Social Networking: Facebook vs. Orkut

Facebook and Orkut are two of the most popular social networking sites, with both offering very similar features and capabilities. Comparing FaceBook vs. Orkut from a market share perspective will show you that both are considerably behind MySpace with Facebook owning just over 11.5% of the market share and Orkut having less than 1%. Facebook has become very popular in North America over the last few months whereas Orkut is extremely popular in India.
I do have access to both an Orkut and Facebook account and find myself using Facebook the majority of the time. I actually prefer Facebook when comparing Facebook vs. Orkut from a usability perspective, here’s why:
- From an overall cosmetic point of view, Facebook is a much more professional looking whereas Orkut looks somewhat unfinished
- Facebook’s Mini Feed feature is useful in seeing a quick snapshot on the latest happenings within your network
- The ease at which you can customize layouts within FaceBook, especially the drag and drop option.
- The ability to supply how you know a person (through school, other friends, work, randomly, etc…). This is especially interesting when you and one your contacts know the same person, but through different ways.
Here’s what I like about Orkut:
- Within Orkut you can view people’s profiles regardless if they are a ‘friend’ or not.
- I like how you can see the number of times your profile has been viewed with Orkut.
- The integration of Google Chat (maybe there is an opportunity for Microsoft to go after Facebook for the same purpose).

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Why is Google the best search engine?

Google could be said to be the best search engine for the following reasons:

It relies on a simplicity that many other search engines lack.
It's fast, reliable, easy to use, user friendly.
Fewer, less noticeable ads.
The search algorithm seems to bring the most relevant items to the top.
More relevant ads.

More people use Google than any other search engine in the world, giving Google the information to improve their engine further.

Google Search can be customized, eg:
google.com (regular)
isearchpink.com (pink google)
purpoogle.com (purple google)
googlemyway.com
namegoogle.com


Basically, Google is a crawler-based engine, meaning that it has software programs designed to "crawl" the information on the Net and add it to its sizeable database. Google has a great reputation for relevant and thorough search results, and is a good first place to start when searching.

Google's home page is extremely clean and simple, loads quickly, and delivers arguably the best results of any search engine out there, mostly due to its PageRank technology and massive listings. Google also earns high marks for its maps and searches for images, videos and blog posts; you can even search inside books with Book Search. However, search experts say that no single search engine provides the most relevant results for all queries. Google is also ranked number one because more people use it than any other search engine.



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Google provides the best relevant results of the search query at the top. It is also analyzed that the referrals from Google have higher conversion rate then any other search engine.

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I can't find my blog on Google: Where is it?

 Many bloggers think that they create a blog at Blogspot and it will  automatically be listed. If only things were that simple.

The first way to get listed in Google is to use their  "Add URL" form located at: http://www.google.com/addurl.html

You can also use a  search engine submission program like submitexpress.com, which will submit your blog to 40 search engines.

Another good way to help Google find your blog is to get a backlink from a site that Google has already indexed. A backlink is an incoming link from any website or blog pointed to your blog.

If you haven't done so yet, submit a sitemap of your blog "Webmaster Tools" to increase your site's visibility in Google.

It usually takes a new blog about a month before it's fully indexed
by Google. To see if Google has already indexed your blog perform a Google search like this:


site:yourblogname.blogspot.com


If your blog isn't already listed in Google's Blog search engine, you
can ping them directly. http://blogsearch.google.com/ping
For more information about Google Blog Search Pinging Service be sure to read their FAQ.

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9 Optimization Tricks to Make More Money with Google Adsense

Google Adsense i s no doubt one of the most preferred CPC network ad serving platform for publishers. Here are some optimization tricks to opt after creating Google Adsense account to make more money with Google Adsense. There is no doubt that once you will install Adsense ads on your busy website, you will start earning thru that, but small optimizations and customization may increase your earning by remarkable percentage. So here are some tips to optimize Google Adsense ads to earn more money thru that ad network by Google.

1. Use Section Targeting to get relevant ads : Benefit of using Google Adsense is that it serves ads related to the content of the website so that users may also find the ads useful for them. If you are having lot many things on your website which are even not related to the content shown on the page, you should use “Section Targeting” to server ads related to the main content rather than related to some static content from sidebar or footer area. This will increase the CTR (Click Thru Ratio) of your website that means your adsense ads will start getting more clicks i.e. more revenue.

2. Effective Formats of Ads – Even Google Adsense team has said that their more effective and the best performing ad formats are 336 x 280px, 300 x 250px and 160 x 600px ads. I would suggest you to install these formats of ads on your website to get more eCPM i.e. more money out of your installed ads.

3. Find Most Clicked Zone using Heatmap – Do you know where most of the visitors on your site used to click more. You can find the same using Heatmap for webpages and find the spot. Try to install Google Adsense ads near to that area to get more clicks i.e. more CTR which will tend to give your more money out of installed Google Adsense ads.

4. Filter unwanted ads from Adsense – If you find that particular ad is not giving much eCPM, you should filter out that from your Adsense account. Other eCPM rich ad will be served in place of that.

5. Install Ads in between the post content – If you are using WordPress as blogging platform, you can use plugin to insert adsense ads in between the post content. As visitor is reading the content, you may choose to serve them with ads to get clicks on them.

6. Install ads on Forum to earn more from there – As Forum is community driven content type where you need to build a strong community and then you can start monetizing that with Google Adsense. Start a forum and install ads over there to earn more.

7. Customize the color of ads as per theme – It is really important to customize the color of Google Adsense ads from the dashboard of Adsense to make ads similar to the theme color of your website. Ads should look similar to get more clicks on them. Yes, it is like making them bit confusing for visitors, but that is how you can make more money out of your website.

8. Track Adsense income in Analytics – Are you aware of the most profitable article on your website / blog? Start tracking Adsense income in Google Analytics by integrating both of them. Here is a tutorial to integrate Google Adsense with Google Analytics. This will help you in making more money with Adsense by promoting your best performing post. You can also optimize the underperforming posts by looking onto them in Analytics.

9. Placement Targeting – Do you know that advertisers can target your blog’s adsense channel and give you more eCPM if they find your site useful? Placement targeting in Adsense is an option to tell advertisers about a particular channel and let them select your website channel to serve their ads.

There may be more AdSense optimization techniques but above tips are really effective in increasing your Adsense income by remarkable amount. Share your views about the above list and let us know if any other technique is working for you.

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