GOOGLE + NOW OPEN FOR BUSINESSES

Finally, Google is now allowing businesses, brands and any non-human entity to participate in its Google+ social network, through new Google+ Pages. Beginning today, and rolling out over the next two days, businesses will be able to create Google+ pages for themselves, using the Create A Page tool (and assuming you already have a regular Google+ account). once you gain access, you’ll be asked to create a page in one of five categories:

• Local Business or Place
• Product or Brand
• Company, Institution or Organization
• Arts, Entertainment or Sports
• Other

At first, whoever creates the page initially will also be the page administrator. No one else will be able to admin that page after them, at first. Nor can that page be transferred to someone else. Multiple administrator support is promised in the near future, but until it arrives, it seems important that if your company has a social media manager, that person should be the one to create the account.

Unlike Facebook, there aren’t “vanity” URLs yet available that use a business name rather than a long string of number. The same issue is true of personal accounts. Google provided no update on when this might change. Don’t like the name of your page? Unlike with Facebook, you can change that at any time. However, if you have verified status, doing this will cause you to lose verification, requiring that process to start again