Google+ Custom URLs – Clarifications and Guidelines

google-plusgoogle-plus-pages

I want to register a custom URL for my Google+ page (I'm eligible)

I have some questions.

  1. Suppose my page name is John Doe. Google forces me to have google.com/+JohnDoe + some extra characters in my choice. google.com/+JohnDoe isn't registered, why can't I directly register that?
  2. Custom URLs are case-sensitive?
  3. Would the old plus.google.com/5432503297532095473210197 address still be accessible? Because of that note in the agreement which says "the service could become a paid extra in the future", I'd like to continue linking on websites the old, long and impossible to remember address.

Best Answer

  1. There could be a couple of reasons why the name you want is not available. Maybe it's too common. Maybe it's the same name as someone famous. Maybe someone else with that name has more followers/posts/been on Google+ longer/is more "valuable" to Google, and Google is reserving the name for them.
  2. Custom URLs aren't case sensitive. In fact, you can edit the URL to change the case of the letters in the URL when it's displayed.
  3. Google is very good about leaving redirects when pages move. I have to believe that that the old stupidly-long number URL will still work in the future, even if it results in a redirect. (Actually, I've just tested it with my old gplus.to address which pointed to the number URL, and it redirected to my G+ custom URL.

I see now you're referring to a G+ page. From what I'm seeing the Customer URL choice you have is based on the verified website URL and (right now) you can't change it.

Some more information in this G+ post.

Related Topic