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	<title>GigaThoughts &#187; Social Media</title>
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		<title>Hubspot – Measure effectiveness of your online initiatives</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/useful_links/hubspot-%e2%80%93-measure-effectiveness-of-your-online-initiatives.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/useful_links/hubspot-%e2%80%93-measure-effectiveness-of-your-online-initiatives.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 21 Apr 2010 10:34:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Online Marketing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Useful Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Web 2.0]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[marketing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[measurement]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[online]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[social networking]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=979</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		
In today’s day and age we are surrounded by the web world and most of our time due to work or personal reasons is spent online.  For most of us Internet has become our lifeline and increasingly people are looking at creating digital assets of their own on the World Wide Web. I have created [...]


Related posts:<ol><li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/online-marketing-at-its-best-%e2%80%93-the-movie-2012-end-of-the-world.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: Online marketing at its best – The movie 2012 End of the world'>Online marketing at its best – The movie 2012 End of the world</a> <small> The latest Hollywood offering, &#8216;2012&#8216;, is a $200 million movie about the end of the world is based on...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/social-media/do-you-have-a-social-media-policy-for-your-organization.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: Do you have a social media policy for your organization'>Do you have a social media policy for your organization</a> <small> I am a firm believer of using social media to aid organizational productivity and I always advocate and encourage...</small></li>
</ol>

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<p>In today’s day and age we are surrounded by the web world and most of our time due to work or personal reasons is spent online.  For most of us Internet has become our lifeline and increasingly people are looking at creating digital assets of their own on the World Wide Web. I have created my own <a href="http://www.synergytechservices.com/">Synergy Technology Services</a> | <a href="http://www.synergyhr.in/">SynergyHr</a> | <a href="../../../../../">GigaThoughts</a> and I am sure  you might be managing  websites, blogs, micro sites and other social media for personal or professional use directly or indirectly.  We put in a lot of effort to make sure we create good user experience for our visitors. At the same time we keep hearing how important it is to implement these terms SEO, Social Media marketing, online marketing, LinkedIn, Facebook and the list is endless.</p>
<p>Again I am sure everyone is aware that enhancing web presence is an ongoing activity and it needs constant evaluation and measurement of its effectiveness to go on and make it even better.  Over time I have been a victim of this funda that once we implement something new, we ask our immediate network and take feedback. We measure it for a while and then assume that the changes we implemented are showing results and leave it there.</p>
<p>The purpose of the article to share awesome tools that I have used to measure and improve online effectiveness and it can be useful to beginners and experienced people as well. There is a company called <a href="http://www.hubspot.com/">hubspot</a> they provide software as a service to improve inbound marketing for your organization.  In addition to their inbound marketing software they have developed some really handy measurement tools that can be useful and individuals alike.</p>
<p><a href="http://websitegrader.com/" target="_blank"><img class="size-full wp-image-1005 alignleft" title="measure_social_media_effectiveness" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/measure_social_media_effectiveness.gif" alt="measure social media effectiveness Hubspot – Measure effectiveness of your online initiatives" width="121" height="30" /><strong>Website Grader:</strong></a> This tool evaluates effectiveness of your website from an SEO perspective.  This is one tool that gives me a detailed analysis on how my blog is performing.  You will see a badge that displays website grader rank it’s <strong>98 out of 100</strong> for GigaThoughts</p>
<p><a href="http://twitter.grader.com/" target="_blank"><strong>Twitter Grader:</strong></a> Evaluates your twitter account by giving an overall rank and also gives ranks for your followers and the ones you are following. Grade for GigaThoughts is <strong>82 out  of 100</strong></p>
<p><span id="more-979"></span></p>
<p><strong><a href="http://gobbledygook.grader.com/">Gobbledygook Grader</a>:</strong> This is another impressive effort it helps you evaluate your content for Gobbledygook words. This simply means use of jargons which cannot be easily understood and this one really helps in simplifying the content to a large extent. This article content has been graded <strong>91 out of 100</strong>.</p>
<p><strong><a href="http://pressrelease.grader.com/">Press Release Grader</a>: </strong> Very helpful for PR people and for most of us it’s always good to get your press release graded as it helps in identifying its marketing effectiveness score.  We don’t have press release for GigaThoughts but I have tried this at professional level and I can recommend that.</p>
<p><strong><a href="http://facebook.grader.com/">Facebook Grader</a>:</strong> This does the same for Facebook for business pages, individual pages or individual accounts. GigaThoughts page grade is <strong>15 out of 100 </strong>and my individual account has grade<strong> 67 out of 100</strong></p>
<p>I haven’t used the following tools myself but looking at the other tools I am sure these will be good enough as well and worth giving a try</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://action.grader.com/">Action Grader</a></li>
<li><a href="http://square.grader.com/">FourSquare  Grader</a></li>
<li><a href="http://book.grader.com/">Book Grader</a></li>
<li><a href="http://alerts.grader.com/">Alerts Grader</a></li>
</ul>
<p>I would urge you guys to try these tools and let me know your feedback.</p>


<p>Related posts:<ol><li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/online-marketing-at-its-best-%e2%80%93-the-movie-2012-end-of-the-world.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: Online marketing at its best – The movie 2012 End of the world'>Online marketing at its best – The movie 2012 End of the world</a> <small> The latest Hollywood offering, &#8216;2012&#8216;, is a $200 million movie about the end of the world is based on...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/social-media/do-you-have-a-social-media-policy-for-your-organization.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: Do you have a social media policy for your organization'>Do you have a social media policy for your organization</a> <small> I am a firm believer of using social media to aid organizational productivity and I always advocate and encourage...</small></li>
</ol></p>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>TweetDeck + TwitterJobSearch = JobDeck &#8211; helps you find your next job.</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/tweetdeck-twitterjobsearch-jobdeck-helps-you-find-your-next-job.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/tweetdeck-twitterjobsearch-jobdeck-helps-you-find-your-next-job.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:42:56 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Information Technology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Start up's]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Useful Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[job search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[social]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Twitter]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=960</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		

Every now and then there comes a disruptive technology that changes the rule of the game.  My initial analysis of using this application makes me believe that such mashups will play vital role as far as job search is concerned.  Applications like JobDeck will provide an alternate channel for employers to scout for new talent [...]


