Why are you still using Google Plus?

Recently I was listening to a webinar about likely social media trends for 2015.

The presenters were all big-name folks who eat, sleep and dream social media news so the rest of us can focus on important things like whether to order pizza again for dinner, or who would play us in the movie about our lives (Natalie Portman!)

According to these experts, Facebook video will be big. Instagram will continue to grow. Linked In will become a more powerful publishing platform.

Not a single one of them mentioned Google Plus.

The Social Network That Never Was

In September, the Washington Post published an article titled, “Google will (sort of) stop forcing Google Plus down your throat.”

The article includes a brief, easily-read history of the service, which I’ll make even briefer: At one time, Google forced users to sign up for G+ and now they don’t.

Why? Because Google Plus was never intended to be the new Facebook. According to Washington Post writer Tim Herrera,

"Google Plus was intended to round up all of the disarrayed data points Google collects about you across all of its services – Google mail, YouTube, news, maps, wherever else – into a single system. And, for the most part, Google has succeeded. Rather than building a great social network for you, Google built a great database for itself."

So if even Google is giving up on their own service, which was never really meant to be a service at all, the question remains: Why are we still using Google Plus?

Why It's So Hard to Cut That Cord

I’ll be honest: I have never liked Google Plus. I’ve written 1,000 words on why.

I wanted to use Google Plus as a social network on which I could promote my blog posts, etc. In that respect, I found it really difficult to use. Primarily, because most of the people I know gave up on Google Plus long ago. They created an account because they had to, and then ignored it completely.

Yet, I continue to use Google Plus. Whenever I publish a blog post, I’ll throw it up on Google Plus, just to cover my ass, basically. I feel like whatever little traffic it generates is worth the two minutes it takes me to post.

The funny thing is, some people are in love with Google Plus. Whenever I disparage it, I’ll get one or two people who are like, “You know nothing, Jon Snow. Google Plus is awesome and you’re just a butthead Facebook user.”

They’ve clearly found a way to make it work for them, and to that I say: Mazel tov. I wonder if it will continue to work the way they want it to, as more and more users abandon ship.

As for me, I’ll continue to put my posts on G+. I’m not ready to cut that cord completely. At least, not while I can eek out some small benefit from it.

How about you? Are you still using Google Plus? If so, how long do you think you’ll ride it out?