One of the hardest parts about writing a guide for a brand new social
network is that I know other people (like yourself) will develop killer
ways to use the platform that blow mine out of the water. It’s part of
what makes the web so spectacular.
That said, I feel these are some of the most effective, and likely profitable strategies you can put to use within the Google+ architecture. Don’t be afraid to experiment of course, but definitely make sure to try these out when you have a chance.
So, you need to know what works to get your posts into the SERPs. Specifically, here are some tips to help you know what Google’s looking for:
Instead, look for ways to offer real value to as many people as you can each day. Don’t feel obligated to reach #1 in Google with a new comment on Google+. Be willing to interact on a personal level more often and you’ll reap bigger rewards.
As a result, there are a lot of strategies that still need to be developed and indexing and SERPS are among them. But, here are some quick tricks we’ve been playing with thus far that I think you’ll be impressed with:
Note: Be careful, because there are a lot of strategies floating around out there that are now considered Black Hat by Google. Exchanging +1’s for example is not allowed, nor is it okay to sell your +1’s or crowd source the process. How Google plans on regulating this, I have no idea, but it’s probably not worth the risk of getting caught.
+1 Other Content – You should be out there putting as many +1’s on good content you like as you can. This is not only good for you to help track what you like, but it will allow you to show up more in the SERPs if any of the people in your Circles see those listings.
Encourage Organic +1’s – It may be against ToS to trade +1’s but it’s perfectly okay to ask people to do it if they like your content. Keyword = “ask” not beg.
Meta Data Matters – To encourage +1’s in the SERPs, make sure your listings are interesting and attractive. The higher your CTRs in Google, the more likely you’ll get +1’d and get a boost in the rankings. If you’re using WordPress, go for custom permalinks and make sure to use All in One SEO.
Copywriting Tactics in Your SERPs – It’s come to this, but you should think of clever, yet evocative ways to create titles, descriptions and tags for your SERPs. Don’t avoid keywords, but also make sure it’s original and interesting. You want to attract attention and draw those +1’s.
There are a few other tricks and ideas floating around out there that haven’t been proven yet, so keep a close eye on the boards and this guide – I’m excited to see what people are capable of doing as the technology Google’ using advances.
But, in this case, I feel like I’ve stumbled upon a possible use for the service that will allow us to complete incredibly powerful things without spending incredible amounts of money.
The problem in question? Project management.
To date, I’ve had a heck of a problem finding the right project management solution. They either cost way too much money and have far too many features for my needs or they don’t scale properly. And then there’s the issue of getting people to actually login and use them.
Of every tool I’ve used, Basecamp is probably the most effective, but I had a hell of a time getting contractors and JVs to login to the service and post there instead of just emailing me directly. I had to update everything myself and it wasted more time than it saved.
So, the idea of a social network in which I can post to a specific list of people or call them into a Hangout to discuss a project from any computer on the planet is very attractive to me.
There is no “right” way to do this, but let me share with you some of the ideas I’ve been working on thus far.
By placing freelancers and contractors into circles such as “writers”, “designers” and “programmers” I can easily post a new project and send a notification to announce it to everyone on my list.
Say for example, I want to develop a new video series on Ab fitness. Instead of posting a project on Elance and manually inviting each of the people I’ve worked with in the past or worse yet, digging through my inbox and trying to find each of them, I put up a single share to my “video/audio contractors” circle, disable comments and send notifications to make sure everyone gets the message.
You can of course leave comments active if you’re comfortable letting your contractors discuss the project openly, but I personally don’t think this is a good idea. Rates tend to vary for each contractor and tempers can flare if you openly give the project to one person over another.
However, announcing the project or posting updates on a new project you’re getting ready to start this way is a fantastic way to develop and maintain relationships with your writers. You can also keep a separate circle for all of your contractors called “Contractors” and send out periodic updates on your business and upcoming projects.
This allows you to stay social with the people you hire and develop a relationship that will only benefit you in the future. If you’ve contracted more than one or two projects in your life, you know how important these relationships are. When a contractor feels like they know you and respect you, they will do a much better job and are far more willing to give you a deal and prioritize your work when necessary.
Google+ can help alleviate this problem by providing a central discussion platform that all parties are likely to access (and can reach via mobile technology). Create circles with specific project names and then add any of your partners to the list.