Related posts:<ol><li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/6-part-series-topic-2-twitter.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: 6 part series &#8211; Topic 2 &#8211; Twitter'>6 part series &#8211; Topic 2 &#8211; Twitter</a> <small> You can read topic 1 on LinkedIn here. Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/useful_links/my-research-and-experience-on-how-to-manage-multiple-twitter-accounts.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: My research and experience on how to manage multiple twitter accounts.'>My research and experience on how to manage multiple twitter accounts.</a> <small> Twitter has already become an integral part of every marketer&#8217;s social media strategy.  During the initial days of twitter...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/twitcam-and-camtweet-to-offer-live-video-streaming-on-twitter.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: twitcam and camtweet to offer live video streaming on twitter'>twitcam and camtweet to offer live video streaming on twitter</a> <small> twitcam &#8211; developed by   Livestream and camtweet &#8211; developed by Justin.TV are utilities where anyone using their twitter login...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/startups/now-money-can-buy-friends-followers-connections-fans-on-social-media-sites.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: Now money can buy friends, followers, connections, fans on social media sites'>Now money can buy friends, followers, connections, fans on social media sites</a> <small> I always thought Money can help you buy materialistic things but certainly not family and friends.  Today I came...</small></li>
</ol>

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			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gigathoughts.com%2Ftechnology%2Ftweetdeck-twitterjobsearch-jobdeck-helps-you-find-your-next-job.html"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gigathoughts.com%2Ftechnology%2Ftweetdeck-twitterjobsearch-jobdeck-helps-you-find-your-next-job.html&amp;source=gigathoughts&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly" height="61" width="50" title="TweetDeck + TwitterJobSearch = JobDeck   helps you find your next job. " alt=" TweetDeck + TwitterJobSearch = JobDeck   helps you find your next job. " /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/tweetdeck_twitjobsearch_jobdeck.png"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-961" title="tweetdeck_twitjobsearch_jobdeck" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/tweetdeck_twitjobsearch_jobdeck.png" alt="tweetdeck twitjobsearch jobdeck TweetDeck + TwitterJobSearch = JobDeck   helps you find your next job. " width="470" height="232" /></a></p>
<p>Every now and then there comes a disruptive technology that changes the rule of the game.  My initial analysis of using this application makes me believe that such mashups will play vital role as far as job search is concerned.  Applications like <a href="http://www.tweetdeck.com/jobdeck/">JobDeck</a> will provide an alternate channel for employers to scout for new talent and at the same time give multiple opportunities to the jobseeker.</p>
<p><strong><a href="http://www.tweetdeck.com/">TweetDeck</a></strong> and <a href="http://www.twitjobsearch.com/">TwitJobSearch</a> have teamed up to provide you with a dedicated <strong>JobDeck</strong>. This makes it even easier to search for jobs, as well as staying in touch with what&#8217;s happening now, and connecting you with your contacts across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and more. Source: TweetDeck.</p>
<p><strong>The Hiring ecosystem:</strong></p>
<p>Since I run an <a href="http://www.synergysolv.com/">HR services company</a> and a social media enthusiast I am in a position to analyze the tool both from the employer and employee perspective.  My analysis of the positioning of JobDeck is given below in the table.</p>
<p><span id="more-960"></span></p>
<table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">
<tbody>
<tr style="text-align: center;">
<td width="308" valign="top">
<p style="text-align: center;"><strong>Job Seeker</strong></p>
</td>
<td width="308" valign="top"><strong>Employer</strong></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="308" valign="top">Register profile with job boards</td>
<td width="308" valign="top">Advertise job on job boards</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="308" valign="top">Subscribe to job news letters</td>
<td width="308" valign="top">Send out job related news letters</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="308" valign="top">Conduct a job search via job boards</td>
<td width="308" valign="top">Conduct candidate search using job boards</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="308" valign="top">Apply to companies directly</td>
<td width="308" valign="top">Get in touch with candidates directly</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="308" valign="top">Increasingly use social media to look for open   positions</td>
<td width="308" valign="top">Increasingly use social media to advertise open   positions</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="308" valign="top"></td>
<td width="308" valign="top"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="308" valign="top"><strong> </strong></td>
<td width="308" valign="top"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2" width="616" valign="top"><strong> </strong></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><strong>Here comes in avenues like  JobDeck, where job seeker and employer   create a relationship synchronously </strong></p>
<p><strong> </strong></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p><strong>JobDeck analysis:</strong></p>
<p>JobDeck consists of primarily 2 column layout where in the first column job related tweets are displayed using the powerful search engine developed by guys at TwitJobSearch. The tweets are filtered in a manner where the content is limited to job hunting.  There is a “Job Search Experts” user list. This area can be used to stay updated with the latest development in the job market and it has lot of HR and career related articles as well. The second column is a dedicated column that is directly connected to the main feed of TwitJobSearch which searches the web and returns search results relevant to jobs and job market.</p>
<p><strong>What I would love to see in JobDeck</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Even more powerful search – based on location, job type, company name like you usually have on job boards</li>
<li>Ability to filter updated just based on my career stream. Like a customized JobDeck for a sales professional in the telecommunication sector.</li>
<li>Ability to develop contact base and tweet with each contact from JobDeck</li>
<li>Trending like twitter</li>
<li>Better integration with other social media applications</li>
</ul>
<p>JobDeck is a pretty decent attempt made towards being innovative, it has a long way to go before it can become main stream and threaten the existence of traditional media like Job Boards. Did we just think about News Papers are traditional media?? Sorry that’s dead long time ago.</p>
<p>To me this is a brilliant concept and the first step towards a newer, smarter and a synchronous mechanism for a job seeker and an employer.</p>


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<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/twitcam-and-camtweet-to-offer-live-video-streaming-on-twitter.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: twitcam and camtweet to offer live video streaming on twitter'>twitcam and camtweet to offer live video streaming on twitter</a> <small> twitcam &#8211; developed by   Livestream and camtweet &#8211; developed by Justin.TV are utilities where anyone using their twitter login...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/startups/now-money-can-buy-friends-followers-connections-fans-on-social-media-sites.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: Now money can buy friends, followers, connections, fans on social media sites'>Now money can buy friends, followers, connections, fans on social media sites</a> <small> I always thought Money can help you buy materialistic things but certainly not family and friends.  Today I came...</small></li>
</ol></p>
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		<item>
		<title>Internet usage Statistics in 2009</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/internet-usage-statistics-in-2009.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/internet-usage-statistics-in-2009.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 27 Jan 2010 05:25:47 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Information Technology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Useful Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Web 2.0]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[internet]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=953</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		
All of us surf the web on a daily basis and for most of us we are always online.  While reading various feeds in my Google Reader I came across this interesting post and I would like to share the details with the readers of this blog.  This post provides statistical information on internet usage [...]


Related posts:<ol><li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/google-wave-%e2%80%93-web-based-real-time-communication-platform.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: Google Wave – web based real time communication platform'>Google Wave – web based real time communication platform</a> <small> During the Google I/O keynote, Google utilized the opportunity to launch its new communication platform called Google Wave. We...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/6-part-series-topic-2-twitter.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: 6 part series &#8211; Topic 2 &#8211; Twitter'>6 part series &#8211; Topic 2 &#8211; Twitter</a> <small> You can read topic 1 on LinkedIn here. Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate...</small></li>
</ol>

