So, Google's +1 button has been around for some time now and, while many sites have integrated it, there are still a surprising number sitting with just the traditional Like and Twitter buttons. My company, Stinkyink.com, is one of them, and this is a decision we have made by choice not negligence. So let me outline below the main points of Google +1, and why we're still not taking it on board.
+1'd to #1
The first and obvious reason to get on the +1 bandwagon is Google's statement last month that +1's will start to have an impact on search results. Google themselves said that they'd be "starting small" with any changes and went on to say that "There are more than 200 signals that we use to determine the rank of a website."
Further Google would be in hot legal water if they did implement a significant boost to non-personalised organic search results from their own services, just look at the hassle they've received over the past few months about Adwords/AdSense customers getting preferential treatment.
At the moment I consider this to have very little strength, I'm sure it will build but at present I wouldn't give this aspect of the discussion much weight.
Visibility
+1'd content does gain a couple of visibility advantages that other content lacks.
Last month pages that were +1'd also began to be shared on Google+, pushing those pages out to any contacts in a manner similar to the Facebook and Twitter exposure we're already well used to.
Each profile on Google+ also shows a list of the content they've recommended (although they can choose to make it private). So a friend checking out what I've recommended may find a number of my articles and choose to read them.
The biggest boost to visibility, and a step away from competing for the #1 slot on the SERP is the function that shows contacts who have already +1'd content on a results page. Seeing a close friend recommending a site is almost certain to increase chances of a users clicking through.
This is the largest positive impact I can see currently for +1's and unfortunately it's hard to measure, did a user click a link because it had a friends name under it or would they have done it anyway?
Between these two arguments we were actually really interested in implementing +1. We happily began planning to implement it ASAP, building a fan-base and backlog of +1'd content before our competitors. Hopefully giving us the edge as +1 is granted more and more influence over searches and the Google+ network expands. Unfortunately Google themselves have thrown a spanner in the works.
Speed
Another factor that held huge sway with us was the speed impact of placing the +1 button on our pages. Nowadays in the cut-throat world of Google results pages there are countless factors that impact ranking. Page speed is seen as one of the bigger ones (or at least one of the largest a webmaster has some control of).
When the button first appeared we started a site-wide test on it's impact on speed. Shockingly we encountered a huge speed impact, with an additional load time of 1 second on any page that had the +1 button! To put this in perspective, a solid target for a website loading is under 4 seconds, so that's 25% taken for Google +1.
It didn't seem worthwhile for us to take such a hit for an almost imperceptible gain. I'm aware that Google has since released patches to the +1 button code to optimise it but currently we don't have the time to run another test.
As a retail business this is the biggest concern to us, the loss of even a couple of places across our long-tail keywords could translate into thousands of lost sales.
Use for business
Google has taken a stance that businesses aren't able to join Google+ and as a result cannot +1 content. My entire office uses google docs and as such always have to be signed in to a Google account that is not permitted to +1.
Although several of us have Google+ accounts we're not able to easily shift between personal and business. This makes recommendations of any content tricky and tends to waste time.
Though I can understand this from a spam-limiting sense, as the likelihood of +1 manipulation from companies with large staff numbers is quite high, it's still quite frustrating where your Google account is also your Google Business Account.
To be fair to them, Google have announced they are working on improving this for Businesses, and it's intriguing to see where they go with it to resolve the Gaming potential whilst also making it easier for legitimate businesses to use. The jury is out, but as yet it's something holding us back.
Clutter
The last aspect of +1 is visitor perception. We already have Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and Stumbleupon buttons above all our content. It gets to a point where a visitor will just shut off - the more buttons the less likely it is that someone will click them all.
This led us to elect to focus our energies into the ones with the largest populations of active users. Most people have a Facebook account (750 Million), fewer have a twitter (200 Million) but Google+ is a new service, very few actual people outside the SEO community have access to it.
Not only does this limit the outreach potential of the +1 but it makes it more likely that a user won't hit +1 simply because they're the first.
With the growth rate Google+ is showing it won't be long until it becomes a Social Signal of huge importance, creating the necessary 3 sharing buttons of Like, Tweet and +1, and we did consider implementing it for early growth. However the limitations on our personal use and speed impact on the website, meant that this clutter issue is one we are choosing not to address yet.
Overall the benefits seem small currently and the risks have real consequences. But technology is constantly evolving, Google is making advancements and I'm sure it will keep pushing Google+ and it's +1. We're happy to change as well and in the next couple of months we'll be re-evaluating our choice. I'm still interested to find out how many people will actually +1 some Epson Ink Cartridges.
I know that the admins on SocialMediaToday have also elected to avoid implementing it (at least for the moment) so I'm glad to be in good company.
Have you had to make the +1 choice too, or seen similar speed impacts or other performance affects? Comment below and see if anyone else has experienced the same.