‘Social Media’ search trends: Pakistan scores over India?

June 20, 2009 at 1:23 pm | In Social Media Predictions, Social media, Web 2.0, social media india | 2 Comments
Tags: Google, Google Insights, Google Insights for Search, Google Trends, Jamaica, Kenya, Search, Search Engines, Social media, social media india, social media search

Google trends & Google Insights are fantastic tools available at your disposal if you want to monitor the market dynamics and observe specific trends for search terms. They give you a fair idea about what the world is searching for and across which segments.

My only problem is that I haven’t yet understood the fundamental difference/similarity between both of these. There is a school of thought which says that the results in both-cases are same and rated over a index of 0-100 and insights are just an extension of the results. This clearly signifies that search-volume index should be the same in both cases. However, this isn’t necessarily true.

This is what Google says about Insights:

Google Insights for Search analyzes a portion of worldwide Google web searches from all Google domains to compute how many searches have been done for the terms you’ve entered,relative to the total number of searches done on Google over time.

There are different opinions which compare Google Trends & Google Insights. Read here, here and here.

Within an expectation that you gain some clarity on these, let us now look at the search trends for ‘Social Media’. The first graphic shows global search density for ‘Social Media’ from 2004-present. Surprisingly, Kenya has search volume index of 100 followed by Jamaica at 82.

What really amazes me is that Pakistan is ahead of India with a search index of 69 in-comparison to 62. Off-course these aren’t actual numbers and secondly the graphic is from 2004 onwards.

Social Media global search trends 2004 - present

However, the scenario is very different for the current year 2009. Expectedly, US is at the top, followed by Singapore, India & Pakistan respectively. For India, this means that there have been more social-media searches this year. This also indicates the rapidly rising interest for Social media in India.

Global search trends for

I dug a little deeper India and observer the ’social media’ search trends from 2004-onwards and for 2009 specifically. What is your take on these trends? How will these numbers change in the coming months? Will US continue to dominate search-rankings?

Social Media Jobs in India

June 17, 2009 at 6:18 pm | In Social media, Web 2.0, social media india | 1 Comment
Tags: Business, Community Manager, community manager india, India, jobs india, Market, marketing, Marketing and Advertising, Mass media, Social media, social media india, social media jobs, social media jobs india, Social network, Web 2.0, Website, World Wide Web

: Image by markhillary via Flickr

Ever since the Web2.0 wave has caught up in India there has been a tremendous shift ! Shift in our thinking, our perception and the way we have looked towards internet & its capabilities. If you talk about an average business owner, he is looking very carefully at the dynamics of Web2.0 [conversations, community, culture, collaboration]. Irrespective of the domain he is trying to tap on its potential an learn from this medium.

However he knows that before making a leap and jumping into the pool, his brand needs an expert advice for creating a successful strategy.

For building a strategy you need helping hands, you need the ’services’ of experts who can understand your needs to the core and guide you. This is where different schools of thought come-in.

The conservatives
As a business owner, I believe that I have an understanding of the Web 2.0 platform, I know what I need to do and where I need to go.I don’t think we need a specialist position or assistance from an agency/consultant for this.

The Street-smarts
I don’t think we have the in-house capabilities to drive our entire web2.0-strategy for us. I think it is best if we discuss our problems with an expert media agencies. The only compromise is in this case

The Futurists
I understand that I need to engage in healthy conversations for my brand and I think we need to hire chaps who can help us in doing just this. I might go in for one guy or a team of individuals depending on what my goals are. I don’t think agency will best serve our case as their perception will always be external. On the flip-side, if we have people are deeply engaged in our daily organizational activities they will certainly execute the plans in a much better way.

So which roles are these and what do these guys need to do? Lets have a look at some real job-descriptions from some Indian companies:

Social-media specialist [via Jobs India]

What does he do?

As a Social Media Specialist, you will be responsible for marketing and socialization of our client’s online content. Familiarity with the internet, social media sites, search engines, discussion boards, blogs, video sharing sites and pod casting is an asset but a willingness to learn is essential. You must possess excellent written and verbal communication skills in order to write and edit high quality content. A background in interactive marketing or public relations is considered a plus. The ability to find solutions in order to generate measurable results for clients is necessary as well as the generation of reports on those efforts.

Social-media marketing/campaign strategist [via Naukri.com]

- Conceptualize the innovative social media solutions to increase traffic to the web sites / portals
- Define strategy to improve end user involvement through Social Networks
- Define the avenues of revenue generation through increased and focused traffic
- Provide valuable insight and strategy for social media campaigns

Community Manager

I think this is one role that is evolving quite well. In bits-nd-pieces you will see some roles in the organization that are performing some actions from this role. Earlier this year, I had talked about the job-description and the need for Community manager at length.

Job-description [via a web portal]

Growing membership and site traffic
Designing and executing marketing initiatives
Working with members to make them successful
Finding members to contribute content to the communities
Contributing product ideas

Not to forget the traditional roles of SEO analysts and Online marketers.

