Google Plus: A Marketing Triumph?

Google hasn’t had a quiet couple of months. From the latest Panda update, the SERP redesign and installation of the +1 button, the Googlers have been hard at work hunched over their keyboards. However, all of this pales in comparison to the launch of Google Plus, the social network that has enjoyed massive coverage over the past month on digital marketing sites like ours.

The internet titan had many of us in the digital industry fairly perplexed when it failed to deliver the PR storm we were waiting for. However, Larry Page and Co knew exactly what they were doing, beginning with a fizzle and ending with a deafening bang.

Their first and most brilliant move was to trickle invites into the hands of industry bods and those deemed worthy to have a first glimpse at Google’s creation. Predictably, the intertubes ignited with skepticism, what with Buzz and Wave being social flops. People asked whether Google could enter for another round in Facebook’s arena, but then the beta testers began to talk. Word was spreading and the wheels had begun to turn.

Google saw it. They knew that people would want what they couldn’t have and soon the populus craved their new social baby. Why spend millions on PR when you can use your customers to drum up interest for you? Eager early adopters waited anxiously for an invitation to drop into their inbox, like a horde of sales shoppers waiting for the shutters to ascend. Then when they finally managed to snag one, they talked about it, driving anticipation in others.

After a few weeks the site quickly topped 20 million users and people are now sharing one billion items every day, while the iPhone app shot to number one in the most downloaded chart. Granted, new statistics show a three per cent drop in traffic, which could be attributed to the fact that it is still in limited beta and the floodgates are yet to open. However, for the most part, Google Plus has been successful.

So what can we take from this looking through the glimmering prism of digital marketing?

1. People listen to other people, not big companies

Word of mouth can be a great way to get noticed, as long as it’s engineered correctly. It does help that Google is a globally renowned superpower, but the same principal could get your campaign off the ground through a grassroots social medium.

2. People want the unobtainable

Limited releases could be the way forward when it comes to things such as new networks and tools.

3. Listen to your audience

Google Plus was rife with bugs, loopholes and generally frustrating anomalies, but by allowing users to submit the aspects of the network that they liked and disliked, they were able to make some headway in addressing concerns. This is massively important if you want to maintain your customers, as it builds trust and trust is what wins the day.

Whether Google Plus will soar to the frosty heights of Facebook and Twitter remains to be seen, but it’s clear that the company is more focused than it’s ever been in grabbing a slice of that delicious social networking pie.

Source: http://www.epiphanysolutions.co.uk/blog/google-plus-a-marketing-triumph/