Written on 1/10/2011 12:59:00 PM by Martha Ballesteros
Over the weekend, there have been reports claiming that Mark Zuckerberg announced that he will shut down Facebook on March 15th. Here's where the "news" started,
FACEBOOK WILL END ON MARCH 15th!
PALO ALTO, CA –Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook will be shut down in March. Managing the site has become too stressful.
“Facebook has gotten out of control,” said Zuckerberg in a press conference outside his Palo Alto office, “and the stress of managing this company has ruined my life. I need to put an end to all the madness.”
Zuckerberg went on to explain that starting March 15th, users will no longer be able to access their Facebook accounts.
“After March 15th the whole website shuts down,” said Avrat Humarthi, Vice President of Technical Affairs at Facebook. “So if you ever want to see your pictures again, I recommend you take them off the internet. You won’t be able to get them back once Facebook goes out of business.”
Zuckerberg said that the decision to shut down Facebook was difficult, but that he does not think people will be upset.
“I personally don’t think it’s a big deal,” he said in a private phone interview. “And to be honest, I think it’s for the better. Without Facebook, people will have to go outside and make real friends. That’s always a good thing.”
Some Facebook users were furious upon hearing the shocking news.
“What am I going to do without Facebook?” said Denise Bradshaw, a high school student from Indiana. “My life revolves around it. I’m on Facebook at least 10 hours a day. Now what am I going to do with all that free time?”
However, parents across the country have been experiencing a long anticipated sense of relief.
“I’m glad the Facebook nightmare is over,” said Jon Guttari, a single parent from Detroit. “Now my teenager’s face won’t be glued to a computer screen all day. Maybe I can even have a conversation with her.”
Those in the financial circuit are criticizing Zuckerberg for walking away from a multibillion dollar franchise. Facebook is currently ranked as one of the wealthiest businesses in the world, with economists estimating its value at around 7.9 billion.
But Zuckerberg remains unruffled by these accusations. He says he will stand by his decision to give Facebook the axe.
“I don’t care about the money,” said Zuckerberg. “I just want my old life back.”
The Facebook Corporation suggests that users remove all of their personal information from the website before March 15th. After that date, all photos, notes, links, and videos will be permanently erased.
In light of this rumor that alarmed a lot of people, here's the truth,
Faccebook is NOT Shutting Down on March 15
There’s a silly rumor exploding on the Internet this weekend, alleging that Facebook is shutting down on March 15 because CEO Mark Zuckerberg “wants his old life back,” and desires to “put an end to all the madness.”
[UPDATE] We have official confirmation from Facebook Director of Corporate Communications Larry Yu that the rumor is false. We asked him via e-mail if Facebook was shutting down on March 15, to which he responded, “The answer is no, so please help us put an end to this silliness.” He added, “We didn’t get the memo about shutting down and there’s lots to do, so we’ll just keep cranking away like always.”
Let’s think about this for a minute. Would Facebook decide to shut down the company just a few days after announcing a round of funding, consisting of $450 million from Goldman Sachs and $50 million from Russian investment firm Digital Sky Technologies, on a valuation of $50 billion?
The spurious report was started by a site to which we refuse to link, known for its reports of impending attacks of alien spaceships and false reports of a Michelle Obama pregnancy.
The fact that this absurd hoax spread so efficiently makes us wonder: Will people believe anything?
I hope this clarified the silly rumor going around the web.
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martha ballesteros,
social media news
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Written on 1/01/2011 09:41:00 PM by Martha Ballesteros
Happy new year to everyone! I'd like to begin this year with positive and prosperous thoughts for web marketing in 2011. As they say, internet marketing is not just a fad, it's the future.
Social Media Optimization
With the popularity of social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, there is no doubt that these sites have become the most influential media for 2010. It has been expected that people will utilize these networks to reach a larger pool of potential customers in 2011.
Social media sites have a lot of traffic which makes it search engine friendly. Marketing through these sites may be in the form of paid advertisements, like that of Facebook, or in the form of backlinks and credible profile creation. The greater impact you can have and leave on social networking sites, the more likely that you will be visible on local searches.
Mobile Web With the release of the smartphones in 2010 like the iPhone 4, Blackberry Torch, and HTC Evo 4G, people have started surfing more through their phones more that ever. May it be finding the nearest Starbucks in the area, checking the latest movies, updating a status on Twitter, or uploading a picture on Facebook, mobile surfing will definitely be a staple in 2011. For personal or business site owners, you to need to make sure that your site is optimized for relevant mobile applications.
On-Page SEO Activities
A lot of effort is invested in offpage SEO. However for 2011, personal and business site owners should also consider putting more effort in their on-page SEO activites. As of September 2010, Google, in its effort to improve its performance, has decided to penalize sites that have a slow or longer load time. And how will Google do this?
First, the faster your website responds to Googlebot, the higher speed ranking you will receive.
Second, the faster loading time on Google Toolbar than your competition, the higher speed ranking you will receive. To better assist you in analyzing your website speed, Google has added a page speed report to their webmaster tools found within the Google webmasters ‘lab’ section.
In addition, since the web has gone mobile, sites optimized for faster loading work better when accessed on mobile phones, PDAs, tablets, as well as other gadgets that don't have the same level or speed of processing like that of laptops or desktop computers.
Online Videos
YouTube has been one of the best and most popular resources on the web today. It not only caters to personal videos but has also become a haven of online marketers and advertisers. It is currently the second largest search engine in the US next to Google in 2010. Uploading a relevant video on YouTube not only improves your site's visibility in Google, but in YouTube as well.
