Internet Marketing Opportunities Available on Google Plus - Case Study Example

Internet Marketing Opportunities Available on Google Plus Introduction Google Plus is a social network operated by Google that was launched in June, 2011. This interactive online communication feature exhibits integration across a number of Google products including Profile and Buzz. A key element of Google Plus is its strong focus on targeted sharing within subsets of a user’s social group. These social groups are called Circles and represent small groups of people that Google Plus users can share with such as family members, workmates and colleagues. In addition, Google Plus has a specific section for viewing, editing and managing multimedia. For instance, a photo tap on the Google Plus user interface takes a user to all the photos they have shared and the ones they have been tagged in. Google Plus also includes privacy options and sharing features. This way, Google Plus offers opportunities for online marketing as companies can capitalize on the multimedia capability to market products. Another unique feature of Google Plus that is widely used is Hangouts. This feature enables group chatting and communication in a video chat room. Among the early adopters of Google Plus as a means of online marketing were social media sites as well as various SEOs. What is more intriguing is how aggressive mainstream media have become to respond to this technology. For instance, journalists have found it easy to use the Hangout feature on Google Plus to test audience engagement to get a measurement of the value of their channels. The scalable integration of Google Plus with other features of Google allows for many and unlimited ways to expand user base. Although Google Plus still has to resolve the issue of having multiple accounts for various services, the service still poses questions to brand marketers on what it means as anew tool for online marketing. Currently, a small percentage of customers from each Google product is converted but the total sum of these customers might be big enough to pose sizeable competition to established social sites such as Facebook and Twitter in the next few years. This thought is validated by the fact that an adoption rate of 10 million was recorded within the first two weeks of its launch. Internet Marketing Opportunities Available on Google Plus Google Plus has emerged as a service for online users who are searching for different materials, information and products available. The most important feature with Google Plus is that it enables users to find results that have been recommended by specialists and experts. With Google Plus, online marketers can use the ‘Plus’ service to remain online or active all the time. This way, a vast number of online marketers can chat with their potential customers and see the activities of other people. Essentially, Google Plus is useful and effective for people who are doing online businesses and have their own websites. Using the Google Plus feature through one’s own website enables one to remain in close contact with other online dealers and customers. Since constant communication is the most important tool for increasing web traffic and the frequency of online activities, the Google Plus service can be used to increase traffic in online marketer’s corporate websites. Generally, the online marketing benefits of Google Plus are available to the people who want to increase the online rankings of their blogs and websites. These include businessmen who have online stores and websites and want to increase the sizes of their online markets. The most important online marketing available on Google Plus is that the feature can help with content marketing and distribution. Although distributing other businesses’ content is not a new idea for content marketers, Google Plus has become a revolutionary business sandbox where the ability to play nicely and support the business efforts of others pay long term dividends. By enabling sharing or distributing the contents of other business partners, Google Plus offers opportunities for industry influencers and even competitors to share the contents that other businesses create. This is more beneficial and cheaper than the traditional content sharing platform where users had to identify third-party content that was relevant to their specific target audiences (Eley & Tilley, 2012). Google Plus Sparks is perhaps one of the most important and coolest online marketing features that Google offers to content marketers. The innovative Google Plus Sparks provides users with an easy to use version of Google alerts which links directly to the user’s Google Plus dashboard. What makes this feature valuable to online marketers is that once the content is delivered as a result of entering a search, the user can easily share the content across their Google Plus Circles with just a single click. The feature does not require one to copy and paste or use a browser plug-in in order to share within their networks. Although there is room for Google Plus Sparks to grow with more and innovative enhancements, it is a pretty effective tool for online marketers who want to find their way around Boolean search operators (Eley & Tilley, 2012). Another important online marketing benefit of Google Plus is that it is effectively suitable for targeted messaging. The online marketing platform and its associated features have massive intent data and well advertised user base statistics which offers online marketers the exclusive opportunity of working from a powerful advertising platform. For instance, online marketers can use Google Plus circles to communicate about topics that are relevant to the custom segments within their circles. Moreover, online marketers can custom messages to their audiences without necessarily having to make selective messaging obvious. This way, marketers can influence the circles about their products (Eley & Tilley, 2012). Goggle Plus is mobile friendly and is already available on Android. There are plans to launch a Google Plus platform for use with iPhone and this will allow online marketers to engage with potential customers and audience outside the comfort of the desktop. The availability of Google Plus on mobile devices and its integrated web and search analytic tools offer opportunities for one to one engagement between online marketers and customers. As such, business people using the feature have unlimited opportunities to measure the attractiveness of their content across multiple dimensions (Eley & Tilley, 2012). For start up businesses or businesses that are making a debut to the world of online marketing, Google Plus offers unlimited opportunities for brand management. This is enhanced through