Why Google Analytics Users Can’t Remove Profiles?

Ever since I started using Google Analytics and serving clients in their website analytics reports, I have about 50 or so accounts tied to a personal Google account. Some of these accounts have up to six sub profiles for internal website segmentation.

Yet about a third of these accounts are no longer accessible because I no longer work for a client and the owner or administrator removed my access privilege. To my frustration, their account remains in the list. To get rid of this unwanted listing, administrators have to either a) Remove the profile completely or b) Remove my email address in the list of allowed access. If they don’t, the list would only grow, with some of them I really don’t need or want to access.

Sample of unwanted Google Analytics profile.

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Google vs Norton: Somebody Must Be Telling a Lie!

Google search engine gives us the links to sites based on our search query. But if for some reason Google deems your computer could be compromised by clicking on the link, it issues a text warning beside the link you’re about to click: This site may harm your computer or The site may be compromised. In that way, should you decide to follow your instinct and your machine gets infected, Google can only say, “I told you”.

But what if you don’t only follow your instinct, you also follow someone else’s recommendation?

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Google +1 Button: The More Social Dimension of Searching

In an effort to deliver the most relevant search results, Google has just introduced +1, a shorthand used to recommend a link found at Google search result that will become visible to people within your social circle and the world in general. This feature is roughly similar to Twitter’s retweet function, but unlike in the microblogging platform where retweets immediately show up in the stream of the person you’re following, links that are +1′d — let’s see if this ever becomes a verb in the future — only show up when they become part of search results. Oh, and yes, it’s Google’s way to help influence clicks towards pay-per-click ads.

Overview

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Japan Quake, Tsunami and PR Disasters

The massive quake that shook Japan, along with the tsunami it generated, and the potential nuclear meltdown, has both devastated a significant portion of Land of the Rising Sun and worried neighbors who sit in the Pacific Ring of Fire. While the whole situation clearly reveals the mortality of the whole human race, not everyone seems to describe it this way. There are cases when companies, well-known or obscure embrace the spotlight for wrong reasons.

Singapore’s MediaCorp made a sales push for advertisers during its extended coverage of the Japan earthquake, barely two hours after the initial tremor was recorded.

“Book your spots in the Weekday Evening News Bundle as the channel brings viewers comprehensive coverage reports on the disaster with extended versions of news bulletins tonight.”

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JC Penney Black Hat: Spammers Getting Ahead of Google?

A lengthy article posted at the New York Times entitled The Dirty Little Secrets of Search illustrated how JC Penney a US retail giant may have benefited from large-scale link building schemes to boost its ranking for highly competitive keywords.

The article starts with an assumption that if you were Google — that is, you serve search results based on keyword queries entered by users — which site would you rank first if the keywords entered are “dresses”, “beddings” or any arbitrary term used to find a nugget of information or an influencer in making buying decisions? Certainly, the Google search engine is operated by large data center of servers whose results are dictated by algorithms that ensure the best pages appear on top results.

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How To Breakup With Twitter Followers

Breaking up is hard to do? Maybe not in Twitter where followers of an account can easily remove themselves from a boring, intrusive or irrelevant accounts they follow. An Exact Target study shows the reasons how and why Twitter followers start abandoning our tweets.

More than half of Twitter users (52%) say that once content becomes repetitive or boring, it’s time to unfollow a brand, according to a report from Exact Target and CoTweet. Another popular reason (41%) for unfollowing an account is to unclog a crowded stream of tweets. While this reason makes sense — it’s hard to follow a steady stream of tweets — frequency of Twitter updates may also play a part in such disconnection effort. When someone spends the whole day updating his/her account with link dumps, conversation with followers or simply arbitrary update nobody seems to be interested, he/she is a good candidate to unfollow.

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Facebook Places Security Issues

Overeager Hong Kong Facebook users greeted the launch of its Places feature by making updates that allowed friends to know their whereabouts. A friend posted his Facebook Place update while on transit via MTR; he updates his location every time the train arrives at a certain station. I almost forgot about a long-time ex-colleague until his Facebook wall showed his recent affinity for Pages and broadcast his current location. Aside from those two friends, there are more who got hooked into this latest Facebook feature, and proudly announce they are in the lobby of a luxury hotel, an exclusive bar in town or in some place that may raise suspicion from family or friends. If that’s not enough, Facebook users can also tag friends in a certain landmark granted their privacy settings allow them to do so.

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Social Media Week in Hong Kong 2011

While I am unable to attend the event, I am excited to write about Social Media Week in Hong Kong. That’s because I seldom see a opportunities like this in the city, in addition to the social media’s growing influence in the realm of digital marketing. Hong Kong is ripe for such kind of gathering of thoughts. Wireless access is ubiquitous, domestic broadband and mobile phone penetration is at all-time high, such elements vital in propagation of social media in the city. Facebook and YouTube occupy two of the first three spots in Web applications according to Hitwise.

Source: Social Media Hong Kong Week Facebook page

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Baidu Further Ahead in China Search Market Share in Q4 2010

Without a legitimate contender to its throne, it isn’t surprising that Baidu is taking a tighter grip of its dominance in the Chinese search market landscape during the fourth quarter of 2010 — up from 73% to 75.5%.

From Associated Press:

Search engine Baidu further strengthened its dominance of the Chinese Internet market in the fourth quarter at the expense of US rival Google, a research firm said Wednesday.

Baidu’s share of the increasingly lucrative sector hit 75.5 percent in the last three months of the year, compared with 73 percent in the third quarter, Beijing-based Analysys International said in a statement.

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7 Tips for Business Bloggers

We often give advice to businesses that blogging is one of the ways to expand an otherwise static corporate website.

Blogging not only exposes business expertise and raise its reputation in the industry, it also expands opportunities to be found through search engines provides visitors more reason for visitors to return and cultivate relationship with customers and business partners.

By empowering staff members to write about their respective expertise improve their confidence, get press mentions and industry connections, while representing a human side of a corporate organization.

I have had a chance to write blog posts elsewhere — without losing my identity through ghost writing — and I learned valuable lessons in the process.

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