As a child my parents taught me valuable rules: how to carry cash discreetly, what to do if you think you’re being followed, and of course to mind my manners. Social media presents an entirely new challenge, not only to parents, but to any adult or teen trying to traverse Web 2.0.

In our house we had a saying, “Don’t do anything that you don’t want to have to explain to Grandma.” It seems simple enough. If you don’t want people to find out what you’re doing, don’t do it in the first place. Google’s Chief Executive, Eric Schmidt, made a similar remark last year. More recently he stated that perhaps young people should change their names to disassociate themselves from colorful, online pasts.

The debate rages. Sites like Google provide clear benefits; maps, free email, world-class search engine results. Yet Google’s ethics are questioned when it comes to saving search records for several months, collecting Wi-Fi data, and scanning emails for keywords used to personalize advertising. Google has an incredible knack for solving technical problems without fully considering ethics.

Then again, who’s at fault for you getting drunk, taking compromising pictures of yourself, and posting them online? Is it Facebook’s fault if you post too much information about yourself and end up fired, not hired, or embarrassed? Do you really need Google or facebook to stop you from making a fool of yourself? If you wouldn’t want it on a billboard in Times Square, don’t put it online.

Human Resource, Reconnaissance Missions

According to an article from thejobshopper.com, earlier this year, “Recent studies confirm that over half of employers check their job candidates’ social media profiles and activities before making a hiring decision.” Job Shopper lists several ways social media is used in hiring decisions. First, to check education claims and job history. Second, inferences are made based on compromising photos. Potential employers may also look for negative comments about past employers or coworkers, and look for prejudiced or discriminatory remarks.

Matt Warman, writing for readwriteweb.com cites Sir Tim Berners-Lee as an example of a recruiter looking at students’ social media profiles. Apparently if you want to go to MIT, you better have a “clean” facebook page.

Decision Making, the End of an Era?

We are aware of how technology has changed communication. We’re fast forgetting how to really talk to one another, read something that is more than 140 characters, or even pose for a picture without wondering if it will be on facebook tomorrow morning. Scarier yet is the ability for Google or facebook to know who you are, what you do, where you are, who your friends are, and what you search for.

In the past we’ve wanted search engines to answer questions like, “Where is the best sushi restaurant in NYC?”, “What is pi to the thousandth decimal point?”, or “How can I do my own oil change?” We’re soon to expect Google to tell us “Should I message that cute guy I met at a facebook party last week?” Will we be expecting our iPhone to beep as we walk by the supermarket and tell us, “You’re out of milk” or “Do you really need those cupcakes?” when we stop at the bakery?

Do we want Google to auto-fill our lives as we begin to type things like “What should I do with my life?”, “Should I cheat on my spouse?”, or “Is there really a God?”

What’s a Social Media User to Do?

• Don’t make all of your information public. Sites like facebook allow you to make your profile only visible to friends.
• Don’t “friend” people you don’t know.
• Do use a separate email account just for job hunting.
• Do consider using a pseudonym on social networking sites.
• Don’t post pictures of yourself doing stupid things.
• Do untag yourself if your friends post pictures of you doing stupid things.
• Don’t rant about your job on social media.
• Do make sure your online identity is you.

(You can contact us for your brand marketing strategy).

Why spend money if we can protect our brand buy just following few simple steps with Google alerts. Google alerts is a free service from Google where you just need to enter any keyword & your email id & it will send you all updates for that keywords into your mail box as it happens.

Steps to follow.

1. Enter any keyword (here you can enter industry trend, brand name, competitor name etc.).
2. Select any of the listed option.(please select as-it-happens)
3. Enter your email id where you would like to receive email alerts for this.
4. Done.

By simply following these four steps you will receive an email when someone will talk about your brand, industry trends or competitor.

What is industry trend?

Here we can include those keywords which have good no of search volume & chance of ROI conversion. We can use Google trend to indentify best keywords for our industry. You can add these keywords to Google alert & check what other people or competitors are talking about these keywords.

Benefits of using Google alert

1. Free service from Google which can be use anytime from anywhere.
2. It helps us to track famous industry trends, competitors & our brand.
3. We can easily communicate with those people who are talking about our brand or industry.
4. It will send us an email on the same time if someone will talk about our brand on internet.
5. We can find influencers who are just talking about our brand & can be converted into our customers.
6. We can see if someone is linking back to our website or our articles. We can easily check that linking website is from our industry or not.

These results are not any ads from Google. It is very good news for us that Google will started showing some value to good brands.

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Google Sites Most Popular Online Video Destination in U.K.

YouTube the most popular video website (which accounted for 99.6 percent of all videos viewed on the property); Google is leading on the first position with 17% versus a year ago in the U.K. (2.5 billion videos viewed in February 2010). BBC is ranking on second position with 140 million videos viewed & Megavideo.com with 53 million videos.

Facebook ranking in the top 10 as the fastest growing video sites, surging 205 percent in the past year to 43 million videos viewed. Blinkx is the second fastest growing video site with 204 percent to nearly 29 million videos viewed. BBC Sites is third (up 143 percent), Sky Sites (up 139 percent), ITV sites (up 134 percent) also achieved triple-digit growth rates over the past year.

Source: – comscore.com

It is really a matter of concern why identity thefts are increasing at a very high speed. It is only about numbers and money. The attacked ones are individuals and mostly financial institutions. When going through the causes, it was found that it was mostly because of the nature of digital communication that has facilitated these white-collar thieves. And the most incredible point regarding identity theft is that it is very difficult to prove and enforce any legal action for an effective deterrent. However, both ammunition and power is with the law enforcement to fight identity theft successfully.

