Compared with Facebook or Twitter, Google+ can seem like a veritable ghost land. I’m finding few posts from friends or interesting people on the service. And it’s not just anecdotal observations of there being slim pickings. A recent report by RJMetrics found weak user engagement with the social network. And yet Google+ claims to have an ever-growing number of users. So how has it managed to pull off that neat feat?

The not-so-apparent fact is that Google has aggressively integrated its social network throughout its properties, thus driving users to unwittingly use Google+. This is particularly true of Google+’s pages for small businesses, also known as Google+ Local.

For instance, when users search for a small business, Google automatically showcases that business on the right side of the page, as part of its Knowledge Graph initiative, which provides aggregated “answers” in addition to search results.

via You say Google+ is a ghost land? Time to revisit that one | Internet & Media – CNET News.