Speed Up Your Google +1 Button on Squarespace

A few months ago Google rolled out the ability to add the Google +1 button to your blog as a part of their new social media strategy. In the time since, they updated the Google +1 button code to make it load 3x faster. No one wants slow code on their site, so today we look at how to upgrade the Google +1 button code on your Squarespace site.

Installing the Google +1 Button on Squarespace

I wrote a post on installing the Google +1 button on Squarespace within a week of the button launching. If you don't have it on your site yet, go there to learn how to add the code to your site, as I've revised it to reflect the new process.

Read on if you installed the Google +1 button code on your site between June 1 and today. We'll walk through how to make the upgrade from the slow code to the fast code.

Upgrading the Google +1 Button on Squarespace

Speeding up the Google + button is a simple process that involves removing some of the old code from your website header and putting some new code into your website footer. Let's get started.

First, access your Website Management menu and then your Website Settings. Then select Code Injection.

Look for the Google +1 button code snippet highlighted in the screenshot below and delete it from your Code Injection area. Save the changes to your site.

Next up, switch over to Structure Editing mode on your site.

Scroll down to the bottom of your website and enter select the edit website footer option.

Copy and paste the following code into your website footer and save your changes. That's all there is to the process. Enjoy the 3x faster Google +1 button!

<script type="text/javascript">

  (function() {

    var po = document.createElement('script'); po.type = 'text/javascript'; po.async = true;

    po.src = 'https://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js';

    var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(po, s);

  })();

</script>

<!--  Place this tag after the last plusone tag --><script type="text/javascript">  (function() {    var po = document.createElement('script'); po.type = 'text/javascript'; po.async = true;    po.src = 'https://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js';    var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(po, s);  })();</script>

How to Add the StumbleUpon Button to Squarespace

Helen and Graham have a Squarespace website, Obsessionistas, which features stories about collectors and their collections, ranging from insects in amber to airline sick bags. Helen wants to give their readers an easy way to share their posts on StumbleUpon by adding the badge/button to their blog posts.

StumbleUpon's 15 million users love sharing this type of website content, so it's no wonder why Helen wants to add the button to her site. To lend her a hand, today we'll take a look at how to add the StumbleUpon button to a Squarespace website.

What's StumbleUpon?

StumbleUpon is a social content discovery website. Simply press a button and you're presented with an interesting page on the web. You can like and dislike the pages you see, giving StumbleUpon more information on your preferences. As you do so, StumbleUpon gets better about showing you pages you'll like as you stumble along.

StumbleUpon introduces you to excellent new sources of information on the web as well as delightfully random content like what you'll find on Obsessionistas. With over a million visits a day, StumbleUpon is connecting web surfers everywhere with quality content like a man who collects pencil sharpeners.

Adding the StumbleUpon Badge to Squarespace

Adding the StumbleUpon badge/button to your Squarespace blog is easy and follows the same basic process as most other tutorials on Squarespace social buttons.

To start off, head over to the StumbleUpon badges creation page. Select the graphic you wish to display at the top or bottom of each blog post.

Select the graphic you wish you display on your blog template header/footer.

Next, type "%PERMALINK%" in the optional field made for blog entry permalinks. This is case-sensitive and can even fail if you copy/paste. By far, this is the step people most have trouble with. Make sure you've typed in the permalink exactly as it shows below.

Notice how the code changes as you add go through each step.Next, take the code provided by StumbleUpon and bring it on over to your Squarespace blog.

Navigate to your blog (Journal) main page and enter the Structure Editing mode.

Click the configure this page link to configure your blog.

Scroll down to the Post Display Configuration section and select an unused HTML Snippet (you may also add to an existing one) from the collection of Squarespace blog template elements.

Paste the StumbleUpon badge code into your Squarespace HTML snippet and click Hide & Save.

Finally, arrange your HTML snippet within the structure of your blog/journal configuration page and save your changes.

You should now see a StumbleUpon badge on each of your blog posts. Posts will display a count of stumbles on each blog post. Blog posts without stumbles will display "Submit" next to the StumbleUpon badge.

The whole process takes under five minutes and can be a great way to increase your blog's exposure to new visitors. Take some time to add the StumbleUpon button to your Squarespace website and start seeing new visitors as a result. 

