Marketers across the web are starting to ask a big question. Is Google Plus (G+) the future of social media?

Opinions are split. Let’s begin by taking a look at what the facts say. In 2013, Social Media Today published an article starting that Google Plus (G+) was the “one (social media platform) to watch.” While Facebook and Twitter had already established themselves as “go to” social media brands, G+ appeared to be a wild card in the mix as sources across the Internet contemplated just what Google’s social media experiment would accomplish.

Mashable pointed out that, according to research, although Google+ boasts 20 million users or more, they weren’t spending a lot of time on the site. Social Media Today went onto say, “It’s all well and good having masses of members, but it means nothing if they are hardly using the network.”

The Google Plus To Facebook Comparison

The question is: can we accurately compare Facebook to G+? It’s important to note that the G+ platform is different from the platforms of Facebook and Twitter. According to Social Media Today, the G+ platform is a “different type of platform, with a different target audience.” As such, a fine line exists between social media made for socializing and social media made for business.

The buzzy new app Secret — which lets people post messages to their circles of contacts without attribution — has closed a $10 million round of funding at a $50 million post-money valuation, TechCrunch has learned from two sources close to the situation. The funding was led by Google Ventures, with participation also from KPCB.

The news follows a report from Friday in the WSJ, which noted the company was in the process of raising a round of money. It accurately reported the potential backers and funding amount at a $40 million pre-money valuation; we’ve learned that post-money valuation is $50 million, and that the term sheets have already been signed.

It’s a healthy sum of money and valuation for a relative newcomer.

Secret launched at the end of January — amid a rush of many other apps like Whisper, Wickr, Confide, Telegram, and more — some of which were inspired to protect users from the sneaky ways of the NSA, some of which are catching on to a bigger trend for more user privacy.

We've all been there. Suddenly, without warning, and without an obvious reason, your organic traffic drops. What should you do?

1) Don't panic

If you notice that organic traffic dropped 25% from January to March (or whatever), don't panic. Don't start ripping content off of your site, sacrificing goats to a graven image of Matt Cutts, or firing everyone in your marketing department. 

Stay calm and figure it out. 

2) Dig deeper

Spend some significant time in Google Analytics and start evaluating other data sets. For example, did direct visits drop also? Did referral traffic drop? Did time on site drop? What about phone calls via organic traffic? What other trends do you see?

For too long, organizations were told that Facebook was only for "building awareness."

Today, we all recognize how silly it is to think that awareness alone could somehow have a real impact on our mission. Impact is the result of action, whether it’s supporters lending their voice or time to a campaign or making a donation to support your cause. 

“Engagement” is the term used to describe action online these days and the evolution from “awareness" to “engagement" is a very positive one indeed. But engagement is a two way street. Engaging people requires action on your part, too.

So, how do you manage your Facebook page with an eye toward engagement? How do you track progress and know if you’re getting the most out of Facebook? 

Here are three big bucket goals that you should be working to improve upon no matter if your page has 3,000 fans or 3 million fans:

1. Reach

2. Engagement

3. Capturing Data

Facebook redesigned its news feed last week, but the company isn't stopping there. Next up for a makeover is Facebook Pages.

Facebook announced a new look for Pages on Monday, changing the appearance for both Page visitors and Page admins to what the company is calling a more "streamlined" look.

The new design includes two columns similar to the old version, but the right column is now the Page's timeline and the left includes information about the brand or corporation. In the previous design, both columns served as the Timeline; posts were staggered between the left and right columns as users scrolled down.