LinkedIn users who are interested in what their professional contacts are thinking on a minute-to-minute basis should now find it much easier to track down their tweets.  Late yesterday, LinkedIn upgraded its Tweets application by improving the app’s people-finding features.

That’s right – no more having to go to Twitter and perform a search every time you forge a connection on LinkedIn.  Or worse yet, having to go to Twitter, perform a search, and sort through 2,031 Jim Smiths, comparing thumbnail pics and bios.

Now, as a post on the LinkedIn Blog explained, “A new module, ‘Connections to Follow’, has been added to recommend new people for you to follow, based on your LinkedIn connections.”

What’s more, “A new tab has been added to Tweets called ‘Connections’.  On this screen, you can see all of your LinkedIn connections who have added Twitter accounts to their LinkedIn profiles.  Simple navigation is provided to make it easy to see who you are and aren’t following on Twitter.”

And finally, if you use other Twitter clients, LinkedIn can make a private Twitter list of all your connections to simplify the syncing process.

This improved ease of use may go a long way towards making LinkedIn’s Tweets application more popular, and thereby help drum up a little more interest in both LinkedIn and Twitter.

Google TV expands video choice from the hundreds of channels available via a pay TV provider to a storehouse of video content available through the web and streaming video. Users will be able to watch streaming video from Netflix, Amazon Video On Demand, and YouTube.

Google TV features integrated search to allow users to find relevant content across over-the-air and pay-TV channel listings, DVR, and the Internet, as well as a picture-in-picture layout to access multiple windows simultaneously.

Google has introduced Android 2.2 (codenamed Froyo short for frozen yogurt). New Android 2.2 features include portable hotspot functionality, support for Adobe Flash within the Android Browser and a preview of an upcoming web-based version of Android Market.

“The growth of the Android ecosystem continues to exceed our expectations,” said Andy Rubin, VP, Engineering.

“Every day, 100,000 new people start using Android-based handsets. There are now more than 180,000 active Android developers who have contributed over 50,000 apps to the Android Market. Froyo is another step toward making Android an even better platform for developers, enterprises and consumers.”

Email marketing is one of the most effective and inexpensive ways to find and keep new customers.  Email Marketing is the process of sending e-mails to acquire new customers and convince existing customers to make additional purchases.  It is also used to enhance the relationship of a business with its customers and prospects and encourage customer loyalty and repeat business.

By building a mailing list, a business can create an extremely valuable asset.

The advantages of email:

• Email lets you send information to a wide range of existing and potential customers at a much lower cost than direct mail or printed newsletters.
• E-mail marketing allows you to track your return on investment exactly and is often reported as second only to search marketing as the most effective online marketing tactic.
• The delivery time for an e-mail message is short (i.e., seconds or minutes) as compared to a mailed advertisement (i.e., one or more days).
• E-mail marketing is paper-free (i.e., “green)
• Once you have a large list, you can “rent” your list to 3^rd party marketing firms that will mail other offers to people on your list – this can be a significant additional source of revenue for your business.

How to build your email list:

Include an email sign-up box on your web site.  Giving away a free report or “how-to” white  course is a great incentive for people to subscribe to your list.

You can also collect the email addresses of people that drop-off of your cart page after entering their email address. You can then send them a follow up email offering a discount to complete the sale.

Once a person submits their e-mail address to you they become an opt-in subscriber. Don’t just send emails that attempt to sell things but rather offer them information, free reports, and tidbits of news and advice. That way they will be more likely to purchase it as something you recommend to them, not just as something you are selling.

Key points to remember about email:

The sending of unsolicited email is forbidden by law and can involve severe penalties for violators. It is governed by the federal Can Spam Law.

You should only send email to a person when they have “opted-in” to receive it. When you collect a person’s email address, be sure that you explain how you intend to use their email.  Include a privacy policy on your web site and place a link to it next to your email collection box.

Due to the large amount of spam email, it is getting harder to get legitimate commercial email delivered into people’s inbox.  Specialty software and service firms have emerged to help business manage their email programs and ensure that their emails are not blocked as spam.

Although it takes time and effort to maintain and grow, a mailing list can end up being the most powerful tool in your internet marketing arsenal.

