Google+: What it is and what it means

1. Our Model: Advocacy Is Everything
GOOGLE+
WHAT IT IS AND WHAT IT MEANS
©2011 22squared

2. +Circles +Hangouts +Stream +Photos +Profile +Sparks
WHAT IT IS
A social network that allows you to share thoughts and content with those you care
about the most.
WHY IT’S DIFFERENT
Embedded within the core of Google+ is the notion that people have different circles
of friends and interact and share differently with different groups.
©2011 22squared

3. A CHANCE TO START OVER
Google+ gives people a chance to restart their social graphs and organize their online connections
into more accurate depictions of real-life classifications.
Image Source: Paul Adams. http://www.thinkoutsidein.com/blog/2011/05/small-connected-groups/
©2011 22squared

4. +Circles
CLASSIFY YOUR SOCIAL GRAPH
Circles serve as the central construct of Google+. Circles allows you to organize your connections into various groups
by simply dragging and dropping users into individual Circles. Google also serves up suggestions on the right side of
the home page that encourage you to categorize your contacts into Circles.
©2011 22squared

5. +Circles
CLASSIFICATION IS FOR YOUR EYES ONLY
People can be allowed to see which people appear in your
Circles, but only you can see the names and composition of
your Circles.
There are several different visibility settings that can be
adjusted in the privacy settings. For instance, you can
choose to limit the display of who’s in your Circles to those
you’ve already added to your Circles. You can also choose to
display only pictures of people in a certain group.
©2011 22squared

6. +Hangouts
LIVE VIDEO SESSIONS WITH YOUR CIRCLES
Using live video, Hangouts lets you do exactly what the
name implies, hang out. Hangouts can be public or limited
to select Circles, and when you begin one, a post is
published to the Streams of your selected audience that
lets them know you’re hanging out.
NOT IDEAL FOR PROFESSIONAL USE
Hangouts appear to be intended primarily for use in a
social context, as opposed to a professional setting. You
may want to think twice before trying to hold business-
related video Hangouts, as you’ll find that the control
features you’re used to are missing. Hangouts are created
by one person, but anyone in the Hangout has the ability
to invite other people. People can’t be kicked out of a
Hangout, so the only way to deal with an uncomfortable
situation is to leave.
©2011 22squared

7. +Hangouts
WATCH YOUTUBE VIDEOS TOGETHER
One interesting feature of Hangouts is the ability to watch
YouTube videos together as a group. Clicking the YouTube
button brings up a search box. Once a video is selected, all
users are muted by default, to address echo issues, and
anyone in the Hangout can control video play-by-playing,
pausing, or changing the video.
©2011 22squared

8. +Sparks
DISCOVER INTERESTING CONTENT
One of the more underrated aspects of Google+, Sparks
functions as a recommendation engine around interests you
enter. Sparks functions less as a search service and more like
a blend of Google News and Google Blogs. Whereas with
Google Search you typically start with the intent of finding
something specific, Sparks serves to help users discover
new content around topics they’re interested in.
©2011 22squared

9. +Stream
SEGMENTED VERSIONS OF A SOCIAL STAPLE
Anyone can share posts with you, but the Stream only displays
posts from people you’ve added to your Circles. However, you can
choose to view posts from people who aren’t in your Circles by
clicking Incoming. You can also view filtered versions of the Stream
according to the different Circles you’ve created. You can +1 (think
Facebook’s Like button), comment, or share any item displayed in
the Stream.
©2011 22squared

10. +Stream
SELECTIVE SHARING IS THE DEFAULT
Sharing on Google+ is established on the premise that you
don’t always want to share everything with your entire
social graph. In fact, selective sharing is inherently
embedded into the sharing process on Google+; choosing
the Circle(s) you want to broadcast your message to is a
required step anytime you share, although for convenience,
new posts default to the last set of people you shared a
post with. Indeed, Circles are an effective way to help you
share different things with different people, but it remains
to be seen if this segmentation will lower friction and
encourage more sharing.
©2011 22squared

11. +Stream
A POST TO A LIMITED AUDIENCE HAS THE POTENTIAL TO BE PUBLIC
Just because you posted something to a particular Circle doesn’t mean it can’t be made public. For
instance, if you post something to your Family Circle and one of your family members chooses to
share it with the public, that post you originally meant to share only with your family has been made
public. The only way to keep a post to limited audiences truly limited is to shut off sharing for that
post altogether.
©2011 22squared

12. +Photos
UNLIMITED CAPACITY, INSTANT UPLOADS, AND PHOTO EDITING
The Photos feature in Google+ is relatively intuitive. Users can upload as many photos as they want from
virtually anywhere they want, whether it’s from their desktop or mobile device. Additionally, those who use
Android devices (2.1 or greater) or the iPhone are able to upload via Instant Upload with the Google+ app. A
differentiator for Google+ Photos is the ability to edit photos. As with other aspects of the platform, selective
sharing—the ability to share photos with select Circles—remains a key concept within Photos as well.
©2011 22squared