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			</a>
		</div>
<p>All of us surf the web on a daily basis and for most of us we are always online.  While reading various feeds in my Google Reader I came across this interesting post and I would like to share the details with the readers of this blog.  This post provides statistical information on internet usage in 2009 things like</p>
<ul>
<li>How many websites were added</li>
<li>How many emails were sent</li>
<li>How many internet users surfed the web</li>
<li>Web servers in use</li>
<li>Information of domain names</li>
<li>Social media statistics</li>
<li>Information on images</li>
<li>Information on web browsers</li>
<li>Information on malicious software</li>
</ul>
<p>The content below is replicated from the original post on <a href="http://www.entireweb.com/">www.entireweb.com</a></p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>Email usage statistics in 2009</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong> 90 trillion</strong> &#8211; The number of emails sent on the Internet in 2009.</li>
<li><strong> 247 billion</strong> &#8211; Average number of email messages per day.</li>
<li><strong>1.4 billion</strong> &#8211; The number of email users worldwide.</li>
<li><strong>100 million</strong> &#8211; New email users since the year before.</li>
<li><strong>81%</strong> &#8211; The percentage of emails that were spam.</li>
<li><strong>92%</strong> &#8211; Peak spam levels late in the year.</li>
<li><strong>24%</strong> &#8211; Increase in spam since last year.</li>
<li><strong>200 billion</strong> &#8211; The number of spam emails per day (assuming 81% are spam).</li>
</ul>
<p><span id="more-953"></span></p>
<p><strong>Websites</strong></p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>234 million</strong> &#8211; The number of websites as of December 2009.</li>
<li><strong>47 million</strong> &#8211; Added websites in 2009.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>Web servers</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>13.9%</strong> &#8211; The growth of Apache websites in 2009.</li>
<li><strong>22.1%</strong> &#8211; The growth of IIS websites in 2009.</li>
<li><strong>35.0%</strong> &#8211; The growth of Google GFE websites in 2009.</li>
<li><strong>384.4%</strong> &#8211; The growth of Nginx websites in 2009.</li>
<li><strong>-72.4%</strong> &#8211; The growth of Lighttpd websites in 2009.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Domain names</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>81.8 million</strong> &#8211; .COM domain names at the end of 2009.</li>
<li><strong>12.3 million</strong> &#8211; .NET domain names at the end of 2009.</li>
<li><strong>7.8 million</strong> &#8211; .ORG domain names at the end of 2009.</li>
<li><strong>76.3 million</strong> &#8211; The number of country code top-level domains (e.g. .CN, .UK, .DE, etc.).</li>
<li><strong>187 million</strong> &#8211; The number of domain names across all top-level domains (October 2009).</li>
<li><strong>8%</strong> &#8211; The increase in domain names since the year before.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Internet users</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>1.73 billion</strong> &#8211; Internet users worldwide (September 2009).</li>
<li><strong>18%</strong> &#8211; Increase in Internet users since the previous year.</li>
<li><strong>738,257,230</strong> &#8211; Internet users in Asia.</li>
<li><strong>418,029,796</strong> &#8211; Internet users in Europe.</li>
<li><strong>252,908,000</strong> &#8211; Internet users in North America.</li>
<li><strong>179,031,479</strong> &#8211; Internet users in Latin America / Caribbean.</li>
<li><strong>67,371,700</strong> &#8211; Internet users in Africa.</li>
<li><strong>57,425,046</strong> &#8211; Internet users in the Middle East.</li>
<li><strong>20,970,490</strong> &#8211; Internet users in Oceania / Australia.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Social media</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>126 million</strong> &#8211; The number of blogs on the Internet (as tracked by BlogPulse).</li>
<li><strong>84%</strong> &#8211; Percent of social network sites with more women than men.</li>
<li><strong>27.3 million</strong> &#8211; Number of tweets on Twitter per day (November, 2009)</li>
<li><strong>57%</strong> &#8211; Percentage of Twitter&#8217;s user base located in the United States.</li>
<li><strong>4.25 million</strong> &#8211; People following @aplusk (Ashton Kutcher, Twitter&#8217;s most followed user).</li>
<li><strong>350 million</strong> &#8211; People on Facebook.</li>
<li><strong>50%</strong> &#8211; Percentage of Facebook users that log in every day.</li>
<li><strong>500,000</strong> &#8211; The number of active Facebook applications.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Images</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>4 billion</strong> &#8211; Photos hosted by Flickr (October 2009).</li>
<li><strong>2.5 billion</strong> &#8211; Photos uploaded each month to Facebook.</li>
<li><strong>30 billion</strong> &#8211; At the current rate, the number of photos uploaded to Facebook per year<strong> </strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Videos</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>1 billion</strong> &#8211; The total number of videos YouTube serves in one day.</li>
<li><strong>12.2 billion</strong> &#8211; Videos viewed per month on YouTube in the US (November 2009).</li>
<li><strong>924 million</strong> &#8211; Videos viewed per month on Hulu in the US (November 2009).</li>
<li><strong>182</strong> &#8211; The number of online videos the average Internet user watches in a month (USA).</li>
<li><strong>82%</strong> &#8211; Percentage of Internet users that view videos online (USA).</li>
<li><strong>39.4%</strong> &#8211; YouTube online video market share (USA).</li>
<li><strong>81.9%</strong> &#8211; Percentage of embedded videos on blogs that are YouTube videos.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Web browsers</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>62.7%</strong> &#8211; Internet Explorer</li>
<li><strong>24.6%</strong> &#8211; Firefox</li>
<li><strong>4.6%</strong> &#8211; Chrome</li>
<li><strong>4.5%</strong> &#8211; Safari</li>
<li><strong>2.4%</strong> &#8211; Opera</li>
<li><strong>1.2%</strong> &#8211; Other</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Malicious software</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>148,000</strong> &#8211; New zombie computers created per day (used in botnets for sending spam, etc.)</li>
<li><strong>2.6 million</strong> &#8211; Amount of malicious code threats at the start of 2009 (viruses, trojans, etc.)</li>
<li><strong>921,143</strong> &#8211; The number of new malicious code signatures added by Symantec in Q4 2009.</li>
</ul>
<p>Reference for internet usage statistics in 2009</p>
<p><em>Website and web server stats from <a href="http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2009/12/24/december_2009_web_server_survey.html">Netcraft</a>. Domain name stats from <a href="http://www.verisign.com/domain-name-services/domain-information-center/industry-brief/index.html">Verisign</a> and <a href="http://webhosting.info/" target="_blank">Webhosting.info</a>. Internet user stats from <a href="http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm" target="_blank">Internet World Stats</a>. Web browser stats from <a href="http://marketshare.hitslink.com/report.aspx?qprid=0&amp;qpmr=15&amp;qpdt=1&amp;qpct=3&amp;qptimeframe=M&amp;qpsp=131&amp;qpnp=1" target="_blank">Net Applications</a>. Email stats from <a href="http://www.radicati.com/?p=3237" target="_blank">Radicati Group</a>. Spam stats from <a href="http://www.mcafee.com/us/local_content/reports/7315rpt_threat_1009.pdf" target="_blank">McAfee</a>. Malware stats from <a href="http://eval.symantec.com/mktginfo/enterprise/other_resources/b-symc_intelligence_quarterly_oct-dec_2009_20949850.en-us.pdf" target="_blank">Symantec</a> (<a href="http://eval.symantec.com/mktginfo/enterprise/white_papers/b-whitepaper_internet_security_threat_report_xiv_04-2009.en-us.pdf" target="_blank">and here</a>) and <a href="http://www.mcafee.com/us/local_content/reports/7315rpt_threat_1009.pdf" target="_blank">McAfee</a>. Online video stats from <a href="http://www.comscore.com/Press_Events/Press_Releases/2010/1/November_Sees_Number_of_U.S._Videos_Viewed_Online_Surpass_30_Billion_for_First_Time_on_Record" target="_blank">Comscore</a>, <a href="http://www.sysomos.com/reports/video/" target="_blank">Sysomos</a> and <a href="http://youtube-global.blogspot.com/2009/10/y000000000utube.html" target="_blank">YouTube</a>. Photo stats from <a href="http://blog.flickr.net/en/2009/10/12/4000000000/" target="_blank">Flickr</a> and <a href="http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics" target="_blank">Facebook</a>. Social media stats from <a href="http://www.blogpulse.com/" target="_blank">BlogPulse</a>, Pingdom (<a href="http://royal.pingdom.com/2009/11/13/in-depth-study-of-twitter-how-much-we-tweet-and-when/" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://royal.pingdom.com/2009/11/27/study-males-vs-females-in-social-networks" target="_blank">here</a>), <a href="http://twittercounter.com/pages/100" target="_blank">Twittercounter</a>, <a href="http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics" target="_blank">Facebook</a> and <a href="http://gigaom.com/2009/11/10/twitter-valuation/" target="_blank">GigaOm</a>.</em></p>


