By In developing my piece on Google Authorship, and another one this week on niche networks, I needed a link for the words, “brand evangelist.” What happened in the next three minutes shocked me into writing this piece and made me extremely nervous that Google+ is going to influence influence marketing whether we want it to or not.
The steps that occurred are spelled out here carefully so you can follow along. See what you glean from what I did; do you come to the same conclusion, or not?
- My search for “brand evangelist” was returned by Google. I saw a series of Google Plussers who had written a post or piece published on Google+ featuring these key words.
- Each of the folks listed were mentioned with their Google Authorship profile. There was a photo as well as the number of people this person had in circles and the number of circles this person was in.
- I scrolled down page one of my search on Google to see if I recognized anyone.
- Way at bottom, I saw Mack Collier’s name although his Google Authorship information was not included because his post was pre-Google+.
- Because I didn’t recognize an author or publication (there were few), I looked more closely at each person’s Google+ profile seeking anything that would help me discern influence.
- I saw the quantity of circles each person was in; wouldn’t that mean something? The peep with the highest number of circles would supposedly be more influential, right? And knew what they were talking about? (Remember, this was happening over a minute to find one hyperlink.)
- I set out to select the link for the person with the most circles.
Inadvertently, I had just discerned that I would select a hyperlink using someone’s Google+ post content in my blog post based on the quantity of circles associated with that unknown person.
I am agog. I believe strongly that it’s never about quantity; it’s about quality!
I did the exact thing that people complain about Klout for; I associated influence scoring of my own creation and subconscious to determining strength of content and influence.
I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, if I had automatically begun to select someone from a Google search with the highest number of circles, then every other company would be doing the same without a shred of second thought.
What does this mean for how influencers are screened?
Anyone who understands what’s written above understands what I’m getting at…we can hide behind a Klout score because it’s not well-known as an influence metric.
When someone in business plugs in a key word or phrase and watches those with Google Authorship turned on scroll by, then the ones with the most circles wins, right? (Based on what I just experienced first hand, to my utter chagrin.)
One can only hope I’m wrong. Danny Brown, Sam Fiorella, Neal Schaffer? Can you weigh in on this, perhaps?
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Ah, we’re completely on the same page this week, miss:
https://influencemarketingbook.com/influence-authority-relevance/
While Google may say the Authorship is to improve content recognition across the web, I can’t help but feel it’s a much bigger play into making you their property and, if you’re not on Google, you’re not relevant.
We’ll see.
@Danny Brown It’s interesting – in Google’s mind they are giving you a search experience that will return results based on your own personal circles of influence. But, I think this just makes the echo chamber get that much louder. How do you find new voices? I think markwschaefer wrote about that awhile back.
I know I’m constantly turning off my personal results because I want to find “unfiltered” content that isn’t going to be in my sphere of influence. But, it makes me wonder how many other people do that.
@lauraclick @Danny Brown markwschaefer But, the people who appeared in my search for brand evangelist were NOT people within my circles, Laura. They were complete strangers. That’s what this is all about and why I’m reeling.
@Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing @lauraclick See, if it’s also strangers that are appearing, then that would suggest a bigger play by Google when it comes to search relevance and their ownership of you.
Fun times…
@Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing @Danny Brown markwschaefer Ah! Got it. I read that too quickly. I see what you mean.
@lauraclick That’s the thing – if I want to ask someone I trust for their opinion, I do that. I don’t (necessarily) need a search engine for that. Of course, there may be some things my friends are interested in that I didn’t know about, which makes this new search more relevant and useful.
But, yeah, Google seems to be throttling who’s seen and maybe even in a worse way than Facebook’s EdgeRank.
@Danny Brown Don’t get me wrong – I think seeing my G+ connections in results can be very useful. In fact, I like that a lot of the time – I would rather link/share/consume information from people I trust. But you’re right – how Google handles this does limit who is seen. I guess it’s going to get even harder and harder for the little guy to get heard!
@lauraclick @Danny Brown Not sure I agree, Laura. The little guy has benefitted huge from social media; playing field leveled and all that.
As per G+ authority (you can build Authorship rank, you can have circles and you can also be known well for a topic e.g. +Mark Traphagen.
There is so much opportunity for the small business; I’m very excited about the new potential Google+ brings. I’m not as knowledgeable as @Danny Brown by any stretch, so perhaps ignorance is naivete.
@Danny Brown @lauraclick Danny – help me see the evil in this play by Google please. What’s wrong with taking another signal to ensure you the content is they are placing on page one is written by a human in their system?
@Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing @Danny Brown I’ve not articulated myself very well today, have I?! I get your point about social media leveling the playing field, but your story illustrates that you chose to refer to people with the largest circles. In your story, it shows that now people have to keep up with G+ too to compete. That was where I was going with the little guy comment.
Your story shows that Google authorship and Google Plus can’t be ignored. Doing so means that YOU might get ignored (or buried or hidden in search results)!
@Sean McGinnis @lauraclick No-one said it was “evil”, mate – but, if what @Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing shared about the G+ users going to the fore of search results, that raises concerns.
Search should be the most relevant results for your term, not some user of your platform getting preference. If you start to lose online visibility because you don’t adhere to Google’s desire to be on G+, that’s poor form.
If it is true, this kind of approach would be investigated by the Monopolies Commission were it offline.
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be the #1, but not if it’s through unfair and uncompetitive advantage.