(P.S. I wrote this tutorial because Helen asked via a comment in a previous post. If you have a tutorial you'd like me to write, just ask in the comments. Good luck Helen!)

Do Facebook and Twitter Endorse Black Hat SEO?

Black Hat SEO has become a hot topic in the last year within mainstream society. Stories about Overstock.com, J.C. Penney and others have further muddied the public's perception of search engine optimization as a respectable profession and legitimate way for companies to earn new business. And as social media continues to influence search results more and more, there are now two big players in social media who may be openly encouraging black hat SEO tactics. Specifically, it now appears that Facebook and Twitter may be endorsing black hat social SEO.

What is Black Hat SEO?

SEOs know that the most important factor in our profession has traditionally been the number of quality links from other pages on the web that point to our websites. Google sees links as votes, and rewards the most popular pages with the coveted spots in the top of the search results.

Black Hat SEOs have tactics that typically involve creating links (or votes) artificially as a way to trick Google's algorithms. Buying links is like buying votes in an election. It's easy to see how they would be considered artificial.

But other types of artificial links are less intuitive. Overstock.com didn't actually buy any links, but rather gave universities' students big product discounts that the colleges could post on their websites in the form of links to the Overstock product pages. Overstock gave college kids 30% discounts in return for nearly doubling their average monthly web traffic from around 10 million to 20 million visitors per month. Ultimately there was a quid pro quo, discounts for links, and Google stepped in and penalized Overstock (and others).

(Click on image to visit Quantcast.com, a web traffic measurement company)

So Then What is Black Hat Social SEO?

Search engines confirmed they are using signals from social media in the search algorithms. The number of Likes and tweets containing links to a particular page are making a big difference in the search results. It stands to reason that Likes and tweets are being looked at by search engines more and more just like links in terms of importance. And yet the tactics behind acquiring Likes, tweets and links are quite different.

Search engines discourage getting links in any way that is deemed fake, paid or spammy. On the other hand,  Facebook currently permits compensation in exchange for a Like of a page. From their Promotions Guidelines:

"You must not condition registration or entry upon the user taking any action using any Facebook features or functionality other than liking a Page, checking in to a Place, or connecting to your app."

In other words, you can't ask people to do some things, but compensate people all you'd like for Likes.

And Twitter's guidelines aren't much different. While they discourage repeated tweets, it's perfectly acceptable to ask someone to link to a page and include a hashtag in return for entry into a contest.

Do Facebook and Twitter Endorse Black Hat SEO?

This is where it gets tricky. Facebook and Twitter have developed their own user communities and customs over the courses of their respective histories. Facebook has obviously found something that works for them, as their users number well past 750 million. And Twitter's no slouch either at around 150 million users. They've got a good thing going on, so why should they have to change?

On the other hand, shouldn't there be the same level of authenticity on the social web as what Google attempts to drive within the search results? Astroturfing is disapproved of as a way to get fake attention in social media. Should it be just as taboo to get paid attention through contest Likes and tweets?

What do you think? Should social media sites continue to condone compensation for tweets, Likes and other social engagement, or should Google's concept of an authentic vote drive a change in Facebook and Twitter's black hat SEO-friendly contest rules? Share your thoughts in the comments.

How to Add the Google +1 Button to Squarespace

Google just announced their latest initiative to improve the quality of search results. Taking the shape of a social voting button, the Google +1 button allows users to vote for pages on the web they found useful. The +1 button is just one more sign of social media's growing influence on SEO, so naturally many bloggers will want to add it to their sites as a way to boost the reach of their blog.

You've probably already added the Like, Tweet and Share buttons to your Squarespace website. Now you can add the Google +1 button to Squarespace as well.

Getting Started with Google +1

As you can tell by their promo page, Google is pretty excited about +1. Appearing in both the search results and on individual web pages, the +1 button is Google's answer to the recent deal between Facebook and Bing to bring Likes to Microsoft's search engine results. 

Google +1 isn't available to everyone just yet. Join the Google Labs +1 experiment to get started. Once you've signed up, you'll start seeing +1s from friends in the search results.

