Google+ Circle Manifesto

One of the most frequent questions I am asked is… How do I determine who to put in my Google+ Circle?   I found the best way to address this question is to provide my Google+ Circle Manifesto.

Google Plus Circle Manifesto

It is very important to understand the power of the Google+ Circles.  The power comes from who you put in your Google+ Circle.  After all, the content that appears in your Google+ Stream is coming from the people, places and things you put in your G+ Circle.   So,  your Google+ experience comes from who you put in your G+ Circle.

Now, I know there are those who are still drunk on the the Old School Online Influence Marketing Koolaide which is based on gathering up as many people as you can for a baseline for marketing, but these people need to realize that all that went away when Google launched G+.  Now…, anyone who provides quality content can be as influential as those who attempt to manipulate the social spaces.

My Basic Criteria for Selection

Today, the effective way to market online is through:

1. Producing quality content
2. Interacting socially with those who support or share quality content.
3. Sharing quality content

These are the three basic criteria I use to determine if I will place someone in my Circle.

In most cases, quality content is produced by those who understand the new style of marketing.  These are the people who you should be placing into your Circle so you can View the content they post which more than likely would be worth you Sharing to those who have placed You in their Circle.

This is why it is very, very important you carefully select who you place into your G+ Circle as being someone who produces quality content, shares quality content or is a supporter of your quality content.

Since Google will only allow a maximum of 5000 people to be placed into your Circle you need to make your selections wisely.

Selection Process

This is why I have produced my manifesto on how I determine who I will place in My Google+ Circle.  Here is what I look for.

Image

The first criteria for being considered to be placed into my Circle has to do with the Plusser’s profile image.  There are some very creative people online and many of them provide some very creative images as representative of who they are, however, not showing a photo of themselves usually means they are attempting to hide something.  Only in very rare occasions will I even consider placing someone in my Circle who does not have a headshot photo.  The exception would be only if I know the person offline and even then I would be counseling them heavily on the importance of a headshot photo.

Name

Another interesting phenomena brought on by the ‘Mobile’ era has to do with people filling in their entire personal profile in all ‘lowercase’ letters.  If they post their name in all lowercase I usually will pass them by since posting lowercase is part of the Old School Spammer BOT techniques still being used today.

If someone does not think enough of themselves to correctly Cap the First Letter of their name as we all were taught in first grade, then they may not be someone who will meet my basic criteria.

Also, if the person, place or thing places an obvious business name or other description word phrase as their name I pass them by.

Profile Banner

If the person, place or thing has gotten this far in the process I will click into their Profile.  Granted, this takes time to do, but it is worth doing at the very beginning instead of during the Circle Management process I will address later.

If the Banner is full of promotions for a business, I pass.  If it has an animated .gif, I move on.

Of course, there are those exceptions based again on if I know the person offline, are is a client or someone I am mentoring.  But even then if these people are not provider of quality content and do not support the quality content I provide I may have to move on without them in my circle.

Complete Profile

I have found over time there are many people who evidently do not think enough of themselves to fill in their personal profile.   I look for people who tell everyone more about why they are on Google+. A complete personal profile is very important to understanding how much they understand what they are doing online.

Some of the most critical information I look for is where in the world they are located.  I am not looking for their address, but the city, community, state or country they currently reside.  This helps me to  know if there is any common ground we may share.

Knowing a person’s interest, hobbies and mission sometimes helps me to know if there is content I find that would interest them.  It is very important that a person has a complete personal profile.  It helps that person be found.

Posts

The content a Plusser posts is very important.  If they post only .gifs the value of their content is near worthless and sharing .gifs have even less value since there is no search value to them.  As Google grows out of their adolescences phase of attempting to grow their platform users through silly gimmicks these animated .gif files will be looked at the same as the ‘Buy Now’ flashing buttons people were putting on their web-sites in 2000.

Quality content can be graphic or it can be in the form of the written word.  Videos are still the most valued content.   If someone posts an assortment of original content…i.e. blogs, or articles; a balanced mix of videos and photos; as well as sharing other posts, they would be someone I would place in my Circle and visit often.

Rinse, Repeat and Maintain

Once I have gone through the selection process of who I place into my G+ Circle I repeat the process over and over.  However, at some point there comes a time to review who I have placed into my Circle.

I have found people change their minds frequently and many people are easily influenced by others to make a change direction to go backwards with how they use their social space.  This means they will change how they socialize online.   I see these changes when I go in to review my Circles and see many people changing their headshot photos, profiles, banners and type of posts which are not reflective of being quality content.

I also see where people for one reason or another have fallen off the ‘social search’ wagon of using Google+.

All of these changes usually result in me Uncircling these people.

So, once a month I will go through the long list of people I have placed into my Circle to see who has changed.  I also use programs to help me determine those who have left Google+ so I can uncircle them in mass.

The reason I go through all of this is to insure that my time online is spent effectively.  Having the wrong people in your G+ Circles will result in a lot of wasted time which results in a less than satisfying experience.  I really enjoy the content the Plussers in my Circle are producing and look forward to finding even more quality content from quality Plussers to add to my Circle.

I suggest you come up with your own Manifesto on how you will select who you put into your G+ Circles and then of course…let me know how I can help.