Update: +1, HootSuite, and Google+ integration

As promised I headed over to Google+ to see if I could answer some of the questions I posed to myself earlier today.

First, more on the +1 button:

What happens when you +1 something?
When you +1 something, the +1 button will turn blue to confirm that you've recommended the page, and your +1 will be added to the +1's tab of your profile. Here you can manage all your +1’s and decide whether you want to publicly display the +1’s tab.

If you’re a Google+ user, you’ll also have the option to share the webpage you +1’d in Google+. Just click the "Share on Google+" box, enter your comments, choose the circles you’d like to post to, and clickShare. Like other content you share, these +1’s will appear in the streams of the people you share with.

Regardless of the circles you choose to share to on Google+, and whether you chose to publicly share your +1’s tab, your +1’s will still be visible to others viewing the content you +1’d. For instance, your +1 could appear as part of an anonymous aggregated count of the people who have also +1’d the same thing. Your name could also appear next to the +1 button on a website, or beneath a search result or ad on Google Search. This helps friends and contacts identify which content may be most useful to them.

So, is this working?  Until now, I didn't know there was a +1's tab in my profile.  Then again, I don't usually look at my own profile.  The question is, does anyone else?  Heck if I know...  I have now made the +1's tab Public, and also enabled people to send me a message (anyone on the web) or an email (people in my circles only).  I don't know if this functionality is not intuitive, or if I just never took the proper time to figure it out.  Maybe I'm flattering myself, but I feel like if I have to search around to the answer for something, then it wasn't simple to figure out.  Having said that, Google does provide a thorough introduction to Google+ which I'll now take the time to explore.

To the claim that my +1 "helps friends and contacts identify which content may be most useful to them", I can say I have never, ever seen any site where I noticed one of my friends or contacts had given it a +1.  Even if I had, I'm already on the site, so at this point does it matter that my friend likes it?  This looks to me like a miss on Google's part.

On to my question about who is seeing my posts on Google+.  This is really just as simple as it looks.  If you share a post with one of your circles, it appears in the Stream of the members of that circle.  If you share to Public, it appears in the Stream of members of all your circles, and to anyone who views your profile.  I'm still further exploring how the Incoming stream is populated; as far as I can tell it is people who have me in one of their circles without me reciprocating.

Finally, I did try out HootSuite and at least in the free version there is no integration with Google+.  Disappointing.  In fact, HootSuite is a pilot partner of integration with Google+ Pages, a functionality aimed at enterprises and groups.  This is the only API released, and we can only hope Google will release the API for Google+ personal soon.

Here is an excerpt of a good article at Wired.com describing what's possible now and what should be possible soon:

Google’s finally unwrapped the first public iteration of an application programming interface, or API, for Google+. APIs let software programs and services talk to each other, pulling or pushing data between the two. Every Twitter client or integrated service uses Twitter’s published APIs. Now these and other developers can make use of similar kinds of data from Google’s new social network.

To be clear, they can’t use all of it. For now, Google+’s API is limited to public posts and data only. Applications can also use the open authentication OAuth 2 to allow users to identify themselves on Google+ rather than using the long numerical identifiers and authorize each app.

However, because Google+’s API is limited to public data, you can’t really build a full-featured Google+ or Universal Social Media client around it yet. We’ll probably see a lot of news skimmers, some simple integration with location, check-in, or commenting services, and a handful of somewhat more developed app prototypes. In the very near future, the API gives developers a chance to play around. For Google, it gradually and gracefully extends the overall reach of the platform. It also helps the company see possibilities it may have missed in its own development.

Call me lazy but I say the sooner the better.  As long as I manage all my social media except Google+ in one place it will necessarily remain an afterthought.

Meanwhile I'm still going to test drive HootSuite and see how it compares to TweetDeck - at first glance it looks very full featured.