The Google’s password system was attacked in December and the ‘sophisticated and targeted attack’ took just two days. The company managed to save the passwords of Google users and the company took necessary action regarding security changes quickly. Although the theft took place in December, the disclosure was only made in January that along with Google some other companies were preys to the ‘highly sophisticated and targeted attack’. The intention was to gather information with reference to human rights campaigners.

The government of the country involved has completely denied even though the theft took place and the source code of some of the companies is already stolen. As a result Google has stopped its service in that country after the speech of the US Secretary of State who said that this ‘could hurt relations between the two countries’. The debate regarding security and confidentiality of the infinite computing systems has increased and has once again raised the question for millions of computer users. Statistics say that there was an increase of 70% in identity theft cases in just two years.

The problem with this theft started when an employee using Messenger. They clicked on a link that connected them to an infected website. This helped the intruders to access the personal computer of the individual and then eventually got connected to the entire system to affect it. Google is working on including a new layer of encryption and in securing the communication links further. Though the system that was attacked is still in use but with another name. The attacks were traced and it was clear that the work was done from China.

The intruders had access to information of some of the employees from Google and they were able to do so with some specific employees by then. The cyber criminals go on tuning more and more tactics to try and satisfy their intentions with better results. Many go to social networking sites to collect information about the users and with the help of these they are able to reach them. This has become easier because people now prefer broadband and they have started using Internet a lot. On the other hand, awareness is essential among computer users regarding those tempting and persuasive messages that lead to such results. Also it is important to report about any kind of theft or intruding activities so that they can be traced and cracked at an early stage.

Source:-nytimes.com , news.bbc.co.uk

Now you can easily track your facebook fan page with Google Analytic. Below are the three easy steps to add Google Analytic code to your facebook page & it will start showing you the results in Analytics.

Step #1

Create a Google Analytic account, if you already have then create new website profile

Once you will be done, Google will show you the tracking code which generally looks like “UA-3125143-3″. You don’t need to activate  the website on the same time.

Step #2

Here is a free tool (FBGAT) which will generate custom image code to track your Facebook fan pages visits.

You have to fill above mentioned details according to you requirements. Analytic code, Domain should be the same which you filled up in step 1 “Facebook.com“, Your facebook page link “/Websudasa” and title for your page. Once done just click on generate code & it will generate a code for you.

Step #3

Facebook Page Tracking Code

Here you have to add a facebook application (Static FBML) to your facebook page which helps you to add this code to your page. You just simply add your tracking to code to that application & add that box any where to your page.

Google will take around 24 hrs to verify your code & after that it will start showing you the results in your analytic account.

Source:- socialmediaexaminer

Source:- labs.google.com

Google analytic have every thing which can help us to track traffic from social media. Please read if you missed my previous post about Google analytic new features.  These four features can help you to track traffic from social media.

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Some related posts

How to use Google Analytic‘s Goal Funnel to track conversions?

Export Search Results In Spreadsheet with Google Squared

Google Analytics feature: Expanded and Engagement Goals

Now You can track even more conversions by creating up to 20 goals per profile. Measure user engagement and branding success on your site with Time on Site and Pages per Visit goals. Now you can set up your first Engagement goal in minutes.

Google Analytics features: Pivoting & Secondary Dimensions

With Pivoting, Secondary Dimensions you can easily track your keyword with different-2 combination. You can easily track which keyword is giving you more benefit. Not only this but yes you can also check which keyword is giving your more page views.

Google Analytics feature: Advanced Table Filters

Advanced Filters may be the most useful new feature in terms of streamlining your actual process once you access a report and are actively doing analysis. Table Filters are found at the bottom of the table in any report.These combined features enable you to perform in-depth, on the fly data analysis within your account.

Google Analytics feature: Analytics Intelligence & Custom Alerts

Alerts allow you to create your own Custom Alerts that monitor your selection of dimensions and metrics that can be sent by email or displayed in the Intelligence reports.

Analytics Intelligence constantly monitors your website’s traffic. Anytime something significant happens, it adds an automatic alert in your Intelligence reports. If your bounce rate suddenly jumps on one of your referrals, Analytics Intelligence creates an alert. Of course, it’s up to you to go find out that the bounce rate jumped because someone inadvertently changed the landing page. But you might not have noticed that there was a problem that needed fixing if your trusty assistant hadn’t alerted you.

Why Should Not Use IT?

1. Google Chrome OS is not for free.

2. Not be available for download to run and install on your laptop or Mac.

3. It will only be available at the end of 2010 & you have to buy a Chrome OS netbook approved by Google only.

4. It requires Web access to run applications.

5. Chrome OS netbooks will not have traditional hard disk drives

6. It will depend on internet-based storage for saving all of your data.

7. Google encounter problems with the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) for bundling Google Chrome browser with the OS, just like Microsoft did with its Internet Explorer?

Why Should Use IT?

1. Google says Chrome OS is a faster and a more secure alternative to rival Microsoft Corp.’s Windows.

2. It’s booting times of about 7 seconds for users to login to their computers.

3. Google Chrome is both the browser and the OS.

4. All apps are web apps which mean that we don’t need to installs or update our products, everything runs online.

5. TechCrunch has a step-by-step guide.

6. It’s not just operating system, it’s an advertising medium.

7. Google has produced a free, easy-to-use, efficient browser that pushes users to the Web, and Google’s ads, as quickly as possible.

8. Google said the OS is a medium, like television, radio or the Internet.

9. No software, just the web.

10. Google’s careful about saving the money you’d spend on an external hard-disk drive.

11. Chrome OS netbooks will not have traditional hard disk drives.

12. If you are a good Google Citizen and use all these services, you’ll never have to worry about having all your latest data with you, whether you have a net connection or not.

Google Chrome Concept Video.

Tell us your first thoughts of Google Chrome OS in the comment box below.