During the early days of Google+, people believed that it would eventually replace the social media giants Facebook and Twitter. Unfortunately, despite being a product from the big G, it has so far been unsuccessful in completely capturing the elements of what social users find engaging in a social platform.
Rumors of its death surfaced last March 2015, following the appointment of Google VP and key architect Bradley Horowitz as the new lead for G+’s newest products: Photos and Streams. The news made it appear that the end of G+ as a social network was inevitable, but also that it would still survive in the form of its strongest features.
Thus, as avid G+ users and firm believers that the social media platform is not as deserted as many seem to believe, we’re ecstatic about this newly announced development - another welcome surprise, following Google's recent revelation of its new "pro-mobile-friendly" search algorithm. Earlier today, the company officially unveiled the roll-out of its latest feature, Collections. Simply put, the new feature will allow users to group and organize their posts by topic.
Here’s what we already know:
Each collection can be shared publicly, privately, or with a custom set of people.
Users have the option to follow a collection without having to follow the individual who owns that collection. However, a user who follows another individual on G+ automatically subscribes to that person’s collections.
The feature is now available on the web and Android. However, iOS users have to wait a little bit more for the feature to hit their handheld devices.
The feature is available to both profiles and pages. You may view a user’s (or page’s) collections by clicking on the Collections Tab on the Navigation bar under the profile or page header.
Post types in a collection can be anything: photos, videos, links, and even polls and events.
Once you’ve finished setting up a collection, you can move past or existing posts on your profile or page into your collection of choice.
Once an existing post has been moved to a collection, it can still be accessed and viewed from the Posts tab. However, the post will have an indicator, much like how community posts have indicators at the top of the post.
A collection is linked to the creator’s account. The creator of the collection will also see who the followers of the collection are.
The ones you follow will appear on your G+ profile. In case you don’t want to make this visible on your profile, you may opt to hide it instead.
To make sure that you don’t add an ill-fitting cover photo or header photo to your collection, choose a photo that is 1920 pixels x 1080 pixels in size.
Get the word out about your collection by sharing it with specific users, circles, and groups you’re a member of. Just click on the arrow under the header photo of your collection, just beside the gear icon, and share it with other G+ users.
In the event your collection gets suspended for violating any terms of service (such as illegal content or copyright infringement), it can only be viewed to the owner/ creator and deleted after two months. However, creators can still save it from permanent deletion by adjusting the content and applying to have it restored.
What we don’t know yet:
There is a limit to the number of collections a user can manage. We have yet to find out exactly what the limit is.
The analytics for this feature for G+ page owners has yet to be explored.
With the news of G+ being broken into Photos and Streams - and now, with the addition of this new feature - it becomes apparent that Google is taking notes from the success of visual platform Pinterest, and has decided to take G+ towards that direction. As to whether the new feature will be able to drive users back to the social media network, only time will tell.
In the meantime, let’s explore the new feature (while it lasts!) and have fun collecting!
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About the Authors
Hana Abello heads the Social Media Department at StraightArrow Corp. She is a personal blogger and a social media passionista. When not online, she's also a makeup enthusiast and a photohobbyist.
Mikael Angelo Francisco leads the Content Marketing Department at StraightArrow Corporation. A contributor to GMA News Online and various publications, he loves reviewing movies and comic books. He is also into sports climbing, and may or may not be Spider-Man (he refuses to give us a straight answer).