Last week , we gave you four tips on what NOT to do on Google+for your business. Here are five more to help you get even better results from your profile.
Spamming your circles.
While circles are a great way to allow posts to go to targeted consumers, be careful to not overuse or abuse them. Google allows you to send an email to all within that group when you release a post, but unless it is extremely important, try to refrain from doing so. Why does someone want the same information twice? Using this method starts to look “spammy” and puts out those in your circles.
Posting only about your product.
Basic people skills suggest that people are not interested in you if you are all you are interested in. Same goes with business. Though you need to see each post and update as a way of reaching out to your customers and potential client base, do not try to sell a product every time. To best interact with your followers, use the 80/20 rule. 80% of your posts should be catered towards the lifestyle and ideas of your customers (essentially not you), and the other 20% should then be about your business and products. To keep consistent posting, think about the customer you want to reach, find what they are interested in, and write about those specific lifestyle interests. It is better to reveal what type of lifestyle you can achieve from your product rather than only talking about the product.
Ignoring negative comments.
This is one of the hardest tasks for a business owner. Since it is an open forum, you will get bad comments because not everyone will agree with you. To help keep your image, monitor all your social sites and when an issue arises, show that you listen to your customers. Taking the time to process and figure out how to respond is a smart move but remember that it is not only the one commenter who is waiting for your response. Anyone else who may have found the comment will be interested in how you as a company respond. For any comment, it is important to reply quickly and smartly to avoid elevation of negative feelings towards you.
Not joining communities.
Communities are a large part of why the Google + platform is unique from others. You are able to directly connect with communities that share your business niche. Each community grows quickly and is incredibly engaging. You can search and/or get recommendations from Google to find communities that you should join. Treat communities as networking opportunities, if you treat others well and give respect and interest, you are sure to get feedback and advice from other industry leaders.
Posting links without comments.
Have you ever seen a link without any context added to the post? Have you ever clicked it? Most likely not. Posting a link without anything else makes you look thoughtless and results in lower engagement from viewers. To get people to pay attention and respond to you and your business, you need to put out the effort. So when you link to something, write a quick sentence or two on what you liked about it. You have to have some opinion of it for it to be interesting enough to want to share.
Keep these tips in mind while starting or reviewing your Google+ business profile to ensure that you are doing all you can to gain an audience and bring in potential customers to your business!
