Archive for the Google+ Celebrities Category

Google+ is Becoming Musical

Tuesday, April 9th, 2013 | Permalink

As Google+ has progressed as a social network it has branched out and evolved into certain interests. As I scroll down my general feed now I will notice common themes such as stunning pictures of nature, lengthy posts about technology and hilarious videos among many other daily trends. As these trends (or what were once known as Sparks) strengthen it seems that their followings increase and eventually attract well known individuals in those particular fields.

A great addition to this is music as popular bands and musicians have been joining Google+ in a way to engage and interact with their fans. While Myspace has a strong music library it lacks the social connection between artist and fans; Twitter makes up for this yet has obvious limitations thus making Google+ a perfect medium for musicians to communicate to their fan-base and vice versa. James Joseph Howard, a London based Google employee fronting G+ music, made me aware a few months back of the music industry adopting Google+ as this medium and I have been taking an interest in the progress ever since. Over this period of time Google’s social network has seen some of the biggest bands in the industry sign up and even host Hangouts directly to the G+ community giving lucky individuals the opportunity to ask their own questions.

The whole setup works well as a band or artist will have their own page where they have the ability to reach out to fans and potentially even new audiences via posts, videos and Hangouts. Google+ users then have the opportunity to comment on these activities and between one another essentially creating a micro community based around that particular band or artist. Effectively the musicians are able to promote themselves and acquire feedback while the fans are happy being engaged with while seeing the latest updates on their favourite musicians.

If you want to check out which of these musicians are already on Google+ then you are in luck as James has kindly provided me with a circle which you add and share on your own Google+ profile. I am even considering creating a monthly post which will involve sharing a circle with you which includes the latest bands and artists that have signed up to Google+. Let me know your thoughts on this in the comment section everyone!

Add and share this circle on Google+ now!

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Google+ Celebrities, Google+ Music | No Comments »

Ken Livingstone Follows Suit and Joins Google+

Monday, February 27th, 2012 | Permalink

In the middle of September I created a post discussing how the three political leaders of the UK (David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg) had joined Google+ in order to build on their media presence. Google’s social network was new and fairly unknown at the time making it surprising that these individuals (or the public relation people behind them) recognised the future value in creating Google+ profiles.

Both Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg have maintained updated profiles which allow the public to actively interact with their posts and media published. This gives the political leaders some sort of indication on what the Google+ community think of their thoughts and actions making it an excellent testing ground when used correctly. David Cameron’s last update was at the beginning of October making it clear that he (or his PR) were quick to give up on the social network; yet it’s interesting to note that he is still in more people’s circles than the other two party leaders, perhaps this proves that it’s worth having the Google+ presence regardless of whether a celebrity of influential figure is going to keep their profile updated. David Cameron can always return to that profile at a key time to promote himself and essentially target almost 140,000 people at the touch of a button.

By now you have most likely seen different famous icons from around the world join the ever growing social network but to keep relative to the subject I want to bring it to attention that Labour’s London mayoral candidate, Ken Livingstone, has joined Google+. The account has only recently been created so it will be interesting to monitor how the profile is used from a candidate’s perspective, what sort of success will be gained and whether it can have an impact during and leading up to the election period. These factors will depend on how effective Ken Livingstone manages the profile and whether he fully utilises Google+’s excellent features to interact directly with the British public, we have already seen Barack Obama address his nation live using Google+ Hangouts and constantly reach out to the public via posts.

Ken Livingstone on Google Plus

Labour's London mayoral candidate Ken Livingstone has now joined Google+

Tags: ,
Posted in Google+ Celebrities | No Comments »

Bank of America’s Fake Google+ Page

Wednesday, November 16th, 2011 | Permalink

I recently commented how Google+’s pages were open to people creating fake profiles on famous figures despite having a strict real name policy for regular profiles. It seems that somebody proved my theory correct as a false Bank of America page was created on Google Plus making a mockery of the nation’s largest bank. The page included a number of posts and images attacking the bank while each one was shared and +1′d by some of the 500 followers of the page. One of these posts included the following message:

“Starting tomorrow, all Occupy Wall Street protestors with Bank of America accounts around the country will have their assets seized as part of BofA’s new Counter-Financial-Terrorism policy. You will sit down and shut up, or we will foreclose on you.”

Bank of America Google Plus

How will Google stop incidents like this in the future?

