Since launching Google Plus, two years ago, it’s no secret that Google has had its skeptics (myself included) about its social network. However, it may be time to reconsider these hurried prejudices. Recent data show that it is the second largest social network, above YouTube and Twitter.

Personally, I was not very familiar with what is now the second largest social network in the world. I had a default page through my Gmail account, but it never took time to complete my profile. I’ve always considered that it was just an attempt by Google to get on the social media car.

I finally gave in and decided to complete my own Google profile, as well as do a little research to see what was being said. Through my inquiries, I found several advantages and unique features of Google that content creators can take advantage of. What really caught my eye were the SEO benefits that an active and complete profile can have for your online content. And even more with the new update Penguin 2.0 that I sacked Google recently.

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt said the following: “Information linked to online profiles will have a higher position than content without such verification …”

There is no doubt that Google is the perennial leader in the game of the world’s search engines, and irrelevance in the eyes of their crawlers could quickly put a brake on their online marketing efforts. If your content does not appear in Google’s search results, there is little chance that your website will get the traffic you are looking for. This could mean a disaster for any publisher, blogger, or brand hoping to compete online.

So to help avoid any impending disaster in your marketing efforts, here are three ways in which an active and complete Google profile can improve your SEO:

Establish your authority

You’ve probably seen the faces of people that appear alongside some of the search results: Here’s the power of Google, the Authoring! Google is adding more weight to things such as Label Authorship and Author Rank in their search rankings. In order to take advantage of this great advantage, and potentially increase your clickthrough rate of up to 150%.

Get some help from your friends

Is it active in social networks? A social signal could be retweets on Twitter, the “like” on your Facebook page … Social cues are now going to have more relevance in the algorithm of Google to determine the quality of content. Be active sharing and linking quality content.

Link Exchanges

The third Google SEO benefit for content creators has been one of the best SEO strategies today: entry of natural links to your website.

A complete profile

Google offers a great opportunity to get links to your site from high authority sources that will directly influence the ranking of your page. Incoming links to your Google messages will also help drive traffic to your online content. Activity on your Google profile is one of the ways Google determines the value of these links.

Have you already completed your Google page?