@Danny Brown @lauraclick @Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing I guess I don’t see it as anything more than what it is today – another signal. G wan;ts to promote content they are sure has value and taking into account WHO the author is, whether they write things that are widely shared and are widely connected themselves means some sort of tracking. Today that’s authorship. Tomorrow it might be that G can do that level of tracking without forcing membership in the G+ club (perhaps they could do that today and are forcing membership nonetheless – which seems to be related to your point).
I prefer to think of authorship as an improvement in the combat of spam. I sure wish it was easier to implement (but it is a hell of a lot easier than the video Jayme shared recently).
@Sean McGinnis @lauraclick @Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing It’s a signal that’s forcing “rules” upon you. Besides, there are multiple ways of combating spam without the need for Authorship by one entity.
@Danny Brown @lauraclick @Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing Every signal uses to determine rank “forces rules” on us – if we want to rank, that is. That’s the nature of selecting 10 winners from 200,000,000 documents that qualify for inclusion in the club based on the search terms.
@Sean McGinnis @lauraclick @Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing There’s a big difference between understanding SEO, Sean, and having to buy into a network you don’t want to be a part of.
@Danny Brown @lauraclick @Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing Very true. Was just addressing the kernel of your point above that G was forcing rules on us. They always do. It’s their search engine, They get to do with it whatever they want – including forcing us to give over information if we want to be considered for inclusion. 🙂
@Sean McGinnis @lauraclick @Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing And this is where the Monopolies Commission reference earlier comes in. Like you say, mate, it is their engine – but when that engine powers the world to the detriment of competitive fairness and consumer concern, then there’s a bigger issue at hand than just improving search and content spam.
I guess time will tell.
@Sean McGinnis @Danny Brown @lauraclick You have no idea, Sean. That video was the easiest solution to implementing Authorship on my blog. I read about 5 of the top links on “how to add G Auth to WordPress” and each post stopped short somehow. That video was the only one that helped with the actual code!
Remember, we who are ignorant of tech and back end haven’t a clue how to program WordPress. If I found it simple to follow and others did, too AND it was successful, then that’s what we had to use!
I am eager to see your easy solution; and happy to share it here, too. I always toil with programming my site and it has become a huge problem. Sigh.
If you’d be interested in writing a piece at your house, I will share it crazy.
@Danny Brown @Sean McGinnis @lauraclick Well said. I am worried about what I experienced ala the Klout thing — those seeking influencers will only look at the highest-number of circles instead of content.
@lauraclick @Danny Brown Yes, Laura…all of the latter.
I hope my story also shows I unintentionally paid attention to those with the most circles — human nature, right? The guy with more wins?
@Danny Brown Glad for your book/blog link here, Danny. I’m a tad overwhelmed with the implication of what I’m seeing. Others may not be so fortunate to know about this; building authority has never been so important.
Were you logged into Google at the time? I’m wondering if this happens whether or not you’re logged in. My guess is yes, but I’d love to know.
This certainly makes me think I should be more active on Google+! I guess all those early SM folks who tried to get as many followers and into as many circles as possible were on to something–even if it is kinda disgusting.
@Neicolec That’s why I did a jaw drop when this happened. Seriously.
I am always logged in. What I mentioned to @Danny Brown on Twitter today on this topic is that I’m going to need to do a search for my key words/services to see who is popping up with circles. Then, I’m going to need to go to work to beef up my brand and offering for those words and also continue to grow my circles.
What I won’t do, though is be a whore about it; I still have organic Twitter followers and have not been crazy on getting more. Seems, though, all bets are off; it’s totally a numbers game.
I think there is something ominous in this – Google has the highest market share of search by some way. Everyone that is using Google wants to see the most relevant and important results rank highest, NOT the ones that are the biggest slaves to Google. However, Bing, Blekko, et al are a counter-balance to this. I don’t think Google can afford to push their own agenda too hard or they will finish up losing users – if you do the same search in Bing or Blekko, are the results totally different? and better?
@HughAnderson Good point, Hugh. Need to go do the search in Bing (what’s Blekko?); however, can’t imagine any MS product is going to return Google Authorship profiles!!
@Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing I think that’s the point – Bing will return the most relevant results irrespective of Google Authorship, so unless you are looking for a specific author, this is probably a good thing. You should check out https://blekko.com – it’s an intelligent search engine that allows you to refine your search using hash-tags, e.g. “brand evangelist” /marketing should give you more marketing-related results.
Thanks for sharing this info, @Soulati | B2B Social Media Marketing – and great discussion in the comments.
My sense is that Google is currently experimenting with all of these different signals — the search algorithm, the personal results (based on who you’re connected to on G+), and now authorship. I have to believe that they will try to find a way to calibrate the engine that does *not* result in a rush to game the G+ system–they’ve worked too hard to eliminate SEO spammers from their search algorithm to let that happen. And if they really are going to filter results based on the nr of circles an author is in? A lot of really good quality content will get buried.
Still, like @HughAnderson and others here, I’m concerned about the power they have to force people who want their content to be found to change how they use their platform. Interesting times.
@tonia_ries @HughAnderson Tonia, good morning! Thanks for this insightful comment. We early adopters are seeing so many new shiny toys to play with, and one can only hope “the different signals” will eventually work in tandem to our advantage.
Google’s power has a maker and it is the universe of users. If we kick and scream all the way, they have to pay attention. (Ahem, … one can only hope!)
It’s pretty cool to see how Google moves the marketing world, the marketing world doesn’t move Google. If they make one change the followers change.