The Secret To Building Your Business With Google Plus Circles
1. The Secret To Building Your
Business With Google Plus Circles
Have you discovered the power of
building your business with
Google Plus circles?
2. MMSpark.com Resources….
Freebies & Guides
12 Top Social Media Tips
Mmspark.com/mmfreebie
Information packed webinars
http://mmspark.com/webinars/
3. Google Plus is not just
“another social media platform”
It’s the “new Google” and the glue that ties
social search together
Google have done an amazing job of
bringing all their free tools and services
under one umbrella so your Gmail address is
the central connection to your Google Plus
account, Google calendar, Google Drive,
Google Maps, Google Local, YouTube, and
much more!
4. Google Plus is not just
“another social media platform”
With Circles you can effectively build your business by using
Google Plus for targeted promotions and tailoring the
information you share, and receive
Unlike the other social media platforms where everything is
posted to everyone (although only a small percentage of your
friends and fans see your posts), with Google Plus you use
circles to segment your contacts, and the information you
share
5. Getting Started With Circles
When you’re just starting out, you will have 4 pre-created
circles that you can edit or delete
Google will also suggest people to add to your circles based on
the contact lists from your Gmail, Android and other Google
services and products that you’re a part of
You may want to edit the titles of your existing circles before
adding people, so you can easily categorize your contacts
6. Getting Started With Circles
To edit one of Google plus’s default circles, double-click on it to open
its panel
A pop up window will appear that contains the circle’s name, a brief
description, and a snapshot of who you’ve added to the circle
You can also add people based on your education (school, college,
university) and employment (company, business)
When you’re building your business with Google plus circles you
need to keep your ideal clients, and potential partners, in mind
7. Creating Circles
Click on the + to create a new circle or click on a circle to
see who’s in it
Then you can drag and drop into other circles, edit the
circle name, remove people from circles or delete the
circle
Your circle strategy will evolve as you get familiar with
Google Plus but it’s totally flexible and easily updated
Once you’ve started engaging on Google Plus, you can
build your circles using the “People” tab to find contacts
and drag and drop them into your circles
8. You can have as many circles as you like and it’s a good idea to
organise your circles based on the information you want to share
Think about how you might want to segment your contacts
Perhaps based on where they’re located, so you would invite local
contacts to live workshops or 1-2-1 sessions; or customers (share
special offers and members’ content), prospects (share your best blog
posts and e-zine updates), or friends and family
And a great tip is to create a circle of influencers
If you’re working your circles strategically to build your business you
should focus on circling the people you want to learn from
9. The Secret To Building Circles
The key to building circles is not to focus on the numbers
but on the relationships you have with the people you
circle
Actively engage with people you want to learn from by
circling them, engaging them in conversation, sharing
their relevant posts with your communities and
circles, leaving thoughtful comments, +1 their content
By engaging, and sharing relevant, helpful content you’ll
get yourself noticed, and build great relationships
10. Unlike Twitter where you follow as many people as possible in
the hope that a certain percentage of them will follow you back,
with Google Plus, it’s about quality rather than quantity
So only circle people you look up to, and want to learn from
Then you can share their updates and cutting-edge content with
your followers (who hopefully will be circling you because you’re
sharing such good stuff!)
11. Growing Your Circle Following
Focus on providing value and building strong relationships and your
circles will grow as people get to know you and like what you share
and how you add value
And focus on long-term, quality, relationships, rather than for lead
generation or just to promote a product
Spam and promotional posts do not go down well on Google Plus
People are there to connect, build relationships and grow their
businesses, not to make a quick buck
One thing I love about Google Plus is the community’s intolerance of
junk, which keeps the calibre of content and interactions high
12. Another Handy Way To Add
People To Circles
Simply hover over someone’s name and
your list of circles pops up
Click on the circle(s) to add your new
contact
This applies whether you’re in a
community, your home stream or
receiving notifications
13. Talking of hovering…
For more on Google Plus Hover Cards (your online business card), read the
article I wrote recently for Women Unlimited
Womenunlimitedworldwide.com/how-to-use-google-hover-cards
14. Decide Who Sees What You Share
What’s exciting about circles is that they determine the updates you
see in your newsfeed
As you can see from the screen below, I have streams for each of my
circles and can choose which stream I want to receive information
from (you can also change your notifications to control how much
content you receive from each stream)
Similar to Feedly I can choose to receive updates from specific people
or groups
15. For example, if I want to see what my Women
Unlimited contacts are sharing (or check when
my article is being promoted!) I would click on the
Women Unlimited circle (see below)
16. Circles make sharing easy
When you’re sharing content you can
choose whether to share with the public
or just to specific circles or communities
This is VERY powerful, because instead of
posting an update as you would on
Facebook or Twitter to your entire
following, you can create content around
specific audiences, which gives you the
opportunity to connect in a very
different, and far more personalized way
It’s social segmenting at its best!
17. Google plus is not a replacement for an
email list like Aweber or Mail chimp, but it
does have its benefits and can be used for
very targeted and effective communications
It’s a great business tool
18. Your action assignment from this article is
to begin creating a handful of circles
And don’t forget to “circle me” – connect
with me (Cassie Hicks Kerr) directly or
through the rapidly growing MM Spark
community
Plus.google.com/u/0/communities/116157915149834695825
I’ll see you on G+!
19. MMSpark.com Resources….
Freebies & Guides
12 Top Social Media Tips
Mmspark.com/mmfreebie
Information packed webinars
http://mmspark.com/webinars/