Guide to Working with Circles in Google Plus [Google+]
Click here to view the Complete Google+ Setup Guide
Individual Sections:
- What Are Google+ Circles
- What Advantages Do Google+ Circles Provide?
- Contact Organization in Google Plus Circles
- Privacy Control Using Google+ Circles
- Creating a Custom Circle in Google+
- Adding a Contact to a Google+ Circle
What Are Google+ Circles?
One of the most innovative features in Google+ is the ability to group your contacts into different “circles“.
You have the option of using the default circles provided by Google+ or creating your own, customized circles. Every time you post a stream update, you have the option of choosing which circles can see that update.
This means that you can have a circle for each of the following:
- Acquaintances
- Co-workers
- Family
- Famous People
- Friends
- Fraternity Brothers
The list could go on forever!
What Advantages Do Google+ Circles Provide?
- Provide a great way to organize contacts.
- Allow the user complete privacy control.
Contact Organization in Google Plus Circles
As mentioned earlier, a user can create as many circles as he or she wishes. The user can then add contacts to the different circles. A contact can be in multiple circles at once.
Just because you have added someone to one of your circles, doesn’t mean that they have added you to one of their circles.
In short, Google+ allows for one-way relationships (like Twitter, unlike Facebook).
Privacy Control Using Google+ Circles
The privacy control options that Google+ Circles allow are incredible. When a user posts a stream update they can choose to send the update to:
- Public- Anyone who has included you in one of their circles or anyone who views your profile, even if they haven’t added you to any circles
- Your Circles- Everyone who is in at least one of your circles.
- Extended Circles- Everyone who is in a circle of someone in one of your circles (try going over that one in your head a few times!).
- Specific Circles- Choose specifically which circles can see the post and which ones can’t.
- Specific Contacts- By mentioning someone with the @ symbol and then their username or email address, you can post to specific people or even one specific person (personal message).
I personally think that the ability to have complete control over who see what posts in Google+ is the most beneficial feature of the new social media network. You no longer have to hesitate before adding your Mom as a contact. Just add her to the family group and be cautious of what you post to them!
Creating a Custom Circle in Google+
- Click on the “circles” tab.
- Move your cursor over the circle that says “Drop here to create a new circle“.
- Click “Create circle.“.
- In the window that pops up, give the circle a name of your choosing.
- Add as many people as you would like to your new circle.
- Click the “Create circle” button in the popup window.
Adding a Contact to a Google+ Circle
- Click on the “circles” tab.
- Click on “People in your circles” or “Find and invite“.
- Click in the “Add a new person” box.
- Enter the email address and the name of the person you would like to add.
- Choose which circle you would like to add the contact to.
Once the contact is in at least one circle, you can find them by looking through the “People in your circles” area. You can then click and drag them to any additional circles that you would like that person to be a part of.
Additional Google+ Tutorials:
- How to Turn Off Email Notifications in Google Plus
- Managing Privacy Settings in Google Plus
- Google+ Keyboard Shortcuts
- How to Invite Friends to Google Plus
- View Profile as Others See it in Google Plus
About Anson Alexander
Anson Alexander is a graduate from the University of Tampa with a degree in International Business and Information Systems.A previous IT Administrator for a medium size publication company, Anson has recently decided to work full time on his own business by publishing on AnsonAlex.com, publishing technology tutorials on YouTube and offering SEO, IT training and digital marketing services.His main interests include technology, social media, infographics, economics, marketing and web design.Connect with Anson on Google+.
[...] http://ansonalex.com/tutorials/managing-circles-in-google-plus/ [...]
[...] 3. Begin Adding Friends to Your Google+ Circles [...]
I'm still a it confused with circles and who sees your posts.
If I post to a circle, say about my football team, in which I have added all the people I could find who say they are a fan of the team in their profile. Will they ALL see the post or only those who have also added me to one of their circles?
I'm guessing the latter, otherwise the potential for spam is huge?
Jon,
Sorry it has taken so long for me to respond- been swamped lately.
They will only see the updates in the stream if they add you to a circle. There is, however, a stream called "incoming" where your updates will appear if they decide to take a look at that stream!
Hope that helps!
invite me please..
I have created a big "Family" circle and want to move some entries from that big circle into another circle (or new circle). How can I do that?
The only way I can find, at this time, is to add "Family" members, one-by-one, into my new "Family-extended" circle, then return to the "Family" circle and remove that member. That is a lot of work, considering I'm going through 43 members in my "Family" circle!
Thanks for your time!
You can actually select up to 400 people at once and drag them into a circle.
Create your new circle.
Open up your family circle and hit select all and then drag them to the new circle.
Thank you Anson.
While trying things out on my own, I found out that I could move the dividing line between "everybody" and my circles (cool!);
then hover over the circle, drag a member from one circle to another (or new),
then go back to the circle I didn't want that member to be in, click and drag to a place between circles where I would see a trash can symbol and do the "remove" (from just that circle).
