Google+ business pages are here! We have been waiting for these since the platform was launched and we were told by commentators everywhere that they were going to change the way we do things and are going to be way better than Facebook pages. Now from your experiences so far, how has that gone down? Well if you are trying to use them the same way you use Facebook then that is where the problem lies.

I have a strategy to get users in your circles, improve brand image, sharing and interaction. It is simple enough and uses the Google+ features that people are seeing as a bad aspects and using them to your advantage.

As I’m sure you now know, you can’t circle users until they have circled your page, this makes sense but seems to be stopping people that are used to twitter from making the most of it. Why should they circle you? You need to make a reason, it is up to you to make them want to be part of the brand experience.

Your number 1 weapon here are the Circles and in particular selective sharing. This is basically a very simple method of reward that gets users to interact with the page.

Use your circles to crate a hierarchy of followers. Different content is shared with different circles (this is how they were designed), by doing this you will make the users in the higher circles feel special and valued. Below is an example.

• You have public updates for the general population

• First Circle – For everyone that circles your page – they get the ocasional exclusive update as well as public updates

• Second Circle – For those who have commented positively or +1 a post that you have made – More exclusive content and everything from the First Circle

• Third Circle – For the regular commenters and +1ers – even more content and possibly occasional discounts for the members – Everything from the second Circle

• Final Circle – Now the members of this circle are the biggest brand fans, they get rewarded with content, prizes, discounts and anything else you want to offer – everything from the third Circle

This whole strategy comes down to content and exclusivity. You want the members of each circle to know where they are so post to each one once a week thanking them for being followers and tell them where they are in the hierarchy and what they get as a result. Knowing is all part of it, if they know that there is levels above them then they will try and get there which is fantastic for you as you get them to interact more, share your content etc. Money cant buy interaction and loyalty.

Be organised and make sure that you do not neglect any circle. Plan it out at the start of each week. What are you going to give and who to? It may sound like you need a lot of content, it doesn’t have to be the case. You can do a staggered release, top circle gets first look then wait and give it to the next circle down and so on. Don’t only do this otherwise there is little reason to be in the higher circles but it is an element that you can use.

Once you have them set up and populated you need to have a clear idea about what each circle gets. Content, on social media, we eat, breathe and live content. It is the life and soul of social media, so give the people what they want. If you have a new advert getting released soon then give your top circle a sneak peak before everyone else. New product? Your most loyal fans are your focus group. But lets look beyond the simple and into the other features of Google+.

Hangouts. Why not use them as content? For example you run a food blog, why not have a Q&A hangout for your biggest fans? They can ask tips and tricks and you can connect on an even more personal level. Why not offer them a cooking class hangout where they can cook along with you and ask for help? These are rewards and people will love, then you can film the whole thing and release the video on YouTube a week later to the next circle down. Think different and think bigger than normal.

If you are a bigger brand then go bigger. You are EA Sports promoting FIFA 2012, why not have a hangout with one of your cover stars? This can work all over the world and in nearly every single industry, your followers would love to talk to their idols. Make it happen.

The user base on Google+ will grow, make sure that you are there and you are making the most of it.

Why Schedule Tweets?

Twitter is a strange beast and many people find the speed at which it moves overwhelming and that scares them off. Another reason that people struggle is because they want to put content out there but dont want to have to do it at all times of the day and night, but what is the point in putting all your content out when most people are at work and too busy to use twitter? This is where tweet scheduling works perfectly.

The idea of scheduling is made for the times that you are too busy to tweet but still want to get your message out there. Now, there are many different tools that are out there that let you schedule your tweets however in my experience the best one has to be Buffer, this extremely simple tool will give you 4 times a day to post as default however you can add more and change the times. You add a tweet and it just schedules for the next available time. I will show you how to set it up and get the ball rolling with it.

Getting Started

So firstly you need an account of course. Here is how to get started.