Whether it’s for your business or your blog, webhosting is a critical requirement of any website. Web hosting is the service that stores the files and content that make up your web site so that are accessible from any computer around the world. A good web hosting service will make sure you website is secure from hackers and works quickly and reliably for your visitors.

There are two kinds of hosting, dedicated server hosting, where an entire computer is used for the files and content of a single web site, and shared server hosting that allows multiple website owners to share a server for storage. Generally shared hosting is much less expensive and usually suitable for small businesses and blog sites.  For small personal websites free hosting is also an option. This is generally advertising supported, but will not be suitable for any type of commercial website.

Finding the right setup for you can be tricky. Here are some tips to help you find your way to the right web hosting situation for your needs:

1. Reliability: It is important to choose a host that provides reliable services. Nearly all web hosting companies will advertise 99% uptime for your site, so that can’t be your main indicator of reliability. Do a little research and find a reputable review site and look into the hosting companies ratings.
2. Features: The main factor in deciding which service to use should be the tools and features provided by the web host. If you need to host a forum or blogging software or ecommerce cart, find an offer that provides exactly what you need. Many sites will offer unlimited bandwidth and unlimited storage, but this isn’t as good a deal as you might think. Most of the limits on bandwidth and storage are more than enough for all but the largest of websites.
3. Customer Support: Again, a good place to go for customer service ratings is a review site, but this is one area that it is best to investigate yourself. Customer service is as important as anything in choosing a web host, so make sure your hosting service offers 24/7 phone support.
4. Know your future needs. It is a good idea to have a good understanding of what features and services you will need in the future so that you can get the best deal on the services you will need. It can be a hassle to switch hosting services once you are set up.

Web hosting is an extremely competitive business and hosts are constantly trying to sweeten their deals to bring in more users. Use this to your advantage! Shopping around and getting the best deal for you will give you the best experience possible and make sure your website runs smoothly.

One major driving wheel for the politicians towards this direction was the Obama campaign and after its grand success many politicians have been trying to make their online presence felt and sustained. India too is in the league of nations that are rapidly adopting the Twitter phenomenon and the Indian politicians are no way behind.

Ever since Mr. Shashi Tharoor, Minister of state external affairs made headlines with his controversial tweet, Twitter won great attention amongst the political class. Slowly realizing the potential of the microblogging site, politicians found just the perfect opportunity to pounce on and Twitter became a major media to express their opinions. Its quite worthy to note how Indian politics has adopted the web and a number of leaders and MPs now have Twitter profiles which are often updated regularly for the followers. So lets have a look at some of the eminent political leaders of India and their Twitter profiles. (All the profiles have not been verified by the Twitter guys but looking at their tweets and the follower lists I just hope I landed on the true profiles.)

1.)    @ShashiTharoor: Shashi Tharoor, a respected politician from Indian National Congress and currently serving as the Minister of State for External Affairs. He currently has 645, 715 followers that are counting each day.

2.)    @narendramodi : Narendra Modi – Chief Minister of Gujarat has 11,152 followers. Modi is one of the most tech-savvy politicians of India and you will always see his personal assistants carrying his laptop and palmtop at all times. He spends major hours browsing the internet on either the laptops or his high end mobile phones.

3.)     @ksudhakaranMP: K Sudhakaran ex-minister Kerala, now a congress MP from Kannur has 6926 followers on Twitter. The politician has a mass political base and is open to the use of latest technologies. When Dubai crisis was ominous, he fervently used Twitter to comfort the Indians saying that the country could not be affected by the crisis and cited the thoughts of NRIs and other business men.

4.)    @SMKrishnaCong: SM Krishna, currently serving as the Minister for External Affairs. He has 7973 followers on Twitter.

5.)    @rajeev_mp : Rajeev Chandrasekhar is an Independent Member of Parliament in the upper house of Rajya Sabha. He represents Karnataka state and Bangalore Urban district. He is very active on the internet, with his website, and of course, tweets  and currently has 1435 followers on the microblogging site.

6.)    @mallikasarabhai :  Dr Mallika Sarabhai, independent candidate for Lok Sabha Elections 2009 from Gandhinagar. Gujarat-based activist, development worker, social entrepreneur and perf ormer , Mallika Sarabhai is multitalented lady, well recognized for her works in the country as well abroad. Since she has used every medium—dance, theatre, television, film, writing and publishing for her work, Twitter was another medium added to the list. She currently has 893 followers.