This allows you to develop more direct relationships with the people helping you to launch new products and builds on the basic idea of collaboration. On a normal social network this wouldn’t be any better than email, but with the added benefit of Huddle and Hangouts on Google+ you can communicate from anywhere, anytime.
Weekly Hangouts – Setup a Hangout once a week at a set time and invite your affiliates to join you. It can be a Q&A session about your current product or a presentation about a new product you’re developing. I like to give out fresh market data and marketing strategies I’ve developed or learned from my analytics to help the affiliates reach their customers. By holding a weekly Hangout, I can ensure people show up each week and then save that Hangout for future reference in my “Affiliates” stream. I then write up a short email with all the information we discussed and send it to everyone else with a link to add me on Google+.
Huddle Invites – Make sure people can access you via the mobile app as well. Setup weekly Huddles to follow your Hangouts or possibly even hop online every evening. How many times do you crash on the couch and spend three hours sending text messages while watching TV? You can easily do the same thing with a Huddle and stay in touch with your affiliates.
Create Albums – Create albums, file sets and video playlists full of content that your affiliates can use for their campaigns. Why host all that content on your site, where your possible customers can see it when you could just as easily lock it into place in your Google+ account? It’s free storage, easily controlled for privacy and instantly accessible for people who get into the right circle.
Saved Searches – Save searches in your Google+ account for your product names and reference them every day to see if anything new or interesting came up in the last 24 hours, either on Google+ or elsewhere on the web. You might find a fantastic affiliate campaign being run by one of your contacts. Send them a shout out on Google+ so everyone can see. Imagine the response from your affiliates when they see you announcing your appreciation for one of their fellow affiliates. Talk about motivation!
Google+ is a fantastic tool because it takes everything we know and love about existing social networks and amps it up an octane, so it’s not shocking that it makes a fantastic supplement to your affiliate actions.
Right now, the only way to use this is to setup direct connections between your profile and your affiliates, but when Business accounts go live later this year, make sure you’re on top of it, because it will be a fantastic opportunity to create a central location for all of your product’s needs. And let’s not forget the SEO benefits!
I do it with a variety of tools. The most regular tools I use are Clickbank, Amazon and Google AdWords. After all, what better way to research what people want than to see what people are willing to pay for?
But, at the end of the day, I don’t necessarily feel like I fully understand the market I’m entering. I may have an idea of what people interested in organic eating will pay for, but I don’t know anything about them as people.
That’s where Google+ comes in.
Google+ is a fantastic tool for performing market research and learning more about your prospects, both directly (by asking them) and by lurking through public posts and search functions to see what they’re talking about.
In fact, I always like twitter for this reason – the hashtags and search functions on twitter made it possible to learn a lot about people and their interest in a topic. The problem was the lack of depth on the site. With only 140 characters, there’s only so much you can say and frankly, I wasn’t that interested in following all those bit.ly links.
Today, we can upgrade our market research.
While, I highly doubt any social network will ever replace my litany of research tools, Google+ is quickly becoming a part of my routine. Here’s how I use it:
You don’t need many to actually follow you back – maybe 10-20 at the most. The goal isn’t to start marketing to them (yet), but to get their feedback on a potential product. Ask them what they are interested in, what they aren’t interested in, and what they find attractive about a new product in their niche.
Check to see what websites they link to frequently and join them on their forums to read up on their recent trends. The goal here isn’t so much to develop prospects, but to learn from established members of a large niche.
To do this, we need to find a popular nice with a lot of interest and heavy demand. You know the basic tenets of a good product marketing campaign:
To start, set up your saved searches. Use Sparks and the Google+ search function to start tracking a handful of niches you’ve already brainstormed. Let’s say for example I decide I might want to market in any one of a number of niches. Here are some saved searches I might have:
Now, all I have to do is login to Google+ each day and click on those saved searches to see what’s popped up in the last 24 hours or so.
While the Sparks function is useful, I personally prefer to review what people are saying on their profiles. It’s not that profile posts are somehow more useful in any way. It’s just that you get the added bonus of seeing all the comments, +1’s and shares that they’ve received over the course of their lifespan on Google+.
And because you can organize the search results by “Best of” you can easily see what is the most popular in the last few days.
I’m not saying you’re going to run across a share that is instantly useful in helping you select a new product to develop, but you will get ideas and ideas are the lifeblood of this business. Better yet, you may learn that something is less useful than you expected.