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		<title>Recruitment applications on iphone</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/recruitment-applications-on-iphone.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/recruitment-applications-on-iphone.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 19 Jan 2010 13:18:37 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Human Resource]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Information Technology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Useful Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[application]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[iphone]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mobile]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[placement]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Recruitment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[staffing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=942</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		
We all know how big the market is for iphone applications and there are brilliant applications on iTunes which are broadly categorized into utilities, games, entertainment being the most sought after.   Apple Inc had officially released iphone SDK in March 2008 and since then the mobile development community has been busy dishing out awesome applications. [...]


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<p>We all know how big the market is for iphone applications and there are brilliant applications on iTunes which are broadly categorized into utilities, games, entertainment being the most sought after.   Apple Inc had officially released iphone SDK in March 2008 and since then the mobile development community has been busy dishing out awesome applications.  Smart organizations capitalized on the first mover advantage and developed an iphone app to promote/market their products and services.  I have been using iphone and now am on 3GS and am involved in recruitment business I am eagerly waiting for companies to develop customized iphone apps to provide/ facilitate recruitment services.</p>
<p>I would like to see companies provide iphone application which caters to varied interest level of internal employees, candidates/ consultants and clients.</p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"><em>Features that I would like to see in an iphone app by category</em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: large;"><em></em></span><img class="alignright size-full wp-image-943" title="iphone-sdk-develop-recruitment-app" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/iphone-sdk-develop-recruitment-app.png" alt="iphone sdk develop recruitment app Recruitment applications on iphone" width="143" height="129" /></p>
<p><strong>Candidates:</strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Resumes submission</li>
<li> Push notifications for jobs of their interest</li>
<li> Search for jobs</li>
<li> Contact details of recruiters</li>
<li> Applications status</li>
<li> Job referrals</li>
</ul>
<p><span id="more-942"></span></p>
<p><strong>Companies: </strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Push requirements to the vendor</li>
<li> Status on applications</li>
<li> Contact details of the team working on the assignments</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Internal employees:</strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Access to internal recruitment system</li>
<li> Quick submission of resumes to client</li>
<li> Contact details of client</li>
<li> Send out job alerts</li>
<li> Access to candidates social networking details for quick connect</li>
</ul>
<p>My research recruitment apps on iphone resulted into very few well designed apps.  A quick search on iTunes and Google search resulted in apps like:</p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Radar Recruit &#8211; very well made application by an Australian recruitment which specializes in creative jobs in the advertising sector. Radar is primarily using this app to provide job listing by category where the candidate can search for jobs and apply or refer the job posting to someone. <a href="http://itunes.apple.com/in/artist/captainsoft-pty-ltd/id346723905">You can view the app screen shot here</a></li>
<li> JobServe connect &#8211; Provides a job search engine where candidates can search for more than 50,000 jobs globally with locations services on, it has an interesting feature to find jobs near you. It also provide generic functionality like creating a search agent, emailing the job etc <a href="http://itunes.apple.com/in/artist/jobserve-limited/id335516226">You can view the app screen shot here</a></li>
<li> Korn and ferry &#8211; this is one company that is taking social media recruiting to the next level. They have developed an iphone app with a lot of real good features. <a href="http://mobile.kornferry.com/kfconnect/default.aspx">You can read the features here </a></li>
<li> Recruiterapp.com &#8211; these people have gone one step further and have developed a full blown app to manage recruitment cycle for recruitment agencies/ consultants. <a href="http://recruiterapp.com/">You can read about them here</a></li>
</ul>
<p>The iphone app market is heating up and along with social media I foresee companies will have to develop innovative apps to reach candidates via mobile devices.</p>
<p>I would love to see a list of features that you would like in an iphone app that can facilitate the recruitment experience on a mobile device.</p>


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		<title>Online marketing at its best – The movie 2012 End of the world</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/online-marketing-at-its-best-%e2%80%93-the-movie-2012-end-of-the-world.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/online-marketing-at-its-best-%e2%80%93-the-movie-2012-end-of-the-world.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 14 Nov 2009 11:45:59 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Information Technology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Web 2.0]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=916</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		

The latest Hollywood offering, &#8216;2012&#8216;, is a $200 million movie about the end of the world is based on myths backed by the Mayan calendar.  Since the first promotion and marketing event of the movie 2012 there has been a casual buzz about world coming to an end and people are highly curious about the [...]


