Create a Google+ Community Badge for your blog or website

Blogger removed all Google+ gadgets added to blog layouts on February 4, 2019. Manually added Google+ Badges, Buttons, and embedded posts stopped working on March 7, 2019.

Google+ Communities let you create a space to interact with other people with shared interests. On Google+ itself, Communities are promoted on the Recommended Communities page and in Topics. However, you might also want to encourage people who aren't already on Google+ to join your public Community.

You can do that by embedding a Google+ Community Badge on a web page, blog post or sidebar.

It can have different looks:

If the Community's cover image is changed, the badge should update automatically.

Note that the button on the badge just opens the Community, where the viewer then needs to click the Join or Ask to Join button to actually join. If they do not yet have a Google+ Profile, they will be prompted to create one.

How to create a Google+ Community Badge

1. Get the Google+ Community URL
2. Open the Google+ Badge creation page (https://developers.google.com/+/web/badge/)
3. In the badge creation tool, set the "Google+ User" to "Other then paste in the Community URL
4. Adjust the look of the Badge
5. Copy the Badge code
6. Paste the code into the HTML of your website or blog

Note: Blogger does offer a Google+ Badge that can be configured for a Community

However I prefer manually creating a badge for several reasons:

• More customization options
• Can add the badge to a post or existing HTML/Javascript gadget
• You can use the badge code on non-Blogger sites

Read on for details.

1. Get the Google+ Community URL

Note that the badge only is available for public Google+ Communities.

Open the Google+ Community.

To get the link, click the Share icon, and select Share this Community

From the Share on options select Copy Link.

You can also copy the URL from your web browser's address bar, but keep in mind that if you are acting as a Google+ Page, or using a secondary Google account, you may have to edit the URL.

The Community URL looks like: plus.google.com/communities/CommunityID

For example this is the Google+ Help Community:
plus.google.com/communities/115758385206378551362

It should NOT look like: plus.google.com/u/0/b/103172072345300450419/communities/115758385206378551362

2. Open the Google+ Badge creation page 

The Google+ Web Platform developers guide (https://developers.google.com/+/web/badge/)
 lets you create a badge for your Google+ Profile, Google+ Page or Community.

Note that you may need to wait a few moments for the badge creation tool to load at the top of the page. If you are having trouble seeing it, be sure you are not running any extensions or add-ons that block scripts.

By default, it shows a badge for the Google+ Profile on the Google account you are signed into.

3. Enter the Community URL

Click the Google+ User option and switch to Other.

You will then see the option to enter the Google+ Community URL.

Paste in the Community URL and you should automatically see a preview of the default Badge.

4. Adjust the look of the Badge

Adjust the badge settings to change the look. You will see a live preview.

Layout: Portrait or Landscape

Width:  Portrait (180-450px) or Landscape (273-450px)

Color Theme: Light or Dark

Community Photo: Cover image enabled or disabled (Portrait only)

Tagline: Tagline enabled or disabled (Portrait only)

Community Owner: Visibility of Owner(s) enabled or disabled

Language: language of the "Preview Community" button

5. Copy the Badge code

Once you are happy with the way the badge looks, copy the code from under the badge preview.

The code looks like this:

<!-- Place this tag in your head or just before your close body tag. -->
<script src="https://apis.google.com/js/platform.js" async defer></script>

<!-- Place this tag where you want the widget to render. -->
<div class="g-community" data-width="180" data-href="https://plus.google.com/communities/115758385206378551362"></div>

If your website or blog already has the tag for the "head" (and your Blogger blog should, if it's using a standard template), you only need the widget code itself. That's the part highlighted in yellow.

6. Paste the code into the HTML of your website or blog

If you have a Blogger blog, you can paste the code into a HTML/Javascript gadget in your blog's Layout.

Or you can add the badge to a post, by first switching the post editor to HTML mode 

For more information see the Google+ Badges Documentation.