Google has recently launched Search Plus Your World, SPYW for short, and as we mentioned in our previous blog post it will likely have implications on Google search results. The big change is that searches now include personal content if you are logged into Google+. Results are tailored to the individual user based on several parameters.

One of these parameters is the social profile of your online contacts and friends and this is the most groundbreaking change and one that has left some people worried about whether Google will still be able to offer the most relevant results. But the opportunity, especially for small businesses, is to create content on their Google+ page that is relevant to their target audience and the possibility to compete more equally with big companies is definitely there.

It is still early days for SPYW and it is therefore difficult to judge its impact but it signals the start of a whole new kind of personalization of search results even though so far it is for Google+ content only. It is currently a problem for Google that most people still prefer Facebook and Twitter over Google+ and a migration is not, at least in the short term, on the horizon.

Still, Google seem positive about Google+ and although it is only supposed to be users of Google+ who will see their searches affected by the new changes, people in the SEO community fear that content from Google+ will carry more weight in regular searches as well. If the new changes start to seriously impact searches there is no good reason for hotels not to sign up and use it to improve search rankings on Google. The thing to remember is it still comes down to shareable, linkable and quality content and this should be your focus no matter the platform.If it turns out that Google is stacking the deck in favor of its own product and it becomes significant for regular searches it is important to be there from the beginning to build a community around your business by sharing your content there as well.