Google launched yet another important feature today - this time in adwords - called as “Compare ads” which allows users to compare multiple offers from various advertisers and choose the best. This goes one step beyond the current structure where ads compete with one another for users attention through ad title, ad description etc., Now users can compare interest rates for mortgage loans as shown below:
This feature is currently available for mortgages only in US (in select cities). But it’s just a question of time before Google rolls this out across various industry segments and geography. All those comparison shopping engines in travel, loans, insurance, books, products will be definitely affected. The middlemen will be eventually eliminated and Google will become the central hub between sellers and consumers. The users will definitely be happy about this feature. Google is beginning to deliver more and more content from within its site. I am having a bad feeling about this trend…
Recently Businessweek came up with a very interesting story on Google and how it is planning to stay ahead of the competition and whether it can stay on top of the web. Anyone interested in Search and Google should definitely read these articles. It throws lot of light on how google takes things seriously and why Search is still an unsolved problem and the challenges associated with Search. Worth Reading…
Can Google Stay on Top of the Web?
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/09_41/b4150044749206_page_2.htm
…Udi Manber, Google’s vice-president of technology for core search, joined the company almost four years ago after stints running Amazon.com’s A9 search project and serving as chief scientist at Yahoo. He, like some other leaders on the search quality team,……
…Inside Google’s search quality group, Amit Singhal runs the core ranking team, which is responsible for those algorithms you hear so much about. The team ran some 6,000 experiments last year that tried tweaking those mathematical formulas, ultimately producing between……
…It’s up to Matt Cutts and his team at Google to keep search results as free as possible from Web spam, those pages full of Viagra ads or even malware. A 10-year veteran of the company, he got into this……
…Scott Huffman runs one of the least-known units at Google: the evaluation team that measures the impact of every little proposed change to the leading search engine. And with some 6,000 experiments run annually, he’s pretty busy. Not to mention,……
The Visual Search feature offered by Microsoft’s Bing Search Engine is fantabulous! I couldn’t check it out before as I was getting 404 error. But, once I changed the country setting by visiting http://www.bing.com/worldwide.aspx to United States, I was able to play around with Visual search by visiting http://www.bing.com/visualsearch. I love the way the images are presented visually. The ability to sort, re-shuffle and narrow-by is also done nicely. But one has to install microsoft Silverlight to experience the visual search. I would say it’s worth it…go try it!
Plays a Guitar Video Game at expert mode on one hand, not looking straight but through a mirror… and solves two rubik cubes using the other hand…Amazing stuff! Even….Even if it’s staged, it’s not easy Great stuff really.
I have been following the internet space very closely for the past few years and it’s been my observation that people are so critical on the blogosphere about internet start-ups. If anyone else have similar observation, would love to hear your thoughts. If anyone has counter thoughts, even then I would love to hear your opinion
There are handful of blogs in India which cover the digital space in india, especially internet. The prominent ones I can think of are medianama.com, pluggd.in, watblog.com, alootechie.com, trak.in. All these sites cover product launches, company announcements, new features, corporate activities and internet trends. Amazingly, a very large proportion of posts attracts only critical comments. The product/feature would have been launched after months (in some cases years) of hardwork, pressure and toil. But as soon as an user reads about the product news, his fingers involuntarily types “Whats new?”, “Oh! not again..yet another…”, “No innovation”, “Bad product” and so on! The benefit of doubt is never given to the product/startup! Even if the criticism is constructive, there’s some merit in it….Invariably, most of the comments are thoughtless ramblings…Non-constructive feedback. It’s very rare to see a thoughtful, constructive and open-minded feedback.
Why are we so destructively critical? Running a startup or launching a product is not a joke! You need to have balls to run the show! If we have to nurture the spirit of entrepreneurship and develop an environment for research and innovation, then we have to learn to be constructive in our feedback.
Feedback is essential for evolution and improvement. But if the feedback is just ‘NOISE’, it’s not going to benefit anyone, except may be to the commenter whose ego might get an illusionary boost!
