Is Google+ Essential For SEO & SEM

The fact remains that Google gives businesses and sites plenty of tools and resources where you can actually use Google’s own search results to your gain.

One example of this would be Google Places. It’s simply a great tool for consumers to find local businesses. How often do you use the phone book these days?

Another example would be YouTube. It may be hard to get your site to rank for certain keywords, but Google loves to put video results on page one when relevant, and Google just so happens to own the world’s biggest video site. Even if this means they’re technically ranking their own stuff for visibility, you can benefit from this by using YouTube and videos to promote your business.

I’m not going to go through all of these examples, but suffice it to say, you should be trying to be found in Google’s various other search engines, besides straight up Google Web Search. These can in turn get you found in results from regular searches via universal search.

Google+ has introduced a whole new realm of SEO possibilities based on getting found via Google’s own properties.


The +1 button obviously helps your search visibility cause. Google made it clear from the beginning that this would be a search signal. If enough people like your content enough to give it a +1, it must be good right? Why not bump it up in the rankings.

Google likes “freshness” now. Stuff that is recent can appear higher in rankings these days. Google+ updates tend to be recent, and can be very rich in content, depending on how much you put into them. They can also spark conversations and sharing, which should all help your cause.

Google+ is also what Google wants to replace Twitter with in realtime search. You can bet that this will come back sooner or later. Google is failing its mission in search without it.

One thing you will do well to keep in mind is that “Google+ is Google.” This is a mentality that Google has expressed on more than one occasion. If you’re ignoring Google+, you’re ignoring Google. Remember, if you want Google to RESPECT you (give you more search visibility), you should probably respect Google and the means you’re given. Google+ is only going to get more integrated with every aspect of Google.