Google+ is for Everyone!

There is Yahoo, there’s facebook, and there’s twitter…what on earth is google+?

There’s been a lot of confusion about Google+ and how to manage your Circles…  How are they different from the other social platforms…I mean, why should I leave tweeting to come open a google+ account?  What are ‘circles’?

Calm your worries friends, I will simplify it for you

Google+ is different from Twitter and Facebook in the way you obtain and distribute information. In Twitter, you can follow people to see their updates, they don’t have to follow you back. It makes for an easy one way street, for people who are interested in the updates of others. In Facebook, it’s a completely mutual relationship. If you want to see someone’s updates, you need to request their friendship, and the other person has to accept it. You will then be mutually sharing...

Google+ handles this in a completely new way. You have circles, which are basically categories of people. People can be in more than one circle, but they have to be in at least one circle to be a part of your contacts. When you go to post an update, you get to choose what people will see that update in their stream.

What are Circles?

You create Circles to categorize and organize your contacts on Google+, and you can create any that you want. The default ones are actually a great start. You drag contacts into your circles to categorize them. (note: when you add someone to a circle they will be notified that you added them to your circles, but not WHAT circles… for instance if you name a circle “crazy” they won’t ever know… well unless you tell them)

These Circles control not only who sees your updates but also whose updates you see in your stream. When you go to your stream you can see the full stream or you can click to see just a certain circle.

You can also click to see posts from people who you haven’t added to YOUR circles but who have shared something with a circle that they have included you in, these are in the “Incoming” stream. It may sound complicated but in practice it isn’t.

When you share something on Google+ you get to choose who sees it. That doesn’t guarantee they WILL see it, it just means that it will be available in their stream if they look at it, and you are in a circle that they include in that stream.

With Google + instead of the assumption that everyone is your friend, you put everyone in appropriate groups called ‘circles.’ People can be in more than one circle (just like in real life) and you can easily share something to some people or with everyone. With over 1 billion daily users of Google products, Google+ also enables you to reach the right people at the right time. Google searches deliver relevant results from your Google+ page, including recent posts, photos, and videos, right when they matter the most to your customers.