Say for instance you want to create a guide for pregnant women to decide what they should eat during pregnancy. This would be a very useful guide, but if you then learn during your research that there are a dozen guides already like this, including some that are recommended by doctors like BabyCenter.com, you’ll discover that you’re rowing up the wrong creek.
Better yet, I can see what competition is doing in advance and know whether the market can bear another product in that niche (especially one with a unique, interesting angle).
But, all that said, Google+ should absolutely be on your research list. Too many marketers get caught up in the idea that what sells matters most, but you still need to know how to sell it.
If you hop into the fitness niche seeing that there is a huge demand for the product, but have no idea what types of products people buy or how you should present yourself in that niche, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. You can’t just coast your way to profits.
Sometimes you’ll get lucky, but most of the time, the social tools presented on Google+ will make all the difference in the world.
That said, I feel these are some of the most effective, and likely profitable strategies you can put to use within the Google+ architecture. Don’t be afraid to experiment of course, but definitely make sure to try these out when you have a chance.
Google Indexing and SERPs
We know that Google+ content will show up in Google as it continues to grow in size, but obviously not everything will appear in the search engine – there’s just too much to sift through. In time, there would be billions of new posts every day. We’d drown in information (even more than normal) if Google started posting all of that.So, you need to know what works to get your posts into the SERPs. Specifically, here are some tips to help you know what Google’s looking for:
- Public – Obviously, if a post isn’t public, it won’t be indexed.
- Unique – If Google indexed every reshare and repost on Google+ the Internet would crash. So, you need to write something unique to get it into the listings.
- Long and In-depth – Make sure you cover something in-depth and show some real value in it. A four word exclamation won’t get indexed unless it has thousands of +1’s.
- Popularity – If Google sees that people like your comments, they’ll be indexed. So, write things that are useful, interesting and engaging. The result will be higher rankings and more exposure in the SERPs
Instead, look for ways to offer real value to as many people as you can each day. Don’t feel obligated to reach #1 in Google with a new comment on Google+. Be willing to interact on a personal level more often and you’ll reap bigger rewards.
Tricks to Develop High Ranking SERPs
The thing about Google+ is that it’s very different from what we’re used to. There isn’t anything here that you haven’t already seen a hundred times before but how it’s laid out is so completely foreign that most of us are still trying to figure it out.As a result, there are a lot of strategies that still need to be developed and indexing and SERPS are among them. But, here are some quick tricks we’ve been playing with thus far that I think you’ll be impressed with:
Note: Be careful, because there are a lot of strategies floating around out there that are now considered Black Hat by Google. Exchanging +1’s for example is not allowed, nor is it okay to sell your +1’s or crowd source the process. How Google plans on regulating this, I have no idea, but it’s probably not worth the risk of getting caught.
+1 Other Content – You should be out there putting as many +1’s on good content you like as you can. This is not only good for you to help track what you like, but it will allow you to show up more in the SERPs if any of the people in your Circles see those listings.
Encourage Organic +1’s – It may be against ToS to trade +1’s but it’s perfectly okay to ask people to do it if they like your content. Keyword = “ask” not beg.
Meta Data Matters – To encourage +1’s in the SERPs, make sure your listings are interesting and attractive. The higher your CTRs in Google, the more likely you’ll get +1’d and get a boost in the rankings. If you’re using WordPress, go for custom permalinks and make sure to use All in One SEO.
Copywriting Tactics in Your SERPs – It’s come to this, but you should think of clever, yet evocative ways to create titles, descriptions and tags for your SERPs. Don’t avoid keywords, but also make sure it’s original and interesting. You want to attract attention and draw those +1’s.
There are a few other tricks and ideas floating around out there that haven’t been proven yet, so keep a close eye on the boards and this guide – I’m excited to see what people are capable of doing as the technology Google’ using advances.
Managing Projects in Google+
I’m excited to write this chapter because I’m fairly certain I thought of it first. There are a few ideas in GPlus Domination I’m very proud of, but most of them I’ve seen in some iteration or form online. With over 30 million people using Google+ within the first 60 days, there’s bound to be some creative overlap.But, in this case, I feel like I’ve stumbled upon a possible use for the service that will allow us to complete incredibly powerful things without spending incredible amounts of money.
The problem in question? Project management.
To date, I’ve had a heck of a problem finding the right project management solution. They either cost way too much money and have far too many features for my needs or they don’t scale properly. And then there’s the issue of getting people to actually login and use them.
