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5 Ways to Grow Your Google+ Community

by Michael Delgado on December 21, 2012 in Community with No comments

Creating a thriving online community takes time.

Here are 5 strategies to help you get more exposure for your community:

1. Share posts from your community into your personal stream.
A great way to build exposure for the community you want to support is simply to share interesting community posts with your personal stream.

For example, I shared a post from our LinkedIn for Business community with people who circled me. I also included a link and invited everyone to come join. This one post has three links directing people to the LinkedIn community.

If you’re part of a public community that you would like to see grow, make sure and share an interesting post with your followers (and invite them to join in). If a bunch of people in your community share posts regularly, you should see an increase in membership.

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How to Find More Endorsable “Skills” for Your LinkedIn Profile

by Michael Delgado on October 1, 2012 in LinkedIn with No comments

Last week, LinkedIn started allowing members the ability to endorse the skills of colleagues.

Each skill you’ve listed will either be validated and endorsed or ignored by your peers.

So now is a great time to start reviewing the skills you’ve listed on your profile. Think about listing all the skills that actually matter to your career – and the skills that others can validate.

The more skills others can validate, the more endorsements you’ll receive.

Here are 3 simple ways to find popular “skills” listed by professionals in your industry:

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5 Ways to Get More LinkedIn Endorsements

by Michael Delgado on September 26, 2012 in LinkedIn with 11 Comments

LinkedIn started allowing members to endorse skills from others in their network.

Here are 5 ways to get more endorsements (aside from just asking):

1. Move your “Skills & Expertise” Section Above the Fold

If your “Skills & Expertise” section is at the bottom of your profile, it will be more difficult for people to see your skills and endorse you. Consider moving your “Skills” to the top of your profile so that it is easily visible.

The easier it is to see your skills, the more likely you’ll get endorsed.

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The Most Engaging Google+ Pages (Under 5,000 Followers)

by Michael Delgado on March 29, 2012 in Pages with No comments

It’s easy to get lots of shares and comments when you have thousands of followers, but what about if you have under 5,000 followers.

Here’s a look at some great Google+ pages with small followings but getting tons of engagement and will continue to grow:

Photoshop Disasters

Photoshop Disasters has under 4,000 followers at the moment, but each posts on average gets over 120+ shares and dozens of +1s and comments. This shows the power of an engaged picture-sharing community.

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7 Google+ Infographics You Need to See

by Michael Delgado on March 17, 2012 in Infographics with 1 Comment

Here’s a list of some of my favorite Google+ infographics:

Google+ for Business

Chris Brogan shared his awesome infographic to help businesses with their efforts on Google+

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How to Get a Google+ Business Strategy

by Michael Delgado on March 9, 2012 in Pages with No comments

Many small businesses have created pages on Google+, but are having trouble understanding how to use it effectively.

These businesses are also having a lot of trouble networking and engaging their target audience.

So I thought it would fun to bring together some of the best Google+ coaches and strategists together to offer their advice to help a struggling business page with a free Google+ Page makeover.

Free Google+ Page Makeover

Our Google+ A-Team will provide business strategies to help a struggling business page with their:

Content Strategy
Networking
Engagement strategies with their target market
Getting into more relevant circles
Photo Strip & Photo Album Advice
And much more . . .

These strategies will be featured here on this blog so that other businesses can study and apply to their own page on Google+.

Here is a peek at some of the amazing people that will share their business expertise with us . . .

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4 More Ways to Get Your Google+ Page Circled

by Michael Delgado on March 6, 2012 in Pages with No comments

If you’re just starting a page in Google+, it can be a challenge to get followed (especially if nobody is looking for you). Unlike Twitter, you can’t just grow an audience on Google+ by following other people. You’re restricted from following people until they first follow you.

So how do you get noticed? And how can you promote yourself to your target market?

I shared 12 strategies to help you get your Google+ page circled in a recent blog post, and want to continue this series with 4 more ways to get noticed and circled:

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Small Business Guide to Finding Locals on Google+

by Michael Delgado on March 2, 2012 in Tips with 2 Comments

My dad is a plumber and starting up his own plumbing business in Huntington Beach, California.

He’d like to use his Google+ page to promote his business, but he’s not sure if his target market is there.
He also doesn’t know how to find them.

So how can he find and connect with locals? And how can he best use his time in Google+?