Setting up Buffer to suit you

One of the best things about Buffer is that it is completely customisable. You can change the times to suit you and if you have a paid account then you can even shave different schedules on different days. It is a great tool and here is how to change your schedule and get posting on a free account.

So thats it, Buffer is good to go! As a free user you can schedule up to 10 tweets at once but as a paid you can do up to 50.

A few more tips

So that was the basics of buffer but there are a few little things that can help you out.

• Buffer will automatically shorten your links so dont worry if they look really long, when you schedule them they will shorten.
• There are add ons for Chrome and Firefox web browsers that let you add a page straight to Buffer without ever visiting Buffer. This cuts down time and just makes life easier.
• Remember the reason for Twitter, Buffer is a great tool but you still need to interact with your followers.
• You can edit the times of the tweets at any time so it is trial and error to get it perfect.
• Use the analytics to see what is working the best and make sure you do more of the same.

If you have any questions then feel free to ask me in the comments and I will do my best to help you out.

Twitter

Twitter is still an enigma to many of us and seems to be a much more difficult transition from the comfort of a blog than some of the other social platforms, most notably Facebook with its very slow moving interface.

What is twitter for?

So twitter seems to have started out with a relatively cult following and had gathered some pretty bad press about the mundanity of updates from attention starved teens and this only gave insight into their eating habits and how they feel about the latest My Chemical Romance track. However that is no longer the case. Don’t get me wrong there is still a large amount of personal affirmation on Twitter but this need for approval and self worth is exactly what makes it a perfect place for relationships to flourish.

Twitter is used for extremely fast moving communication and sharing. It is all about the conversation, just having automated posts broadcasting your lastest product or deal is not going to get you anywhere and the frustration will cause you to drop the platform all together.

So what do I do?

Like I have said it is all about the conversation, without it you are going to lack any real value. That leaves one option, get involved in the community that you want to be part of.

There are a number of ways to get involved, here are a few.

• Set up searches
• Follow people who are interested in the community
• Retweet anything that adds value to your followers
• Mention people that are talking about the industry
• Follow influential users
• Just get talking!

TweetDeck – Accounts and Searches

Time to set up searches, but why? What you want to achieve is to find users that are interested in what you have to offer and to find people to follow and get into conversations with. A search is literally that, you are just searching for a particular phrase or hashtag. Now I may have just baffled you there but ‘hashtags’ are used on twitter mainly to show what the post is about. So for example, if I wanted to tweet about this blog post then I could say something like:

“Social media basics: How to effectively use twitter #socialmedia #twitter #guide”

#hashtags have to all be one word, there is no way around that. You would set up a search for each hashtag that you want to follow.

For this I would suggest using TweetDeck to begin with. It is free and great for searches.

Here is how to set it up:

First lets add an account

Now lets set up some searches

Now you just need to keep following the searches that are relevant to your business and start talking to people who are interested in the community that you want to be part of.

Mentions

Mentions are one of the most important parts of twitter, this is how you have actual conversations with users. There are 2 ways of mentioning someone. The first is just by including their ‘handle’ in a tweet, a handle is their username so ours is @WeAreUpstream, you would just include that anywhere in the tweet and we would be notified of it. Like below.

The other way is to reply to a post, this makes the reply not show up in your followers timelines. This is very good when having a conversation but not good if you are trying to make public tweets. Example below, the examples are using TweetDeck but it is possible to do all of this in the web browser version of Twitter.

Retweets (RT)

These are used when someone posts something that you think your followers will like. Again this can be done in two ways. There is a RT button which on TweetDeck is the arrow pointing right. The other way is to copy the post into your own update bar, add RT at the front followed by their twitter handle. Like below.

Now you have all the tools and know how to get you going on Twitter. Jump in and give it a go. Make sure that you get involved, you don’t have to go head first but make sure that you keep it up. Make twitter part of your daily routine, TweetDeck should help with this as it is always on your desktop.

Good luck!