Google+ Ranking Factors - Are Keywords meaningless ?

[ShivaS]

Hello Mozers!

On the Conversation Marketing blog, Ian Lurie published a lengthy article called Google Plus Box Ranking Factors Report. In it, he claimed amongst other things, that "Keyword relevance of your posts: Totally meaningless. Write whatever you want. Seriously. Just make it good."

What say you?

Are keywords really meaningless?

Thanks in advance!

[WrightIMC]

For Ian's study on Google Plus Box Ranking Factors - I agree, Keyword relevance is not a huge factor. Don't think it really needs to be, since the Plus Box seems to provide influential people on a broad subject/topic. However, I don't expect to see Madonna popping up for SEO in the Google Plus box anytime soon. I'm not exactly sure where Google is pulling the data to associate the influencer with a particular keyword/topic, but I'm sure it has something to do with search trends, engagement (+1s, posts, etc..) and a variety of other factors.

As for your question "Google+ Ranking Factors - Are Keywords meaningless." This would be a totally different story and I believe keyword relevance has to be an important factor.

[TalarMade]

I've seen examples that If you bold title posts like this it can appear in the personalized results for targeted keywords.

The most influential factors for appearing within the G+ Internal search are:

Personal Profiles - Keywords in Bio, Employment, Education; Account verification; Number of times you appear in other peoples circles

Brand Profiles - The number of times you appear in other peoples circles; brand verification & whether you have a the main keyword in the brand page name (although if this isn't consistent with your official website it jeopordises the brand verification with the rel=publisher coding)