IMU is an educational program powered by HubSpot, a software company that helps marketers and small businesses grow their business online through inbound marketing. IMU is collaborating with colleges and MBA programs such as Harvard Business School, Northeastern University and UMass Dartmouth to offer college students tools and resources to become masters in inbound marketing.

Head of Google’s Webspam team Matt Cutts announced last Friday the launch of a new algorithm that is intended to better detect and fight spam in Google’s search results. Google’s main objectives are those sites that copies content then republish them on another websites.

Cutts said the change was approved last Thursday and released earlier this week. Cutts announced its intention to combat spam in his blog post last Friday.

Matt also wrote on his blog:

This was a pretty targeted launch: slightly over 2% of queries change in some way, but less than half a percent of search results change enough that someone might really notice. The net effect is that searchers are more likely to see the sites that wrote the original content rather than a site that scraped or copied the original site’s content.

The search giant Google will no longer support properties or real estate listings uploaded to its site on Google Maps and they are taking it off the market on February 10, 2011.

In part due to low usage, the proliferation of excellent property-search tools on real estate websites, and the infrastructure challenge posed by the impending retirement of the Google Base API (used by listing providers to submit listings), we’ve decided to discontinue the real estate feature within Google Maps on February 10, 2011.

Real estate is a huge category and too big to ignore or to realize its full potential online and they will be back soon. Or maybe we can expect an acquisition by Google of one of the large real estate portals in the future.

And the winning belly flop move and winners.

Congratulations to all the winners. Shiv was the winner of AED10,000 from Speedo and an annual Wild Wadi Water Park pass. He told Virign Radio that his birthday is coming up soon and he’s going to spend the money on a great party for him and his friends!

Flickr site was blocked by UAE authorities in 2005 a year after the site was launched.

About Flickr

Flickr was created by former game designers Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake in February of 2004. Flickr, which began as a photo-sharing feature of their gaming project, has since then blossomed into one of the premiere photo-sharing sites on the web. Yahoo purchased Flickr for $35 million in March of 2005. Since then Flickr continues to compete with other photo-sharing giant Photobucket.

On September 19,  the photo-sharing site Flickr announced on its blog that they are now hosting 5 billion photos.

User named “yeoaaron” was the one who uploaded the site’s 5 billionth photo . The image shows the Woodwards Collage in Vancouver, B.C.

Traffic Stats

Here’s what you need to know about Google Instant:

Google Instant is a feature that predicts what you’re searching for and shows results as you type.

Both the predicted queries and the search results change as you continue to typing in search box.

Now with Google Instant, you may notice an increase in impressions because your site will appear in search results as users type in a key.

Impressions are measured in three ways with Google Instant

1. Your site is displayed in search results as a response to a user’s completed query (e.g. by pressing “enter” or selecting a term from autocomplete). This is the traditional model.

2. The user begins to type a term on Google and clicks on a link on the page, such as a search result, ad, or a related search.

3. The user stops typing, and the results are displayed for a minimum of 3 seconds.

If you don’t want to see results as you type, you can turn Google Instant off by clicking the link next to the search box on any search results page.

If you havn’t noticed. Google have dropped the second search box at the bottom of the result page. This means that if you are at the bottom of search results, you’ll now have to scroll all the way up to modify your search query.

Google won’t show results for searches it deems pornographic, violent, hateful unless you actually hit enter or click the search button like if you search for the word “naked”.

Benefits of Google Instant

Faster Searches: By predicting your search and showing results before you finish typing, Google Instant can save 2-5 seconds per search.

Smarter Predictions: Even when you don’t know exactly what you’re looking for, predictions help guide your search. The top prediction is shown in grey text directly in the search box, so you can stop typing as soon as you see what you need.

Instant Results: Start typing and results appear right before your eyes. Until now, you had to type a full search term, hit return, and hope for the right results. Now results appear instantly as you type, helping you see where you’re headed, every step of the way.

What people are saying about Google Instant?

Matt Cutts’ answer to  “Will Google Instant change search engine optimization?”

I think over time it might. The search results will remain the same for a query, but it’s possible that people will learn to search differently over time.

Steve Rubel, SVP and Director of Insights for Edelman Digital, a division of Edelman – the world’s largest independent PR firm says that “Google Instant makes SEO irrelevant“.

No two people will see the same web. Once a single search would do the trick – and everyone saw the same results. That’s what made search engine optimization work. Now, with this, everyone is going to start tweaking their searches in real-time. The reason this is a game changer is feedback. When you get feedback, you change your behaviors.”

Stefan Spencer founder of Netconcepts says…

Google is in business to build shareholder value. That’s done by maximizing profits and operating cash, both short term and long term. It’s all fine and good for Google to say it [Instant] was done to provide searchers with a better user experience. (Google’s official position is that Instant can save 2 to 3 seconds per search, which I have trouble buying, incidentally.) But I believe financial incentives are at the heart of it.