13. +Marketing Implications
THE SOCIAL LAYER TO RULE THEM ALL
Google has a robust line of products and services that many people use on a daily basis. With these products
and services, Google is able to mine massive amounts of data that provide valuable information to power their
advertising platforms. In particular, Google Search provides powerful insights into the needs and desires of
users as consumers. However, absent throughout this powerful range of Google products has been the ability
for social collaboration and sharing across various apps and platforms. With Google+ as the backbone, Google
can build outbound and inbound pipelines for sharing across its existing products and services. More
importantly, it drives longer and more frequent logged-in sessions for Google properties, which gives Google
the potential to usurp Facebook to once again become the most popular online destination.
©2011 22squared

14. +Marketing Implications
A SOCIAL RANKING FACTOR IN SEARCH
Google+ utilizes the +1 button for the same function as the Like button on Facebook: a way for users to express
validation for a piece of shared content. Google also took Facebook’s lead in releasing their +1 button to web
developers and publishers as a social plug-in for web content. Bing has been incorporating Facebook Likes in
search results for quite some time, and it now looks as though Google will follow suit to tout their own socially
relevant search results.
©2011 22squared

15. +Marketing Implications
“We will record information about your activity - such as posts you comment on and the other
users with whom you interact - in order to provide you and other users with a better experience
on Google services.” — Google+ Privacy Policy
MORE ACCURATE USER PROFILING AND PRIVACY CONCERNS
Google’s success is directly tied to its ability to index user activity. As online user activity has progressively shifted to
social networks—where discovery, as opposed to search, occurs—Google’s inability to index the activity within the
walled gardens of Facebook has posed a serious threat to building robust user profiles. With Google+ acting as the
social layer across all of its products and services, and as more users turn to it as a go-to social network for sharing
and discovering content, Google will gain access to a social layer of user data to help draw a more comprehensive
picture of users. Google has traditionally helped brand marketers target users based on needs and intentions, but
they’ve fallen behind social networks like Facebook in targeting based on interests and identities. With Google+, the
search giant looks to provide brands with the ability to provide targeted advertising to users based on needs,
identities, interests, and network attributes that compose user profiles. The granular, segmented data that Google
will provide may allow for much more accurate targeting, but it is also sure to bring up privacy concerns among
users.
©2011 22squared

16. +Marketing Implications
SOLOMO WITH MOBILE GOOGLE+
With Google+ as the foundation, Google aims to truly create a convergence point for
SoLoMo (social, local, and mobile). Google has put a good bit of thought into catering its
mobile version of Google+ to stay true to the inherent tenets of the mobile experience. For
instance, Huddle is a feature unique to the mobile Google+ experience that allows users to
group-message each other. The mobile version also provides check-in functionality (tapping
into existing Google Places data), and may also suggest offers and deals by way of Google
Latitude.
©2011 22squared

17. +Marketing Implications
SOLUTIONS FOR BRANDS?
Google has stated that Google+ is currently only for building user profiles. As such, many brands looking to
have an early presence on the site have been forcibly shut down. However, Google is testing business solutions
with a beta group of brands, including Ford, MTV, Mashable, and Dell, and monitoring this group may prove
helpful in forecasting the solutions and features Google+ will ultimately offer for brands. In the meantime, there
are two features brands may be able to anticipate:
1. SEGMENTATION WITH CIRCLES
Just as a user can (somewhat) easily classify contacts into different Circles, brands will be able to classify
their fans into Circles. This provides the opportunity to easily publish segmented messages to different
audiences.
2. SPONSORED ADS AND CONTENT WITHIN SPARKS
Sparks are interest-based channels with curated content. As user behavior on the Internet continually shifts
toward a discovery-based model, Sparks will present an opportunity for brands to sponsor relevant content
or target ads based on certain interests. Another interesting possibility to consider: dedicated branded
Sparks.
©2011 22squared

18. +Final Thoughts
GOOGLE+ VS FACEBOOK
So how does Google+ stack up against Facebook? In terms of functionality, besides a few unique features such
as Circles and Hangouts, much of it is what people would expect based on their experiences on Facebook. This
only seems natural, as the Facebook experience is what over 750 million users have become accustomed to
over the years. Although Google+ has experienced a meteoric rise to over 20 million users in a timeframe that
barely spans a month, the true test will be whether it can maintain an increase in active users (a challenging
task, as Twitter knows all too well).
GOOGLE HAS ONLY JUST BEGUN
It’s unclear where Google+ will be five years from now, but it’s safe to say that after a number of half-baked
failures—Orkut, Buzz, Wave—this is simply the beginning of Google’s movements. With Google’s infrastructure
of existing products and services, Google+ may prove to be a compelling web-wide social experience, so much
so that it could siphon off time spent on other social sites like Facebook and Twitter. If it truly hopes to become
a game-changer, however, Google+ will need to place users first by closely monitoring initial feedback.
©2011 22squared