Googles Both Social Networking Sites: Orkut and Google+

Saturday, July 9, 2011

Google’s other social networking site, Orkut, which has been around for about seven years and has tens of millions of users worldwide, will continue to operate alongside the new Google+ for now.

However, Google is leaving its options open regarding the possibility of fusing the two through some sort of integration further down the road.

“Orkut and Google+ are different products, and will both exist. Over time, we’ll determine what makes the most sense in terms of integrating these products,” a Google spokeswoman said via e-mail, when asked what the future holds for Orkut.

At this point, it’s not clear whether Google will provide a mechanism for Orkut users to export their friends list and profile data to Google+, or add Google+ privacy features to Orkut.

With Google+, the company is hoping to make a run at Facebook with a social networking site whose privacy features are tighter and easier to configure.

Google is betting that while Facebook is the dominant player in social networking, enough of its users feel uneasy about its privacy controls that they would be willing to switch to a rival that offered them an improvement in that area.

In its design, Orkut, launched in 2004, is generally similar to social networking sites of that generation, including Facebook, MySpace and Friendster.

Orkut ranks in the 102 spot in Alexa.com’s list of most popular websites in the world, but most of its users are concentrated in two countries: India and Brazil.

As the Google+ project shows, Google clearly felt that it needed to create a new social networking site from scratch in order to give Facebook a run for its money in the U.S. and around the world.

It will be interesting to see if the company opts to continue operating the two sites in parallel in the long term, or whether having Orkut becomes strategically contradictory as Google preaches its new privacy approach with Google+.

The good news for users of Orkut is that there seem to be no imminent plans to shut it down. “We will continue to invest in the product,” the spokeswoman wrote.

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How To Avoid Viruses On Social Media by James Brack

Saturday, June 25, 2011

Online thieves and scammers are increasingly using social media to scam and hustle people out of private information and even money. This is due to people’s trust in links posted by their friends – but it has now started to filter through to people that there is a spam danger with links posted by friends.

Here are the Top 10 Basic Tips to Stay Spam and Malware Free on Social Networking Websites:


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• Be 100% sure that links are going to respectable websites by hovering over the link to check the web address.
• You might receive emails asking for your log-in details – but don’t enter your Facebook login anywhere other than Facebook.com.
• Use numbers and characters in passwords and don’t use words.  It is also recommended to change your password regularly.
• Ensure anti-virus software is installed. Run a scan every couple of days and keep it updated with the latest updates.
• Remove cookies.
• Don’t add people on Facebook that you don’t know – as scammers use fake profiles to spy on you. Unfollow people on Twitter if their tweets look “unhuman”.
• Using Wi-fi can be very spammy, as the security isn’t quite to the same level as a traditional connection. Don’t click on links in your inbox or in text messages you have received.
• Videos that claim to show the body of Osama Bin Laden or ‘My Ex-Girlfriend Cheated on me… Here is my revenge!’ posts are spam. Don’t click on them and delete immediately. There are lots of variables of these types of scams – so always do the “hover test” to see where the link goes.
• Remove spam and report suspicious looking links/posts.
• Browse the security sections, such as http://twitter.com/about/security and http://www.facebook.com/security, just to keep you up-to-date and aware of things to avoid.

If you have clicked on a link that you think is malware, then immediately change your password, delete the post/uninstall the app, tell the social media website that you suspect that a post is spam, and run a full virus scan on your computer.

This guest post was written by James Brack

James Brack is a regular contributor to blogs on the topic of search engine optimization, social media security, and computer and mobile forensics

This Post was written by James Brack for http://netlz1.wordpress.com

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Three Primary Goals In Social Media

Monday, May 30, 2011

To build a social media strategy around specific goals instead of simply launching a presence because "everyone else is doing it." Today, I'm going to map out the three primary goals most social media outreach campaigns fall into. If you're still trying to figure out how and why to get involved in social media outreach, consider these three categories and ask yourself how they might apply to your business. 

Three Primary Social Media Goals:

When we look at online marketing, there are three broad categories into which nearly all social media related goals can fall. They are usually either aimed at: 

          

          1. Building/Strengthening the Brand   

          2. Driving Conversions   

          3. Increasing/Monitoring the Presence

 Starting at this broad level and thinking about the goals you have for your business can help you begin to write up a list of realistic ways in which social media might help you reach those goals.

Let's take a closer look at these three areas and how they might apply to your social media optimization efforts.

Goal #1: Build the Brand:

When it comes to building and reinforcing your brand, social media is one of the most powerful marketing tools available. It gives you the strongest and broadest opportunity to both find your target audience and to engage in conversation with them.

These days, you have no choice but to differentiate yourself from your competitors unless you have an exclusive product. Otherwise, you're forced into the unwinnable battle of competing for the lowest prices and the fastest shipping.

Think about the things that make your company different from your competitors; your unique value proposition. This is the thing you want to use social media to built awareness of. If you're a service professional, target a specific niche and build a blogging and Twitter strategy around that.

Demonstrate your expertise in working with a certain type of client and then seek out those types of clients to have conversation with. Look for new ways to connect with them and encourage your current clients to socially share your articles with their networks.

Goal #2: Drive Conversions

One of smartest reasons to use social media is for the potential boost it can have to your conversion efforts. Whether you're looking to drive sales, increase leads or simply drive people to action, conversions are an easily traceable goal in the realm of social media.

Sit down and write out a list of all the potential actions someone might take while engaging with your company's web site or while interacting online.

Obvious options like buying your products or becoming a lead spring to mind, but don't forget about other valuable actions like subscribing to your newsletter, retweeting a blog post or downloading a white paper.

Read over your list and think about the different ways you might be able to use social media to increase conversions for each item. Often times, this is the best way to start planning your social media efforts.

Goal #3: Increase Presence

Finally, we come to the goal most often associated with social media outreach efforts; increasing the conversation about your brand. After all, social media is all about the conversation. It's about the only space in the world where consumers talk to each other and to companies in an environment that can be tracked, sorted and followed-up with. This makes social media a prime outlet for PR driven companies who want to know what customers are saying about them.

Setting up even a baseline of social media monitoring can go a long way toward helping you follow these conversations. Whether you're launching new product and aiming to get people buzz about it or trying to reach out to a new target audience to share information about one of your best selling services, it's all traceable.

When it comes to the conversation people might be having about you online, ask yourself a few questions.

    * Who do you want to hear talking?

    * What do you want them to be saying?

    * Who do you want them to say it to?

These are your starting points for setting up key goals within the realm of increasing your presence.

You've Set Your Stage, Now Start Building a Plan

Looking at your business with each of the above goals in mind helps you set the stage for your social media efforts. This post isn't aimed at telling you what to do, I'm simply trying to get you to figure out why you want (and need) to do it.

If you're small business looking to take your social media efforts up a notch (or maybe even just get started,) take the time to define at least two goals from the categories above. Once you've identified your desired outcome, you'll be a lot more ready to start mapping out the path to get there.

Source: http://smosolutions.blogspot.com

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