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<p style="text-align: center;"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-917" title="online-marketing-2012-movie" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/online-marketing-2012-movie.jpg" alt="online marketing 2012 movie Online marketing at its best – The movie 2012 End of the world  " width="273" height="59" /></p>
<p>The latest Hollywood offering, &#8216;<a href="http://www.whowillsurvive2012.com/">2012</a>&#8216;, is a $200 million movie about the end of the world is based on myths backed by the Mayan calendar.  Since the first promotion and marketing event of the movie 2012 there has been a casual buzz about world coming to an end and people are highly curious about the prediction.   In the past there have been numerous predictions about the world coming to an end.</p>
<p>To me the Barack Obama online marketing campaign was the best in terms of strategy and execution. The team at Sony has similarly done a great job at strategizing and executing online marketing campaign for the <a href="http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/2012/">movie 2012</a>.</p>
<p>Online marketing Lessons we can learn from 2012&#8217;s.</p>
<p><strong>Strategy </strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> The What: Exploit people&#8217;s fears and generate curiosity amongst the target audience</li>
<li> The Where: social media &#8211; primarily websites, <a href="http://www.facebook.com/2012Movie" target="_blank">Facebook pages</a>, <a href="http://www.myspace.com/2012movie" target="_blank">myspace</a> twitter and video viral</li>
<li> The How: Use of organic Google search coupled with highly focused SEO, SMO and SEM activities</li>
</ul>
<p><span id="more-916"></span></p>
<p><strong>Execution </strong></p>
<p>It all started with a phrase &#8220;Find out the truth, search Google for 2012&#8243;. This prompted people to do just that and as a result in Google and SEO parlance the key phrase was searched over and over again in very short period of time. This increased the SEO value of that keyword and since it was passed around over various social networking sites there was a huge viral effect. Initially 2012 was not ranking first in Google it came right up there in couple of days</p>
<p><strong>Big Viral effect</strong></p>
<p>Search Google for 2012 the movie and you will see loads of articles, websites, videos, images, fan pages, groups, social organizations, NGO&#8217;s and last but not the least even NASA has to get into the act.  This topic appeals to wide variety of audience the viral effect was very strong and fast, this can be clearly seen in the research on Google Trends</p>
<p>Google Trends</p>
<p><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-918" title="2012-the-movie-online-marketing-campaign_google_trends" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/2012-the-movie-online-marketing-campaign_google_trends.jpg" alt="2012 the movie online marketing campaign google trends Online marketing at its best – The movie 2012 End of the world  " width="418" height="238" /></p>
<p>Alexa Ranking</p>
<p><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-919" title="2012-the-movie-online-marketing-campaign_alexa" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/2012-the-movie-online-marketing-campaign_alexa.jpg" alt="2012 the movie online marketing campaign alexa Online marketing at its best – The movie 2012 End of the world  " width="451" height="314" /></p>
<p>In addition to the official movie site, <a href="http://whowillsurvive2012.com/">whowillsurvive2012.com</a>, the search results pages include Wikipedia pages as well as <a href="http://survive2012.com/">Web</a> <a href="http://www.december212012.com/">sites</a> built by devotees of the Mayan doomsday prophecy, lending more credibility to the premise of the <a title="film" href="http://e-strategyblog.com/category/film/">film</a>. You&#8217;ll find the same type of results at <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/daviderickson/3988079976/">Yahoo!</a>, <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/daviderickson/3987324813/">Bing</a>, and <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/daviderickson/3988080262/">Ask</a>.</p>
<p>There has been a negative impact of this marketing campaign as well, since the news that the world is going to end by 2012 spread like wild fire authorities like NASA has been bombarded with people asking them to question if the world would really end.  The authorities at NASA had to create a <a href="http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/2012.html">FAQ page</a> on their website clarifying that the nothing wrong is going to happen.</p>
<p>To me the marketing campaign of the movie 2012 is a huge success considering its effectiveness online coupled with its offline marketing and promotions activities.</p>
<p>Movie reviews for 2012 look promising the world over,I only hope that the movie lives up to the hype and expectation.</p>


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		<title>Play Farmville on Facebook to enhance your business management skills</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/useful_links/play-farmville-on-facebook-to-enhance-your-business-management-skills.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/useful_links/play-farmville-on-facebook-to-enhance-your-business-management-skills.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 27 Oct 2009 09:10:22 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=905</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		
I have been on Facebook for a long time and have been an active social networker.  One of the best ways to network is to get involved into playing games on the social networking sites. Being in strategic role I tend to indulge myself strategy games.  I generally like games developed by Zynga as they [...]


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<p>I have been on <a href="http://www.facebook.com/amitkdesai">Facebook</a> for a long time and have been an active social networker.  One of the best ways to network is to get involved into playing games on the social networking sites. Being in strategic role I tend to indulge myself strategy games.  I generally like games developed by <a href="http://www.zynga.com/">Zynga</a> as they specialize in creating games on social networking sites.  <a href="http://www.farmville.com/">FarmVille</a> is yet another &#8220;strategic&#8221; game where players can manager virtual farm by planting, growing and harvesting virtual crops.</p>
<p>Since its launch in June 2009, FarmVille has become the most popular game application on Facebook with 56.1 million active users in October 2009. Source <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FarmVille">Wikipedia</a>.</p>
<p>Why this game is so famous:<img class="alignright size-full wp-image-906" title="play_farmville_logo_facebook" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/play_farmville_logo_facebook.png" alt="play farmville logo facebook Play Farmville on Facebook to enhance your business management skills " width="123" height="123" /></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Everyone can relate to farming</li>
<li> Everyone has basic knowledge about agriculture</li>
<li> It&#8217;s not like normal role play gaming that gets over at that instant</li>
<li> Game can be played over period of time</li>
<li> Creates an environment of healthy competition</li>
</ul>
<p><span id="more-905"></span></p>
<p>Management lessons that can be learnt from FarmVille game on Facebook:</p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Strategic planning: Improves your strategic thinking capability as you need to strategize on what you&#8217;re planning to grow according to the time available.</li>
<li> Utilization of resources: Need to choose your options (trees, flowers, fruits, animals and crops) to earn income on harvesting thereby one has to ensure optimum utilization of resources</li>
<li> Planned Growth: Growth largely depends on your experience level and that can be achieved by planting can be gained</li>
<li> Team work: sending gifts and helping friends farm leads to better team work.</li>
<li> Cash flow: since everything has to be purchased and has a return on investment, it becomes important to manage your cash flows and invest in the right areas at the right time.</li>
<li> Time management: each crop/fruits/tress has a predefined time to mature where the cost of planting and time of harvesting is fixed. It becomes imperative to choose what your are going to plant based on the time available with you</li>
</ul>
<p>At the end of the day this is just a game but I am sure if played with good intent one can surely learn a lot of aspects of business.  Feel free to <a href="http://www.facebook.com/amitkdesai">add me</a> as your neighbour on FarmVille.</p>
<p>It would be nice to receive comments from people who have played Farmville and let us know what their experiences have been playing this super cool game.</p>


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		<title>Now money can buy friends, followers, connections, fans on social media sites</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/startups/now-money-can-buy-friends-followers-connections-fans-on-social-media-sites.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/startups/now-money-can-buy-friends-followers-connections-fans-on-social-media-sites.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 03 Sep 2009 07:12:59 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Start up's]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Web 2.0]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[facebook]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Twitter]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=856</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		
I always thought Money can help you buy materialistic things but certainly not family and friends.  Today I came across a company that helps you do just that and I was really amazed to learn that now you can buy friends.  With the advent of social media and everyone is trying to establish their brand [...]


