Google has started to host office hours in Google+ hangouts, making it incredibly easy to meet with folks on the Google Webmaster Central team. I’ll test this shortly, but my first thoughts are that this is a great way to get webmaster-centric questions answered and provide feedback to Google staffers about how the company is doing.
These office hours will be held a few times weekly and announced a few days ahead of time. Each session will typically last an hour, and will cover any topics related to Google search, such as developing sitemaps, Google Webmaster Tools, dealing with duplicate content, and more. You just need, you guessed it, a Google+ account to play. A webcam and headset will help too, obviously.
Here are some of Google’s next Office Hours:
- Thursday, 15 March, at 10am Zürich time, English office hours with John
- Thursday, 15 March, at 2pm Seattle time, English office hours with Jonathan
- Friday, 16 March, at 2pm Zürich time, German office hours with John
- Friday, 23 March, at 2pm Zürich time, German office hours with John
You can find the rest of the Office Hours listed here.
Thanks to Lee Odden, my Google+ chum, for helping me to notice this. Ultimately, I think this is a great example of Google leveraging Hangouts in a positive way. After all, the big G isn’t known for support and most people don’t think there are enough reasons to use Google+ Hangouts; this essentially kills two birds with one stone. And isn’t that what business should be about?