7.)    @CaptainGopinath – Karnataka’s Independent Candidate Captain Gopinath’s Twitter profile has an obvious green kite (his symbol) used as the background. But after he lost the in the recent elections, his tweeting frequency is just coming to a little halt. He has 400 followers at present.(no active tweets)

8.)    @meerasanyal: Mumbai’s Independent Candidate Meera Sanyal.  She is a professional banker for the past 25 years and is currently the Chairperson and Country Executive for ABN AMRO Bank. She has 383 followers on Twitter.

9.)    @krishnabgowda: Karnataka Politician Krishna Byre Gowda is one of the promising upcoming politicians from Karnataka. He is currently the Youth Congress President for Karnataka, and serving his third term in the State Legislature. He has 359 followers on Twitter.

10.) @kalmadisuresh: Suresh Kalmadi is also a politician and businessman from India. He has 123 Twitter followers.

11.) @rajeevgowda : Karnataka Politician Rajeev Gowda’s Twitter Page. He is Professor at the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore and now a member of the Congress Party. He currently has 91 followers.

12.) @bjp_: Bhartiya Janata Party Twitter page has1075 followers and gives you the latest press releases, new campaigns and the news surrounding the political party.

I really miss Rahul Gandhi, Mr. Advani, Sonia Gandhi and few others here. But these politicians are not away from the social media world as some of them do have their Facebook profiles while the others have official websites where they interact with the public. From making the news viral, giving more transparency in the conduct of politicians, closer account with the pulse of the people and bringing the different facets of the life of the political leaders, Twitter has created a new wave in the Indian politics. Its really interesting to watch the politics and the technology work together for the common man.

I still can’t think of a proper title for this post, but I guess may be it’s relevant to the topic. Do you know which users got the maximum or highest number of followers? How many twitter followers you have? Hundred or may be something in Thousand figure? Thats quite less. OK, let me ask you again, how many maximum followers can you think of? What do you think would be the maximum number of followers someone has on his twitter? The answer is 1,804,029.

Yes! Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk) has 1,804,029 followers. 1.8million followers on twitter is a huge amount. And he is only following 149 people. Now coming to the second position, we have Ellen DeGeneres (@TheEllenShow) with 1,536,208 (1.5million followers) . He is also having a website just like Ashton which gives up gossips, news and photos about celebrities. On the thirst position, its NEWS. CNN Breaking News (@cnnbrk) with 1,507,430 followers just jumped from 4th position to the 3rd one and left Queen of Pop Miss Britney Spears (@britneyspears) left behind having 1,493,124 followers (1.4million followers).

Here is the list of top 10 users with most / highest number of  followers on twitter.

1. Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk) –  1,804,029 followers.
2. Ellen DeGeneres (@TheEllenShow) - 1,536,208 followers.
3. CNN Breaking News (@cnnbrk) –  1,507,430 followers
4. Britney Spears (@britneyspears) –  1,493,124 followers.
5. Barack Obama (@BarackObama) –  1,193,125 followers.
6. Twitter (@twitter) –  1,157,167 followers.
7. John C. Mayer (@johncmayer) –  1,085,273 followers.
8. Oprah Winfrey (@Oprah) –  1,068,119 followers.
9. Ryan Seacrest (@RyanSeacrest) –  1,018,948 followers.
10. Jimmy Fallon (@jimmyfallon) –  1,011,893 followers.

From the list above, I have only figured out one thing. If you are a celebrity page 6 blogger with gossips, photos and videos on your website, you will be the most followed one. On the second place they are celebrities them self. All of the top 10 in the list are either celebrities or do have some connection with celebrities (except the CNN Breaking News and Twitter itself). So, I guess the Celebrity niche is the best one so far if you need success.

Benefits of outsourcing Near shore:
The near shore outsourcing has lot of benefits compared to the offshore outsourcing. The Outsourcing solutions provided by the near countries to their clients will not have much difference in their time zones and thus they can provide business process outsourcing services in the same time zone as their customers do. It helps to avoid problems evolve due to language, culture, legal affairs, infrastructure and technology. They desire to go for near shoring as the cost effective structures are available nearby than depending on offshore countries for their works done.

