Wednesday Social Media Headlines from Google+ and Facebook

Sometimes we just can’t wait until Friday to share big social media headlines from the week. Today our office has been buzzing about the launch of Google+ Local Pages and a new monetization and reach paid strategy from Facebook that offers admins the chance to pay money to have a post pushed to more people.

• Official Google Blog - Local—now with a dash of Zagat and a sprinkle of Google+
• TIME Techland - Facebook Now Letting Users Pay to Promote Their Posts

Google+ may continue to feel like a ghost town, but the folks behind it will not back down to the critics. With the launch of Google+ Local, SEO teams are clearing their schedules to make sure keyword and optimization strategies take into account this powerful new aggregation tool. Business owners must, more than ever, pay close attention to consumer-driven reviews as Zagat is deeply integrated with the rank and scoring of local businesses, in addition to reviews from people in your circles.

Back in February, TechCrunch reported that only 16 percent of posts reach Facebook brand page followers. Ouch. Now TIME Techland is reporting (and we’ve seen the rollout on several pages we’re admins for, but not all) that you can pay a fee to have your status update post reach more people. For example, as an admin on the GroundFloor Media page, I can pay $5 to reach 500 of our 930 followers or $10 to reach 600 fans. A screenshot of this option is below.

It’s hard to tell this early in the game what investment in Facebook’s paid promotion option brands should be making, and what the ROI will be for those payments. But admins of brand pages should keep a close eye on the news from Facebook over the next few days, especially if they have a big promotional push coming up and limited budget to spread the word through other more traditional social advertising channels.

What else are you reading about these two announcements?

~Alexis