Google Plus’ ability to offer features for company profiles and pages. Such features are necessary for public announcements, virtual conferences and for connecting potential customers without need for IT setup. The Google Plus feature can also be effective for product management. The online marketing platform allows online marketers to get in touch with the potential users of their products and collect feedback on the existing products and services using the Hangout functionality. The Hangout feature makes Google Plus a good feature to collect insights directly from customers on what is best for them. It also allows online marketers to capture body language and other clues from their conversations with the audience (Eley & Tilley, 2012). Although hangout is limited to 10 parties at a time, it still offers a quality focus group session through which marketers can enrich the audience’s meaning about the topic at hand. Google Plus has immense opportunities for online marketers to benefit their people search. This can be beneficial especially when the marketer is trying to get into a new area or finding and connecting to experts. In addition to enhancing search of people who have newly joined the network, Google Plus offers opportunities for marketers to find experts in various fields based on the provided statistics and the feature is poised to become a people search filter in the near future. Google Plus is excellent for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) marketing and allows users to connect to their accounts on other social websites. Most SEOs speculate that Google Plus statistics will factor in search engine visibility as much as the clicks to a user’s site from Google. This makes more sense with the recent launch of real time search engine feature of Google with its unlimited search capabilities. If a business writes about a product and is present on Google Plus, its corporate picture (logo) and name will show up next to the post in search results. This has huge potentials for influential experts to conduct more effective online marketing. The greatest weakness associated with marketing on Google Plus is the cluttered appearance of websites. Adverts that are messy and difficult to read and which present too much information simultaneously often turn off viewers (Eley & Tilley, 2012). Another downfall of marketing on Google Plus is that it is always not suitable for advertising all services and products. This may force some marketers and advertisers to find alternative methods for promoting their products. Google plus however is good at targeting specific niche audiences and communities. The promotion and sale of night venues and music can be successfully advertised through Google Plus. This is because these products can be targeted at specific audiences and age groups. A common problem with online advertising is that because of the large number of SPAMs and unsolicited emails, users may find difficulties distinguishing between genuine adverts and false adverts. This brings into question the trustworthiness of online adverts and is one of the reasons why it may take long for many people to develop full confidence on Google Plus as a medium of advertisement. While Google Plus has the potential to showcase innovative marketing strategies, most businesses have not harnessed this opportunity because majority of online marketers are displaying the traditional marketing strategies on the online platform (Eley & Tilley, 2012). Conclusion Google Plus has come about as a new social media place for businesses and individuals to share their lives with people around them. Although social websites sites such as Facebook and Twitter are well known to users having taken to the stage a little bit early, Google Plus’ innovative products have come into the spotlight as a new way to communicate and share information with people all around the world. The Google Plus interface is very different from those of other social sites and gives users exclusive opportunities that cannot be found on other social websites. This has intrigued the online marketing community, thereby making the growth prospects of Google Plus to soar up. An interesting thing is that companies are already giving Google Plus marketing tips as a way to help businesses get going. Apart from the new interface and other options available on Google Plus, there are important features that make businesses to choose to add their profiles to Google Plus. Already, many businesses use Google as a tool to market products and services to their potential online clients and it is for this reason that Google Plus has been created as a tool to help businesses communicate better with their customers. The online marketing tips offered by Google Plus can be helpful especially for start-up businesses especially those that have decided to use the online marketing avenue. Although established social websites such as Facebook may currently be the largest realm of online marketing, thee are huge potentials for Google Plus to develop into a world class online marketing platform and therefore it would be beneficial for companies to take advantage of it as soon as possible. There are many simple things that companies can do ensure that their connection on Google Plus remains strong. First, it is important to set up a strong profile. A weak business profile or one that misses some features will get less people interested in seeing who the online marketer is and what they have to offer. It is therefore important for online marketers to have pictures that identify their businesses with the audience. Essentially adverts on Google Plus need to be long enough to include all relevant information that effectively captures the attention of potential customers. Second, it can be beneficial for Google Plus marketers to use SEOs to optimize searches for their information. This will involve the online marketing company using its terms and unique information to encourage more users to visit the website. Thirdly and the most important thing about Google Plus marketing is for marketers to communicate. It is advisable for marketers to use comments and share options to their advantage and hence build strong relationships. Instead of just putting comments or posts for others to read, marketers can do better by commenting on other people’s posts and keeping them informed about the news of their industry. Instead of letting conversations be one sided, the Google plus feature allows marketers to talk to a large audience and the audience to talk back. References Eley, B and Tilley, S 2012, Online Marketing Inside Out, Accessed 9th August 9, 2012 at http://dualibra.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/ONLINE-Marketing.pdf. Read More