Limitations of Outsourcing:
In addition to the benefits, there are few limitations to near shore outsourcing, it’s not always the situation where the near shore outsourcing is profitable, when the economical conditions of the neighboring countries are same. For ex: American’s providing projects to Canada pay the same as they do for American workers which wont help them to save money instead add expenses for travel, legal affairs, etc. but the only gain is to open up trade between two countries. Again it leads to fewer job opportunities for American workers and thus complains & criticizes their own Government. Further, it is difficult to maintain security and confidentiality in business transactions as it is offered to outside service provider.

Still, the organizations desire to near shore outsourcing as these limitations are concealed by the huge advantages and therefore many countries have preference to near shore Outsourcing and few examples are mentioned below.

Japan prefers China for near shoring for their projects.

Mexico and Canada provides near shoring solutions and services to American clients.

India provides business process outsourcing solutions and customer services to their neighboring countries like Singapore, Malaysia and Middle East countries.

UK collides with its neighbor country partner Ireland for its outsourcing operations.

Thus, it becomes less expensive, easier to travel and communicate for the clients as well, the near shore outsourcing partners can develop their economical value, increase their standard of life, and employment opportunities will immigrate. Near shore outsourcing creates best cooperation and interaction with their partner countries for the Business projects and services to provide with quality.

Today, Information Technology is expected to meet with regular changes in IT and performance needs of economy. To meet the challenges, organizations are finding outsourcing a better option. IT Outsourcing comes when an organization gives the task to a service provider to perform an IT function for them. The service provider is a third party or other part of entity.

Many types of IT Services can be outsourced. The management can outsource for several reasons, may be operational, technological, financial etc. Operational conditions can be like, to improve service quality, develop and maintain robust systems, reduce the efforts for real business. The technological benefits may include, achieving IT efficiencies, access to people processes and technology, being up to date with changing technology, improving the quality of IT services. The financial reasons may include, bringing IT costs in control, minimizing the risk of investing in the wrong technology.

Outsourcing has many advantages

o It allows companies to hire best experts for the required work.
o Organizations can put much cash on hand, freeing resources to other tasks.
o Cheaper in terms of salaries, benefits and reduces risks and costs.
o Organizations can focus on its core components.

IT Outsourcing also have some pitfalls

Operational Problems includes failure of systems, unauthorized access to data, further; it is possible that organization is unable to identify the problem. Sometimes IT professionals are sent to the service provider, this results in lack of knowledgeable staff.

Service Problems may be the difference between the services of service provider and what the services organization wants. That may be due to following reasons, the organizations standard and the service provider standards may not be the same, or service provider may not fully appreciate organizations priorities.

Cost Problems may occur if outsourcing is not well planned related to management. Lack of planning is the biggest problem of outsourcing. In addition, services, processing and technologies change over outsourcing. Sometimes due to unexpected situations if an organization, terminate an outsourcing contract it includes high costs.

An outsourcing decision can have a long-lasting influence on the reputation and performance of the company. The organization’s business objectives and how to meet them are accomplished through use of Information Technologies. They examine an outsourcing option benefits and risks, the importance of the IT activity to the company as whole, the impact of the outsourcing arrangement on the organization’s reputation.

The organization must not only identify its requirements, it must define its obvious performance criteria. The organization must evaluate the credentials of service provider. Finally is the decision whether to continue with the outsourcing arrangement or not.

It is very important that service provider understands the needs of the organization’s business processes and systems. The organization must ensure that service provider do this. The organization must develop the thorough understanding of the providers financial and operating conditions, for examining the service provider’s operational and financial ability to fulfill the organization’s needs and objective’s.

Concluding the topic, IT outsourcing should be the integral part of a company’s overall business strategy.

Payroll outsourcing services for SME’s can free up a small company to allow them to concentrate on the things they do best. Wages and salaries have become such an increasingly complicated part of running a business that it can often be plain common sense for a small company to outsource.

There was a time when a wage was a wage. Now, apart from basic PAYE, there’s sick pay, pension payments, holiday payments, and a whole lot more to consider. It takes more than a few minutes spent with a calculator to work out properly. Furthermore, if an employer makes a mistake they could find themselves in a whole lot of trouble. In light of this, payroll outsourcing makes a lot of sense.

