Are you on Google+ yet? There are many reason why you should be.

First up, it’s a Google run operation, which means your involvement surely won’t hurt your cause. Here’s what Google has to say about the way Google+ affects SEO:

Content recommended by friends and acquaintances is often more relevant than content from strangers. For example, a movie review from an expert is useful, but a movie review from a friend who shares your tastes can be even better. Because of this, +1’s from friends and contacts can be a useful signal to Google when determining the relevance of your page to a user’s query. This is just one of many signals Google may use to determine a page’s relevance and ranking, and we’re constantly tweaking and improving our algorithm to improve overall search quality.

What this means is that your Google searches will show personalized results from Google+ pages in your results. If you’re encouraging Google+ activity from your readers, they will see more of you in searches. Take a look at the top 6 results (the very top one is an ad) when I search for coupons to print (I own a website in this niche) when logged into my G+ account:

See those two arrows? They are pointing to the personalized results that are shown as a result of my Google plus activity. The personalised results are marked with a little person to the left of the result.
Now, let’s log out of the Google+ account and run the same search.
Here’s the top 6 now:

As you can see, the personalized results are gone. Getting those results is hugely important. Just because of our Google plus behavior, 2 websites were immediately shot to #3 and #6 on in the results page for a major Google search phrase! Now, they are nowhere to be found on the first 10 pages of results!

Having a Google+ account is good, but if you really want to get all of the benefits from it, you’ll want to be as active as you can with the network. Actively seek +1’s and follows while also actively giving them. Join relevant circles and leave good comments on others’ pages to show Google that your account is very active and relevant in your field.