The bottom line is that Google Instant drives growth in ad revenues. That’s because it displays more ads to more users (5 to 7 times the number of results are displayed now via Google Instant than before). And it motivates AdWords advertisers to compete more vigorously for the top predictions coming out of Google Suggest. These terms are already expensive, and now they’re more so, thanks to Google Instant.

Read more on SEO experts view of Google Instant.

Related articles

• How Will Google Instant Affect Search Marketing? (firstrate.co.nz)
• 10 Almost Instant Responses to Your Google Instant Questions (hubspot.com)
• Will Your SEO Efforts Change Due To Google Instant? (seroundtable.com)

Let’s say Dubaian is planning to put up a restaurant business and he wants it to be located inside a mall.

Then for him to get more people to eat at his restaurant, he needs to find out the top 10 most visited malls.

The simple reason why Dubaian needs to built his restaurant in the top 10 visited malls is simply because the more people going to that mall, the more chances many will try and eat at his restaurant. We all know that the above Dubai shopping malls like  Dubai Mall, Mall of the Emirates, Deira City Centre, Dubai Festival Centre are the busiest malls specially on weekends so these are a good location for Dubaian.

The same thing goes when you have a website. For you to be able to get more traffic, more leads and more sales, your website must appear on the 1st page or top 10 results of search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo. A website really needs to be on the first page of results to get any real chance of being seen for a variety of terms and one way of achieving that is by doing SEO.

Hope this example helps you understand why you need search engine optimization or SEO.

The event will showcase the latest technology and hottest internet business solutions in  Digital marketing and advertising , Web 2.0 and social networking, e-Commerce and payments, Content management and streaming and hosting and infrastructure.

There will be over 40 Free educational seminars that you can choose from which sad to say I can’t attend and listen to them all as there are 2 different locations – the Yahoo Maktoob Theatre and Internet Show Theatre. So just choose which topics interest you most.

Internet Show mentioned 8 reasons why YOU must to attend this event.

1. Over 40 FREE educational seminars
Held in themed theatres, you can customise your own programme to meet your needs. Leading industry experts will be sharing experience and expertise. Register online to access these free of charge.

2. The latest products and solutions
Technology is changing so quickly. Here you’ll be able to see first hand the best solutions available today.

3. The Internet Show is for all businesses
Small, medium and big business, anyone doing business online. For the experienced and for the wannabe’s.

4. Meet the leading players
The people that are shaping the internet in Middle East will be here. Shouldn’t you be?

5. Don’t get left behind
The internet changes so fast. What’s hip today will be gone tomorrow. Attending The Internet Show guarantees you’ll be up-to-date.

6. It’s the only business internet show in Middle East
This isn’t for techies. It’s for real business people. The people with the vision and strategy. (Techies also welcome!)

7. Network online and offline
Network face to face at The Internet Show, online with “Contact” our business networking tool and by joining our Twitter and LinkedIn discussions.

8. It’s only two days. And it’s free.
You’ll learn loads, solve problems and come away with real ideas that will transform your business. What a productive way to spend two days.

Here’s more. For every visitor, there will be a free Google Adwords voucher to be given away.

Visit www.internetshow.ae for more information and seminar session details and to enquire about exhibiting and sponsoring, email joseph.ridley@terrapinn.com.

Although this tag does not weigh heavily in search engine ranking algorithms, it remains a powerful element of an effective SEO campaign. As the title tag, Meta description tag will always appear in search results. In general what you see in the search engine ranking pages are the Title tags then the description tag followed by its specified link page. It becomes a very important element to help attract visitors to click the link on your site.

Those who take the time to look through search results, read the titles and descriptions to find sites that are most likely to give them the information they seek are more likely that to be a targeted visitors.

The general rule is that you want every description of your tags to be unique. The description must be maximum 150 characters summary of what visitors can expect to find on this page and this page only. Descriptions for each page must be unique from each other. Be sure to summarize the page in a unique way.

But is not always advisable to put description tag on every page. There are some cases where it would be a better not put description tag. If you are targeting long tail keywords, then do not put meta tags. Description tags would be best use when targeting broader keywords.

An explanation to this is that if you go after long tail phrases in your article or blog post, there is a lot of variations that can come up in a description of 150 characters. If there are no description tags created, search engines will imports from the page snippets based on search made if those long-tail words are on the content.

Public Relations

Effective public relations are a process and an important first step is research. Today, research is widely accepted by PR professionals/PR agencies and companies as part of the planning, program development, and evaluation. Before the PR program is implemented, information must be collected, data collection and interpretation to be made. After the first step is done, organizations can begin to make policy decisions and identify strategies for effective communication programs.

What To Look For In A PR Agency?

Public relations can give a real boost to your business, increase awareness and visibility of your business considerably. You should choose your public relations agency with care, bearing in micnd that they will represent your business and that the errors made could have a negative impact on your business.