This process now known as “brandjacking” has been seen on a number of social networks  but it seems that Google+ has become a victim too due to the lack identity protection for their pages release. There are concerns over the fact it was able to be put up in the first place (on November 8th) and managed to survive a week without being taken down until Bank of America shared their concerns with Google. Since my previous post about Google+ pages it looks like the verification tick has been introduced to pages but I still believe creating pages has to be a harder process to complete to avoid cases like this happening on a frequent basis.

Surely it would be simple to ask page creators to introduce a unique meta tag to their site in order to verify they own it?

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Google+ Celebrities, Google+ Findings | 1 Comment »

Google+ Direct Connect

Friday, November 11th, 2011 | Permalink

I have to admit, at first glance I couldn’t see the benefit of this new feature but I can definitely see potential after looking into it. Google+ Direct Connect allows you to search for Google+ pages direct from the search engine itself. Simply add a ‘+’ before entering your search query and you have the potential of finding Google Plus pages related to what you are looking for. Try searching for ‘+all american rejects’ in the Google search engine as an example and you will be presented with a suggestion prompt linking to their Google+ page.

Google Plus Direct Connect

The auto-complete feature will help you find the page you are looking for.

I was originally thinking, “Why not just go direct to Google Plus and use the search function there?” I tested whether this would have the same results within the social network and searched ‘All American Rejects’ which presented me with two pages related to the search term. So why create a feature which saves about two seconds of a searchers time and won’t necessarily be used?

I started considering how people may use the feature in a practical way. If someone hears an artist on the radio they like the sound of while working or view a trailer for a game, movie or product while browsing the net / TV then they may wish to follow and find out more about it. They only have to add the plus sign before what they would have usually searched for in the past and be taken to the Google+ page which will give them all the updates and information they need (providing the page is run well). The searcher is not just reading an article or publicity about what they are interested in, this page allows them to connect and interact directly with the admin of that page providing them the opportunity to find out exactly what they want.

Only a few famous brand pages have been included within this new feature to begin with but more will be added eventually. If you want to have your own page added to the list then it is up to Google’s algorithm to determine whether it makes the grade. This is based on the page’s relevancy, popularity and link to your own website. I would recommend checking out the two links below to improve the chances of having your Google+ page included to Google+ Direct Connect:

Google+ Pages

Linking to Your Website

 

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Google+ Celebrities, Google+ Features | No Comments »

Politicians Arrive to Google+

Friday, September 16th, 2011 | Permalink

Steady there, don’t get too excited! Yes, it’s true, the three political leaders of the UK have signed up to Google Plus: David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg.

Don’t hold your breath for insightful posts on how the UK will move forward in difficult times though. It seems that all three of the leaders will be using their social presence on Google+ to try to convert people in their circles into active voters. Yet, who can blame them? Google will soon be approaching 30 million users after only a few months running (in an invitation beta phase I remind you) and this member base will keep growing at an exponential rate. A report carried out in 2010 also revealed that over 50% of adults online read and / or received some sort of information about the election during the political campaign.

So here’s a small profile on each one of them and their Google Plus profiles:

David Cameron

David Cameron on Google Plus

Don't expand those comments if you are sensitive to hate...

With 2,071 followers, David is leading the Google+ race for now but it’s only early days. As the picture caption suggests, there isn’t too much love for Mr Cameron in the 48 comments seen above and some are incredibly offensive (Stream Filter might be useful here). If will certainly be interesting to see how he handles this negative attention and whether he replies at all.

Comment made on Google Plus: “Anything that makes politics more open and accessible is to be welcomed, and I am proud that Britain politicians are leading the way when it comes to embracing new methods of engaging people online, from e-petitions to the latest developments in social media.’’

Ed Miliband

Ed Miliband on Google Plus

Ed shows the others how to use social media properly.

In second place with 1,431 followers, Ed Miliband is using Google+ in a way it should be. With a variety of photos uploaded, multiple posts (relevant to current events) and interacting with other users, it seems that Ed is popular with the rest of the Google Plus community. His opening post received 21 shares and 51 (positive) comments, it will be interesting to see whether this type of feedback continues.

Comment made on Google Plus: “Labour is determined to be a party that looks outwards, not inwards. That means talking to people, but also listening and responding to them too. That’s what I’ve been using social media for, and that’s what I’ll keep doing.”

Nick Clegg

Nick Clegg on Google Plus

A pretty stale profile at the moment...

Nick Clegg is in last place with a single post but surprisingly 82 comments made on it. Most of these people are attacking Nick through the social network though so we’ll just have to see whether he continues to use Google Plus.

