Google released some interesting figures about Google+ at their I/O developers’ conference, but how seriously should we be taking the platform?

Already search results are changing thanks to Google+ and many are predicting that the social network will eventually have a huge impact on your search campaigns, including click through rates, quality score and general SEO. We’ve been looking into the platform and attended a Google Social last night about the platform.

Here are 10 interesting things we’ve learnt about Google+;

1. Google+ now has 150 million monthly active users, and 50% of users sign in daily. (Stats from Google I/O 2012)

2. Hangouts are one of the most successful features of Google+, setting it apart from Facebook and Twitter. Cadbury said it’s their favourite feature because of the opportunity to speak with customers easily and with little preparation.

3. 1 in 3 Hangouts are now used as an app, within a game or learning environment like SlideShare. Check out HangoutApps.com to browse some examples.

4. It is possible to Hangout with more than 10 customers at a time. Hangout on Air is a feature where you can broadcast your Hangout to people around the world and then embed in your website. Cadbury, Fiat and The New York Times are all using this feature.

5. Google+ is already having a huge affect on search results. Jerry Daykin, Head of Social Media at Cadbury, showed us how Cadbury appear in positions 2, 3, and 4 on keywords such as ‘London2012′, ‘Rebecca Adlington’ and ‘Chocolate recipes’ when a user who has circled them on Google+ is using Google search. When a user is not logged in, they do not appear on Page 1. With more users syncing up their Gmail, Google+ and Drive apps into one experience, this will only become more important.

6. Social extensions are now key to your AdWords campaigns if you are using Google+ too. Google will feed in annotations from Google+ to display underneath your AdWords adverts, listing users that have +1′d your Page. This can have a positive effect on your Click-through-rate (CTR) as recommendations from your friends will appear, and the ads are therefore more compelling. See the example below from Booking.com.

7. Since Cadbury started using social extensions, which links their Google+ Page to their AdWords campaigns, they have achieved a 17% uplift in CTR across all their AdWords campaigns. Read the full case study here.

8. Images are highly recommended to post along with your content on Google+, and this is something brands are adhering to. Rich Kemp, Social Media Manager for hotel booking specialist LateRooms.com said: “The most effective updates that we’ve done are interactive, engaging, fun photos that suit the environment”.

9. Posting unique content to Google+, that isn’t available in other social networks or on your website can attract a community. The Financial Times, which recently hit 1 million +1’s, do this well with graphs, insight and any rich media content. “Whether it’s a video, image or infographic, the interface of Google+ just works well” says FT Community Manager, Rebecca Heptinstall.

10. Ripples are a great way to find your most active users, by seeing who has shared and commented on your posts. You can use the tool to identify influencers and brand advocates and add them to your circles. However, this is only useful if your posts are getting a decent amount of interactions.