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</ol>

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<p>I always thought Money can help you buy materialistic things but certainly not family and friends.  Today I came <img class="alignright size-full wp-image-857" title="increase-facebook-twitter-followers_friends_contacts" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/increase-facebook-twitter-followers_friends_contacts.jpg" alt="increase facebook twitter followers friends contacts Now money can buy friends, followers, connections, fans on social media sites" width="131" height="36" />across a company that helps you do just that and I was really amazed to learn that now you can buy friends.  With the advent of social media and everyone is trying to establish their brand online and wants to be present across social media sites and the first notion is to get maximum followers, friends, connections, whatever you want to call it.  The base idea to generate lot of contacts which supposedly are interested in your products or services and you can use these contacts to create a marketing exercise around this data.  Since everyone is feeling the heat and really don&#8217;t have a success formula to create a database (so called fans and followers) of people across social media sites there comes this company <a href="http://usocial.net/">uSocial</a> who wants to capitalize on this need and make their millions ;-)</p>
<p><strong>Services offered by uSocial</strong></p>
<p><strong>Regular services</strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Front page services &#8211; basically getting on first page of dig, yahoo buzz and other social media bookmarking sites</li>
<li> Press release distribution &#8211; the same old thing</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Interesting Services</strong></p>
<p>Now these are the services where money can buy you friends and followers</p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Facebook marketing service
<ul>
<li> <a href="http://usocial.net/facebook_marketing/#press1">Buy Facebook friends</a> &#8211; how to increase Facebook friends</li>
<li> <a href="http://usocial.net/facebook_marketing/#press2">Buy Facebook fans</a> &#8211; how to increase Facebook fans</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<p><span id="more-856"></span></p>
<p>The packages depends on the number of fans your desire and in multiple of thousands. You can increase the number of Facebook friends and fans from 0 to 10000 and the pricing starts form $100 to $700 for 1000 to 10000 contacts respectively.</p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Twitter marketing services
<ul>
<li> <a href="http://usocial.net/twitter_marketing/#press2">Buy twitter followers </a>- how to increase followers on twitter</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<p>They do the same thing on twitter and the packages depends on the number of followers you desire the range starts form 1000 and goes up to 100000 twitter followers and the pricing starts from $87 to $3500.</p>
<p>They claim that via both services they will help you get friends and followers based on your target audience.</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>My views on the model:</strong></p>
<p>I think just like in the real world you cannot buy friends and family and more importantly when you use social media for business then in that case you cannot buy customers.  The basic idea is that you need to slowly build your presence via these social media sites and deliver value to your potential customers.  If you resort to buying friends, followers, connections, contacts then they will just be there in your contact list and will not prove to be of any value.  The key is not to have thousands of followers because it is going to be virtually impossible to manage one on one relation with each and everyone and at the same time you cannot deliver value to thousands of people at the same time.</p>
<p>I maybe wrong but to my mind companies like uSocial are opportunists and want to make quick bucks from people who are at the start of the learning curve in social media.  According to me these auto generated contacts will prove to be absolutely useless.</p>
<p>What&#8217;s your take on this ?</p>


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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Do you have a social media policy for your organization</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/social-media/do-you-have-a-social-media-policy-for-your-organization.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/social-media/do-you-have-a-social-media-policy-for-your-organization.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 04 Aug 2009 08:08:15 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[facebook]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[LinkedIn]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[social networking]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Twitter]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=831</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		
I am a firm believer of using social media to aid organizational productivity and I always advocate and encourage use of various social media applications like blogs, networking sites, wiki&#8217;s within my organization. Past couple of months I have been analyzing time spent by my employees on these social networking sites and measuring its effectiveness [...]


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			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gigathoughts.com%2Fsocial-media%2Fdo-you-have-a-social-media-policy-for-your-organization.html"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gigathoughts.com%2Fsocial-media%2Fdo-you-have-a-social-media-policy-for-your-organization.html&amp;source=gigathoughts&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly" height="61" width="50" title="Do you have a social media policy for your organization" alt=" Do you have a social media policy for your organization" /><br />
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<p><img class="alignright size-full wp-image-833" title="how-to-develop-social-media-policy-for-your-organization" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/how-to-develop-social-media-policy-for-your-organization.gif" alt="how to develop social media policy for your organization Do you have a social media policy for your organization" width="103" height="126" />I am a firm believer of using social media to aid organizational productivity and I always advocate and encourage use of various social media applications like blogs, networking sites, wiki&#8217;s within my organization. Past couple of months I have been analyzing time spent by my employees on these social networking sites and measuring its effectiveness against increase in productivity or against generating / facilitating business.  The analysis was based on social media and its direct impact on productivity. Though the over results are positive but there were some areas of concerns that I would like to highlight in this article.  My analysis pointed out that in certain cases there was a high percentage of unproductive time spent on these sites which lead to loss in productivity.  I am not sure if there should be a clear cut policy that restricts the usage of social media sites or should one adopt an evolutionary process by making the employees realize the good and bad of it and treat it accordingly. My analysis was I have conducted</p>
<p><strong>Areas of concern:</strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> <strong>Excessive time spent networking sites:</strong> leads to loss of focus and loss of time. These activities include chatting with friends, updating social profiles of sites like Facebook , MySpace and other such sites and not really focusing on work realted interactions.</li>
<li> <strong>High usage of bandwidth:</strong> people upload pictures, presentations, videos purely for purpose to add fun element in their social media adventure which leads to high usage of bandwidth and time.</li>
<li> <strong>Public image of the company: </strong>people will have to be very careful about what they say about your company, the projects that they work  on and the team that they are involved in as this can really damage your reputation. This is the most important as the internet world consists of your potential clients and employees <strong></strong></li>
<li> <strong>Viral effect: </strong>once someone gets a message/ pictures they keep involving the rest of the employees and the viral keeps on viraling leading to again loss of time</li>
</ul>
<p><span id="more-831"></span></p>
<p>My analysis has made me realise that there has to be a social media policy for every organization.  Please do not confuse it with your IT policy as the major difference is you ideally want to restrict users from abusing your IT infrastructure and hence strict guidelines of Do&#8217;s and Don&#8217;ts is possible but in case of social media you want to encourage interaction of employees internally and externally to derive benefits for your business.  In this scenario you will have to develop a policy which encourages yet restrict use of social media.</p>
<p><strong>Points to be considered while formulating social media policy:</strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Explain why you need this policy, this will help get buy in from your employees</li>
<li> How will you provide access to your employees, pointers could be:
<ul>
<li> Hierarchy wise access (Sr Manages, Managers, Juniors)</li>
<li> Time bound usage (An hour a day at one time or spread during the day)</li>
<li> Department wise access</li>
<li> Roles wise access and usage (Marketing , operations, customer support, PR)</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li> Set measurement mechanism connecting use of social media and productivity based on the above mentioned access</li>
<li> Create guidelines where people take responsibility of what they write about the organisation</li>
<li> If the employee is using the sites for work purpose then they represent them by name of the organization as compared to personal names.</li>
</ul>
<p>I suggest you conduct an exercise to measure the use of networking sites within your organisation and start acting on creating a policy for usage of social media before its too late.</p>
<p>If this article got you thinking on how to develop social media policy then these resources can help you develop Social media policy for your organizations:</p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> <a href="http://123socialmedia.com/2009/01/23/social-media-policy-examples/">30 sample policies of various organizations by 123Socialmedia.com</a></li>
<li> <a href="http://humanresources.about.com/od/socialmediaandwork/a/social_media.htm">How to develop social media policy</a></li>
<li> <a href="http://mashable.com/2009/04/27/social-media-policy/">Social Media policy by Mashable</a></li>
<li> <a href="http://www.shiftcomm.com/downloads/socialmediaguidelines.pdf">Top 10 guidelines for social media participation at a company by Shift Communications</a> (PDF)</li>
<li> <a href="http://www.nowwearetalking.com.au/opinion/blog-how-the-3rs-empower-telstra-staff-online-225">Telstra releases social media policy</a></li>
<li> <a href="http://www.sun.com/communities/guidelines.jsp">Sun&#8217;s Guidelines on public disclosure</a></li>
<li> <a href="http://www.intel.com/sites/sitewide/en_US/social-media.htm">Intel Social Media Guidelines</a></li>
</ul>