First, you must define your PR objectives. Do you want public relations based on your company products or the entire company? How many press releases do you expect the agency to provide monthly?

Once you have selected the most promising candidates, arrange a meeting. You can choose to ask them to create a presentation that contains information about their company and what they think they could do to promote your business. If not, ask them to talk through some of the work they have done for other clients. Take a look at their press releases and ensure that they are concise and error free – if you can not understand what they wrote, then neither will a journalist.

How do you find the right PR agency for your business?

Assemble a team from your company to select the agency that going to work for your business. The ideal team should consist of a review team with members of staff as a brand manager and chief financial officer. Also includes a pair of internal clients to the team for best results.

Always keep in mind that your public relations agency has to work along with your company. The PR agency will be crucial in shaping public opinion about your company. It will develop strategies for everything from tactical execution for building partnerships for media relations. So, get to know a lot about the organization, their reputation and experience before accepting them.

List of Dubai Public Relations Companies

There are many PR consultancy firms in Dubai and the following are just few of them.

Asda’a Public Relations
Tel : +971 (4) 334 4550 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              +971 (4) 334 4550      end_of_the_skype_highlighting
Email : info@asdaa.com
Web site : www.asdaa.com

Concept PR
Tel : +971 (4) 390 3947
Email : info@cpr.ae
Web site : www.cpr.ae

Diva Modelling & Events
Tel : +971 (4) 332 2530
Email : nicole@divadubai.com
Web site : www.divadubai.com

Emirates Secretarial Svcs
Tel : +971 (4) 397 9623
Email : majed341@yahoo.com

Gulf Hill & Knowlton Co LLC
Tel : +971 (4) 334 4930
Web site : www.hillandknowlton.com

Gulf House Public Relations
Tel : +971 (4) 228 2277
dubai@gulfhouse-pr.com
Headline Public Relations
Tel : +971 (4) 228 9655
Email : sadri@headlinepr.com

Impact Porter Novelli
Tel : +971 (4) 330 4030
Web site : www.porternovelli.com

Matrix Consulting Group
Tel : +971 (4) 343 0888
Email : jack@matrixdubai.com
Web site : www.matrixdubai.com

Memac Ogilvy & Mather LLC
Tel : +971 (4) 332 0002
Email : info@memacogilvy.co.ae

Orient Planet
Tel : +971 (4) 398 8901
Web site : www.orientplanet.com

O2 Marketing Communications
Tel : +971 (4) 04 312 2701
Email : adv@o2mc.net
Web site : www.o2mc.net

O2Public Relations
Tel : +971 (4) 04 312 777
Email : pr@o2mc.net
Web site : www.o2pr.net

PressRelaseNetwork.com
Tel : +971 (4) 331 2627
Email : editor@pressreleasenetwork.com
Web site : www.pressreleasenetwork.com

Promax Middle East
Tel : +971 (4) 282 6411
Email : rani@pomax.ae
Web site : www.promaxme.com

People Co Management Svcs
Tel : +971 (4) 282 5646
Email : peopleco@emirates.net.ae

Raee Public Relations
Tel : +971 (4) 341 5558
Email : info@raeepr.com
Web site : www.raeepr.com

Rawaj International FZ LLC
Tel : +971 (4) 391 3560
Web site : www.rawajinternational.com

Promoservices
Tel : +971 (4) 268 1699
Email : promoserv53@hotmail.com

Solution A 2 Z LLC
Tel : +971 (4) 282 2877
Email : marketing@solutiona2z.com
Web site : www.solutiona2z.com

Sareem International
Tel : +971 (4) 343 3688
Email : info@sareem.net
Web site : www.sareem.net

Strategic Communications Group FZ LLC
Tel : +971 (4) 391 2313
Email : info@scgfzllc.org
Web site : www.scgfzllc.org

Spot on Public Relations
Tel : +971 (4) 349 1686
Email : info@spotonpr.com
Web site : www.spotonpr.com

The Content Factory
GSM : +971 (50) 874 0860
Tel : +971 (4) 447 2501
Fax : +971 (4) 447 2505
Email : noaf@tcf-me.com
Web site : www.tcf-me.com

Tigi PR – PR Agency Dubai
Tel : +971 050 8747309
Email : walid@tigipr.com
Web site : www.tigipr.com

Strategic Solutions
Tel : +971 (4) 391 5390
Email : admin@strategicsolutiosonline.com

Total Communications
Tel : +971 (4) 336 9909
Email : tony@totalcompr.ae
Web site : www.totalcompr.com

Article Sources:
www.ultimatearticledirectory.com/article30191-Introducing+Public+Relations.html
www.articleonlinedirectory.com/Art/430926/95/what-to-look-for-in-a-pr-agency.html
articledirectory.com/Art/117384/259/How-To-Get-The-Best-PR-Agency.html