Part 5 (1/2)

Think of the line below your name on your profile page as a summary line or a place for a tagline. What it might best serve as for you would be the answer to the sentence, ”What do you do for your prospective customers?”

At the time of this writing, I have a little comment about what I believe I do for the world, plus I put an immediate and obvious link to my primary website URL. By the time this book is printed, I will probably have edited it some, and that's okay. To me, this little piece of territory might be best used flexibly.

Your little ”summary” section might be something you change often, like an announcement, for instance, or a status. Maybe not, but it's an idea. For instance, if people hovered over your summary in the fall, they could be sent to a blog post or an article on your primary site that talks about how your business works in this season. The idea, simply, is that you can have some fun with this summary because it's visible only when someone clicks your About tab on your profile, and as such, it means they're open to learning more about you.

The Most Important Part of Your Profile: The Introduction.

At this point, maybe you're thinking, ”Geez, Chris. We get it. You want the profile to be robust and good.” But to me, there's a lot to consider, especially because every time I survey other people's profiles, I'm left with an urge to shake many of these people and say, ”You could be doing so much more business, if only you'd consider a few updates and improvements to how you use your profile page. So, that's why I hammer this home.

In your introduction, write it so that people understand how you might work with them. Blend this with some personal information so that people understand what matters to you outside of business. Be sure to use links inside that text; although be wary of having too many links. (Because too many links leads to the opposite effect of what you want: People won't click anything.) My own profile is about as messy as my business life. I work for a lot of projects and companies. Therefore, I've done my best to explain how I work for large companies in one capacity, and how I work for smaller companies in another capacity.

In your case, try to be clear about how others will work with you. Explain what services or offerings you present. Be clear about what you do for your organization. Don't write a novel, but give it more than a sentence. For instance, maybe you can say this: ”I teach franchise owners how to empower their franchisees, and I help franchisees navigate the complex waters of running a franchise. I consult in person and via online courses. If you want to see a sample of my online courses and some testimonials from professionals I've helped, click here.”

That would simply sum up what you're doing and give people a sense of what they can do with you. That's the goal. Try to hook someone in the grand theater of no attention span.

A Little Trick About Your Introduction Area.

If you want to finish your Introduction section in style, do this: Put a way to contact you at the bottom of the introduction. That way, when people decide you're interesting and might be useful to their business needs, they know how to reach you. Do NOT include a link to your website but include a link directly to how people can contact you, or an email address and a phone number. I put a link to my primary contact form so that people can reach me easily.

Employment: A Useful Hack for You.

When you fill out the Employment part of your profile, the part of your employment that's ”current” is what shows up when someone hovers over your name in a post or in a comment. That is where you can insert a useful summary of what you do to catch people's attention.

Mine, at the time of this writing says this: Human Business Works: Large Business Digital Marketing Strategy & Advice and Small Business Tools and Smarts.

Write yours in a way that it engages people. It can be reasonably simple-actually, it's probably better that it is simple-but it must be engaging.

Instead of ”Marketing Manager for Pearson Publis.h.i.+ng,” consider writing something such as ”Finding great books about education and sharing them with people who love books.” See how that might lead to more engaging interactions?

Create yours accordingly.

The Links Section.

The Links section of your profile is probably the second most important part after the Introduction because it's where people can learn more about you and where you can point people to the specific pages or sites that best extend your conversation.

This is another situation in which a little goes a long way. Consider not sharing every potential place where people can connect with you. Consider also pointing people toward specific pages or posts on your sites, instead of to the main link, unless the main site URL is the best representation of continuing the conversation.

For instance, if you have a page that talks about your services, point people to that. Remember that you can select what text you want the link to present, so maybe a photographer's will say ”Photography for Corporate Projects.” It's up to you how you use it.

Moving on from the Profile.

The profile can improve your potential chances to build business relations.h.i.+ps on Google+. You can do this in many ways, but hopefully what this chapter covers gives you enough to start. If you have questions, you can always connect with me via Google+ and ask specifics: gplus.to/chrisbrogan.

5. Circles.

The best part of Google+ is Circles, which is how the platform enables you to organize the people you choose to follow and connect with. It's also probably the part of Google+ that most people skip or don't do much with, and then wish they could go back and do it all over again. The good news is that you can go back and do it again. But maybe, if we do some things together, you won't have to do that. Figure 5-1 shows you what my main Circles page looks like.

Figure 5-1 The main Circles page.

What Circling Means.

As shown in Figure 5-1, Google+ enables you to organize the people you choose to follow by adding them to circles. This means that you have opted to receive any public posts they've shared, plus, if they choose to follow you back and add you to one of their circles, you can see whatever posts they share with your circle.

Now walk through that a moment. If you circle me, for instance, that means you've opted to receive anything I post to the public. If I don't circle you, and then I choose to post something to only my circles, you won't see it. If I've circled you under Good People, and I share something only with Attention Getters, you won't see that post, either.

Conversely, just because you've circled someone, it doesn't mean they'll see your posts, even if you mention them in a post. (Chapter 6, ”Posting in the Stream,” talks about what that means.) The act of circling someone simply means that you've chosen to add them to people you follow. It doesn't mean you've opened two-way communications between them.

How Do I Know Who Is Circling Me Back?

You can look for who is circling you in three ways. First, if you're looking at someone specific, you can just click that person's name, and you get to his profile page. Under the big red b.u.t.ton that says Add to Circles, it'll say something such as You Are in Vincenzo's Circles.

You can also look by going to /notifications/circle (see Figure 5-2).

Figure 5-2 Notifications of people who have added you to a circle.