What is your take on this? Please do share other roles that I did miss? In the Indian context do you think we’ll see more such roles in the future?

Suggested reading:

Six types of social media agencies in India

Indian startups need more community managers

Printing solutions for startups

May 20, 2009 at 11:17 pm | In Web 2.0 | Leave a Comment

A quick post

I was reading an inspiring article the other-day where the writer had talked about common tactics which startups should use to promote/market their business.

Although the focus was primarily on the usage of commonly available tools, one point of using ‘business-cards’ really caught my attention. As a startup owner there are many costs that you have to bear and one-such cost is printing cost on various items:

Business card
Letter head
Notepad
Flyers
Manuals
Newsletter
Brochures…

Traditionally you either outsource such work to a nearby vendor or if you have the capacity and the budget then you try to manage some of the printing needs in-house only.

However, there are some nice online options available

http://printo.in On demand printing and fast growing network of document shops. A branded retail chain that provides services of international standard.

http://giggleprint.com A onestop shop for all printing needs.

PsPrint – A printing company that prints business cards, stickers, poster printing and more.

http://www.printcamp.com A platform for social expression and an enterprise for digital photo printing that helps you share, send and store your digitized memories.

Apart from the options mentioned above, Picsquare, Canvera, Zoomin, Itasveer are some popular photo-printing startups which have been providing great value for money.

Success mantra for a thriving startup: Empower your people

March 31, 2009 at 10:57 pm | In Web 2.0 | 2 Comments
Tags: Indian Startups, startup, startups, Web 2.0

My mind told me that I should share a couple of cents which might leave an

Image source: Alexander Kjerulf's post on 8 random tips for making your startup company happy and successful

impression on your life as a start-up owner ! These opinions have emerged from experiential traits of observing, listening, watching, engaging and at times even reading during all these months..

Which success metrics have you defined for your start-up baby? Break-even the costs by next year? May be achieve next round of funding inside three months? Or even double the number of clients in six months?

You wish you could do it all yourself ! May be you could, if you were a superhero but even then 24 hours in a day were not going be enough. How do you achieve all that and much more? Wait a minute

Do not expect me to talk about that one-in-million magical solution as it never existed. Yeah, I am not talking about out of the world rocket science here. All you need are ‘PEOPLE’ who can make-it-happen! People who have cool heads and are a bundle of energy. May be you could hire them from outside, if you’re a cash-rich start-up.

But in tough times of recession, you’re expected to cut your operating costs. You are expected not to hire people and even fire the ones who are working with you!

Coming down to ground reality, most start-ups cannot afford to loose people as it is difficult to find a single replacement for any guy who quits. Each person thinks multi-dimensionally and is engaged in cross-functional work.

So how do you make them happy? Throw more money at them? May be it will work in some-cases but for the rest?

To begin with, Never promise anything to them that you cannot deliver. For e.g. you make a promise to your senior guy that he is a key member of the strategy group but sideline him

Second- the key to make people a part of your growth is by involving them in the so called decision making process. Provide them the right opportunities at right time/stage. For e.g. If you are caught in a web of problems, feel free to consult them for help. No, it is not a help in-terms of bugfix but instead help at a mental level. That is where you will be able to judge their mindset and take a call about things which you never expected them to do.

Third, never fall into a fixed mindset trap as that is the easiest thing you can do at this stage. for e.g. a marketer can only pitch or a developer can only code. These are all mind-games that you tend to play with yourself. Because of your one-dimensional thoughts, you are sometimes unable to visualize the potential of people in your team.

Fourth – Trust your people. Trust them for their thought, for what they have done, continue to do and what they can do. Make people feel counted as a part of the group. Listen to them, ask them what they feel/think. Never try to be their boss and impose your decisions on them.

Fifth - Drop your ego. It is a 360 degree cycle of feedback. The so called ego rules which apply to your employees are also valid for you

Remember, it takes more than a sweat to build a quality team. If you can do that success comes naturally to you and your start-up! On the flip-side it takes not more than a blink of an eye-lid to get back to the same mode of hiring replacements for the people who have left you. So what do you want do to – take one step forward or two steps backward?

OMG ! I could delete an index in Microsoft word?

March 24, 2009 at 3:18 pm | In Tech, Web 2.0 | 1 Comment
Tags: microsoft word, microsoft word index, Tech, tips and tricks, word index

No, this post doesn’t fit the context of this blog and I know that

It isn’t about socially social media or the newest version of ‘Web’. But it is a useful tip, that all Market researchers who prepare research-reports and executive summaries are perhaps going to appreciate. Needless to mention, this post is focused towards advanced users of Microsoft word.

Problem – How to delete all index entries from a Microsoft word document [Don't ask me why would somebody want to delete an index I am assuming the problem is already there !!]

What is an index? – Remember the search-index that you had at the back of your book in your hay-days ? The one that you could use to identify wherever your favorite keyword in the book was present.

Assumption – You have already created a word document with those countless index entires. Continue reading OMG ! I could delete an index in Microsoft word?…