Of every tool I’ve used, Basecamp is probably the most effective, but I had a hell of a time getting contractors and JVs to login to the service and post there instead of just emailing me directly. I had to update everything myself and it wasted more time than it saved.
So, the idea of a social network in which I can post to a specific list of people or call them into a Hangout to discuss a project from any computer on the planet is very attractive to me.
There is no “right” way to do this, but let me share with you some of the ideas I’ve been working on thus far.
Outsourcing Projects
I outsource a lot of projects. It’s the only way to keep up with all the content I’m trying to create. But, it’s not always easy to keep track of who is available, when they are available or even how many contractors I have on my “contact” list. Google+ is a great way to get around this problem.By placing freelancers and contractors into circles such as “writers”, “designers” and “programmers” I can easily post a new project and send a notification to announce it to everyone on my list.
Say for example, I want to develop a new video series on Ab fitness. Instead of posting a project on Elance and manually inviting each of the people I’ve worked with in the past or worse yet, digging through my inbox and trying to find each of them, I put up a single share to my “video/audio contractors” circle, disable comments and send notifications to make sure everyone gets the message.
You can of course leave comments active if you’re comfortable letting your contractors discuss the project openly, but I personally don’t think this is a good idea. Rates tend to vary for each contractor and tempers can flare if you openly give the project to one person over another.
However, announcing the project or posting updates on a new project you’re getting ready to start this way is a fantastic way to develop and maintain relationships with your writers. You can also keep a separate circle for all of your contractors called “Contractors” and send out periodic updates on your business and upcoming projects.
This allows you to stay social with the people you hire and develop a relationship that will only benefit you in the future. If you’ve contracted more than one or two projects in your life, you know how important these relationships are. When a contractor feels like they know you and respect you, they will do a much better job and are far more willing to give you a deal and prioritize your work when necessary.
JV Partnerships
When partnering with someone on a new project, the hardest part of the whole thing is keeping up with the most recent developments or getting replies from them about something important to the project.Google+ can help alleviate this problem by providing a central discussion platform that all parties are likely to access (and can reach via mobile technology). Create circles with specific project names and then add any of your partners to the list.
This allows you to develop more direct relationships with the people helping you to launch new products and builds on the basic idea of collaboration. On a normal social network this wouldn’t be any better than email, but with the added benefit of Huddle and Hangouts on Google+ you can communicate from anywhere, anytime.
Affiliate Support
The same goes for your affiliates. If you just launched a new product, consider developing an affiliates circle for that product. Now, you can post new tools you’ve developed, recent news, and contests related to that product to your circle and people will instantly receive the value you offer them. Again, because Google+ has so many other tools to offer, this can be fleshed out many times over. Here are some ideas you can put to use in your affiliate campaigns:Weekly Hangouts – Setup a Hangout once a week at a set time and invite your affiliates to join you. It can be a Q&A session about your current product or a presentation about a new product you’re developing. I like to give out fresh market data and marketing strategies I’ve developed or learned from my analytics to help the affiliates reach their customers. By holding a weekly Hangout, I can ensure people show up each week and then save that Hangout for future reference in my “Affiliates” stream. I then write up a short email with all the information we discussed and send it to everyone else with a link to add me on Google+.
Huddle Invites – Make sure people can access you via the mobile app as well. Setup weekly Huddles to follow your Hangouts or possibly even hop online every evening. How many times do you crash on the couch and spend three hours sending text messages while watching TV? You can easily do the same thing with a Huddle and stay in touch with your affiliates.
Create Albums – Create albums, file sets and video playlists full of content that your affiliates can use for their campaigns. Why host all that content on your site, where your possible customers can see it when you could just as easily lock it into place in your Google+ account? It’s free storage, easily controlled for privacy and instantly accessible for people who get into the right circle.
Saved Searches – Save searches in your Google+ account for your product names and reference them every day to see if anything new or interesting came up in the last 24 hours, either on Google+ or elsewhere on the web. You might find a fantastic affiliate campaign being run by one of your contacts. Send them a shout out on Google+ so everyone can see. Imagine the response from your affiliates when they see you announcing your appreciation for one of their fellow affiliates. Talk about motivation!
Google+ is a fantastic tool because it takes everything we know and love about existing social networks and amps it up an octane, so it’s not shocking that it makes a fantastic supplement to your affiliate actions.
