You might have come across the ultimate motivational graphic ever which was designed to help me push on and hit my Google Plus challenge goal. 3 days ago I threw down the gauntlet to make 1000 connections on Google Plus before the New Year and now, this post is to formalise it, well, as much as a blog post can formalise anything.
As the graphic shows I’ve got 526 circles to make in 31 days – it won’t be easy but nobody said it would be. If you’re thinking of embarking on a challenge yourself I’d encourage you to do so. Set a goal for any of the metrics that are important to you and work to achieve it. Having a fixed start and end point will help define the scope of the challenge, and perhaps it’s naivety, but I believe that us humans are capable of great things once we set our mind to it.
The Google Plus K1 Challenge – Google Plus Tips
Tell the Story – Form a Band of Brothers and bring them along for the ride with you. We may be hanging online and banging out a stream of 1’s and 0’s but at the end of the day we’re human and connect with each other on a human level. Tell your story, let people know what you’re doing and you’re doing it. You don’t know what small details may be common ground between you and a potential ally so tell your story and find out!
Pinterest – I’ve been slowly ramping up my Pinterest usage and on the advice of Peg Fitzpatrick I’ve taken to pinning my posts and including a link to the pin in my Google Plus updates. This has resulted in an uptick in Pinterest activity but has also forced me to think harder about the images I use for my posts. I’ve also started to use bigger, taller images to for sharing on Google Plus as it takes up a bit more key retail and can yield more exposure – all good when one has a challenge to accomplish!
Communities – My eternal thanks go to Emmett Smith for helping me take the plunge into communities on Google Plus. He recently shared my post on the SEO Anatomy of a blog post to an SEO community on Google Plus and the response has been eye opening. Suffice to say I’m going to embrace communities with open arms and suggest you do too.
Say Hi – I know you might be shy, I am too, and sure, nobody probably cares about what you have to say, right? Well, I’ve gotten that monkey called shyness off my back and have been fearless in saying hi to people on G+ for the last few days. The results have been astonishing. I’ve had a much richer experience on Google Plus (gah, can’t believe I’ve used that old cliched chestnut of “richer experience”, but it’s true) since starting to reach out to people who circle me which has led to more circles and all round G+ traction. Go, say hi or circle me and watch me say hi to you!!
Cross Pollinate – This is a tip that I recently saw Daniel Sharkov talk about and it’s one I totally agree with. If you have a strong network on say Facebook or Twitter why not cross pollinate your networks and share some of your Google Plus posts via Twitter/Facebook etc. This will open up your different networks to each other – you don’t want to have have followers silo-ed in just one social media platform but instead you want them to intermingle with each other on all platforms, building a much stronger interconnected network.
HOA – My newly found Google Plus wings have me itching to make my debut on the G+ silver screen. I’ve been watching lots of hangouts for a while now from the likes of Eric Enge, Craig Chamberlin & David Amerland and have been picking up tips from Ronnie Bincer on how to run them and I think firing up some G+ Hangouts On Air now might help me achieve my Google Plus goal – might, I’m no Ryan Gosling or whatever but I hope I might be able to provide some patented “edutainment”.
Free Info – If/when I start to do HOA I’m hellbent on giving away some good, useful info for free. I’ve always been a, well, eccentric thinker I suppose and view things differently to most. Often times this can help with content creation or coming up with marketing ideas. I’m handy enough with social media, SEO and WordPress design but I think the ability to come up different marketing or content ideas, oftentimes on the spot, is a useful one and one that could lend itself nicely to a HOA environment. I’m also going to step up my blogging efforts and focus on providing even more solid, actionable info that will help people. If you’re interested in doing a hangout with me get in touch, now, more than ever before :)
So, there you have it. My Google Plus K1 Challenge in a nutshell – 31 days, 526 circles, 1 challenge – and what I’m going to do to try achieve it.. Will I do it? Well, it largely depends on you, but I hope so..
Would love to hear any of your tips for Google Plus success and if you’re spurred into your own challenge let me know the details about it in a comment below. If you haven’t circled me yet then, please, don’t forget to do so ;)
And as I always say, take things, one circle at a time!