So it’s all over Facebook. Almost everyone in the photography industry is moving away from Facebook and leaning towards Google+. The photographs look better, the ability to share with the world is easier, and most importantly, it improves your SEO. So why not? Give it a try. Here’s a simple tutorial I drummed up to help everyone navigate Google, set up their Google+ page and get it up and running.
Everyone I know has a Gmail account. If you have one, just login to your Gmail, click on the top right box that has little squares and your google+ profile will pop up. If you haven’t updated your profile, please do so. Add any and all your social media links to it so it is easy for people to find you and to find out what you do.
To do this, after you click on the Google+ link, go to the top left and hover over “Home”. Click on Profile.
It will bring you to your personal Google+ page. Click on the “About” tab to add all your information. The important part of this is to add in all
your social media links to the links area.
Once you have everything updated, go back and over the “Home” tab at top right and click on “Pages”. You will be able to create a page or navigate to a page you have already created. After you have created a page, you can go in and manage the page. It will bring you to the dashboard where you will be able to see how many views your page has received, how many click-throughs to your website you have received, and it will also let you go in to edit your business information.
Once you go in to edit your information, you will be able to add your business address, website, phone, etc. Remember when you set up your Google+ business page, be sure to enter in your valid address. If you do not, you will not be able to receive a postcard from Google with a code on it to verify your account. Make sure all of this is accurate as this will affect how you place on Google search. If you do not want your business address public, just make sure you have the “
If you want to switch between your business and your personal profiles, go to the top right and click your profile image. Your other pages will pop up.
If you want to navigate to your main page and see what it will look like to the public, click on your business name in your dashboard and it will take you there. Here, you can post pictures, links, texts, videos, anything your heart desires.
Remember when you do a post, always use appropriate hashtags and links to your website. After you do a post, share it with all your circles. You can switch between your personal profiles and your business profiles so you can share with all of circles.
If you are a photographer and you blog with WordPress, install the plugin Publicize. Have it share your blog link automatically with your Facebook , LinkedIn, Tumblr, Google+, etc. Remember to link both your personal and your business pages so you get visibility on both. Google authorship also increases your SEO. That way, all you have to do after you finish a blog post is go in and edit the posts on Facebook and Google+ to your liking. Adding more text, adding hashtags, etc. After I do this, I usually go back to my blog post and pin images directly from the blog post so my Pinterest followers can see my favorite images.
When you network and follow other people’s pages, you should follow and +1 with your personal and your business profiles. When u do a post from your personal profile and share it with your business page, it actually increases your visibility and authorship with google. It is very important if u blog or have a website. The more interactions u have, the higher ranked u will be on google. Also, when u put someone in your circle, it enables you to share your content with them and also to email them if you want to. A +1 is a “like” much like on Facebook but it is more powerful because Google captures that information. When you Follow someone, it means, you want their information and what they post to show up on your stream.
For tips on how to obtain a custom Google+ url like mine: http://google.com/+sugashocphotography, please see click on this tutorial from Google.
I am no expert but this is how I got my Google+ business page up and running and I hope this will help you out in some way. Please feel free to follow me, +1 me, and I will return the favor! Let’s all join in and help each other out!