A decade ago, Google was a non-existent word, but it soon became a common household name, synonymous with such things as search, email, chat and now a social network. Of course, this isn’t Google’s first attempt in the social space. Remember Google Buzz? Yeah, neither do we.

So the million dollar question is, “does Google have all its ducks in a row?” With all of this speculation, the BLASTmedia office has been abuzz. Could Facebook collapse and join the ranks of MySpace? All signs point to no, but we thought it would be good to share our thoughts on the latest social network and the innovative features it brings to the table.

Emily Trimble – I’ll admit, at first I wasn’t all that into Google+. However, as someone who grew up in the social media age (yes, I remember when Facebook was only for college students and MySpace was cool), I had to give it a chance. While I’m not ready to ditch any of my other accounts for it, I do think the Circles feature is really innovative. It’s nice to have the ability to share things from the same dashboard, but target different people. I know my best friends don’t necessarily care about the geeky stuff I do at work – so when I have something to share with those people, I simply share it with my circle called “Geeks” (Now you’re wondering if you’re in it, aren’t you?).

Lindsey Groepper – I don’t see the value of it – yet. The early adopters are all over it, but I’ll be interested to see if the general consumer audience really gets involved. I do like how you can categorize people into different groups and only see updates from them (similar to how you can categorize in Tweetdeck) – this could be useful for a business or for me as PR professional.

Anna Julow – I’m not a huge Google+ fan, but I think once businesses get added into the mix the entire dynamic is going to shift – especially because of the way personal Google+ profiles are already set up. Personal profiles prominently feature employer information (just hover over your contacts & you’ll see where they work) and the “About” section already includes place for past experience. If Google+ continues to gain business-mined features like these, which already make it look similar to LinkedIn, it could become a great platform for recruiting and B2B marketing – which would (without a doubt) win me over.

Blake Fife – As long as I don’t receive an invite to join someone’s Mafia Family, Farmville, or Zombie Hunt, I’ll be happy. No matter how appealing “Google Arcade” sounds, please do not introduce social gaming to Google+.

Julie Perry – The video capabilities are cool. Google+ Videos have all the power of YouTube’s Video Player (1080p, HTML5, etc.), without the 15-minute time limit, the YouTube branding watermark in the bottom corner, and the “related videos” at the end. The Video Hangout and the Huddle options are pretty sweet, too.

We’ll see where it goes in terms of being a social network though. A stellar communications tool, yes. But my non-techie friends aren’t into it at all. Having said that, many of them laughed at me when I went from Friendster to MySpace—and, of course, five years ago, they would have bet money they’d never join Facebook (where probably 85% of my friends and family now have profiles and log in nearly every day).

I think search benefits are going to be key. For now, it simply feels like a distraction—with a lot of hype and a clever launch strategy. Funny what building a little anticipation will do. (Exactly why mothers tell their daughters never to kiss on the first date.) ;-* Props to The Goog on that.

With regard to search, I found this to be quite amusing. Google is only slowly starting to index content posted in Google+ (for privacy reasons, I believe—until it goes fully public). Meanwhile, new media marketer, Paul Colligan, found that BING IS! That’s right—check out Paul’s video showing that BING is searching Google+ before Google is (whoops!).

In summary, I say: “Only search will tell…”

So which Google+ features do you love…or hate? Let us know what you think in our comments section!