There has been a lot of hubbub about missing views in April 2015:
+Masatake Wasa wrote an interesting article about the Views with a tip how to grow them.
Now we have Views instead of +1's. One can still see the plusones on mobile and inside the Google Webmasters Badge tool:
The page's total +1 number will appear in the preview image for the badge.
This number on your profile box next to the follower count is the sum of your profile, post and photo views since October 2012.
When you look at your Google+ page or profile, you can see your total number of views. This number tells you how many times your content has been seen by other people, including your Photos, Posts, and the page itself. Also private posts or the ones shared with your circles or extended circles.
You can still see the +1's, shares and comments on each post. Only the way to display the engagement of a Page has changed: Now showing the times anyone views your post in their stream.
Why not take a screenshot today and compare it to the growth later? Looks like the numbers update every 24 hours.
Do post good stuff and especially photos, blog about your passions and share the articles on Google+, engage with your audience and grow the numbers organically.
Resorting to any kinds of tricks is a famously short lived practice where Google is concerned...
View counts may not be exact, and may not be updated in real time.
You can use your settings to choose whether or not people see the number of times your page and other content have been viewed.
The Google+ settings on your profile: Uncheck to hide the Views number.
Open Google+. Place your cursor in the top left corner for the Google+ main menu.
Click Pages.
Click Manage this page on the page where you wish to change the setting.
Click open the round profile pic in the upper-right corner of your screen and then click on Page Settings.
Scroll to “Profile.”
Check or uncheck the box to the left of “Show how many times your profile and content have been viewed."
You can’t adjust this setting from your mobile device just yet. Please use a desktop computer to hide or show your view count.
Q&A from Googler +Yonatan Zunger:
What does this number count? This is total views on your profile, your posts, your photos, and your videos.
What constitutes a "view?" For your profile, when someone goes to view your profile page. For other things, it's when they look at it -- e.g., when one of your posts shows up on someone's screen. (That's because this is how most people read posts: showing up in a stream, without clicking on it explicitly) Looking at your hovercard doesn't count.
Is this related to +1's, reshares, etc.? Only in that someone who +1'ed your post also probably saw it. You can already see counts for those on individual posts, etc., and before today you could see view counts for each photo if you looked carefully at the one-up view -- now you can see that for everything.
If someone reshares my post, does that count? Yes, since a viewer is seeing your content. Ditto if someone sees your post through an "Alice +1'ed this," through a post embedded on a page, or any other way that someone encounters it.
This seems strange: Some people seem to have a lot more views relative to their number of followers than others. Is something broken? Not at all. Some people have a lot of followers but don't engage with them well, while other people engage amazingly with a smaller group.
New addition from Yonatan:
The Views (here are mine)
Coming to the profiles and business pages soon all over the Circleverse...
One cannot break down the Views to see where they are coming from. Google has plans for the business pages, I guess. That would make sense.
- The Insights in the Dashboard of a Page: Mine is empty at the moment, perhaps something there in the future?
What do you think of the change?
I've seen people grumbling about the profile Views that they cannot see bounce rates etc...
Come on, before we had nothing on profiles, not even Plusones to show any level of engagement. If you're a business, you are already using Google Analytics or some such on your Page, surely?
Patience, this is all part of Google's BIG plan. There will be more.
Oh, and +CircleCount has listed the most viewed profiles already!
You may wonder why some people have few followers on Google+ but large number of views?
Sharing other people's photos without acknowledgement or copyright infringement plays some part with many of these people...
Bloggers get lots of views:
Check out their Blogger blog, could be very popular and as the blog photos are hosted on Google+ nowadays, thosemight also count as views.
Chromecast showing Google+ photos definitely counts, some of the top photographers on Google+ have staggering view counts. Like +Romain Guy with his 15 billion and 700 million etc views...
Before this update we had no idea how widely spread our content may have been, as the majority of people just "stalk" or read posts without interaction. Now all this has changed.
There's a lot of interesting speculation and discussion going on about the new feature:
By the way, I didn't believe that embedded posts like this add to the view count, unless you engage on the post. Although here Yonatan says:
The implications as I understand are this:
Someone with lots of followers shares your post -> you'll get plenty of Views.
In the old days resharing a blog post like this would not actually "reshare" any embedded post, but now there will be "Views"?
Finally, as the Views presumably also come from photos on Blogger and YouTube videos shared on Google+, the amount of followers on Google+ is not a decisive factor here, methinks.
