If you haven’t yet created a Google+ page for your company or brand, you really should consider doing so as soon as possible. Google+ is growing by leaps and bounds and, although it’s not set to overtake Facebook any time soon, it does have a significant user base that deserves some attention. Although Google+ currently only boasts about one-tenth the number of users as Facebook, they are growing by more than 500 million users each day. While some of these users may use both Facebook and Google+ accounts, there are also many unique users, which means you could be missing out on valuable free advertising by not having a Google+ page for your brand. Once you’ve started your page, you’ll need to think about content, photos and other information you want visible on your page. While the type of content you can share is similar to the information you’ve shared on your Facebook page, there are also some key differences between Facebook and Google+.
Use Your Circles
Google+ allows users to organize their friends into circles so they can easily share pertinent information with specific people. While brands or companies who create a Google+ page cannot actively pursue followers, once a user chooses to follow your page, you can organize that user into a circle. It’s important to not if you do not put users into at least one of your circles, they will not see any content that you post. It’s a good idea to get into the habit of monitoring your followers on a regular basis so you can fit them into one or more circles as soon as possible. Rather than putting all of your followers into one big circle, it is better to take the time to organize them in some fashion, whether by geographical location, products they’re interested in or another organizational system that makes sense for your brand. This allows you to send targeted messages to each circle, which will increase the effectiveness of your marketing efforts on Google+. For example, if your product is sold in retail locations throughout the U.S., but you know that the retail stores in California are having a sale on your product, you can send a message to your California circle notifying them of the sale. You can send a different message to your other circles or simply not send them anything since the current sale does not apply to them.
Improve the Appearance of Your Brand’s Page
Like Facebook, there are not many customization options for your Google+ page, although you can hide certain tabs if they do not pertain to you. Your page has four tabs across the top, beneath the cover photo: Posts, About, Photos and Video. If you do not plan to utilize the photo or video tabs, you can remove these. This will make your page appear a bit cleaner and will eliminate the possibility of disappointing a follower who clicks on one of these tabs only to discover there’s no content there. Choose a profile photo and a cover photo that best reflects your company or brand. Users should be able to easily identify your brand or company through these photos. It’s up to you whether you’d like to switch these photos out from time to time or keep the same photos. When you’re just starting out on Google+, your follower number will most likely be quite low. This is because Google+ users don’t yet know that your page is there. As time goes on and you continue to interact with your followers, this number will most likely grow. It’s not a bad idea to hide your follower number while you’re getting your page started so Google+ users won’t know you’re just getting started and don’t have too many followers just yet.
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I’m still not sure that Google + will take off as much as the people at Google preach that it will, but this was definitely an informative article!
I’m going to have to get working on my + page asap!