So just a few moments ago, Google announced that they were opening up Google+ pages for businesses - one might say a direct competitor for Facebook Pages.

Finally, something to get slightly excited about! I did a bit of searching (OK I'll say googling!) to find out how I can create a Google+ page for Virya Technologies, but it seems they haven't quite got around to publicising this yet.

It's open ... but not for you!

Perhaps the reason for that is that they've only allowed 20 pages thus far and they haven't opened up the system to the rest of the world at large.

According to the information on the official Google blog, you will be able to sign up at http://plus.google.com/pages/create at some point in the future, but no suggestion as to whether this is likely to be a few days, a few weeks, a few months ... let's just hope it's not as long as Google Apps users have been waiting to use Google+ :)

Direct connect - a new way of reaching your target audience

Another funky thing which is coming up is the Direct Connect feature. This basically means that as well as Google+ Business pages being indexed by Google, if you want to connect to a particular business - perhaps your favourite band or a local business - on Google+, you just need to put a plus sign in front of their name and it'll connect you directly with their Google+ page - e.g. +Google allowing you to add the page to your circles.

So where do we go from here?

The only thing to do is wait until Google decide to open up their Google+ Business Pages to the rest of the world. Speculation is rife about when this will be - but hopefully soon!

Follow me on Google+ here

Update:

07/11/11 1900hrs Here's a great link which takes you through some of the ways in which you might consider using your Google+ page (when you get one!) http://adwords.blogspot.com/2011/11/get-closer-to-your-customers-with.html

07/11/11 2100hrs Want to get involved, suggest features and find out what's new? Join the group here: https://groups.google.com/a/googleproductforums.com/forum/#!forum/pages-discuss

07/11/11 2130hrs We have a Google+ Page!

Virya Technologies
on Google+