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1.
How Small and Medium Businesses
are Using Google+
By Erica Swallow
Tech Journalist & Director of Community, Contently
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2.
About Google+
• Launched to public in September 2011
• Google’s latest foray into social networking
• Google Friend Connect, Google Buzz, Orkut
• 90 million users
• Tech enthusiasts, male students
• Largely inactive user base
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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3.
Why Google+ Matters
• Largest search engine in the world
• Momentum towards social-driven search
• Google products continue to merge
• Google Places, Google Reader, Google Search
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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4.
The Downside
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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5.
More Negatives
• Administration is difficult
• You need a personal account to create a business
page
• Social dashboards don’t integrate Google+ yet
• Google side projects are unreliable
• Buzz, Wave, Hotpot
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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6.
The Google+ Profile
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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7.
Create Custom Circles
• Based on your email contacts
• Circles enable easy grouping and sharing
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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8.
Follow Sparks
• Google+’s algorithmic content recommendation system
• Based on Google Search, Google+ and +1 button
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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9.
Google+ Business Pages
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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10.
Anecdotal Evidence
• More than 50 small business Google+ pages
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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11.
Get an SEO Boost
• Free SEO!
• At the very least, create and fill out a page
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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12.
Host Hangouts
• Business meetings, industry chats, meetups
• Hangout with Extras: named hangouts, shared notes and
sketchpad, Google docs integration, screensharing
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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13.
Expand Content Distribution
• Share photos, videos, links and commentary
• Segmentation: Customers, VIPs, Team members
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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14.
Other Reasons To Get Started…
• Connect with early adopters
• Network with journalists and potential clients
• Explore
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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15.
Pro Tip: Shorten Your URL
• Google+ doesn’t support vanity URLs
• Use gplus.to to create a short URL for sharing
#SMBGoogle+ | @ericaswallow
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16.
Questions?
Erica Swallow | @ericaswallow | ericaswallow.com
Friend Connect: social add-ons for websitesGoogle Buzz: social stream tied to Gmail Orkut: facebook-like social network that really only took off in a few countries, namely Brazil.90 million users (mid-January; 1/19) – 100 million (independent analyst Paul Allen, founder of Ancestry.com, 2/1)(60% male / 40% female) 18-30 year olds a whopping 83% of users are inactive, leaving only 17% of active users (Bime – 10 million person tracking study)
Most people are not active and growing a fan base is difficult. 83% active / 17% inactive (as of a few months ago) – according to a study of 10 million Google+ users by data visualization firm Bime.
HotPot – social recommendation systems
Introduced brand pages in November.
Obama hangout: http://mashable.com/2012/01/31/obama-hangout/, 227,000 attendees, real-time conversation.