Facebook’s uniquitous Like button is almost ready to celebrate its first birthday. Yesterday, Google launched the “+ 1” button to search results in the U.S., bringing real time social recommendations to search results. Essentially, pressing the button on the Google search result is a way for users to vote for the search result. Unlike the earlier social search experiment run by Google, user recommendations will show up in the search results!
If you were Google, what would you do with such votes? If I were Google I’d have them play some roll in the ranking of search results.
Try Google +1 on your browser
Users with a Google account can turn on “+1″ in the Google Experimental settings for their account.
The new +1 button only applies to Google.com, not global domains that are forced on users browsers depending on where in the world they are located – ie: Google.ca. Depending on your country of origin, you’ll need to force Google to show the default U.S. domain in your browser. Try:http://www.google.com/ncr (ncr stands for no country redirect)
What +1 looks like
When your mouse hovers over the Plus one button it becomes a colourful icon that you click in order to make a recommendation. +1 users will also show up in the search results of people in their plus 1 network. When users like a search result, but are not in your search network, results will show the number of people who like the search result.
Users can even +1 Ads!
According to Search Engine Land the Plus One button will also show up in Google Adwords Advertising. Get the FAQ’s on this at Search Engine Land.
Here’s How Google explains +1.
Social Buttons everywhere!
Google will be rolling out +1 buttons for users to add to their websites soon! Sign up for an invitation to add Google’s button to your Website.
Stay tuned, it’s going to get very interesting for all of us on the social Web. Will +1 buttons have the same cachet that Facebook Like buttons do? Will users begin to get bored or overwhelmed with the plethora of choices awaiting them to like, +1 and tweet their favourite brands on the Web?