See for instance +Teresa Richardson who has 27 million views, but only 4000 followers. Her YouTube channel is extremely popular though. She only allows her circles to comment on Google+ posts, so that creates even less interaction / views.
Some other good examples include +David Kutcher +Andy Page who are not overly active on Google+ (well, David is) but in Blogger? Oh, boy! They're both Blogger Top Contributors, too.
This nails it, forget all your follower count vs. Views stats and calculations:
Thanks to this find from David Kutcher I think we have a winner. 75 followers and over 22 BILLION views...
Blogger template kings notwithstanding:
I think that this update will create even more engagement and interaction on Google+ posts and comments, at least from the profile owners view.
A Pro Tip for getting views organically:
Speaking of eyeballs on our posts...
Why not share your Google+ posts outside the platform, too?
Just click the post open or copy the URL from the time stamp and share that in Pinterest, Twitter, etc.
I'm using the +Buffer for scheduling and sharing: I click open a post in a new tab, click on the photo / image attached and right click "Buffer this image", then I can share it to any of my social media platforms I have on my Buffer account. Even a photo album like I did here, though only one pic shows in the Twitter post:
Google+ Pages, Facebook Pages & profile, Twitter, LinkedIn... Great tool.
There is a free version, then an Awesome plan for 10 USD / month and ultimately the Business plan for bigger needs, 50 USD / month.
I've been using Buffer since its Beta, love it. And no, I'm not in any way connected to the Buffer company.
Back to the matter in hand, this still needs answering:
When someone shares your post, does the sharer also get Views?
And here is the answer:
+Masatake Wasa wrote an interesting article about the Views with a tip how to grow them.
Now we have Views instead of +1's. One can still see the plusones on mobile and inside the Google Webmasters Badge tool:
- Go to the Google+ Badge Tool
- Change Google+ User to "other"
- Enter the page's URL
The page's total +1 number will appear in the preview image for the badge.
See how many times your Google+ page & content has been viewed by other people!
This number on your profile box next to the follower count is the sum of your profile, post and photo views since October 2012.
When you look at your Google+ page or profile, you can see your total number of views. This number tells you how many times your content has been seen by other people, including your Photos, Posts, and the page itself. Also private posts or the ones shared with your circles or extended circles.
You can still see the +1's, shares and comments on each post. Only the way to display the engagement of a Page has changed: Now showing the times anyone views your post in their stream.
Why not take a screenshot today and compare it to the growth later? Looks like the numbers update every 24 hours.
Do post good stuff and especially photos, blog about your passions and share the articles on Google+, engage with your audience and grow the numbers organically.
Resorting to any kinds of tricks is a famously short lived practice where Google is concerned...
View counts may not be exact, and may not be updated in real time.
Hide or show the view count of your page & other content
You can use your settings to choose whether or not people see the number of times your page and other content have been viewed.
The Google+ settings on your profile: Uncheck to hide the Views number.
Desktop for business Pages:
Open Google+. Place your cursor in the top left corner for the Google+ main menu.
Click Pages.
Click Manage this page on the page where you wish to change the setting.
Click open the round profile pic in the upper-right corner of your screen and then click on Page Settings.
Scroll to “Profile.”
Check or uncheck the box to the left of “Show how many times your profile and content have been viewed."
Android / Mobile Web / iOS
You can’t adjust this setting from your mobile device just yet. Please use a desktop computer to hide or show your view count.
Q&A from Googler +Yonatan Zunger:
What does this number count? This is total views on your profile, your posts, your photos, and your videos.
What constitutes a "view?" For your profile, when someone goes to view your profile page. For other things, it's when they look at it -- e.g., when one of your posts shows up on someone's screen. (That's because this is how most people read posts: showing up in a stream, without clicking on it explicitly) Looking at your hovercard doesn't count.
Is this related to +1's, reshares, etc.? Only in that someone who +1'ed your post also probably saw it. You can already see counts for those on individual posts, etc., and before today you could see view counts for each photo if you looked carefully at the one-up view -- now you can see that for everything.
If someone reshares my post, does that count? Yes, since a viewer is seeing your content. Ditto if someone sees your post through an "Alice +1'ed this," through a post embedded on a page, or any other way that someone encounters it.
This seems strange: Some people seem to have a lot more views relative to their number of followers than others. Is something broken? Not at all. Some people have a lot of followers but don't engage with them well, while other people engage amazingly with a smaller group.
New addition from Yonatan:
I can confirm that +1's, comments, and reshares are not counted in this, only views.
