@utags, please read the article for your answer.

But seriously, I think that's the only way. They have to have some way to kill Facebook, because I can't see both G+ and Facebook existing.

Unless, of course, G+ becomes more of a niche place, sort of like LinkedIn which seems to be more of a place you go to if you want to professionally network, especially in terms of getting a new job or hiring employees.

But as a general social network where college kids share their drunk photos...I don't think so.

What could Google do to make Google+ actually work?

Buy Facebook?

If nothing else, check out this post for the video at the end. Especially if you're someone who's having a bout of KloutRage due to Klout's recent changes!

The age old SEO question!

I think if you have a current client in a space, you probably shouldn't compete with them via another client. That said, there would be nothing wrong with charging your client more for this exclusivity.

You can get rankings into GA a whole lot easier by simply attaching your Google Webmaster Tools account to your Google Analytics account, and enabling it.

Sean, I don't believe that's what Google said.

I don't think we'll know the full impact until it all takes effect and we have enough data to see how much information we're now missing.

But to sum up my first thoughts/feelings after reading the announcement:

IT SUCKS!

@Ehomes, but does the page where your link will be on have a high PR?

After you read this post on how to email spam people, you might want to read about the legalities of the situation via this post as well.

It's not a marketing channel I use. I experimented with it a few times years ago, but it seemed that unless you were or knew a power digger, there was no value.

This article from Greg Sterling on SEL is a good recap of what happened at the Senate Hearings yesterday.

I find it interesting that Sen. Mike Lee professes his love of free market, yet wants to break up Google.

I'm with Todd on this one. I'm a firm believe in capitalism and survival of the fittest.

Whether what they're doing violates anti-trust laws or not, I don't know. But I guess that's what the trial with sort out.

Either that or it is an old extension that they no longer support, but this advertiser never removed it. There's nothing in their documentation about a subscription extension, nor is the Contact Form Extension seemed to be mentioned anymore.

Apparently, the subsription form does still work though.

Weird!

Certainly a step in the right direction. Thanks for letting us know of the update, Mike.

It's really unfathomable that they haven't done anything about this! I remember Mike posting about this at least a month ago.

Good question! I'll see if I can tell at all on my site. I typically only see the bullets for phrases that aren't all that highly searched upon, like SEO articles, so it might be difficult to measure. But I'll check. It's possible that that phrase and others get more search than I previously thought.

So wait, Doc...are you saying you only follow the 19 year old bikini wearers? :D

I rarely follow anyone back these days on Twitter if they simply follow me and don't interact with me. If they follow me and also interact with me, i.e., asking me SEO questions or mentioning an article they've read of mine, etc., I may check out their profile and follow back if what they typically tweet seems of interest to me.

I'll also often follow someone back if I've met them in real life, like at a conference. Or if I've participated in an online event with them.

For the rare ones I do follow back, it's usually because something they say has caught my eye, either because it's humorous, intelligent, thought provoking, controversial and/or relevant to me in some way or another.

For Facebook, I pretty much have to know them for real. And if I do friend someone on Facebook and I start to get messages about their scores on some quiz or they post those stupid "POST THIS ON YOUR STATUS IF YOU LOVE ME" things, then I'll unfriend them in a heartbeat. (I do keep a few of those who are family or somewhat closer real life friends, but they still annoy me!)

On G+ I'm mostly only circle people I know as well. Either from conferences, as clients, or from other social media.

SEO-wise, I've not found it to make a difference.

Something to consider these days is that direct referrals may appear to be lower with search referrals higher when it comes to brand terms these days. This is due to people using Google to easily get to sites they know about rather than bookmark or type them directly. Plus sometimes you just type the domain into the wrong browser box.

In other words, don't worry too much if your search traffic seems awful high, at least where branded terms are concerned.

I use them as a break from real work. Check them in the morning, do some work, take a break and check again...do some more work, etc.

At least that's the ideal! It really depends on how busy I am. If I'm in the middle of an important project, there are usually less breaks or they're very quick ones!

I have been keeping track of my time for all client work for many years, so I have a good idea of how long it takes me to do things for most projects. Since I'm a solo consultant, it's fairly easy to price things out based on that knowledge and the kind of profit I want to make on each project.

A few projects will take longer than I expect, but most go the other way so it balances out in the end.

For the most part, I don't price based on an hourly rate though, but more in what I think it is worth for the client.

What a shortsighted post. Twitter and Facebook are of course not a substitute for blogging. They are a means for promoting your blog (and other) content.

To give them up is to give up a potential source of highly targeted blog traffic.

Bet he gets back on one day if/when he realizes what he's missing in that respect.

Scary thought: What if Google starts to offer those sitelinks for non-branded terms for a fee?

I suppose they sort of do this already with sitelinks in Adwords. Watch them start to make those a lot larger.