Plus One Google+ Marketing
Disclaimer Social Media Marketing changes daily and many factors will be important in determining your actual results and no guarantees are made that you will achieve results similar to ours or anybody else’s, in fact no guarantees are made that you will achieve any results from our ideas and techniques in our material.
What is Google+ Google+ or G+ is a social networking platform that has also been described as a social layer, because it integrates many Google products and services. Some of these applications include Google Search, YouTube, Google Calendars, Gmail, Google Maps, Google Hangouts events and many others. You can post, comment, share photos, images and videos to connect with others.
Google + has many features that are like other social networking websites such as Twitter and Facebook. You can make status updates, gain followers, join communities and share information. Followers can also be grouped into topics of importance through the circles feature.
Features of G+ You can create a personal learning network, share information, connect with colleagues, follow influencers and join communities around topics of interest. The user communicates by posting or messaging information. They have the option of using any of Google’s applications that are deemed necessary for sharing information. Content is usually made up of research, news, quotes, trends, celebrity news, advertising, promotions, sales leads, local openings, events, advertising and anything people find entertaining or useful.
Why Is G+ Becoming Popular? Google+ is the second largest social network in the world that is continually growing in popularity. It has over 500 million registered users and also owns 80% of all search traffic. 41% of Google+ users interact with brand content and 54% of users use the website to interact with friends. This demonstrates a large audience of potential followers or clients. Google+ has restricted the amount of advertising being used on its website and has allowed users to reach their target audience outside of the site.
G+ for Marketing 1. G+ offers many benefits to social media marketers; • Targeted posts and ads are easy to create because G+ offers so many ways of finding followers and targeting an audience or niche. • Marketing lists and conversion tracking makes it easy to retarget an audience that has looked at a website but not completed an action. • People can see how the competition markets a product or service to potential clients by accessing communities, circles and collections. • The user can conduct simple market research and learn about their target market by using polls and asking questions before committing to advertising a promotional post.
G+ for Marketing (Cont) 2. A respected audience can be acquired much faster than other social media. • There is no need to wait for confirmation of followers on Google+ and a large audience can be acquired quickly for further engagement. People being followed then have a choice to reciprocate a follow. • Fast access to followers makes it simple to gain an audience of important and influential people, brands and businesses by adding moderators and followers with a high number of followers.
G+ for Marketing (Cont) 3. G+ is a popular place for conducting business because it affirms the popularity and social proof of information, products and services put forward by a website. •
+1s, followers, shares and mentions will be ranked higher in Google search results and will also demonstrate the account holders social proof.
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G+ has made it clear that it values good quality content that is timely and uses keywords in the correct locations. It also values creative content that demonstrates the usefulness of a brand across all layers of Google.
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Poor quality content, too many keywords or hashtags in the wrong places will not be rewarded by the Google algorithm.
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Google+ looks for keywords in certain places. E.g. in the taglines of a story section.
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Websites like CircleCount.com, record social media analytics to rate users according to their number of followers.
Creating A Personal Page 1. Sign in with or create a Gmail account http://accounts.google.com/signup
2. Create a Profile, choose a professional photo and cover image. • Add some basic information such as your name, website and location.
3. Import your contacts from Outlook, AOL and other email providers.
Creating a G+ Brand Page It is also recommended that a serious social media marketer also creates a Google+ brand page to be used with a personal profile - https://plus.google.com/u/0/brand?hl=en_GB Making casual engagements with friends and family from a G+ personal profile is one of the easiest ways to promote a brand. It is also another way to demonstrate social proof because it shows that the profile is legitimate with achievements that are real. A user can link a follower to their brand page and provide more information about a product or service. Creating a profile with a brand is also a great way to add more followers to circles quickly because both can be used to drive traffic to the other.
Strategy And Research • Create a budget and list of costs for scheduling, content management, AdWords and profile creation. • The strategy should also consider branding across all other websites and social media. It should include ideas for finding more influencers and creating a SEO strategy. The SEO strategy should include keywords and creation of a profile that includes an eye-catching cover image and profile photo. • The user should also consider some methods for adding more followers, scheduling posts and considering what constitutes good quality and entertaining content for a target audience. Check influential followers and competitors that may be able to mention your page, make comments, share and mentions.
How Often Should You Post? • Research has shown that users look at content most frequently from 9am to 10am and peak engagement is usually around 9am on Wednesdays. The worst time for posting information is before 9am, evenings and weekends. Websites like Buffer and Hootsuite will usually suggest the best times for posting. • Posting promotions a few times a day, changing content or being selective with the wording and placement of images will make sure that followers do not miss the promotion or label it as spam.