Help Center article
Coming to the profiles and business pages soon all over the Circleverse...
One cannot break down the Views to see where they are coming from. Google has plans for the business pages, I guess. That would make sense.
- The Insights in the Dashboard of a Page: Mine is empty at the moment, perhaps something there in the future?
What do you think of the change?
I've seen people grumbling about the profile Views that they cannot see bounce rates etc...
Come on, before we had nothing on profiles, not even Plusones to show any level of engagement. If you're a business, you are already using Google Analytics or some such on your Page, surely?
Patience, this is all part of Google's BIG plan. There will be more.
Oh, and +CircleCount has listed the most viewed profiles already!
You may wonder why some people have few followers on Google+ but large number of views?
Sharing other people's photos without acknowledgement or copyright infringement plays some part with many of these people...
Bloggers get lots of views:
Check out their Blogger blog, could be very popular and as the blog photos are hosted on Google+ nowadays, those
Chromecast showing Google+ photos definitely counts, some of the top photographers on Google+ have staggering view counts. Like +Romain Guy with his 15 billion and 700 million etc views...
Before this update we had no idea how widely spread our content may have been, as the majority of people just "stalk" or read posts without interaction. Now all this has changed.
There's a lot of interesting speculation and discussion going on about the new feature:
By the way, I didn't believe that embedded posts like this add to the view count, unless you engage on the post. Although here Yonatan says:
If someone reshares my post, does that count? Yes, since a viewer is seeing your content. Ditto if someone sees your post through an "Alice +1'ed this," through a post embedded on a page, or any other way that someone encounters it.
I stand corrected:
The implications as I understand are this:
Someone with lots of followers shares your post -> you'll get plenty of Views.
In the old days resharing a blog post like this would not actually "reshare" any embedded post, but now there will be "Views"?
Finally, as the Views presumably also come from photos on Blogger and YouTube videos shared on Google+, the amount of followers on Google+ is not a decisive factor here, methinks.
See for instance +Teresa Richardson who has 27 million views, but only 4000 followers. Her YouTube channel is extremely popular though. She only allows her circles to comment on Google+ posts, so that creates even less interaction / views.
Some other good examples include +David Kutcher +Andy Page who are not overly active on Google+ (well, David is) but in Blogger? Oh, boy! They're both Blogger Top Contributors, too.
This nails it, forget all your follower count vs. Views stats and calculations:
Thanks to this find from David Kutcher I think we have a winner. 75 followers and over 22 BILLION views...
Blogger template kings notwithstanding:
I think that this update will create even more engagement and interaction on Google+ posts and comments, at least from the profile owners view.
A Pro Tip for getting views organically:
Speaking of eyeballs on our posts...
Why not share your Google+ posts outside the platform, too?
Just click the post open or copy the URL from the time stamp and share that in Pinterest, Twitter, etc.
I'm using the +Buffer for scheduling and sharing: I click open a post in a new tab, click on the photo / image attached and right click "Buffer this image", then I can share it to any of my social media platforms I have on my Buffer account. Even a photo album like I did here, though only one pic shows in the Twitter post:
Google+ now: - Hey +David Hasselhoff won't you join me? :D http://t.co/OsxR7xL4KC #Hoffsome pic.twitter.com/HaMMSRkMlo
— Jaana Nyström (@JaanaNystrom) April 1, 2014
Google+ Pages, Facebook Pages & profile, Twitter, LinkedIn... Great tool.
There is a free version, then an Awesome plan for 10 USD / month and ultimately the Business plan for bigger needs, 50 USD / month.
I've been using Buffer since its Beta, love it. And no, I'm not in any way connected to the Buffer company.
Back to the matter in hand, this still needs answering:
When someone shares your post, does the sharer also get Views?
And here is the answer:
More from the over 200 comments to Yonatan's post:
- All posts are counted, but we don't show the number if you have only a small number of views because that could be used to expose who has read things. (Photos used to be 250 views -JN)
- If you post a single photo in two places, that's actually two posts referring to the same photo. So the photo's view counts will come from both places, while the post view counts will come from each separately.
- the view count is just posts, photos, videos, and profile.
- +1's and sharing measure active engagers, but on pretty much any kind of media, lurkers make up something like 90% of your readership. Total view count tends to give you a good idea of how many people are really seeing what you say.
- (About follower vs views ratio:) I'd say that ratios should be looked at rather carefully - the raw counts may be more useful.
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