First, let’s address the problems of finding people based on location:

The Problem of Finding People by Location

There isn’t a surefire way to find out where people are living simply by doing a city search in Google. Sometimes people list their location in their about page, but not always. Many people share a variety of places they have lived, and it’s not always clear where they live now.

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How Google+ Helps Businesses Achieve Top Ranking for High Traffic Keywords

by Michael Delgado on March 1, 2012 in Tips with 1 Comment

Google+ can help you rank for keywords you never thought possible – and place your business page and/or profile in top positions organically.

Let me show you how . . .

1. People and Pages Spotlight Area

Depending on the query, relevant Google+ businesses and profiles appear in a “people and pages” spotlight area right area above the ads on the right side. Here are some examples:

Scott Jarvie is one of the most popular wedding photographers on Google+. He shares amazing photos from his shoots, and is followed by over 64,000+ people. Since he has the most followers out of all the photographers that I follow, he ranks #1 for “wedding photography” when I’m logged-in. I’ve tested this query many times over the last week and he consistently ranks in this top position.

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How to Find Your Target Market in Google+

by Michael Delgado on February 26, 2012 in Pages with No comments

I recently spoke at the SocialMediaExaminar.com Small Business Summit to share how I’m using Google+ for business. During the webinar, I discussed a variety of ways that businesses can begin finding their target market in Google+.

Here are some of the strategies that I shared in my presentation:

1. Search for topics related to your audience or niche.

The first step is do a search for keywords related to your target audience. In this example, I’m looking to connect with ad agencies in Google+. I conducted searches for keywords like: digital agency, ad agency, advertising, marketing, etc. I found hundreds of pages related to this topic and started following these pages as a first step in networking with them. Since I can only follow other pages, I conducted my search within the “People and pages” drop-down and also looked for the “gray box” page icon to help me identify pages (since I’m unable to follow people with my page until first followed by them).

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5 Creative Ways People Are Using Hangouts [Videos]

by Michael Delgado on January 5, 2012 in Hangouts with No comments

Here are some creative ways people and organizations are using Google+ hangouts:

Universe Today Astronomers Discussing Discovery of Earth-Sized Planets

Fraser Cain from Universe Today hosts a discussion with astronomers about the discovery of earth-sized planets by NASA’s Kepler recent mission.

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Google+ Pages Get Notifications, Multiple Admins, Stream “Volume Control” and More

by Michael Delgado on December 21, 2011 in News with 2 Comments

Here is a peek at some of the big changes for Google+ page admins:

Multiple Admins for Google+ Pages

Google is now allowing page admins to have up to 50 managers on a page. This will help a page become more effective at managing and producing content 24/7. To add admins, here is the process:

After logged into your page, click on the gear icon (top-right corner)
Click “Managers” button on left-hand side
Add email address of another Google+ members in the “Add managers by email” box
Click “Invite”

I’m not able to add admins to my +circled.us page yet, but here is a screenshot of how it looks when inside page settings:

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How to Get Your New Google+ Page Circled Today: 12 Simple Ways to Promote Your Page Effectively

by Michael Delgado on December 14, 2011 in Pages with 3 Comments

When first starting a Google+ page, it can feel lonely.

And I mean lonely.

Google doesn’t let you follow anyone, which means that nobody is subscribing to your page updates or even knows your page exists.

So how do you start getting circled? And more importantly, how do you start networking with your target audience on Google+?

Here are some page promotion tips to help you get started . . .

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Google+ News Mashup: December 10, 2011

by Michael Delgado on December 10, 2011 in News with No comments

Here’s what happened this week in Google+ . . .

Google+ Photos Get Automatic ‘Find My Face’ Recognition

With Find My Face, “Google+ can prompt people you know to tag your face when it appears in photos,” Google’s Matt Steiner wrote in a Google+ post. “Of course, you have control over which tags you accept or reject, and you can turn the feature on or off in Google+ settings.” See the Washington Post article.

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The Google+ Circle You Should Know About

by Michael Delgado on December 9, 2011 in Circles with 2 Comments

It all started when +Melody Lynn asked for recommendations from “Olbie GPlussers” about who they recommend people circle if just starting out in Google+. This quickly erupted into 55+ comments with dozens of recommendations of the top G+ helpers known today.

I thought it was a great list, so I quickly compiled the names and shared Melody’s post with my circles. In less than an hour, Ryan Crowe took my list (along with others he felt belonged) and shared his “Invaluable Google+ ‘Getting Started’ Circle” with his 25,000+ followers.

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