Will your site be taking advantage?
It’s now official, the Google +1 button designed for websites will be officially released tomorrow. One of Google’s launch partners reportedly leaked news of the release to TechCrunch, who later confirmed that this is indeed true.
In a blog by Danny Sullivan made earlier today, it was confirmed that the +1 button will be available for all webmasters in a self-serve process. The +1 button will essentially work like the Facebook ‘like’ and Twitter ‘tweet’ buttons now ubiquitous across the web in terms of implementation. Webmasters will paste a simple code on their site (which appears to be a remotely hosted JavaScript, like AdSense), and the buttons will be served. Statistics of +1 activity will subsequently be available on Google’s website.
As of this time, what isn’t clear, is the total effect of +1’ing a web page. Last week, Matt Cutts confirmed that the +1 button will indeed play a role in future organic search results, so is no doubt a factor that SEO’s need to take notice of. Complimenting the release of social search, outlined in our last blog, we can be certain that some level of Facebook-like social sharing is imminent, while it’s effect on SEO as a whole will remain somewhat of a mystery for the time being.
Also unknown, is of course whether or others, such as Yahoo! and Bing, will follow suit, and just how far these 3rd party buttons are going to go.