Social Media Accounts

[Chris NB]

At a minimum, what social media accounts should I setup once I get my site up and running? I'm thinking Facebook and Twitter for sure. Any others I should seriously consider?

[Lynn Terry]

Hi Chris,

You'll need a Gmail account specifically for your business. This will be important for Google+, which is so much more than a social network - and affects personalized search results, which is a big plus! It's also smart to separate your niche/business email from your other email. It makes it easier to outsource your email in the future and/or if you ever decide to sell your business. See: http://www.clicknewz.com/8827/what-the-plus/

So...

Gmail / Google+
YouTube
Facebook Page
Twitter
Pinterest
Instagram
LinkedIn (if connecting with professionals)

That would be my starting list. Even if you don't think you'll be using YouTube or Pinterest for example, it's smart to secure your brand/name on those networks and set up your profile. You may want to use them in the future (and probably should) and want to make sure you have your usernames consistent across networks.

I teach all of this in great detail in http://www.SocialMarketingResults.com :)

[MonjaW]

hi lynn,
maybe you can enlighten me on this - google definitely confuses me. i have a main email and it wants me to have pages there. then i have my business email and i have google+ there. but that is not all. when i sign into youtube it wants me to create a page for youtube...that is connected with google+ or the google+ page? i have no clue. it simply gets over my head LOL
can you help me with that? thank you!

[Lynn Terry]

I only have my YouTube connected to my personal Google+ profile. My profile is what I use to interact on Google+ - with groups, hangouts, circles, people, etc. I did set up a Google+ Page (just to claim my name/brand) but haven't really done anything with it yet.

I recommend you use separate Gmail/Google+ accounts for each niche or business, if you're targeting different markets. For example, I have one for Lynn Terry / ClickNewz:

https://plus.google.com/u/0/+LynnTerry40/

And one for @LowCarbTraveler (for my TravelingLowCarb.com blog):

https://plus.google.com/u/0/+LynnTerryLowCarb/

Hope that helps :)

[Chris NB]

Great info... thanks for the response :-)

[wade_watson]

I found it interesting that you suggest "separate Gmail/Google+ accounts", Lynn. While I knew it was acceptable to have multiple Gmail accounts-- I even have several funneled into my main one-- my understanding was that Google has been pretty prickly about people having more than one Google+ account.

I know originally, Google wasn't even allowing people to use branded version of their names. I recall podcaster "Doctor Kiki" had her account deleted and had to re-register in her given name. More recently, though, I do see G+ accounts with business names, so apparently that rule has changed. I've not found anything on whether Google sanctions one person having multiple G+ accounts, though. If you know something I don't on this I'd be very interested.

I did just find an explanation by Google (https://support.google.com/plus/answer/1254839?hl=en) on how to sign into multiple G+ accounts at once, so apparently having them is now sanctioned. I also found Mashable has something on merging multiple G+ accounts (http://mashable.com/2012/07/12/google-merge-accounts/#337599-Use-Circles).

All I can figure is that at some point having multiple (and business named) Google+ accounts became OK.

[Lynn Terry]

Yes, it's perfectly fine. Obviously you want to keep it limited, otherwise it would get overwhelming. I do almost everything under my "Lynn Terry" account - everything except low carb / diet which I do under the "Traveling Low Carb" account. And those are the only two Google+ accounts I have.

[Lynn Terry]

I originally shared my Google Chrome Browser tips for productivity in this post:
http://www.clicknewz.com/9493/browser-tricks-for-productivity/

Today I uploaded a video that demonstrates that tip - and you can also see how I manage my multiple social accounts (in the post and in this video): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nh76GYAIZN8

[JRLang]

I too have multiple Google accounts and a couple of different Google+ pages, some for business and one under my name.

The business page function on G+ is very cool.

Having a lot of G accounts can get overwhelming, but I use Last Pass, the best and most secure password saving service, so when I am on Google login page, Last Pass gives me a drop down of all the possible logins, and I name them so I can quickly and easily login to whatever account I want, this makes like much easier.

[Trent]

For business purposes you should focus on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn in order to get in touch with more professionals too. There are other important networks and obviously a gmail account is important for Youtube and Goggle+ as well as webmasters tools and others.