In addition, YouTube videos get passed around very quickly through the aid of social networking sites. Even reality and talk show scout talents through YouTube. So, I guess YouTube marketing will definitely be hot in 2011.
Local Search Results
I've already mentioned in one of my posts late last year about Google Boost. This new Google feature lists local search results and allows local websites to be more visible in local searches. Dominating the local search results is much easier because there are a lesser number of players rather than globally competing for first page result. Since this started only late last year, I can say that this will serve as a "heads up" for site owners to host your site in the same country where your business operates to take advantage of local search listings.
There you go! These are just some of the innovations from the last quarter of 2010 that are definitely helpful to improve and boost your site in 2011. Cheers!
Posted in
local search results,
martha ballesteros,
mobile SEO,
mobile web,
seo 2011,
SEO news,
social media optimization
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Written on 12/10/2010 07:02:00 AM by Martha Ballesteros
Let's face it - no pun intended - nowadays, rarely do people look at or even glimpse at Google ads. With the way things are going, it seems that Facebook's Social Advertisements just gave Google's Pay Per Click (PPC) Adwords campaign a run for its money.
According to a recent eMarketer article, worldwide online advertising spending increased by 39% from 2009 to 2010.
In addition, their data also suggests a steady increase in US online social network advertising spending.
You've now got the facts, it's now time to learn the what, why, and how. Here are just some of the reasons why you should put more marketing efforts in your Facebook account,
Facebook is a Social Network
Apart from your friends, you get to be connected to the world and build business or personal relationships. After you get to know your friends and let them get to know you, you will be in a much better position to promote your network marketing business.
More Personalized Network Marketing
Since you are friends on Facebook, you get to know more about client. Instead of pushing hard to sell them your business, get to know them as people. Find out what is important to them in life, their likes and dislikes.
Free Business/Product Exposure Though Facebook Page
Apart from Facebook's paid advertisement section, you can also create a page for your business where you can post updates and promos and invite your friends to follow or like it. In the spirit of viral marketing, Facebook also has a Share button which allows people who liked your page to Share your posts on their Wall making it more accessible to another user's network. This You can link your blog to your Facebook profile using NetworkedBlogs. You can also create an event and invite your friends or members of your group.
Gives a Face to Your Business
With all the hacking, online scamming, and phishing, netizens are now very vigilant with regards to online business transactions. Having a face or an actual person they can talk or chat with sometimes gives more assurance to online clients rather than just an auto-reply machine. Facebook also allows you to add images to your ad unlike Google AdWords. Users also get the chance to vote on whether or not they like the ad making businesses much more accountable to their target audience.
Facebook's Niche-Targeted Demographic PPC
Facebook allows you to narrow your ads to be seen by more specific demographic such as by age, sex, location, occupation, and interests. With the currently updated Facebook profile, users load up their profiles with huge amounts of useful information ranging from gender, age, location, nationality, languages, and occupation to personal interests, favourite books and educational history.
Try it! Facebook ads make you look twice because of the nice pictures that go with it. Not to mention Facebook's more fun to use!
Posted in
facebook marketing,
facebook social advertisements,
google adwords,
google PPC,
martha ballesteros,
pay per click costs
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Written on 11/25/2010 07:16:00 PM by Martha Ballesteros
A customized site gives the image of yourself or your business. It showcases proper and relevant content matched with well-thought and creative web design.
Customizing your site or blog makes it stand out because its aesthetic uniqueness. For business sites, it gives your company an identity in the corporate world. Customized sites make the visitor feel that you have put time and effort to it and makes them browse through it to find more about you, what you have to offer, and other interesting features.
For business sites or blogs, graphics or pictures also play a major role to project your company's work. Most site visitors give little time and, most of the time avoid, reading all the written content and focus on figures or visual representations. Relevant graphics will give the proper idea about your business and its work and can influence a lot in their decision making.
Posted in
affordable search engine optimization,
customized web design,
customized web design make better impressions,
improving search engine ranking,
martha ballesteros
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Written on 11/14/2010 07:26:00 PM by Martha Ballesteros
For those having a few problems with Google today, apparently, it is due to server maintenance. According to Google Calendar
Exchange Server Scheduled Maintenance
IT will be applying routine maintenance to the Forest domain controllers, Exchange mail servers, and file servers which will require a reboot of the servers. Users may experience brief outages as the servers are rebooted.
Posted in
google problem nov 14 2010,
google server maintenance nov 14 2010,
martha ballesteros,
no google page rank display nov 14 2010,
server error
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Written on 11/13/2010 09:46:00 PM by Martha Ballesteros
Out of the IT- and SEO-related newsletters I receive, most of it spam, one particular update caught my attention. With the increasing popularity of Google Maps for its usefulness and relevance to local and international business, Google recently launched another "business" feature called Google Boost. Google recently launched Google Boost. Google Boost is an AdWords feature that allows local websites be more visible in local searches. For new and local businesses, this would be advantageous and would definitely help them be "searchable". However, for business or personal websites and blogs that have positioned themselves, if not on top at least the first page of search engine search results, this would definitely affect their ranking.
Google reps also disclosed, "We've made results like this possible by developing technology to better understand places. With Google Place Search, we're dynamically connecting hundreds of millíons of websites with more than 50 million real-world locations. We automatically identify when sites are talking about physical places and cluster links even when they don't provide addresses and use different names."
In addition, Google has been making the internet a very huge and competitive marketplace for everyone. With the introduction of Google Place Search, which works alongside Google Maps, local and international business can be listed, like a big directory, and potential clients and customers can have a visible physical view of the business location. This helps people make more informed business or personal decisions.
Posted in
google boost,
google maps,
google place search,
martha ballesteros,
SEO news
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