After my post about getting started with social networking, I’ve received some questions about Google Profile. It’s a great tool, but Google released it with little fanfare.

Google profile is a great way to get your information on the first page of Google when anyone searches for your name. Your picture will also show if you upload a photo as part of your profile.

Disabling Google Buzz will delete your profile. You can recreate it, if you want. However, disabling Google Buzz will delete all of your connected social networking websites.

Before you set up your profile, get a Gmail email address for the name you want to use. It doesn’t have to be your email address, just use your name on the account.

Everyone needs a Google account. Google has lots of neat tools to help with your writing business. After you have your Google account created, you can start to build your profile.

• Go to the Google profile page
• Click on Create My Profile
• Fill in the information you want to share
  • You don’t need to fill in everything
  • Some of the information is serious and some is not
  • Fill in your bio (it says short bio, but it allows much more room than Twitter)
  • Upload your picture
  • Add links to your blog, website, Twitter profile, Facebook page, etc.
• Google will show a URL with your name in it
  • Use that URL and not the ugly one with the numbers

You need to have a certain amount of information filled out before your profile will display to anyone except your chat buddies. Google’s rules are secret, but I think filling out links and your bio will satisfy the requirement. You want your links and bio everywhere you can put them across the Internet anyway.

When anyone searches for you name using quotation marks, your profile will show at the bottom of the page.

Write your bio, take a picture, and put up your Google profile.

Write on,

Lynn