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		<title>twitcam and camtweet to offer live video streaming on twitter</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/twitcam-and-camtweet-to-offer-live-video-streaming-on-twitter.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/twitcam-and-camtweet-to-offer-live-video-streaming-on-twitter.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 Jul 2009 14:54:49 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Information Technology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Web 2.0]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Twitter]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[video]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=819</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		
twitcam &#8211; developed by   Livestream and camtweet &#8211; developed by Justin.TV are utilities where anyone using their twitter login details can start streaming live to its followers, create live chat rooms and archive each streaming event.   This is not a ground breaking technological neither it&#8217;s an innovative concept.  To me it&#8217;s smart thinking and [...]


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<p><a href="http://twitcam.com/" target="_blank">twitcam</a> &#8211; developed by   <a href="http://www.livestream.com/">Livestream</a> and <a href="http://www.camtweet.com/">camtweet</a> &#8211; developed by <a href="http://www.justin.tv/">Justin.TV</a> are utilities where anyone using their twitter login details can start streaming live to its followers, create live chat rooms and archive each streaming event.   <img class="alignright size-full wp-image-826" title="camtweet_twitchat-live-video-streaming-on-twitter" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/camtweet_twitchat-live-video-streaming-on-twitter.png" alt="camtweet twitchat live video streaming on twitter twitcam and camtweet to offer live video streaming on twitter" width="223" height="71" />This is not a ground breaking technological neither it&#8217;s an innovative concept.  To me it&#8217;s smart thinking and right timing on part of both companies to take advantage of their expertise and applying to the critical mass of twitter.  There is virtually no difference between twitcam and camtweet.</p>
<p><a href="http://twitter.com/">Twitter</a> is certainly one of the most successful <a href="../../../../../tag/social-media">social media</a> concepts to hit the web recently and is growing exponentially.  The more I hear about twitter&#8217;s success the more I am made to believe that <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micro-blogging">micro blogging</a> platforms will soon take over from the current main stream communication avenues like emails and blogs.  There are a lot of smart people out there who have jumped on the early innovators band wagon and developed some really cool applications around twitter and hopefully with that would have developed a business model around it as well.  The idea of developing applications and concepts around twitter is to target real time conversations and thereby making highly effective marketing campaigns.</p>
<p>There are many applications/utilities built around twitter and are doing reasonably well. The reason <strong>twitcam and camtweet</strong> needs a special mention is because I feel they surely are a game changer.  Services like these are likely to take tweeting to a whole new level both at personal as well as corporate marketing and relationship building exercise.</p>
<p><span id="more-819"></span></p>
<p>What really is live streaming on twitter?</p>
<p>Twitcam and camtweet are tools which lets you broadcast live using your webcam and tweet it to your followers. It&#8217;s going to be as simple as turning on your webcam and start streaming live to your followers in 3 simple steps.</p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Connect your webcam</li>
<li> Login using twitter credentials</li>
<li> Click broadcast button.</li>
</ul>
<p>How it can help us:</p>
<p>People by their very nature love interactivity and synchronous communication with other people and twitcam will help us get one step ahead of plain vanilla chat</p>
<p>Twitcam and camtweet will help us strengthen the relationship building exercise over the web by attaching a face and voice to each communication.  This will help us build trust and thereby resulting into stronger and deeper relationships.</p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Marketers can create viral campaigns using the power of video to reach out to their customers</li>
<li> Businesses can use it as a productivity tool for people working on the same project but are in different parts of the world</li>
<li> Live streaming can be used by companies to provide higher level of customer services vis twitter</li>
<li> Researchers can use it to understand the market better by developing greater insights into each communication</li>
<li> Individuals can create their own streams and use it for fun as well as academic purpose</li>
<li> Families spread over the world can have a quick live face to face update on their each family member</li>
</ul>
<p>These are just few advantages that come to my mind when I first downloaded and tested them. I am sure moving forward people will find innovative and abstract ways of using and abusing a service like twitcam.</p>
<p>Livestream says that twitcam was built in about a week and uses new player tools that are going into an updated version of its API that will be released in the near future. The company hopes these will let anyone build a similar service with their own branding, and audience tools&#8211;preferably with a chat system that does not require so many tweets.</p>
<p>I believe that the biggest danger in developing a twitter related application is that it can be copied very easily and the early mover advantage lasts for a very short while.  It will become increasingly difficult for these companies to create a sustainable competitive advantage and ongoing revenues to justify their existence</p>


<p>Related posts:<ol><li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/6-part-series-topic-2-twitter.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: 6 part series &#8211; Topic 2 &#8211; Twitter'>6 part series &#8211; Topic 2 &#8211; Twitter</a> <small> You can read topic 1 on LinkedIn here. Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/useful_links/my-research-and-experience-on-how-to-manage-multiple-twitter-accounts.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: My research and experience on how to manage multiple twitter accounts.'>My research and experience on how to manage multiple twitter accounts.</a> <small> Twitter has already become an integral part of every marketer&#8217;s social media strategy.  During the initial days of twitter...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/startups/now-money-can-buy-friends-followers-connections-fans-on-social-media-sites.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: Now money can buy friends, followers, connections, fans on social media sites'>Now money can buy friends, followers, connections, fans on social media sites</a> <small> I always thought Money can help you buy materialistic things but certainly not family and friends.  Today I came...</small></li>
<li><a href='http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/tweetdeck-twitterjobsearch-jobdeck-helps-you-find-your-next-job.html' rel='bookmark' title='Permanent Link: TweetDeck + TwitterJobSearch = JobDeck &#8211; helps you find your next job.'>TweetDeck + TwitterJobSearch = JobDeck &#8211; helps you find your next job.</a> <small> Every now and then there comes a disruptive technology that changes the rule of the game.  My initial analysis...</small></li>
</ol></p>
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		<title>How to install IntenseDebate on wordpress 2.7.1</title>
		<link>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/how-to-install-intensedebate-on-wordpress-271.html</link>
		<comments>http://www.gigathoughts.com/technology/how-to-install-intensedebate-on-wordpress-271.html#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 08 Jul 2009 08:13:07 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Amit Desai</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Information Technology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Useful Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[blog]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[plugins]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[wordpress]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.gigathoughts.com/?p=800</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
			
				
			
		
IntenseDebate &#8211; super charge your commenting system
I installed IntenseDebate to offer highly interactive commenting system to the readers of GigaThoughts.  As always it started with a lot of research, which led to final two competitors to choose from &#8211; IntenseDebate and Disqus. After testing both commenting system on local machine for a week, I finally [...]


