It’s Day 2 of Rankings Week, and I’m going to talk about something which is new but will undoubtedly help you rank in Google because it’s from the big G-men themselves. Google Plus 1 has been in the experimental stages for some time now but it’s finally available and in effect. Google Plus 1 is in many ways Google’s answer to Facebook’s “Like” feature; it’s their way of keeping up with the social search direction which search engines are taking.
How it works on the search engine level is that the Google Plus 1 button appears along every web page in the Google search results ONLY when you are signed in to a Google account. You can click on the plus 1 button is added to all web pages in the search results
Additionally, you can add the Google Plus 1 button to your website so that it appears on every post and page which you create. I recommend that you go ahead and do this because you’ll accumulate many more pluses this way.
Think about it, if someone sees your web page in the SERPs, they’re not going to give you a plus before they read your content. And if they like your content and you don’t have the plus button installed on your page, they’re likely not going to click the back button on their web browser so they can give your page a plus back in the SERPs. They’re going to give you the plus after reading your content, so your plus button should be visible ideally at the bottom of your post/page or at the top.
Furthermore, don’t forget about all of the people who don’t find your web page/post through the search engines. What if they get redirected through a link from a referring site? In this case you definitely need that Google Plus 1 button on your individual page.
There are two obvious benefits of the Google Plus 1 button. One is that it will boost your rankings (assuming you have received pluses) as Google sees this as firsthand proof that a real and actual person has given a personal thumbs up approval of your content, thus making their job in determining what web pages should rank well for keywords that much easier. Keep in mind that while this is important, it’s still just another piece of their multiple piece pie which is their ranking algorithm.
Secondly is that it will boost your traffic. Social proof can motivate people to check out a web page online, and the beauty of Google Plus 1 (especially while it’s still in the early stages) is that not many people are using it effectively yet, so even just a few pluses of your web page can persuade someone to check out your web page, especially next to another web page on the same content which does not have any pluses.
How to Install Google Plus 1
It’s very easy to add the Google Plus 1 button to your page. You can check out Google’s page on it, or if you’re using WordPress then you can just use one of the many plugins for adding it to your site which is what I do. I just added this plugin/button to my site, so I don’t have enough experience with the particular plugin which I’m using to recommend it to you all or not, but just do a search for “Google Plus 1” from your plugins tab and you’ll find a number of free options which will make it simple to add it to your site.