Google+ Going Away?

Issue #813 April 29, 2014
Publisher: Joan Stewart

“Tips, Tricks and Tools for Free Publicity”

In This Issue

Google+ Going Away?
Bye-bye Ladies’ Home Journal
Tacky Email Addresses
Hound Video of the Week

This Week in the Hound House:

I’m wrapping up my interviews with more than 50 customers this week. I’ve learned so much about what you need from me, and how I can improve. Thanks for being so generous with your time, and for your honesty. You have until May 7 to use your $30 coupon and type the secret word into the coupon code box at checkout. Spent all your money on dog treats? That’s OK. Grab two of my $15 special reports.

1. Google+ Going Away?

If you’re not on Google+ yet and dread learning it, you were probably thrilled to hear news reports late last week that Google will de-emphasize Google+.

Victor Gundotra, who led the Google+ experiment, announced that he would be leaving the company after eight years. That led to wild speculation and quotes from anonymous sources saying that Google is disbanding the Google+ team and that the network might turn into a ghost town. Google vehemently denies those reports.

What to you do, then, if you’re on Google+? Keep using it. That’s what many of the Google+ experts say they will do.

Why? Because the interactions on that platform are too valuable to abandon. And they find it difficult to believe that Google would de-emphasize a platform that so many companies have found wildly successful.

Google+ content still ranks very high in search. Its active communities are still teaming with smart people who are sharing content and helping each other. They have deeper conversations than you’ll ever find on any other social site.

Whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or Google+, these sites are moving targets. Their platforms change so rapidly that it’s difficult to keep up. But until Google confirms reports that it’s neutering Google+, I’m not slowing down my activities on that site.

Here are three articles about the future of Google+ from Google+ experts:

From Mark Traphagen:
Where Will Google+ Go Next? My Personal “Thinking Out Loud

From Amanda Blain:
Google+ Ghost Town: My Open Letter to the Misguided Reporters

From BL Ochman:
Creative (and lucrative) ways smart brands are using Google+

2. Bye-bye Ladies’ Home Journal

A publicity hit in the Ladies’ Home Journal has always been a trophy for Publicity Hounds.

The July issue will be the last for the 3.2 million subscribers. After that, the magazine will publish quarterly and sold at newsstands only.

Famous for its “Can This Marriage be Saved?” column, the Journal has seen advertising drop for three main reasons: readership has dropped, competition for ad dollars from the web and, oh, that archaic name!

Magazines come and go, and there’s still plenty of opportunity for pitching high-circulation magazines, as well as niche publications where you have a better chance of earning publicity. But you must know what you’re doing.

I have shortcuts and tools that will save you time during your research. And I know the one thing that editors wish more PR people and Publicity Hounds would send to them, as well as an often-overlooked place where magazine editors are telling you what issues they think are important. I explain them all in the video replay of How to Find Your Way into Glossy Magazines.

Fifteen minutes after using my tips to pitch, Publicity Hound Mary Castillo had two reporters confirm they’re interested in her client’s story, and good response from a radio show she’d been pitching for more than a year. What does Mary know that you don’t?

3. Tacky Email Addresses

The email you use for business should never include the words Yahoo, Hotmail, Gmail, AOL, the name of your Internet service provider or any company other than your own or the one where you’re employed.

Instead, use an address that brands YOU!

Authors violate this rule more than any other group I know. Of the 62 email addresses I collected last weekend at the American Society of Journalists and Authors conference in New York City, only 16 included the author’s name or brand.

Use these tacky email addresses on business cards or your website, and go straight to the doghouse without your dinner.

Don’t have a website? You can buy a domain name for about $10 and use that for email.

If you’re going to the Author U Extravaganza in Denver where I’m speaking this weekend, you still have time to print a new batch of business cards. Read my list of things to do if you’re going.

4. Hound Video of the Week

Somebody give this dog a tennis racquet! He loves jumping back and forth with such enthusiasm while watching a tournament on TV that I’ll bet he’d be great on the court.