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29% of the Top 500 Google+ Pages are News and Content Sites

December 3, 2013 by Adam Sherk

Most popular Google+ pages for news brandsWhenever I do a presentation on Google+ for publishers I mention that quite a few news and content brands are among the most followed pages. The point being that Google+ does indeed offer good opportunities for audience development, engagement and content promotion.

Today I thought I’d check to see just how many news and content sites are among the top 500 pages on Google+. So I went through the most followed rankings on CircleCount to see how many fall into this category.

For the purposes of this exercise I counted traditional news organizations, lifestyle publications, Web-only news and content sites and broadcast channels/programs with a companion site.

Here is the breakdown:

  • Top 500: 29% (145)
  • Top 100: 28% (28)
  • Top 50: 22% (11)
  • Top 10: 30% (3)

The three Google+ pages that made the top 10 are The Economist, National Geographic and TIME.

29% of the top 500 pages is a pretty good showing, and a wide range of content brands, areas of coverage and audience demographics are covered. This has been established for some time, but the Google+ user base goes well beyond young, tech-focused males.

A number of international sites fared well too, particularly some from Brazil and other parts of Latin America.

The Most Followed News and Content Sites on Google+

Here is the full list of Google+ pages, ranked by their CircleCount PagesRank (which is based on the number of followers).

It should be noted that the figures reported by CircleCount will not exactly match what is shown on a Google+ page. However CircleCount informed me that the data for any page shouldn’t be more than 24 hours old.

Follower count is not the most insightful metric (and it becomes quickly outdated) but I find it useful to take a snapshot at periodic intervals, as I do with my posts on Google+ engagement for news sites.

Google+ PageCircleCount
PagesRank
Reported followers
as of 12/3/13
1The Economist84,632,772
2National Geographic94,567,736
3TIME104,097,452
4ESPN124,001,707
5MTV233,448,571
6Travel Channel263,335,575
7BBC News273,315,935
8Food Network283,235,697
9TechCrunch373,023,175
10Epicurious492,695,448
11The Wall Street Journal502,661,448
12FashionTV522,557,690
13IGN562,524,114
14The Guardian572,494,104
15NBC Sports602,466,391
16Mashable612,440,411
17CBSSports.com642,417,902
18ELLE662,386,109
19WIRED672,304,569
20Billboard692,295,340
21Finanical Times702,289,383
22Vogue722,274,983
23Martha Stewart802,183,243
24Bravo842,136,478
25NBC News872,098,339
26Huffington Post Politics932,031,006
27Esquire Network942,026,255
28CNBC961,988,214
29Rachel Ray Show1031,918,191
30Motor Trend Magazine1091,858,223
31MAKE1211,753,449
32Los Angeles Times1241,748,035
33The Associated Press1261,746,835
34CNN International1291,713,071
35TripAdvisor1351,668,900
36CBS This Morning1411,640,048
37VEJA1451,608,612
38The Next Web1481,592,691
39The Huffington Post1491,588,632
40Reuters1511,570,034
41Forbes1551,552,129
42The New York Times1561,550,257
43BBC Good Food1581,524,034
44Cooking Channel1681,487,400
45CNN en Espanol1711,470,171
46Booooooom1721,466,370
47Car and Driver Magazine1771,441,733
48Engadget1831,419,019
49The Onion1921,380,775
50Estadão1931,379,143
51Sports Illustrated1941,369,835
52VH12011,351,850
53SB Nation2021,350,575
54FAWN2061,312,859
55Design Milk2081,303,010
56designboom2091,298,350
57Bored Panda2111,286,012
58Scene 3602121,285,120
59Young Hollywood2161,264,899
60Colossal2171,263,041
61USA Today2191,259,241
62ABC News2201,254,925
63PEOPLE2241,246,261
64Face the Nation2251,239,429
65CNET2261,238,095
66Breaking News2271,225,583
67Washington Post2291,218,790
68msnbc2341,204,027
69E! Entertainment2361,118,928
70Bleacher Report2411,166,422
71Food Republic2421,160,576
72Vanity Fair2431,159,217
73ÉPOCA2471,132,584
74Al Jazeera English2491,129,536
75Nerdist2551,118,810
76Mother Jones2571,107,966
77MTV Brasil2591,106,418
78Rasa Malaysia2651,093,268
79Hyperallergic2661,087,377
80Jornal O Globo2681,083,077
81zoOm TV2771,060,409
82Al Arabiya News - English2781,054,153
83Canal GNT2791,052,737
84CollegeFashionista2801,050,561
85Fast Company2811,050,360
86Revision32841,046,086
87Rolling Stone2871,037,871
88Firstpost2921,021,172
89ITN302979,137
90PBS NewsHour305968,802
91BakeSpace.com308966,768
92Yoga Journal312962,707
93People StyleWatch313961,827
94CMT342935,552
95CELEBUZZ330917,823
96Mixmag337902,507
97PBS338900,699
98Entertainment Weekly339898,315
99Talking Points Memo340894,762
100ESPN cricinfo341894,285
101Who What Wear355866,091
102TV Cultura360861,787
103Smithsonian Magazine361861,023
104Good Morning America375839,535
105Catraca Livre378832,885
106Al Jazeera Channel384823,192
107MODTV389813,550
108FashionEtc394809,515
109The Hacker News395807,967
110ModernMom398806,111
111Slate401796,531
112TODAY405792,715
113Adweek406790,942
114Marie Claire Brasil407788,949
115National Geographic Abu Dhabi415775,124
116The Zoe Report416773,940
117Every Day with Rachael Ray Magazine417771,738
118Foodily418770,999
119INFO419770,894
120Thrillist421767,068
121Viva423766,535
122The Daily Show429761,010
123glamsham.com430760,029
124Ars Technica443739,224
125The Weather Channel444738,660
126TMZ445737,790
127Modelina451729,247
128Seventeen453728,022
129Folha de S.Paulo455726,166
130Terra456725,578
131Eater458724,658
132EIWatan News463722,129
133Revista Galileu466713,980
134The Stream468712,291
135UOL470708,951
136EXAME.com478705,371
137PetaPixel479703,455
138This Week482699,925
139Perez Hilton488694,231
140PurseBlog490693,149
141QUEM Acontece493689,710
142Cultura Brasil494688,080
143OK! Magazine495687,028
144Crescer499683,286
145The Times of India500681,701

Related posts:

  1. Facebook Pages: Which News Sites Get The Most Engagement?
  2. Google+ Engagement for News Sites: Top Performers and One-Year Growth Rates
  3. News Organizations on Google+: Which Pages Get the Most Engagement?
  4. Which News Sites Have the Most Valuable Facebook Pages?
  5. News Sites Not Making Much Use of Static FBML on Facebook Pages

Comments

  1. David Black says

    December 30, 2013 at 12:06 pm

    I’m not surprised by your results – Google+ is certainly on something of a rise at the moment – many people had pretty much written it off in the face of Facebook (hmm) but it’s now got close to 360 million users a month against Facebook’s 1.15 billion. Twitter only has 200 million.
    The big news sites involvement only encourages other content driven sites to get involved.

  2. Adam Sherk says

    January 8, 2014 at 12:41 pm

    Yes, it’ll be interesting to see how it continues to grow and evolve, particularly for publishers.

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About Adam Sherk

Adam Sherk is an SEO and PR consultant helping publishers with digital strategy and audience development, including enterprise SEO, public relations and social media marketing.

Adam is VP SEO and Digital Strategy for Define Media Group.

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