Monthly Archive for August, 2009

Finding Followers Effectively on Twitter

If you have a Twitter account, you might have seen tweets regarding services that will allow you to gain followers quickly.  These tweets are pretty bizarre at first however; they are very tempting to click on.  Upon doing so, you are basically led to sites that will promise you tons of individuals that will visit your page.

As the old expression goes, “If you want something done right, do it yourself”.  If you are looking to build your list of followers, consider using TweepSearch.

TweepSearch allows individuals to find Twitter pages based on what is contained in the bio and profile description on the pages.  This tool is especially handy when searching for experts.

TweepSearch Index Page

TweepSearch Index Page
Please click on the image to enlarge

Case Example:

You are thinking about creating a network of Twitter pages from various economic development agencies from across North America.

Solution:

There are two solutions to the case example.  At first, you may think about visiting each economic development agency’s website however; it is not the most efficient method.  By using TweepSearch, you can enter the keyword, “economic development” and be provided with a list of Twitter pages.  On the result page, the following information is available so you can base your decision on whether or not to become a follower and in turn, have the individual follow your feeds:

  • Complete text of the individual’s / organization’s profile.  Keywords are highlighted in red
  • The individual’s / organization’s screen name and proper name
  • The geographical location from where the tweets are being sent
  • The number of followers of the Twitter page
  • The number of friends of the Twitter page
  • The number of updates of the Twitter page

TweepSearch Results Page for “economic development”
Please click on the image to enlarge

To begin using TweepSearch, visit http://tweepsearch.com/

Ping.fm – Manage Your Presence On Social Networks In Five Easy Steps

Today, many of us have multiple accounts on online social networks (ie, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter) and are wondering how to save time when posting the same message on various social networks without having to log in multiple times.

Thanks to Ping.fm, you can centrally manage your accounts on different social networks.

Here is a quick tutorial that will allow you to manage your presence on social networks in five easy steps.

Step 1: Sign up on Ping.fm by entering your e-mail address and a password. You can configure your profile in the future.

Ping.Fm Index Page

Ping.fm Index Page

Step 2: Add your social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to the account. New with Ping.fm, you can add your Facebook Fan pages.

Adding social networks to Ping.fm

Adding Networks

Listing of Possible Online Social Networks

Step 3: Create and name your group, choose the method of post selected social networks associated with each of your group. You can change them if you are not satisfied.

Creating Your Group


Selecting and Posting To Your Group

Selecting Which Group To Post

Setting Up A Posting Shortcuts

Step 4: Instead of returning to the ping.fm site each time you wish to post a message,, you can install the toolbar and send messages by clicking on “Post Message” or use “Ping this!” button to post a link you are visiting.

Using The Ping.fm Toolbar

Step 5: Click on the “Feedback” button if you have any questions.

You can now enjoy the benefits of Ping.fm.

Intelegia is using Ping.fm to manage content on the following platforms.

The Many Faces Of Google For Economic Intelligence: Part 6 - Google Video

In the sixth and last part of the series, “The Many Faces Of Google For Economic Intelligence“, let us take a look at Google Video for relevant information for economic development.

You may wonder what kind of information could be found with Google Video that would benefit individuals such as economic development officers or potential investors?  The answer is pretty simple if you stop and think about it.  With the introduction of video sharing platforms such as YouTube, individuals and organizations are making interesting content available courtesy of videos.  Finding content dealing with different economic development initiatives from different organizations in video format is amazing.

Google Video is a video sharing and searching platform.  In October 2006, Google bought YouTube to make its content available via Google Video.

Google Video

Please click on the image to enlarge.

Case Study:

As a consultant, you are asked by an economic development officer of a remote region to provide an example of mining services hub or network.

Solution:

Going to Google Video and entering the keywords, “mining services network” will allow you to access the following video clip: regarding the Desert Knowledge Australia Mining Services Network.

Did you miss a post from The Many Faces Of Google For Economic Intelligence series?  Please find below the links to the previous five posts:

The Many Faces Of Google For Economic Intelligence: Part 5 - Google News

In this fifth installment of the series of “The Many Faces Of Google For Economic Intelligence“,  we will take a look at Google News.  Knowing this application beyond entering a couple of keywords will help you in your next economic intelligence or competitive intelligence research tasks.

Without a doubt, news articles are the best sources for intelligence on various subjects, especially if they are written by industry experts and reputable journalists.

Google News provides you with access to over 4,500 sources in the english language.  In addition, news articles can be supplied in 18 languages (July 2009).  To go beyond the routine Google News search, one has to look to the Google News Advanced Search and the Archive Search for content that is older than 30 days.  Both interfaces are presented below.

Google News Advanced Search

Google News - Advanced Search
Please click on the image to enlarge.

Google News Archive Search

Google News - Archive Search
Please click on the image to enlarge.

Case Study

You are called upon to identify if Walmart has made capital investments in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan in the past 30 days and in the year, 2007.

Solution

Using the Google News - Advanced Search option right off the bat, you are called upon to pluggin the keyword(s) - Saskatchewan, capital investment, investment - in the form:”with all of the words” field and enter the country, Canada, in the “Source Location” field.  One result from such a query is: Saskatchewan to be home of two Walmart ’supercentres’ (Source: Leader-Post, July 21st, 2009)

Turning to Google News - Archive Search option and using the same keywords and the year, 2007,  you will discover that Walmart invested in two stores as stated in the article, “Wal-Mart more than a store for Kindersley” (Source: Canada.com, February 17th, 2007)

Please Note:If you select to use the Archive Search option, keep in mind that not all articles are free to access.  You may encounter links that will bring you to a page that will ask you for payment to view the content.

The Many Faces Of Google For Economic Intelligence: Part 4 - Google Groups Search

In the first couple of posts in the series, The Many Faces Of Google For Economic Intelligence, we examined how relevant applications such as Google Alerts, Google Finance and Google Blog Search are to economic intelligence for economic development projects.

This post will elaborate on the benefits of using Google Groups Search for information gathering online.

Google Groups are platforms in which individuals may have discussions on various topics.  As of July 2009,  Google Groups has searchable archives of more than 700 million Usenet postings from a period of more than 20 years.

Intelegia - Tools For Thought - Google Groups

Please click on the image to enlarge.

Case Study:

You are interested in thoughts of individuals and related information regarding the past levels of foreign direct investment in India.

Solution:

By simple inputting the keywords such as “foreign direct investment” and “India”, you can access discussion posts such as past newspaper articles and analysis reports.