Google Launches +1 to Challenge Facebook’s Growing Influence!

Almost any page I visit online now a days, I come across three buttons on every page. These buttons are retweet, FB Like and FB share buttons. This proves how traffic on the internet has also become social and is not just controlled totally by search algorithms.

This meant people were now discovering new content thanks to their friends on social networks and not necessarily through search results. Google had announced that it will have some sort of a social layer on all its products. Today Google unveiled +1 feature which is very similar to Facebook’s “Like” feature.

Try out Google’s +1 with your search results

• Sign –in to your Google account while using Google search
• Now visit http://www.google.com/experimental/ and click on “Join this experiment” for +1 button.
• This will start showing search results on Google with the option to click on +1 (see image).

• The links you select as +1 will show up even in your Google profile.

Here is the video that explains Google +1:

Future plans for Google’s +1

• Google will soon start allowing web-pages to add a +1 button so that people can click on this button.
• This will mean +1 will become a rival of Facebook’s “Like” button.

This is the first time I feel Google is really taking “social” seriously. Only time will tell if Google has hit a jackpot or if it has hit a dud like it did with Google Buzz.

Do try out Google +1 and let me know your views and opinions. Do drop in your comments.

Link: Google +1 Button