Does Our Business Need More Focus on Google+?
As many in the social media world know, Google developed a social networking to compete with Facebook and Twitter. The big two social networks had taken quite a chunk of the customer base for Google, so the latter felt it had to act.
As with most other computer based programs, Google stepped up to the plate with something they thought would draw people to their brand. When Google Plus was released most people on the new network was happy that they had a network free of marketing.
However after the release to the general public, companies began to create Google Plus pages to try and help bring more visibility to their brands. This hasn’t seemed to help that many companies as Google+ is very new and too full of usage options for the general social media user.
Navigation
Google Plus can be hard to navigate for novices. You do not actually have followers or friends.
Google uses something called ‘circles’. These circles can include people you found through searches, people that have found your company, or email contacts. Google used their network to try and make social networking more personal and included the options to restrict who sees your information. You can add quite a few people to your circles, but due to the filters these people may never add you or even see your page at all.
Privacy
Google Plus includes privacy options that can restrict how your company interacts with customers. This is good and bad – good for customers that do not want any company to find out too much about their habits. Bad for companies that are trying to find out those things in order to better target customer base. Google is very strict on privacy, which can help keep your own information safe.
Hangouts
If you do work with Google Plus, growing your presence with customers can be as simple as creating hangouts.
What this option does is allow you facetime with one or more customers. These customers can see you or your representatives. By speaking with them directly you’re bringing something personal to your brand, this is one thing you can’t do on other social networks. Focusing on Google+ can bring your personality to your customers.
Most people that use Google+ are more tech savvy than the general social networking user. They’re not interested in receiving advertisements nor do they follow just any company.
To use this social network effectively you’ll need to be informed on the demographics that are already on Google+ or hire a social media manager who does understand the network. When compared with the other ‘big’ networks you may want to focus only a small portion of time growing your Google+ presence.
The majority of users on the internet are either unfamiliar with Google+, find it too hard to use, or are tired of adding social network profiles to their own profiles.
So, what has your Google+ experience been like to date?
About the Author: Tina Samuels writes her opinion of social media and its trends on used office furniture, because she’s cheap.
Image Credit: 1.
Google has been renovating itself within the past 3 years that I’ve notice and I’m just jumping on the bandwagon trying to learn all that I can. When I started internet marketing everyone was talking about google analytics, then google webmaster tools and then came google+.
This is great information here and I like the privacy that google has set up. I may be a novice now but pretty tech savvy and just the basic information here is a great start for me. Thanks for sharing!