Adding Google +1 to Squarespace

Signing up for +1 is the first step, but you'll also want to add the new +1 button to the posts on your Squarespace blog. It's a pretty simple process. (Note: This post has changed since its original posting because Google upgraded the +1 button code.)

First, you'll need to head over to the Google +1 button code page. Step one is to configure the way you'd like the button to appear and your langauge preference.

Next up, select the Advanced options to get at the URL stettings of +1. Enter "%PERMALINK%" (case sensitive) as your URL to +1. The permalink is a placeholder for the actual URL of your blog posts. When the +1 button loads on your website, Squarespace swaps the permalink for the actual URL of your blog posts automatically.

At this point, you're ready to install Google's +1 button code on your blog. Unlike most social buttons, Google provides you with two code snippets. The first code snippet belongs in a HTML snippet on your blog. Select and copy the code highlighted below.

Navigate to your blog (Journal) main page and enter Structure Editing mode.

Click the configure this page link to enter the Journal Page Configuration menu.

Scroll down to the Post Display Configuration section and click on an unused HTML Snippet (or add to an existing one) from the list of Squarespace journal components.

Paste the second Google +1 code snippet into the HTML editor and select Hide and Save.

Arrange the snippet within the blog post layout and save your changes. You can place the code snippet at either the top or the bottom of your blog template.

Next up, go back to the +1 button code site and grab the second code snippet.

Make sure you're still in Structure Editing mode and scroll to the bottom of your website to find the edit website footer option.

Paste the second part of the Google +1 button code within your website footer and save your changes.

You should now see the Google +1 button show up alongside the rest of your social buttons on your Squarespace blog. Adding the +1 button is a smart move along the way to SEO and social media convergence.

What do you think of Google +1? Are you looking forward to the button like I am or does it seem like button overkill at this point?

5 Reasons Social Media Belongs in Your SEO Strategy

When you think of search engine optimization (SEO) tactics, keyword research, meta tags and inbound links come to mind much sooner than engagement via social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. But many recent search engine industry reports paint a picture of the near future in which links, likes and tweets become equally important to your overall SEO efforts.

Why is social media becoming so imporant to SEO? Here are five reasons why social media belongs in your SEO strategy.

5 Reasons Social Media Belongs in Your SEO Strategy

1. Google and Bing Algorithms - In a December 2010 Search Engine Land interview, Google and Bing both admitted to using signals from Facebook and Twitter to calculate a part of their search algorithms. They take note of how many times a page is shared and the importance of those doing the sharing to calculate a portion of the ranking process.
2. Liked Pages Rank Higher - SEOmoz recently reported that content shared and liked on Facebook correlated more highly with higher search results than did the number of links on the web. Until now, links have been the bread and butter of SEO. This research suggests an important role for social media in the future of SEO, a development that should drive a major fundamental shift in most SEO strategies.
3. Social Media in the Search Results - Google's new +1 button gives search engine users a chance to note which web pages were helpful. If you're logged in to your Google Account, you'll start seeing pictures of your friends near the search results they found helpful. The first result on a search results page typically receives the most amount of clicks. With the +1 button, click patterns will shift towards the results that carry the recommendations of your trusted network. This is only the beginning of search engines using social media signals to increase the quality of search results.
4. Bing Results and the Facebook Like - Not to be outdone by Google's new +1 button, Facebook and Bing announced a deal to show Facebook likes in Bing's search results. Likes should now be considered a primary tactic for Bing Social Media/SEO strategy, as they have a direct impact on both the ranking factors and the resulting click-through rate patterns within Microsoft's search engine.
5. The Power of Social Proof - We often take the suggestions of others before making decisions. Web pages are no different. A web page that has been liked or tweeted many times subtely persuades us that we have found quality information. We notice the sharing counts in the margins or the headers of the articles we find and read the ones that impress us. Social proof increases the chances visitors will stay on your site, thus increasing the value of traffic you fought so hard to get through SEO in the first place.

Approaching search engine optimization and social media from separate angles is not a long-term strategy at this point in the game. If you're operating search and social strategies in silos, it's time to rethink your approach and combine some of your efforts.

Where are you taking your search and social strategies? Have you found any tactics or synergies in utilizing social media within your SEO strategy that have worked particularly well? As always, I invite you to share your thoughts in the comments below.