eTravel Project

It is now more than ten days that I have played around Google+ – the new social networking site that Google recently launched – and I have to say that I really like it. Honestly, I have to admit that I never warmed up to Facebook. I use it, my friends are there and I share things, but I have always felt a bit uneasy to share things with my family, friends, colleagues, acquaintances etc. all at the same time. You might argue that I can divide people into groups. This is true, but it is easier to say than to do on Facebook. Plus, Facebook is well known for the arbitrary changes that always makes to its privacy settings. One day my sister is sharing my nephew’s photos with me, the other day they might well be public or show know what else…

Google+ circles let me organize my contacts in a flawless way and Google+ always asks who I want to share with. So, when I want to post about a travel industry topic and get an opinion from my fellow colleagues, I select my professional circles. If I have a funny photo of me while on vacation that I want to share only with friends and family, I can. I also love that I can edit my comments after they are posted. Lately, I have hit the enter button on Facebook too many times when I just wanted a break line.Even though I have compared Google+ to Facebook up to here, I believe that Google+ is more of a threat to blogging and Twitter. I do not blog regularly, but I am a heavy Twitter user. I have blogged even less and have not used Twitter that much since Google+ is around. Google+ lets me keep all the interactions in the same place. If I ask for an opinion on the fly as I would do on Twitter, all the related answers stay under the same post.

Now ComScore is saying that Google+ reached 20 million users in the first three weeks since its launch. Not bad at all if we also take into account that access is by invitation only. The graph gives a better idea of what Google+ has accomplished in such a little time. User acquisition is going to be essential to the success of Google+. I might like Google+ a great deal, but how do I convince all my contacts to move to another spot? In the meantime, I convinced my sister to open an account on Google+, she took years before joining Facebook. Google might really be into something with this Google+. Next step will be to figure out how Google+ can help my DMO to promote the destination. I do not want to build a clone of a Facebook fan page or just publish a stream of photos, let’s create something fun and useful.

If you would like to join me on Google+, I am at https://plus.google.com/117358455056916203405#117358455056916203405/posts