Finding Content To Post • It is possible to share information that is already posted on Google+. Websites like Digg have trending articles, videos and stories from other websites that can be used. Pinterest is a great resource for collecting videos and images that can be posted on G+ later. • Schedule multiple posts and duplicate content to different social media outlets such as Twitter, Facebook and Google using websites like Hootsuite, Edgar or Buffer. • Repost and reword with different images and details to convey the same info.
Ideal Layout Of A Post? • Create an eye catching title that explains the post with *bold* text. Look at some unique ways to make the title by looking at websites like Upworthy. Upworthy is an example of how to create uplifting and motivational articles with obscure headlines. It can grab the attention of a target audience and create more shares. • Mention the user or influencer who created the original post to demonstrate the importance of the information being shared. • A summary at the start of the post mentioning the reasons it is enjoyable or important for the reader.
Audience and Influencers • If your content is for a brand page, sharing the post with the public is perfectly acceptable. Circles should be used for posting to target audiences. Posting to the relevant circles will result in better feedback and less muting of posts or reports of abuse. • Post content to friends, family and close colleagues on a personal profile. • Adding people to circles is a great way to segment followers into niches or groups. It is also another way to list followers and competitors with a reputation and influence. For example, a business selling online hosting can find a competitor and follow their audience.
Communities • Creating communities is another way of finding a target audience and understanding user preferences. • Join a community and add followers of relevance to circles. • Look for influential followers, moderators and competitors. • Learn more about competitors, products and services. • Learn about an audience’s preferences and habits by making comments. • An influencer can also promote a product, service or website in exchange for mentions of their Google+ profile.
Contacting Followers • Posts that do not look like promotions but casual conversation that lead readers to your site have more potential of drawing an audience. • Helping solve a problem or asking for advice is one way to engage with a follower. For example, contacting an SEO expert about a marketing issue through a brand page may solve a problem and result in direct methods of communication. • General conversation about humour, places visited and upcoming industry events are also great ice breakers. • If both followers are engaged in conversation, it may be better to connect further by email or LinkedIn.
Creating Shareable Content • Creating possible viral content is a great way to be included in the ‘What’s Hot and Recommended Google+ list’. Once the post has received a combination of reposts and +1s, an algorithm informs Google to take notice and add content to the list. • A strong call to action (CTA) button tells users what you want them to do and how sharing will benefit them. A CTA can be included with posts, shares or +1s. For example, ‘share this post with someone experiencing anxiety’. • Sharing relevant content with followers in communities will result in more shares with people outside that community.
Google+ Campaigns • G+ users can create targeted campaigns to improve the flow of traffic to a Google+ page. Ad posts can also be created in ads manager. • A user must have 1000 followers before creating a + post ad. • Read the post ads policy before commencing and decide to create the ads in either AdWords or Adwords Express. It is recommended that only one is used at a time. • Both AdWords and AdWords Express allows G+ users many opportunities to increase the number of places where business information can be displayed. AdWords Express can be started quickly with minimal time and management. Readers only pay when someone clicks on the ad but it doesn’t have all the features of an AdWords account.
Google+ AdWords Express 1. Login into https://www.google.com.au/adwords/express/, create ads that targets a broad audience. E.g distance from the business, city, region and country. 2. Enter a product or service to advertise. Suggestions such as web design and other categories are shown. 3. Create your ad with a headline 1 & 2, description and website. Ads Express also provides help for writing an ad and will preview it before being created. 4. Set up a budget, select the most relevant keywords to trigger other related websites. The ads are found when a Google searcher types in a word or phrase related to the business. On the ads people can +1, comment, share and add the page. Keyword targeting that is ineffective can be stopped in the dashboard.
Google+ AdWords • AdWords features additional formats, settings, features and benefits. • Users can create multiple campaigns, drafts, budgets and ad groups with different keywords. • The user selects their own keywords and the website includes keyword search term reports with more detail.
G+ AdWords Campaign 1. Login to Google AdWords. https://adwords.google.com/um/identity The creator will be taken to the Google ads page to start creating the ad. 2. Set up an ad campaign with a new name and go to select campaign settings. 3. Select display type as ‘display network only’ and choose engagement from the list. ‘Display Network only' campaigns are best if you'd like to show ads on websites and apps.
4. Choose the device where the ads will be and set the location, language, daily budget and more. It is then possible to schedule the campaign and select the type of rotation and frequency.
