The first things I should mention is that ever since signing up for the Google+ beta I have seen my profile at #1 position in Google whilst logged in with a little “edit profile” link as seen below. Whilst this can be handy it’s not really a game changer as I’m the only one seeing it (until now!).

Straight after getting my Google+ alert I ran over to search my name in non cookied browser to see if the first page situation had changed at all. Not only had it changed but I found the following listing at the bottom of the first page (where Google is sometimes known to show social content).

Whether or not this will stay is yet to be seen but it does have big implications for those hoping to optimize their Google+ listing. Here is what the listing listing currently contains:

• Full Name – Google Profile
• https://plus.google.com/117893476287021965250
• Location – Job Title at Company Name
• First 64 characters of your profile headline including spaces wrapped in quotation marks
• First 71 characters of your introduction including spaces
• 17 character keyword link to first URL in your profile
• 14 character keyword link to second URL in your profile
• 18 character keyword link to third URL in your profile

Now the as a marketer the first thing you probably going to be inclined to change are the profile links. When you look at my my breakdown above you might be wondering why the keyword links are at such odd character counts. From a quick analysis of the three links it looks like Google are allowing the first 14 characters of a link except where the fourteenth character forms part of another word which is being shown whole pushing the character amount up slightly.

The next thing Google+ listing inspired me to change was both my headline and introduction text. I realised that the headline was almost an exact copy of my job title and instead crafted the headline and introduction text to create a more descriptive and hopefully engaging flow within the Google listing whilst still retaining their own independence on my Google profile.

After hitting the save button on my profile edit I hoped that somehow I’d landed on a magic solution to instant links in Google… Crazy wishing aside it appears that even my Google profile will have to wait to be crawled again for my listing to be be updated. With the profile only just being listed I will have to wait and see how long it takes for a refresh but I’ll be sure to update on this blog when it does.

Whilst I’ve researched as much as I can with the data I have available I’d be interested to hear your experiences with the Google+ listing appearing in the SERPs. Have you been listed yet and if so what steps are you taking to optimise your Google profile?

Whilst you are logged in to a Google account there is a new feature named SearchWiki, where you now have the option to remove a listing from your results or promote it to the top of your page. If you own or run a website you were probably asking the same question as I was “Will SearchWiki have an effect on SEO and my websites ranking?”.

For the moment at least you can sit back and play around with this feature to your hearts content. Google has stated “The changes you make only affect your own searches.” Anything you do at the moment will only effect the way that you are provided your results. Having said that with so much user generated input on websites that they may never have fully reviewed before it’s hard to see that this won’t eventually play at ;east some factor in search engine rankings.

The obvious things that will stand in the way of this ever being a completely trustworthy way to generate website feedback is the huge opportunity for Spammers. Less than honest webmasters could potentially manipulate search results hugely in their favour and even launch campaigns to crush their opponents.

Another thing to think about if you use AdWords is the potential knock-on effects for your website. If you are not generating great quality content for your users or providing relevant information on your websites you could get knocked from a lot of people’s search results. There is nothing that I’m aware of to stop Google in future using this information to decide on the charges and position of your AdWords Campaigns. After all the ultimate goal of any search engine is to keep their results relevant and therefore profitable.

In conclusion as long as you are providing great value through your website this should not effect you too much and probably won’t in the future. It’s just something to be aware of and can always be used to filter your own search results as long as you have a Google Account. Below I’ve attached the video from the SearchWiki Post on Google’s Blog so that you can take a look for yourself.

Whilst most of us wish this was the case, for good reason more often than not it will actually take a while for you to see the results from your SEO efforts. A recent article from SEOmoz reminds both the practitioners and executives that less haste, more speed is the key to successful SEO projects. In fact they continue to say that it is not uncommon for developments on your site to take 6 weeks or more before they fully start to come into play.

What does this mean for the impatient Internet Marketer that wants it all now?

Well the truth is, in this area patience really is a virtue. Just because you are not seeing great results for your organic listings within the first few days and weeks you should not give up hope. Even more important is that you don’t change something a week in because it doesn’t seem to be working.

You may have a great set up and it’s just taking a while for the collections of backlinks to build up and resgiter with the search engines. In addition you may even have to wait weeks just for the Search Engines to crawl your website and register the latest SEO updates that you’ve made on your website.

There are of course many factors that will influence your organic listings and how long it takes for changes to register. If you’d like to read their full article you can find it on the SEOmoz blog by following the link.