November 9, 2011 | 9 Comments

Chill. Google Plus Isn’t Killing Facebook Fan Pages Yet.

I know, everyone’s really excited that Google Plus now has pages for businesses. I was among the first to run to the site and establish my page. I had a few issues, but all in all it’s definitely a cool experience. (If anyone is having issues switching between page and profile this article will help).

Facebook Needn’t Worry For Now…

As nifty as it is that Google is getting into the social game, I don’t think Facebook needs to shake in their boots. Not for a little while yet. Why?

My Dad isn’t on Google plus, and my guess is, neither is yours.

Or, for that matter, very many “average” people over the age of 40. I say average in the sense of “not particularly social media savvy.” You know, the ones who use Facebook to connect with friends, look at pictures of their family, and get news from some of their favorite brands. These are the people that lots of companies are trying to market to. And they can’t market to people who aren’t on a platform…

Currently, there’s really just four types of businesses who will get viable leads from having a Google Plus business page:

1. You sell something to Social Media enthusiasts

2. You are a B2B (business to business) company

3. You sell something to tech geeks

4. You’re a news source

I’m not saying this will be that way forever, but if I were running the marketing of a company, I would focus more of my dollars on developing a Facebook presence for the “everyone else” and a Twitter presence for the customer support experience. Even my Dad is starting to realize that he can get a quicker answer from @askamex than he can from waiting on the phone for 25 minutes. Google Plus has a lot of potential, but they have yet to open their API properly, get third party apps like MarketMeSuite and Hootsuite to include them as part of the mix. It’s not even part of Klout yet. There’s still a ways to go…

Create a presence, but don’t expect leads…

There will come a time that Gplus is integrated into all the tools you use, I think it’s a good idea to grab your Gplus page, post on it, and get comfortable with it, sure. But as someone who has run a couple of small businesses, the only thing that matters in the end is can you convert leads?

Just focus on places that you can improve your bottom line for now and think about it. Is your customer savvy enough to be on Google Plus yet?

Tags: featured, google plus brand page, google plus fan page, google plus pages

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http://keithbloemendaal.me Keith Bloemendaal

It really isn’t even in the same category, I wouldn’t discount the value of it though, especially in the search realm….
- http://wearesocialpeople.com Tammy Kahn Fennell
  
  Yeah, I agree… there is value. I’ve just been reading a load of stuff this morning “Google Plus will Crush Fanpages” etc so I decided it was time to reply
http://www.oursocialtimes.com/ Luke Brynley-Jones

OK – you goaded me into a return comment… With my post (5 Reasons to Ditch Facebook and Switch to Google+ Pages) I was really just giving 5 reasons. Whether or not those reasons are strong enough to get you to switch depends on your own circumstances. Nice counter post though.
- http://wearesocialpeople.com Tammy Kahn Fennell
  
  Hey Luke!
  Oh it wasn’t a counter post! Just happened to publish it before reading yours. Great minds think…differently? lol
  
  I do agree, there’s a lot of reasons to want to gravitate toward google plus, but until i see some mainstream adoption, and opening of the api, etc, I just think “be there” but don’t put a whole lot of effort…
  
  BTW if anyone wants to read luke’s post it’s here:
  http://oursocialtimes.com/index.php/2011/11/5-reasons-to-ditch-facebook-and-start-using-google-pages/
  - http://twitter.com/digitaliprod Digital I
    
    I don’t think it’s a matter of ditching any of them. That’s kind of like saying you’ll ditch advertising on one TV network or another (and remember here in the states we generally have 3-4 over the air channels). True one of the channels may not be your prime market, but if you’re smart about your budget and expectations, you can still benefit from a presence. Same thing is true for the social networks.
    
    It’s great that products like MarketMeSuite allow us to manage it from a central location, because otherwise the resource drain can be staggering. I look forward to G+ opening themselves to a third party client/dashboard market, but I suspect they are a) trying to make sure the thing works reliably as they envision it and b) trying to reach a critical mass of users to make the additional overhead of supporting a developer base worth the cost.
Akronsound

Thanks for the great article…I share exactly the same thoughts. If I may add Market Share is another reason Google + won’t make it ATM vs Facebook.

I wrote a detailed blog about it here: atladasmedia.wordpress.com

From my experience so far people can get very passionate about Google+ and opinions differ as to if it is a social media platform or not.
Harald Walker

The majority of “average” people over the age of 40 that I know neither use Facebook nor Google+. If they are online at all, they use email, visit some web-pages and maybe use something like Flickr or Picasa to share images with their family.
http://twitter.com/akronsound Yiannis Gedeon

Hi harald, quiet interesting as demographics show that generation Y has a huge presence on Facebook, something that caught me by surprise as well as people I have done social media training for.

I read 2 articles by Bundlepost that state why Google+ can not compete Facebook or affect social media performace atm.

I did a detailed blog about those POV here http://www.atladasmedia.co.uk/blog/114-why-google-plus-business-edition-wont-impact-your-social-media-performance and u can find the links on his article as well.

While we can not write off Google as you do not know what they plan to do (thus it will make us look naive stating at this point that they are doomed), atm they can not compete. Also I had a lot of people telling me that Google is not aiming to compete facebook with Google+, mostly from people who defende the product. My answer was: download the Iphone app of Google plus. Open it and tell me what do you see. Oh yes they do try to get shares.
http://www.promodirect.com/ Corporate Gifts

Recently Google
launched their Brand Page, which will help bring more people on Google+.
Companies can do live video chats with their customers through the Brand
Page. Google is working towards having multiple admins on the Brand Page,
somewhat like Facebook, who will maintain and control the page. From a
business point of view, Google Plus pages are more effective and can easily
promote brands.This is because even people outside of your
“circles” can view the Brand Page. The Brand Page also has an
upperhand as one has access to Google’s other sevices and tools, like search
engine, documents, Google Maps, shopping, videos, news, places, etc. With
these advantages it certainly looks as though Google Plus is gonna win the
race in the coming years.

Regards,
Business Gifts