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Post by lanternerouge on Jul 14, 2012 6:30:28 GMT
We just received this email from the people at Google+ which I'm guessing others will also have seen:
Hi guys,
I've recently joined the team here at Google UK and have been given the awesome job of bringing football and Google+ closer together.
We're going to be launching quite a lot of football related content in the near future (not before the olympics) and wanted to start building up some partners to get involved. In terms of basics, it would just be about posting your blog posts on the site.
What we were also hoping is that you might be interested in getting involved in Hangouts with Talent/Clubs and other journalists to talk about football. The idea is to push these hangouts on youtube and Google+, so they would have high visibility, and we'd love to have some knowledgeable people on board.
We are also going to have a Google+ Football landing page and the idea is to get some of the best blogs on there as well as all the major clubs.
If you have a few minutes, I'd love to chat about some of the ideas we have, or alternatively, any ideas you might have.
Kind regards,
I have found Google useful in catching up with posts from the likes of The Stiles Council and Football Attic among others and the comments facility has been more substantive than twitter (not hard) but I had also gotten the impression that Google + had been blown out of the water by facebook somewhat.
How dod you think the kind of relationship the fella is suggesting would work? Rob
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Post by Ian on Jul 14, 2012 11:41:04 GMT
I know that Gary Andrews, Terry Duffelen and a few others use Google +, but it proved to be a step too far for me. There are only so many hours in the day, and I can't be giving too much time over to yet more social media networks these days. I might drop him a line, but this is, presumably, just another person who wants free content and my opinion on getting paid has hardened over the last few months. It is doubtful that I'll be producing free content of any sort for Google. They made $2.89 billion in the first quarter of 2012. They can afford to pay.
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Post by chroak on Jul 14, 2012 18:44:07 GMT
Hi Rob, Speaking as a representative of The Football Attic, I've only used Google+ sparingly, publishing status messages from my own account about a new post I've put on the website. Quite honestly, I've not got the time needed to make more use of Google+, let alone get involved with purpose-built Hangouts. Even if I had the time, I'm not sure Google would be much interested in football nostalgia specifically. I'd like to be proven wrong though! I think, regrettably, I'll have to take a pass on this one Rob, but thanks for passing on the details, though.
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Post by lanternerouge on Jul 14, 2012 21:30:43 GMT
That was pretty much my feeling folks - as Ian says, if Google are serious, then some financial recompense would be in order - but from their point of view, it probably isn't worth it so this is likely to be a dead end. Additional opinions welcome though.
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Post by garyandrews on Jul 15, 2012 10:35:25 GMT
Ok, a few thoughts from me as this is a little more interesting and different than the requests I usually see. From a professional (non-football blogging) day job, it's fascinating.
First off, it's probably best not to think of Google+ in terms of another social network to compete with Facebook, Twitter, etc, as it's a little different than that. In terms of traffic and hits (and probably engagement) it won't compete. It's a nice platform though - a lot more logical, intuitive and potentially useful than Facebook, but suffers from a lack of users. Some brands, such as Cadburys, the Financial Times and Great British Chefs have built up quite a following on there.
Me, I use it regularly but I'm a little more of a lurker. I tend not to use it so much to promote my own work, but it's much more of a brain dump - a halfway house between Twitter and blogging for me. Plus I have an interest in Google+ Local, as I know some of the team, so often help with early feedback when they roll out changes. It's a very personalised platform though - I don't know two people who use it in the same way, which is both a strength and a weakness.
Anyway, that's a bit of preamble and context out of the way.
Where Google+ is fascinating is the way they're integrating it with other Google products such as YouTube and, crucially, search and their work on personalisation of search. If you have a website fully optimised for G+ (as, say Cadbury's do), then you'll see the benefits. There's also smart little tweaks they've made such as a journalist's G+ profile showing up next to results for articles they've written when you search Google News, that sort of thing.
The potential (and the emphasis is very much on potential here) benefits of Google+ would appear to be very much search related. If you have a high profile on G+ (or, I suppose, G+ is featuring you) then you're building both followers and, more importantly, SEO - and it's the latter that may be quite valuable.
It's certainly not quite as straightforward in terms of benefits or negatives as, say, The Guardian's sports network or other companies looking for content for free or payment.
What Google's plans are for G+ are a bit baffling, though, as it's never really been a content publisher - more of a content aggregator or curator (which would come with its own benefits). Reading between the lines, I'm not entirely sure they're asking for content, more of the latter two (curation and aggregation). Quite how this would work I have absolutely no idea whatsoever.
Hangouts are... interesting. Again, there would be benefits and otherwise on here, depending on what they're planning on doing. If they're taking an approach similar to traditional media with regard to their viewpoint on football ("wahey, isn't the Premier League brilliant, you love football, look at the passive, drooling football masses") then I could take it or leave it (although, given Google's promotion efforts, I suspect there would be the potential to build a lot of followers through a big profile). If it plays to G+'s individualistic strengths (ditto YouTube) then you're looking at something altogether more fascinating.
I think the best summary of my position on this is interested without being fully convinced. I'd like to learn a lot more about what they have planned and, crucially, what the benefits for individual blogs would be (be it monetary, SEO, other). Once there's a bit more information beyond the initial pitch, which doesn't go into much detail, understandably, then I think we'd be in a better position to understand it.
Conclusion: Don't dismiss this out of hand. There may be some merit in it.
PS I do know a few people in various areas of Google, so can try and find out a bit more information. In addition, if anybody wants me to look at any follow-up information that comes from G+ with my professional day job hat on, I'd be happy to help.
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Post by garyandrews on Jul 15, 2012 10:42:28 GMT
Actually, one last thought - I know Mark Chalcraft (2nd Yellow) posts on here. He is much more au fait with SEO than I am. I'd be fascinated to hear his thoughts on this.
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terry
New Member
Posts: 11
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Post by terry on Jul 15, 2012 14:00:26 GMT
Hi Rob, Not sure I can add much more to this apart from to underline that if you're going to give them content, you should be suitably compensated.
This idea does sound interesting so it may be worth finding out exactly what they can offer you in return.
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