Last week, we soft-launched a comprehensive Educational Portal Studytimes.com. Studytimes contains information regarding 25000+ colleges and more than 400,000 courses. We have spent the last 10 months to research, gather and curate this content. To facilitate user to find colleges and courses easily, we have also provided a good search facility where we have classified colleges into various ranks.
We have also incorporated a thorough discussion forum where users can discuss anything about colleges, courses, career options, entrance exams, admission procedures, travel related queries etc.,
There are exclusive sections for Test Prepartion, Educational Events (like admission deadlines, college events, conferences, educational fairs etc.,), Career Counselling where a counseller from studytimes will get in touch with you to solve your queries.
Since “Study Abroad” is a huge section in itself, we have created a sub-site for the Study-abroad section.
To keep up with the openness of the web world, we have all the user-favoured elements like reviews, ratings, suggestions, feedback, forums in place. The whole idea is that the users - predominantly students and parents - should have CONTROL.
There are already few players in online education space like studyplaces.com, shiksha.com, pagalguy.com and various online test preparation sites. But no one is offering a comprehensive solution. Studyplaces is focussed on study abroad, while Shiksha doesn’t have complete coverage of institutes and courses, Pagalguy is focussed too much on MBA crowd!
It’s our humble attempt to provide that ‘missing’ 360 degree, comprehensive, high-quality educational website for Indians. I guess, we Indians deserve that…After all, education has been our strength
Being an online education portal, there is only so much you can differentiate on the user interface element. We do not want to fiddle around with things that have been well-established and proven. We cant differentiate on every single User Interface elements and classification system, just because we have to be unique. So, we have chosen the Classification systems and User-interface elements that would make the life easier for the users. However, we have focussed our efforts on putting together a high-quality content and making studytimes a user-powered site, which in the long-run would make us unique and useful.
Play around with site, let me know your feedback. We would be glad to take every single feedback, however minor it may be.
Spending 5 days away from work, away from PC, away from business and away from internet was much easier than I thought/expected Yeah, I went to Kullu-Manali along with my wife to celebrate our second successful wedding anniversary! Really enjoyed the trip and did quite a few things including white-water rafting, skiing, trekking, para-gliding, lots of sight-seeing and trying out local food. Should seriously do 2 outings/vacations per year…Now, heart wants to explore the beautiful north…;)
Off-late, I have been so engrossed in my pursuit of goals that I have lost touch with my good old pals. It’s not that I dont remember them…Everyday I think about my friends and ruminate over the good-old memories…It’s just that I am making the mistake of not keeping in touch…! The guys who manage to keep in touch with everyone, I seriously need some lessons from you….
Have been away from blogging for almost 6 months now! Learning curve in running your own business is indeed quite high. Naturally, I have to cut down on relatively low-priority things when I am short of time.
Nevertheless, Accentium Web is growing steadily with every passing day. The team size has grown from 6 to 28 within 9 months! After Gaadi and Secondshaadi , We are working on 3 more products and will be live in couple of months.
Yeah, blunder by Google! According to the adsense reports of individual publishers, google has sent out cheques with conversion rates of 1:1. In case you have earned 100$ you are supposed to be paid 4500 rupees (assuming a conversion rate of 45), but they have sent a cheque of Rs.100 (assuming a conversion rate of 1:1! Same problem across the globe in all countries!
The major pain point that every publisher faces with Google adsense is the 45 days to 60 days delay between the amount credit and amount realization. If Google takes another cycle to fix the recent conversion problem, then there will be major loss of goodwill against Google! Entire thread can be seen here
BTW, if at all Google can be beaten down in publisher network game, one of the ways is ought to be credit cycle. If some network can settle payments faster with publishers, there is a good chance to convert the existing customers!
Bobbie Carlyle's 'Self-made man', a statue I greatly admire and a principle I strongly believe in. "...left to his own devices, man will use his God-given talents to be creative, productive, and prosperous. Using free will, he will better his own situation and that of those around him, thereby influencing in a positive way his own destiny..."
Great stuff really.
