a local home builder page that has over 300 people that has circled them, while our FB page only has 130 fans for the same builder. And yes, I have seen it help the SERP's.

We share industry related articles, cool architecture images, and add in a little of our own stuff for that builder, and we are starting to see some traction.

Bottom line, you get what you put in it. I am seeing local groups forming to work together to help promote each other, etc...

Still a very young network. Remember, you can't automate "social".... (not that that was question at hand, just like to remind people social isn't a "set it and forget it" metric in marketing)

[sansonj]

Google+ Facebook, Twitter, and the list goes on. They are social viruses. They bog you down thinking you will get something out of nothing, and you miss things that actually give you real ROI. I do not know how old you are, but back in the days the hot thing were these live chat rooms like a craigslist in away- real time micro post going on and you go go PM somebody. These were in like MSN or Yahoo or somewhere. Great place to meet the ladies back in the day. Then it eventually migrated to MySpace then Facebook (where 1:3 people state they are board with it) to something new and just straight up wasting your time. Speaking of Facebook I look at it and say really? Where is the value. Then I ask my kids where is the true value in facebook, and nobody has the answer- then bamb it goes IPO and fools buy it. Just make sure you are not buying into anything with social media outside of keeping a super clean image for business reviews.

[sansonj]

Time requires energy, time is money, etc, so what is your true ROI on this. How does it impact your bottom line? You are right it is not set it and forget it, but is it truly the most profitable thing you can do with your time.  I would not waste a single penny on twitter, google+ facebook, etc. However, I do enjoy social places (Not social Media) like www.cre8asiteforums.com here I can give and get, and network for a niche thing or things I need and can hopefully give. All social media will eventually die. I love Chevy, I love Pepsi, and the list goes on, but I am not chilling in their social media areas. Those are giants, so a spending less than .0001% of their money there.

[sansonj]

Where are really any of them in any true form of social media?

[sansonj]

Being social online takes a huge amount of time.