I’m noticing over here on the other side of the Atlantic that the British freelancer community seems less enamoured by Google Plus than their US counterparts. I could speculate for hours why that might be: probably some mix of American enthusiasm for anything new and shiny, British cynicism of bandwagon-leaping, and perhaps just something pessimistic in the water at the moment.
I’ll admit to a certain amount of reluctance to invest time in yet another social network at first: didn’t I waste enough time on Twitter, Facebook, and media-sharing sites, not to mention those weekly newsletters and subscribed blog posts silting up my inbox?
But after two months on Google Plus, I’m sold. It helped that freelancing colleagues kept inviting me to join, so I could see there was already plenty of interest among people I knew: by last November I felt distinctly late for the party.
What got me first was the sleek, clean layout. Some of the features, such as having to decide what circle to add people to took a bit longer, but feel perfectly natural now. To me, it feels like a good social networking fit for the way that freelancers interact and do business.
So what makes it so good for freelancers?
G+ (I’m going to call it that from here on in) integrates several of the more useful functions of other sites and adds some new ideas of its own. It also integrates well with other Google features, with even more inter-connectivity expected in the future.
This is G+’s way of streaming which updates you see or who can view your own news. If you don’t make your posts public, only people in the Circles you choose can see it. You can add people to more than one Circle. This is perfect for keeping your personal life and the different aspects of your business life separate. You can post different news to Friends, Colleagues, or Clients, for example.
Many blogs and media sites I follow post their content onto G+ so I can stream by my Media Circle (or even break it down even more specifically: Tech News, Social Media, Blogs etc.) to get the latest updates. I find it much easier to click through on posts that catch my eye than going into the Newsletter filter in my inbox every couple of days and wading through.
You can join in the discussion on posts, and this is often more lively than the on-site comments. I find a lot of new people to add to my network by reading their responses to posts.
This is a facility for up to 10 people to have a video chat session. You can invite people publicly, by a Circle, or individually. It is a great way of arranging small group discussions with people in your industry around the world, a bit like hosting your own little conference. Some people schedule weekly or monthly sessions around certain topics and invite people to drop by.
Do you need a separate Business Page? If you operate under your own name, then probably not. If you have a consultancy or small business then you could consider it. You can have several administrators, which is an advantage, and use features such as combining a local business with Google Maps so that your profile pops up in Map searches.
It’s not available in the UK yet, but has been the subject of controversy since its US launch. Google users can choose between two views: one highlighting search results from their G+ contacts, and one standard Google search. For businesses, this means that the Your World search will prioritise G+ results above official websites and generally muck up their carefully-sculpted SEO. The good news is that if you post plenty of content to G+ and have a wide network who share it, you can leap to the top of the search results. It’s certainly at least worth claiming your name or business profile, even if you just use it to direct people to your website.
