Claiming Google+ URLs?

[IrvCo_Interactive]

I have several brands which I am managing G+ profile pages for. These range from established brands with large followings to just starting out. When I try to claim a custom URL for these on Google+, it says to add some extra characters after the brand names to make them unique. I can't find any example of established big brands who have G+ URLS like "+toyotausa24" "+tacobell3" or anything like that. This does not seem to be well documented anywhere. Can someone tell me what the deal is with this feature?

Also what is the best practice for large brands when claiming this? +BrandName1?

[RobertFisher]

Irvco,

I checked with our head of Local, Amber, who I consider an expert and she states as follows:

You don't have to add a special character. It just depends what vanity URL's have already been generated by Google and accepted by the listing manager.

Sometimes you don't have the option of adding characters. You can either accept the vanity URL or keep what you have.I hope that helps you out, Best,Robert

[WilliamKammer]

I do sometimes see hijacked G+ pages, or other shady G+ activities, but in my experience flagging it or calling Google resolves the issue quickly. You're always going to have people trying to game the system, just make sure to know how to defend yourself against it.

As for +TacoBellCom, first you would have to have the business named "Taco Bell" and get that verified (good luck there). Then, you'd have to hope that Google lets you add characters to the end of the URL instead of deciding it for you. Then, you would have to hope you were never reported, flagged, or otherwise looked at by a human on Google's end. So, odds are it wouldn't work for too long.

That's not even getting into the legality of trademark infringement.

[IrvCo_Interactive]

Here is the other aspect of this that is disturbing to me, Google's implication with this is that other people could claim the same trademarked brand name? So I guess I can go make a G+ page and call it +TacoBellCom and they wouldn't stop me from trying to pass off as the official brand.

[IrvCo_Interactive]

Hi, yes you are correct that I'm mainly looking at brands that are not specific to a geographic region. Thanks for your suggestion on branding the URL/domain as an option.

I'd be interested if anyone has any insight as to what drives this. I can find many examples of small companies and brands that were able to claim their brand name (+BrandName) and I have even found examples of companies that claimed keywords instead of their brand names? There doesn't seem to be any connection with company size, followers or online ad spend. The only thing I can figure is the rules used to be different and at some point in time they changed and some pages got in during the window of time when it was different.

[DJ123]

Good answers here, run with it

[RobertFisher]

IrvCo

William's response around geography is a very good idea in my opinion. I think you are asking about a major brand without Geo qualifier needed. What you can do is what we did with our company drumBEAT Marketing. We are +drumBEATMarketingNET because we are the .net domain.

I have wondered about this from time to time myself so I have also forwarded this to our Director of Local as she is on some exclusive Local forums where we might get an answer better than mine. I will post her thoughts here as soon as she responds but likely in 12 hours.

Best,

[WilliamKammer]

When I have multiple listings under the same brand like that, I think it's good to add something descriptive at the end.

For example, if you have a brand with 10 locations in 10 cities, then you can make them +BrandLosAngeles, +BrandNewYork, etc.

The URLs are there to make for a better user experience, so adding a number to end of the brand doesn't really help much. Instead, think of a word or two that is memorable, and that makes sense to those who might see it.