Google Plus Business Page – Hangouts On Air and YouTube Integration

Google+ Business Pages, Hangouts on Air, Profiles & YouTube… oh My!

You are on Google+ and you See the Future…
Your Google+ Business page has got you thinking about all the opportunities out there! You have embraced Google+ because you can see how it impacts search and you are amazed! Now you want to try something new… something you never thought you’d try: Hangouts on Air… because the opportunities are endless (and amazing at the same time)!

So you’ve got a Profile, a Page or 2 set up and a YouTube Channel… you think you have them working together properly, but with the advent of Hangouts on Air, you aren’t so sure anymore.

Google+ Pages need their own YouTube Channel, right?
There is a bit of confusion about how to properly set up Google Plus Pages, Profiles, Hangouts On Air, and YouTube when you want them all to play together nicely.

This post will address those issues and try to clear things up a bit. Let me know in the comments if I made it better or worse! 

Google+ Pages & Hangouts On Air… Why do it?
If you are anything like me and have entrepenurial tendencies, you may want to try using Google+ to test out a new business idea (or two!) to see how well it goes.

G+ is a great place for that type of market testing. Especially with the addition of Hangouts On Air… I mean where else do you get an opportunity like this to interact with your potential customers face to face (from all over the world) and record the various conversations for others to see in the future?

For clarity moving forward, I will refer to a Google Plus business Page as a +Page, a Google Plus personal Profile as a +Profile, and the Hangouts On Air as HoA. Got it?… Good!

Google Plus Business Pages using Hangouts!
The Current Dilemma: How do you connect +Pages, +Profiles & YouTube in order to properly control the location of the HoA Live Broadcast Feed & the Recorded video. You can’t just add a new YouTube channel for your Business +Page and be done. Nooooo, it’s a bit more complex than that, but it certainly can be accomplished… read on!

Google+ Business Pages & Hangouts On Air (HoA)
The Desired Solution: When you are done, you will have 1 or more +Pages that can hold HoA sessions. The video of that session will stream live to the proper +Page & YouTube channel and it will be all branded properly… no personal names need to show at all!

Your YouTube channel will even have a nice big G+ logo that points back to the Properly Branded +Page!

Sound to good to be true? Well it is possible, let’s see how it’s done!

Let’s say you have a Google+ Profile and you want to make a +Page for your business.
No problem  right?… you create the +Page and manage it all by yourself, or assign other ‘Managers’ to do that +Page management. You connect it to your YouTube channel… and all is good, right? Yeah, sounds good.

The confusion comes when you want another +Page and need another corresponding YouTube channel.

Confusion about Google+ Pages and YouTube
YouTube channels used to sort of stand on their own… now they are tied to Google+ in such a way that when you make a new YouTube channel you are are also making a new G+ account – as a Person!

But you just want a YouTube channel, no new people involved, just the YouTube place… well sorry, it can’t be done. But you can make it work… however you still need to create a ‘new’ person or duplicate yourself in the process.

Starting from scratch is the easiest way to explain the setup process, but you can adapt the methods discussed to your existing situation as long as you have control of (or access to) the +Profile that ‘made’ the +Page in question.

If you would rather read specifically about how to work with an existing YouTube channel click here: Connecting Google+ Hangouts On Air to an Existing YouTube Channel.

Start from Scratch: Make a new YouTube Business Channel.

Go to YouTube.com and start a new account. This means you will be setting up a Google Account now. That means that a person’s name (a ‘common name’) will be used to create this account.

You can use your real name or a pseudonym / nick name… not to worry, this name will not be seen or found by many, it is just the identity needed to create the YouTube Business Channel. We will change the ‘names’ of things as we go.

After you created the YouTube Business Account, click on the option to go to your YouTube Settings… (you may need to do this via the drop-own near the Avatar in the upper right) here is where we will rename the Channel to be Branded for your business and not based on the Google Profile ‘Name’ (which is the default).

Select ‘Create a Channel’ so that you can change ‘How You’ll Appear on YouTube’ (shown above) by clicking on the ‘Create a username‘ link that appears near the bottom of the white box. This is where you change the name of the YouTube channel to reflect the desired Business name (brand).

