Google Apps Coming To Google+ ‘Within Days’

Google+ SVP Vic Gundotra and Google Co-founder Sergey Brin took to the stage today at The Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco to talk about their new social network and what exactly they’re up to these days.

Among other things, Gundotra touched on the success Google+ has seen since its launch,most notably that users have uploaded 3.4 billion photos over the last 90 days — a statistic which “blew his mind”. Because of this early success, much of which was unexpected, Gundotra said, Google has been focusing on scaling the social network to make sure that it works for all of its users.

As a result, Google+ has so far lacked integration with Google Apps, a feature many users have been clamoring to see. According to the Google SVP, the company “thought it would have more time” before it hit a scale and popularity in which these kinds of additions would become necessary.

With 40 million users, Google+ is already there. Gundotra said that Google Apps support on Google+ would be arriving “imminently”, which he later clarified by saying “within a few days”.

At the same time, developers have also been waiting for Google+ to make its APIs available for use, and many have wondered why the company hasn’t released them as of yet. The SVP said that the Google+ team has been taking a “cautious approach” to APIs and, though it might annoy some, they would not be rushing their APIs to the public’s hands.

“When we release an API we want developers to have high confidence that they can depend on Google”, he said.

Also of note: A la Twitter, Google+ will (in the next few months) be rolling out support for pseudonyms and other forms of identity, Gundotra said today. Google+ initially only allowed users to sign up using their real names, but it will be adding features in the near future that support other forms of identity, specifically pseudonyms and nicknames.

While Google+ had early on resisted the appeal for support for alternative identities, it seems to have changed course, understanding that some people do, in fact, have legitimate reasons to choose not to use their real name. In my case, it’s to avoid revealing my superpower. I’m sure many others feel the same way.

Source: Media-business

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Google+: Is It Worth The Effort For Driving Traffic to Your Website?

You have just gotten used to Tweeting updates about your website, and Facebook has been a resource for years, but now Google has come out with Google Plus (G+ henceforth) and you are wondering if it is a useful property for future promotions.

The short answer is that every avenue is useful, but the cost versus time equation comes into play. There are a few ways of looking at the real meat of the problem, so let’s break it down as best as we can.

Every Avenue Is Useful

This piece of advice is worth saying more than once. If you are serious about wanting to drive traffic to your website, then it shouldn’t matter what the rate of promotion is, all avenues should be explored. You know the type of person that is sitting on the other side of that screen, and they are using all ends of social media, too.

The push of G+ at first has been like-minded individuals having conversations about things, over just sharing them. Being able to talk to your clients or viewers directly can give you a exceptional amount of insight into their needs and wants.

It’s Good To Be An Early Adopter

The internet moves fast. Faster than any metrics is really going to give you information on at times. In the last few months, people have been leaving Facebook. This doesn’t mean that the ship is dead, but it does mean that there is a slow movement away from their business practices. In the longterm, this means that people are going to have to find a new place to go.

G+ is most definitely one of the prospects, and is probably the number one option. By being there early and ready as people start to come in, you already will have a fanbase that is touting your brilliance. That makes it that much easier for people to find you when they show up later.

Functions & Features

Google makes it their job to be full of function. They want to be your all encompassing workstation, and they are well on their way. With G+ they are slowly integrating video chat, document sharing, shared graphical interaction, and tons of other potential ways that you can interact in a very personal way with your friends, fans, and clients. As G+ grows, they are only going to continue adding more integration to their other products. Every new way that sprouts up is a new way to introduce your content.

Whatever it is that your website provides to people, there is no reason to say no to a trend that has a bit of buzz about it. The worst you will lose is a little bit of your time, but even during that you might have made a few new fans or clients. Google has proven to be in the social media game for the long haul, and by investing your time into it, the return should become obvious. By giving your clients a new avenue to drive traffic to your website, your traffic can only increase. If your website is the product, social media is the billboard. Planting your message everywhere you can will always be the greatest form of advertising.

Source: Dailyseotip

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Google+ for the Enterprise – the breakthrough for Google Apps

It is a question often asked, how will Google Apps become significant in the Enterprise. Though there is a lot of talk about the cloud the traction of Google Apps and its main competitor Microsoft’s Office 365 in the enterprise segment is low. The most successful company in the enterprise cloud and with a lot of future potential is SalesForce.com. Their vision for the social enterprise as well as the established account base in the enterprise segment puts them in the pole position.

But Google could change that game significantly, fight SalesForce.com and leave Microsoft behind. The key is the SalesForce.com vision about the social enterprise. In both parts, the internal collaboration as well as the listening and reacting to customers through social channels, Google has the components to be successful.

Internal Collaboration

The world is changing. When I joined Microsoft in 2005 and they introduced me into IM I was completely surprised and discounted that as a tool for kids. I must admit I have been wrong and would not like to miss it at all nowadays. The means of collaboration do change. Mail will not go away so the mail component is still core to each enterprise collaboration offering. But there is more. Look at how social components take entry into enterprises. This is not only because the new means of “working together” are more efficient, it is also due to the simple fact that a generation of workforce is entering the companies that is simply used to these new ways. They would indeed claim that these ways are not new.

So how can Google attack this market? By enriching the Google Apps suite is my response. Imagine an encapsulated Google+ for the enterprise. Something that cannot be seen from the outside but applies the same benefits the public Google+ offering has. You can create circles, one for HR, one for colleagues you go to lunch with, one for company car users, job postings readers, etc whatever your role is. Based on this you can push information through Google+ for enterprise rather than stuffing their mailbox. Also the ability to choose different streams enables your employees to stay productive and manage their span of attention. Your employees could start hangouts and share information and all this in a highly integrated manner. The high level of integration in the cloud is what so far has been SalesForce.com’s advantage and is where Microsoft theoretically is great but fails as it is all components and not an integrated cloud offer. Mail will not go away but you would rather pick an email systems deeply embedded into your social enterprise infrastructure than a separate email system.

A cloud based social enterprise service will also help to establish global collaboration and communication infrastructures without a deployment of technology into subsidiaries across the globe. If you look at mobile applications for Google+ today you can see the potential to have these as a basic foundation for work of mobile workers. Integrate a Google Mail client into the same application and you have the employee one stop shop for collaboration.

Customer interaction

Independent of your target customer size, from a single consumer to large enterprises, the interaction through the internet is changing the relationships. It is the way you sense and respond that changes the customer relationship.

With its reference cases and the vision of combining CRM and listening channels to social networks. Salesorce.com is in a great position. But Google has a head start themselves, other than SalesForce.com Google operates the most promising social networking platform of the past years – Google+. The amount of users picking up Google+ and the speed in which this happens is enormous. This puts Google in the position to create an interaction between Google+ and “Google+ for the Enterprise”. As both are built on the same idea and profit from developments on either side the high level of integration is obvious. But also the user benefit of working in both worlds without having to change the interface is great. Imagine that you internal collaboration environment could be extended by external circles. You could create the listening channels and ensure that your customer interaction is highly improved. Would it hurt Google if they focus this on Google+ only or do they need a Facebook interface as well? Personally I would say focus on what you can do best and this is your own product range but for B2C Facebook still has a stake in the ground. Therefore an interface to Facebook would be a good decision also to compete head to head with SalesForce.com.

Google currently is working on the enterprise identities on Google+. So far there is no secret as you can see through the pilot pages, e.g. Ford Motor Company. But what really will be a game change would be the Google+ for the Enterprise. I would love to see that. Actually I believe so much in that idea that I would love to join Google to drive and push that business to enterprises across the world.

Source: Clouddiscussions

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