The above image was shared by digital Agency Virante from the Google Adwords website. It claims to promote ads for your Google+ page to get customers to your Google+ page. Combined with Adwords Express, which is a simpler version of Adwords for small businesses it should be more effective on the face of it in promoting local businesses.
It is important to understand that the ads will live outside of Google+. This is a bigger difference to the other social media models of paid advertising in that their advertising remains with the network and is more interruptive. Where as the Google+ page ads will exist where search ads currently exist. This allows for better targeting of people as most people use search when looking for answers. If your business can provide answers then it is only likely that revenue will follow.
Google+ will stand out from other social media platforms due to its lack of ads and given that it has integrated Google+ into other things that are Google related it probably may not show ads for at least the foreseeable future.
These Google+ page ads are targeted for small businesses, advertising locally. That is what the Adwords Express product is for. So this may be a bigger deal for Yelp, as a Google Local competitor, than Facebook. Either way, it is a new way for businesses to think about advertising their business, and social networking profiles.