You may have to spend some time here typing in various names to get what you like… there is a 20 character limit, no spaces, no special characters, only letters and numbers are allowed.

Tip: For Branding purposes use UpperLower case letters to help readability, you can’t come back and change this later.

When this Username is changed, then activity you do ‘as the YouTube channel’ will be shown to others as being done ‘by Username’ (i.e. GooTubePlus commented…, or GooTubePlus uploaded a new video, etc.)

Making Sure the HoA Video is Seen in the Proper Place

Now that your New YouTube Channel is ready, let’s address how to make sure your Video, both live and saved, ends up being seen and saved in the right place: Your Business YouTube channel.

We will assume here that you already had a +profile built and active before you started making the new +profile & YouTube channel we just talked about. If not, then you simply utilize your brand new +profile you just made and add a +Page to it.

For the majority of those reading this post you already had an active +profile page and may have already built 1 or more +Pages that are attached to it. Now you want to use one of those +Pages and run your HoA as part of that +Page’s activities right?

Google Plus Business Page – Hangouts On Air and YouTube Integration – Three Main Steps

1) The First Key to Making this work:
Invite a New Manager for the +Page

The brand new Business YouTube channel you just made uses an email address to sign into it. We will call that the ‘business email address’ for the purposes of this post. That business email address represents a ‘Google Account’ which can be given certain rights. What we care about now, is the ability for the business email address to be given authority to act as a ‘Manager’ of the +Page in question.

When you are signed into Google+ as your +Profile go to the +Page (your Business Page) and add/invite the business email address to be a ‘Manager’ of that +Page.

Look in the upper right when inside the +Page or when you click on the ‘Pages’ icon in the G+ Ribbon you will be presented with a list of +Pages you own or manage… hover over the +Page in question and you can click on the ‘Managers’ link here as well.

Once in the Add Managers area, enter the business email address into the ‘Add managers by email’ field and press the blue Invite icon. Manager Names you see here have already been added, when you see an email address, that means that email was invited but has not yet accepted the invitation to manage this +Page. You can have up to 50 managers of a +Page.

Now go to your business email address email account (Gmail) and Accept the invitation. Now you can Manage the Branded +Page inside Google Plus ‘as the business email address account’.

2) The Second Key to Making this work: Log into the +Page using the new Business Email Account 

In order to make all the proper connections work, you are Required to log into Google+ using the new business email account. Then go and Manage the +Page. Now the proper connection is made: You are Managing the Branded +Page with the same account that can ‘Manage’ the Branded YouTube account.

When you are ready to do a Business Branded HoA you must use the business email address as the login for Google+ and access the Branded Business +Page as a Manager of the +Page.

3) Making the Final Connection: Activate the G+ Icon Inside YouTube 

The last step is to go back to YouTube and on your Channel, activate the G+ Icon that will point to the Google+ Branded +Page.

If you are not sure how to do that, read our post about
How YouTube and Google Plus Connect.

As long as the business email address is either the owner or assigned as a Manager of the +Page, you can select the appropriate +Page (or +profile) from the drop-down list inside the YouTube Channel… this way you can have a Big G+ icon that connects people (and YouTube) to your Google Plus Branded +Page.

Google Plus Business Page, Hangouts on Air and YouTube Integration Summary
Whew… that may seem like a lot of work, but now you are set. Just remember, when you want to make the HoA ‘as the business’ you must first sign into Google+ ‘as the business’ using the business email address which is connected to the proper YouTube account.

Think about the YouTube ending place Before you start your Hangout! So like I said at the start of this post… Let me know in the comments below if I made it better or worse! Good Luck and happy Hanging Out (on Air)!

[Note: I have made a massive collection of all the full size annotated screen shots involved when doing this entire process... is is displayed on Google+ on my new +Page called Making Google Plus Work... add that Page to your circles and view the slide show by clicking here:  Connecting Hangouts on Air and YouTube Channels - a Visual Guide ]