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<p><strong>IntenseDebate &#8211; super charge your commenting system</strong></p>
<p>I installed <a href="http://www.intensedebate.com/">IntenseDebate</a> to offer highly interactive commenting system to the readers of GigaThoughts.  As always it <img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-801" title="intense-debate-logo" src="http://www.gigathoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/intense-debate-logo.png" alt="intense debate logo How to install IntenseDebate on wordpress 2.7.1" width="151" height="40" />started with a lot of research, which led to final two competitors to choose from &#8211; IntenseDebate and <a href="http://disqus.com/">Disqus</a>. After testing both commenting system on local machine for a week, I finally chose IntenseDebate primarily because it&#8217;s an <a href="http://automattic.com/">Automatic</a> company and for those who are not aware they are the same guys behind wordpress and more so IntenseDebate offers all the <a href="http://www.intensedebate.com/features">features</a> that are offered by Disqus.  I have been using it since a week on the live site and I am really thrilled with interactivity it can offer to the readers.  I would recommend using IntenseDebate to everyone who wishes to offer a better user experience to their readers.</p>
<p><strong>Errors, issues, problems and fixes while installing IntenseDebate on Wordpress 2.7.1</strong></p>
<p>Like a lot of people who tried installing IntenseDebate I was faced with several issues and it wasn&#8217;t a smooth installation process.  But persistence and the urge to offer better usability to the readers i was able to find solutions of each one and hence I wish to share my experience so that other people can benefit from it and I am sure it can help ease their installation issues.</p>
<p><strong>Error 1:</strong> &#8220;Login failed. Please check your credentials and try again&#8221; Login Failure while accessing ID via wordpress admin once the plugin is activated. This is the first error which most people would face and it blocks the further installation and synching process.</p>
<p><strong>Solution 1: </strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> First try and reset the plugin by downloading the <a href="http://intensedebate.com/misc/clearID.zip" target="_blank">cleared.php</a> and do the following:<br />
Please use these instructions:<br />
1. Uninstall and remove the IntenseDebate plugin<br />
2. Install, activate the clearID.php plugin<br />
3. Uninstall it.<br />
4. Install the<a href="http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/intensedebate"> latest version</a> of the plugin and activate it.<strong></strong></li>
<li> Step 2 is to change<strong> </strong>your username and password on the ID website and try installing the plugin again and try again. Make sure your password does not contain any special character like #$% as that will not work<strong></strong></li>
<li> Step 3 is to check missing Blog Title, while accepting the username and password ID check if the blog has a valid blog title if not it will reject the request. So if you don&#8217;t have a title you need to have one but this will lead to the text appearing above your logo in the header. You need to reduce the font size in the theme CSS to 0 so for the application the title will still be there but it not be visible on your site. <strong></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><span id="more-800"></span></p>
<p><strong>Error 2: </strong>Post installation<strong> </strong>all the comments have not been synchronized.</p>
<p><strong>Solution 2: </strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> I would say first check for the comments on the ID website in your account if they are there.<strong></strong></li>
<li> if not wait for couple of days after installation and try and synching process again and see if that works<strong></strong></li>
<li> Under your WP admin settings section there is an option under the ID tab to reset the plugin in most cases this should solve the problems of missing or disappearing comments in ID<strong></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Error 3:</strong> IntenseDebate plugin has skewed the layout of the site.</p>
<p><strong>Solution 3:</strong></p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> The issues is noscript tag present in your comment.php or main php file</li>
<li> Or one of your existing plugin is dynamically adding a noscript tag</li>
</ul>
<p>ID works on Java Script and there are a lot of browsers, themes and plugins that block java script and as a result the layout is thrown out of order.  There can be a case where in your comments.php, or your main php file or the comment template file has a &lt;noscript&gt; tag if you can locate that then your problems is over normally the lines would say</p>
<p><strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">&lt;noscript&gt; </span></strong><strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">Currently you have JavaScript disabled. In order to post comments, please make sure JavaScript and Cookies are enabled, and reload the page</span></strong><strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">.</span></strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;"> Click here for instructions on how to enable JavaScript in your browser</span>&#8220;.<br />
<strong>&lt;/noscript&gt;</strong></p>
<p>The problem arises because that is part of a block of content that gets nested in another &lt;noscript&gt; tag, which becomes invalid and throws the nesting out in your HTML.</p>
<p>You can do two things either remove those lines and yes its ok to remove those lines or add a // before these lines and it will indicate that the text following // is for information only and not action and then you layout should be back to normal.</p>
<p>If this does not solve then it means that one of your other plugins might be dynamically adding the noscript tag to your comment form. The solution for that is to disable all plugins and activate only ID plugin and check if works and i am sure it will work. The next step is to activate each plugin one by one and check if it&#8217;s creating any conflict with ID plugin.  After this long exercise you will be able to identify a plugin which is causing the layout issue. Once you have identified the plugin you need to click on edit option where the plugin is listed and again look for the noscript tag in that plugin and follow the same // process  mentioned above.</p>
<p>In my case it was the plugin <strong>WP-SpamFree</strong> plugin dynamically adding the noscript tag and hence causing the conflict with ID plugin. I added the // tag and it worked fine.  But remember once you upgrade the WP-SpamFree plugin the next time it will again add the noscript tag so be careful before upgrading.</p>
<p><strong>IntenseDebate Support: </strong></p>
<p>The support team at ID is amazing and they have been through the entire episode with me and have helped me with solution at every stage of my problem.  We all need to remember that ID is a open source utility and it&#8217;s an unpaid support as a result you will have to be patient with the team and they will surely help you with all your issues.  I would particularly like to thank <a href="http://www.intensedebate.com/users/191803">Beau</a> form the <a href="http://www.intensedebate.com/aboutus">ID team</a> who have helped me almost on a daily basis to resolve my issues.</p>
<p><strong>Contacting ID Team: </strong></p>
<p>Getsatisfaction.com there is wealth of information and i am sure it will solve most of your issues by visiting the <a href="http://getsatisfaction.com/intensedebate">ID page</a></p>
<p>IF that doesn&#8217;t work email ID support team on <a href="mailto:support@intensedebate.com">support@intensedebate.com</a> and try and give as much information as possible also first do some research then they will be able to help you better</p>
<p>Follow ID on twitter: <a href="http://twitter.com/IntenseDebate">twitter.com/IntenseDebate</a></p>
<p>Follow ID on Facebook: <a href="http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=18092405897">IntenseDebate on Facebook</a></p>
<p><strong>Contact me:</strong></p>
<p>Please feel free to contact me and I shall be more than happy to help you solve your queries.</p>
<ul class="unIndentedList">
<li> Email: desaiamit (at) gmail (dot) com</li>
<li> Linkedin: <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/amitdesai">http://www.linkedin.com/in/amitdesai</a></li>
<li> Twitter : <a href="http://twitter.com/amitdesai">http://twitter.com/amitdesai</a></li>
<li> Facebook: <a href="http://facebook.com/amitkdesai">http://facebook.com/amitkdesai</a></li>
</ul>


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