G+ AdWords Campaign(Cont) 5. Create an ad group using keywords to trigger the ads when a search contains keywords. The group needs a name, a default bid, keywords and interests. It is recommended that two ad groups with at least two ads in each be created. Multiple ad groups organised by theme get better results.
6. Select the type of ad group that is ideal for the campaign and the targeting method. 7. Create the ads by selecting the + post ad template. Enter the Google+ page URL to be promoted or profile from which you want the add post to display.
G+ AdWords Campaign (Cont) 8. ‘Customize’ and decide to show ‘comments’ or different sized ads. 9. Choose to ‘review and finish’, ‘cancel’, ‘save ads’ or ‘skip’ ad creation. 10.Review and finish when done or choose other options on the page. 11.Return to the ad screen to see the ads ‘under review’.
G+ AdWords Costs & Bidding • The user must decide on the right budget for bidding on a campaign per day or an average cost per month. • A maximum cost per click bid (CPC bid) is the most that an ad creator is willing to pay for a click on an ad. • Better bidding is related to targeting and selection of keywords. A good bid will result in a higher amount of traffic and more relevant ads for a target audience. A lower bid is likely to receive fewer clicks and conversions if the targeting and keywords are irrelevant.
Costs & Bidding Tips • Google+ will show more of an ad campaign if content is valuable and drives more traffic. Good targeting produces a positive level of engagement and demonstrates relevance to a target market. It results in better value for money for the advertiser and decreases the recommended bid.
• ‘Maximise clicks’ is a safe way of bidding because G+ will enter the advertiser in auctions with the lowest bid while delivering on the overall campaign objectives. The average cost per action is often high because it is linked to high estimate bid data.
Split Testing • It provides a better understanding of customers likes, interests and preferences to drive traffic to G+ and other websites. It compares multiple versions of an ad to see which one performs the best. Once this is known it is possible to cancel the other ads that are not performing well.
• There are various methods for split testing but the simplest form involves a test of one element against another to see which one results in better performance. Test your ‘call to action’, content, headlines, best time to post, text, images and videos. • Split testing should include G+ post creation, shortening links, deploying posts and checking results.
Measuring Success Measuring the success of an ad campaign depends on the most important metrics for the ad being created for a Google+ profile or G+ brand. Both include the ‘influence’ dashboard. It can be linked to Google AdWords and Google Analytics. • A Google+ profile or page will display ‘Influence’ for the last 30 days. It will describe follows, posts and reach. • The follows tab shows how many people have followed the profile or page, communities and collections. • The posts tab tracks how many people have viewed a post, +1s and comments. • The reach tab includes the amount of times a post has been shared or reshared, how many times it has been viewed, the number of comments, reshares or +1s.
Useful Tools • Buffer gives essential metrics for the latest Google+ posts and can also publish and schedule posts. • CircleCount.com provides a count of how many people have been added to an account and shows the same information for other profile users. It includes simple analytics charts displaying Google+ post content, the date a post was published, the type of engagement and the post received. • It also provides a comparison of G+ profiles for finding influencers. It is simple to use and only requires a G+ profile URL. The website also includes the Follow Map. It is a neat visualization of where followers come from and is excellent for targeting certain products and services to a location.
Useful Tools(Cont) • Steady Demand (https://www.steadydemand.com/ ) provides an audit of a Google+ page. This is useful for an account that has reached a plateau or in its initial creation. It provides a regular view of what is working and needs improvement. It also provides a report of what time is best to post and what type of content is popular such as videos, photos and other information. • Sum all (https://sumall.com/) is a useful tool for measuring the success of a G+ profile against another competitor or against other social media (Instagram, Facebook and Twitter). It provides an aggregate of +1s, comments, shares and the total number G+ users in a circle. It is also possible to do some split testing on the website and predicts how trends are going to affect marketing efforts down the line.
Summary G+ has a simple to use interface for communicating and promoting content. An initial audience of followers can be found easily through Google's searching capabilities. However, there is no obligation for someone to follow a user back. An account user must still build a reputation and gain the trust of their followers by creating quality content.
G+ users can gain more followers, click throughs and conversions to their website by bidding for post advertising on AdWords. New campaigns can be tested in Google AdWords, Google Analytics as well as third-party tools. The ability to create targeted content and build an audience for social media marketing, using all of Google’s Applications and search network is the major benefit of using Google+.
Plus One Google+ Marketing
Disclaimer Social Media Marketing changes daily and many factors will be important in determining your actual results and no guarantees are made that you will achieve results similar to ours or anybody else’s, in fact no guarantees are made that you will achieve any results from our ideas and techniques in our material.