This is SOOOO cool and great! Kudos to the developers!
Thanks for your help. But I'm still confused on one thing. After you have created a custom circle. How do you set the Privacy settings for that circle. Like the original circles. Family is more private etc.
Thanks again!
I have a problem with the circles and streams. I don't know how it happened or how to fix it. I have 2 circle 1) Dad's family and 2) Mom's family. I don't want the streams mixed up. When I highlight Mom's family circle I see the stream with me and my cousin on my Dad's side of the family. I highlight my Dad's family circle and the stream for me and my cousin doesn't show up. How can I move it to the other circle?
Tonya,
Once you post a stream update to Google+, there isn't a way to change the sharing visibility of it yet. You can, however, delete the stream and restart it- sharing it with the right circles.
In the future, make sure your sharing preferences for the past are configured correctly before posting it!
[...] on G+. Just show your updates in all your emails using Gmail. It’s easy to set it up, too.Guide to Working With Circles in G+ — Creating your different social circles in G+ is one of the hottest topics. Google simply [...]
[...] Though I understand its appeal, I’ve never found Facebook compelling. What I’ve taken to be its core assumptions—that one’s world is divided into friends and everyone else, and that all your friends are friends in exactly the same way—just don’t work for me. That’s why I’ve so far stuck with Twitter and its follower model and dallied with Google Plus and its concept of differentiated social circles. [...]
Is there a way to send an email to everyone in a circle at once?
You can send everyone a message at once, if you wanted to send everyone in a circle an email you'd have to export the circle and then import it as a group into Gmail.
[...] understand the new friend groups, unless they are also on Google Plus and love its “circles.” In general, it seems many people want to go back to the old way (which they hated when it [...]
[...] they are also on Google Plus and love its “circles.” in general, it seems that many people want to [...]
I'm early days in Google+ having gotten use to Facebook where I can make an explicit "friend request". It appears in Google+, I can do the equivalent of a Twitter follow by putting someone in one of my circles. I've put a few people in my "Acquaintances" circle, rather than the "Following". Will this action be seen by those people without me making an explicit request?
In addition to my Google+ profile http://goo.gl/w1EJ6, I also created 2 Google+ pages with content related to my 2 websites. In Facebook, friends who Like my fan page will see my fan page posts. I don't see an equivalent mechanism in Google+. How do I get my Google+ page posts to be seen?
How can I create add to circles button for website?
I would like to know how to send mail to all in a cirlce, at the same time?
Is it possible to create a circle for "nice" people you want to have in your circles (or you want them to see you have them in your circles), BUT not show their activity in your feed because they produce too much content, and uninteresting ?
@Jerome JeJe, I've had similar encounters on Twitter and I end up unfollowing those polite but noisy people. What is the motivation to have "nice" people in your circles but effectively block their posts? (I do see the "block this person" in the dropdown "Options menu" but I have not used it.)
I just want to keep them for "diplomatic" reasons, like they can't complain that "you blocked me" or "you deleted me from your circles/friends…"
If you use the option "block this person", it will also remove them from your circles and prevent them from commenting on your content, you don't want this (also, their activity will not show in your feed, but they will still see your public posts, wich is what you want)
So we need more options.
It will be interesting to see if such an option will be added. I can envision such an option being abused by users wanting to broadcast their messages in a 1-way fashion which is hardly the objective for social networking (though that may be what some people do e.g. they enter into a 2-way social connection but they effectively ignore your posts).
[...] as controlling who they share content with. The main sharing portion of Google Plus is within its Circles feature, and a teen’s profile is more restrictive on sharing content outside of their Circles. [...]
Is there a simple, free app to allow me to distinguish those who I have in my circles that do not have me in their circles and/or follow me?
I have seen/read about bars for each circle that you can slide in order to adjust the stream contribution form each circle. Something similar to the ut I can't find this option!
Reposting due to keyboard error:
I have seen/read about bars for each circle that you can slide in order to adjust the stream contribution form each circle. Something similar to the Google News and adjusting the news sources. But I can't find this option.
[...] Unlike Twitter, Google + allows the specific targeting of your audience through the circles you can create. [...]
hey! Wondering if you may be able to help me out on a question I have. I started google+ and my blog with one email address, but am trying to change over to our business address now. I think ive done it, EXCEPT, I cannot see my google+ circles and communities on the NEW google+ (using my new email address) – do you have any idea how to do this?
Kristen, I think your best option is to go into the original Gmail account and access your contacts by using the dropdown at the top left. Once inside of your contacts, I would export all of them to a file on your computer and then go into your new Gmail account and import all of your contacts. It should also export and import your Google+ circles so you should have access to everyone. I hope that helps!