Right now, the only way to use this is to setup direct connections between your profile and your affiliates, but when Business accounts go live later this year, make sure you’re on top of it, because it will be a fantastic opportunity to create a central location for all of your product’s needs. And let’s not forget the SEO benefits!
Market Research 101 in Google+
One of the most frequent questions I get from other marketers is how I perform my market research. How do I decide what my next project will be or how I will develop my next interactive website?I do it with a variety of tools. The most regular tools I use are Clickbank, Amazon and Google AdWords. After all, what better way to research what people want than to see what people are willing to pay for?
But, at the end of the day, I don’t necessarily feel like I fully understand the market I’m entering. I may have an idea of what people interested in organic eating will pay for, but I don’t know anything about them as people.
That’s where Google+ comes in.
Google+ is a fantastic tool for performing market research and learning more about your prospects, both directly (by asking them) and by lurking through public posts and search functions to see what they’re talking about.
In fact, I always like twitter for this reason – the hashtags and search functions on twitter made it possible to learn a lot about people and their interest in a topic. The problem was the lack of depth on the site. With only 140 characters, there’s only so much you can say and frankly, I wasn’t that interested in following all those bit.ly links.
Today, we can upgrade our market research.
While, I highly doubt any social network will ever replace my litany of research tools, Google+ is quickly becoming a part of my routine. Here’s how I use it:
Creating Targeted Circles
I’ve already talked a lot about how to build your circles, so I’ll skip that and just say that it’s a good idea to create more targeted circles that build on what you’ve already developed. Say you want to learn more about what fitness gurus are interested in – start posting some content about fitness to your public stream and add a few fitness gurus and devotees to a new circle.You don’t need many to actually follow you back – maybe 10-20 at the most. The goal isn’t to start marketing to them (yet), but to get their feedback on a potential product. Ask them what they are interested in, what they aren’t interested in, and what they find attractive about a new product in their niche.
Check to see what websites they link to frequently and join them on their forums to read up on their recent trends. The goal here isn’t so much to develop prospects, but to learn from established members of a large niche.
Finding New Niches
That’s all fine and good if you already know who you want to market to and are trying to develop a new product, but what about actually finding the niche in which you will next create a product?To do this, we need to find a popular nice with a lot of interest and heavy demand. You know the basic tenets of a good product marketing campaign:
- Resolve a Pain or Provide Pleasure
- Instant Need
- Built in Social Proof and Scarcity
- Unique Angle to Provide Added Value
To start, set up your saved searches. Use Sparks and the Google+ search function to start tracking a handful of niches you’ve already brainstormed. Let’s say for example I decide I might want to market in any one of a number of niches. Here are some saved searches I might have:
Now, all I have to do is login to Google+ each day and click on those saved searches to see what’s popped up in the last 24 hours or so.
While the Sparks function is useful, I personally prefer to review what people are saying on their profiles. It’s not that profile posts are somehow more useful in any way. It’s just that you get the added bonus of seeing all the comments, +1’s and shares that they’ve received over the course of their lifespan on Google+.
And because you can organize the search results by “Best of” you can easily see what is the most popular in the last few days.
I’m not saying you’re going to run across a share that is instantly useful in helping you select a new product to develop, but you will get ideas and ideas are the lifeblood of this business. Better yet, you may learn that something is less useful than you expected.
Say for instance you want to create a guide for pregnant women to decide what they should eat during pregnancy. This would be a very useful guide, but if you then learn during your research that there are a dozen guides already like this, including some that are recommended by doctors like BabyCenter.com, you’ll discover that you’re rowing up the wrong creek.
Supplementing Your Research
This is why Google+ is almost always a good supplement to other research materials. I personally prefer to get my data from Amazon.com (seeing which products have the most total reviews), Clickbank (checking for high gravity) and AdWords (checking for high PPC rates). These resources show me something very important – what people are willing to spend money on, and how many people spend it.Better yet, I can see what competition is doing in advance and know whether the market can bear another product in that niche (especially one with a unique, interesting angle).
But, all that said, Google+ should absolutely be on your research list. Too many marketers get caught up in the idea that what sells matters most, but you still need to know how to sell it.
If you hop into the fitness niche seeing that there is a huge demand for the product, but have no idea what types of products people buy or how you should present yourself in that niche, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. You can’t just coast your way to profits.
Sometimes you’ll get lucky, but most of the time, the social tools presented on Google+ will make all the difference in the world.
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