COMMENTS
I was wondering why I could get a Buzz account. now I know why..I guess I will have to load it on my iphone
Such exciting times! And as soon as the news dropped I said to my coworker "I'm interested to see what HubSpot's take is" - blam. Good job Mr. Volpe. Solid advice.
The larger context of this is that this is another salvo in the Google vs Facebook war. This really ramps up speculation about how long it is before Facebook unleashes a social powered web search engine that really challenges Google's bread and butter web search engine. We're getting closer - I wrote about it here:
http://bit.ly/FacebookVGoogle - over the weekend we were discussing the Google superbowl ad - some people see it as resulting from pressure from Bing. I say Facebook is the reason.
It'll be Google vs Facebook in 2010 and the war is just beginning.
Thanks Mike, Great practical information. I was wondering though, I have a gmail account staciechalmers@gmail.com, but use stacie@companyname.com for business as in the past its been recommended that this looks more professional. Should I set up a companyname@gmail.com email address? Im thinking this might be better for seo, and building a network on gmail? Welcome your thoughts and recommendations on this.
@Stacie - I am struggling with this same thing right now. We use Google Apps at HubSpot, so my HubSpot email is powered by Gmail, but I also have my personal Gmail, yet we also want to have a company presence. For you, since you really are the company and the company is you, it might be fine to user your personal Google Buzz account for work. But for HubSpot, I think I need a personal Google Buzz account and also a Company one (like we do on twitter with @HubSpot and @mvolpe).
I just downloaded this to my Droid. So far I have Google Voice, Google Talk, Google Maps, and Google Goggles all on my phone.
I will play with this tonight and report back. So far it seems very easy to use.
Great Article, Social media really is more than just staying connected to friends. It really is becoming a must have platform not only in personal but in business worlds.
Bravo to Google for putting so many things in once place.
Great article and i will share this with all i know who want to get buzzed from Gooogle Buzz. Keep up the great work Hubspot
I am working on a blog post for next week on how entrepreneurs can make uses of the Google Buzz for their business, any suggestions?
Its seems one is required to create a gmail account, what does one do if you have several different companies you want to create Google Buzz accounts for each with their own separate social media profiles? One would not want to tie in all the content especially if they do not relate
Google Buzz seems promising, but as you said, currently a bit limited. However, I am curious on what others think about waiting to see how the technology develops, before getting everyone in the company on the Google Buzz bandwagon. Any kind of initiative like that requires some amount of change management. I can hear the employees now, "Great -- *another* thing marketing wants me to get involved with." If I had gotten everyone to jump on Friendster, they'd be annoyed with me now. :) What about vetting the service first?
Facebook is going to lock out Google Buzz then it will be just another "remember when" application so before you all run out and get everyone in your company on buzz remember the Orkut!
What Buzz has going for it though over Facebook is Google's proper email integration. And a social-powered search engine won't touch the business world's need for business/technology subject searching, Google's bread & butter.
That ominous prediction by Mark Zuckerberg is coming true... we no longer have a professional/personal privacy barrier. As of today, everyone from my school dean to my elementary school friends get the same dose of Chris.
I see some great potential in Buzz as a
professional networking tool as well! There's more content than Twitter, but has a much lower barrier to 'following' than Facebook or LinkedIn.
How can one change the URL for the Google Profile account? Mine is currently a username for my email and I will like to change it to my name with missing with my email address.
Secondly, I have several site added to my Google Profile page but I do not see them connected on my Google Buzz.
I guess they are still working on it.
So far this seems like a giant chat room. It is now part of my Google Maps on my Droid, so that may come in handy.
My guess is this will not do much to take away from Facebook.
I followed the steps, set up the gmail account using my desktop computer and Google Buzz was available?
@Michael Perrault - Yes, it looks like Google has rolled out Buzz to most public Gmail users today and yesterday.
The good thing about using an iPhone is the ability to see the public postings in the area around where you are.
Hey everyone, I was able to create a company account for HubSpot and get us set up. You can see our profile here:
http://www.google.com/profiles/hubspot
And you can follow us by searching for "HubSpot Inc." when adding people in Google Buzz.
@Chris - The ability to create groups in Facebook, and tailor status updates and content to those groups, is the biggest improvement so far. I think Facebook will stick around.
Thank you! I was wondering how that I can best use this great tool by Google.
I believe that this is going to continue to evolve and though its not a powerhouse yet, Google has a way of dominating whatever market they go into.
I am not a fan of Buzz. It is a giant message board, seems confusing.
This will not make a dent in Facebook's traffic.
Thanks for the information. I have just started looking into buzz so your post came at the perfect time.
I start each new client with their own Google account to manage all of their information (analytics, webmaster tools, etc.) so Google Buzz appears to be another extension of this account and an additional area to manage. It will be interesting to see the staying power of Buzz, I too lost momentum with Wave.
Just a word of precaution for some of your tips that you just mentioned: Google Buzz does not yet let you actually publish directly to Twitter or Facebook from the Buzz interface. It simply acts as aggregation for those that are on both Buzz and Facebook (or Buzz and Twitter).
You'll still need to log in to Twitter and Facebook. But there is a work-around to solve the problem. In Gmail Labs, you can add gadgets to the interface that expands the functionality. There are both Twitter and Facebook gadgets, which will allow you publish. But this is still not integrated with Buzz, just the Gmail interface.
So after having Google Buzz up and running for about a week, I don't have much positive feedback on it. This article is interesting and makes sense on how you can share better, more targeted content than say on twitter and in theory it's taking the social aspects of twitter and facebook and combining them. However, I hate the layout and the way it feeds. It's hard to read and hard to follow. It feels like things are just being thrown at me and I don't know where they are coming from and I feel much less control than I have with other social networking sites. I don't feel connected to the users or the posts and if I'm going to put time and energy into another site I want to feel it is value-adding. Can you do a follow-up article on how google buzz is actually working and being perceived?
I think, I use my Gmail-account in future much more! But i have to find out how can i Use Google Buzz in a perfect way!