In August 2011, Google made an announcement that Google+ results would also be found in Google search results. This development has since changed the definition of what social media marketing used to be. Previously, there were very strong lines between social networking and search. With the blurring of these lines, things have become more complex, while the Internet landscape has improved altogether.
Google+ is basically Google's attempt at creating a social networking website, similar to Facebook. The main objective of this project is to get ahead of Facebook, both in terms of users as well as advertising revenues. Google has integrated many of its other successful products with Google Plus, some of which include Picasa, Gmail and Google Maps. This will enable users who have signed up with Google+ to share photos and other information from a single point.
The Plus profile of each user will be centred on the 'Stream', which is similar to Facebook's news feed, where one can view the latest actions/updates of one's friends. It will also include other features called Circles, Huddles, Hangouts and Sparks. About integrating Google+ posts with search engine results, Google says that only those people who are signed-in to Google+ will be able to view posts of their friends in Google search results. These posts only include those posts that have been shared publicly.