Comment made on Google Plus:  “The Liberal Democrats are always open to new and innovative ways of communicating with voters, so creating a Google+ account was an easy and logical step.”

I’m entirely neutral on all political aspects but will you guys be adding any of the above leaders to your circles?

…I know I’ll be removing them from mine as soon as I hit the “Publish” button!

Tags: , , , , , , ,
Posted in Google+ Celebrities | 9 Comments »

Google+ Follow Suggested Users

Monday, September 5th, 2011 | Permalink

It looks like Google+ has borrowed a feature similar to that of Twitter. Newcomers to Google+ are now provided with a “Get Started” list of suggested users to follow, this page is not just restricted to new accounts though and can be accessed on the following link -

https://plus.google.com/getstarted/follow

This list is categorised by topics such as sports, music and technology meaning there is someone interesting to add for everyone using the new social network. At least that’s what you would think…

Head to the music category for example and add Taylor Swift to one of your circles, unfortunately you will then realise that the account is in fact controlled by a marketing team and run as a “fan page” more than anything. Next, go to the sports category and follow Erin Andrews (if you are an American sports fan), this time you will notice that Erin hasn’t actually posted since the 26th of July which was before this new feature was introduced.

Taylor Swift google plus

Do you really want to follow my marketing team?

Perhaps I am being picky but it raises the question: What is really required to become a suggested user to follow on Google Plus? At this stage it seems you only need some sort of fame and a Google Plus account but hopefully this will change as more inspirational people join the social network. This is not an attack on the feature itself though as there are still plenty of active and entertaining users included on the list to follow, I am just concerned that there are exceptional posters out there who are not getting the recognition that they deserve. We must remember that Google Plus is still in a beta phase though and everything is a learning process at this stage.

…on a side note, does anyone recognise this guy?

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Google+ Celebrities, Google+ Features | 6 Comments »

Google+ Verified Celebrity Profiles

Sunday, August 28th, 2011 | Permalink

So it seems Google+ has taken a leaf out of Twitter’s book and introduced a verification system to combat fake profiles posing as celebrities. If you check out Mark Zuckenberg’s profile for example (yes I am incredibly shocked it’s actually him!) then you will notice a little tick by the side of his name, hover over this and the tick will expand to reveal “verified name”.

Mark Zuckenberg on Google+

Mark seems happy about the new profile verification feature!

You may have already heard of instances in which people have not been able to use their real name because it has been considered a pseudonym or nickname by Google. It looks like Google want their social network to be a professional place as possible without the hassle of dealing with impersonation, they even state in the guidelines: “Impersonation is a serious issue. Pretending to be someone else could cause your profile to be deleted.” I personally think this is a good thing (despite people like the author Violet Blue having their profile deleted despite it actually being her real name) as we will no longer have to trawl through hundreds of fake celebrity profiles wondering which is the real one to add to our “follow” circle.

So what exactly IS Mark Zuckenberg doing on Google turf? Embracing Facebook’s death or spying out the competition?

…ideas anyone?

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Google+ Celebrities | 4 Comments »

The Celebrities have Arrived!

Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011 | Permalink

Celebrities have been one of the main driving factors behind Twitter popularity as it has bridged that huge gap between fans and fame. Some have used it for the power of good (interacting with their followers and tweeting interesting info) while others have used it for the power of bad (promoting their own products or sponsors while generally just handing control of the account to someone else). We have seen some very interesting cases such as Charlie Sheen with his #Winning and #TigerBlood promotions but how will these celebs get on with Google+?

Well, we already have ten of the usual candidates using the social network -

Google didn’t pitch their new social network to the most sophisticated of celebrities but certainly very popular ones which should attract fans to start using the service. Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, Britney Spears, Kim Kardashian, and Ashton Kutcher are all in the top 10 list of most Twitter followers; if they can persuade even a small percentage of these fans to “Circle” them on Google+ then it will benefit the new social network greatly.
Google plus celebrities

Social "royalty" have arrived!

These ten celebs are using Google+ in a mixture of ways though, with Ashton Kutcher already becoming a G+ pro while Kim Kardashian appears to be struggling to get her head around the new social network. As long as they don’t promote product after product, these celebrities should be a huge asset to Google+ and might even encourage more to sign up.
…I just hope Rebecca Black joins soon, I keep forgetting what day it is.

Tags: , , ,
Posted in Google+ Celebrities | 3 Comments »

Add me on Google+

+1 and Follow this Blog on Google+

Subscribe Here!

Subscribe
Google+