It may seem that doing the payroll in-house will cut costs. This is so financially, but there is still a rather hefty cost of time. The government change their rules of tax and pay so often that it takes a lot of time keeping up with it all. Payroll outsourcing gives back all that time and it needn’t be an expensive option either.

The decision to outsource is usually triggered by time constraints. The person doing the wages and salaries in-house is often the same person who does all the other administration as well. They don’t have the necessary time to keep up with new developments with the result that often costly mistakes can be made.

Using payroll outsourcing also makes sense when only one person in the company knows how to process the payroll. If that person falls ill, or goes on holiday, or even if they suddenly decide to leave the company, then a problem arises with the question of who will take over.

Outsourcing removes that problem. Your chosen partner employ staff who do nothing else but process the wages and salaries for your company. The staff are kept strictly up to date with all the latest developments involving tax and pay. In short, payroll outsourcing services are experts in their field.

Before deciding on a suitable payroll outsourcing service it’s always best to shop around. You may prefer to use the services of a local outsourcing service, though it isn’t essential.

However, a few considerations are worth keeping in mind. Choose someone experienced and someone familiar with your industry sector. This is not essential, but could prove to be a plus point. They should also offer as much flexibility as possible, making your company’s life as easy as possible.

The best payroll outsourcing services will always be on hand to offer the kind of help your company needs should the unexpected arise and they will use a software package that is compatible with your needs. In order to ensure you get what you need, be sure to sign a contract with your payroll outsourcing services provider.

. Private Equity firms have invested US$ 1.03 billion in around 54 deals during April-June 2009, an increase of 17 percent as compared to the previous quarter last year.

Spotlight: Healthcare

Private Equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) investors are keen on cashing in on the growth of the healthcare and life sciences sectors in India. A survey of over 60 PE and VC firms carried by research firm Venture Intelligence has announced that companies have invested more than US$2 billion in the Indian healthcare and life sciences sector in the last five years.

. Diagnostic services, medical devices/equipment, hospital chains and wellness products and services are some of the key areas the investors seem to be quite interested in.

Spotlight: Education

An excellent example of private equity player’s role in the Indian education sector is that of Matrix Partners India. The investors consider two fundamental things before investing: considerable government support and increasing privatization of the education sector, according to Private Equity Group, an advisory firm for PE investment in India.

As per a Chennai based deal tracer, Venture Intelligence, nearly 30 such investments worth around US$ 300 million was invested in education-related companies since 2005.

Spotlight: Beverages

Ahmet C Bozer, President (Eurasia and Africa), who’s spearheading the Coca-Cola operations in over 90 countries, seems pretty optimist about India’s growth potential and considers India as one of the fastest growing markets for Coca-Cola.

According Bozer, India’s Beverage industry will outgrow the world average. In the years to come, the opportunities will be huge and growth will be in double digits. Coca Cola India is also working in the same direction by partnering different bottling partners; few of them are local Indian companies. Investments are also happening, in the areas of Technology, Infrastructure, consumer marketing and manufacturing capacity. The company is working in coordination with its bottling partners to harness the growth potential of this country.

Sebi sets Rs 5-cr start up cap on foreign VCIs

Securities & Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has made it mandatory for foreign venture capital investors (FVCIs) to obtain a commitment from investors for a contribution of at least Rs. 5 crore, before the start of operations.

Michelin’s US$ 2.26 billion FDI proposal gets FIPB Clearance

French tyre major Michelin’s foreign direct investment (FDI) proposal worth US$ 2.26 billion to establish a manufacturing facility in Tamil Nadu has been cleared by the government.

India a preferred destination for foreign investors: Moody’s

According to Economy.com, the research arm of global rating agency, Moody’s, India and China are emerging as promising destinations for foreign investors.

PE investments achieve US$ 1.03 billion during April-June 2009

The private equity (PE) investments in the country reached US$ 1.03 billion, an increase of 17 percent, according to the data compiled by SMC Capitals, an equity research and analysis firm.

Services sector attracting most FDI over last 3 yrs

According to the Minster of State for Commerce and Industry, Mr. Jyotiraditya Scindia in the Lok Sabha, the service sector of India is attracting the highest foreign direct investment (FDI) worth US$ 17.45 billion in the period between April 2006-March 2009.

NRI deposits in banks increased to $1.16 b in April-May

Non-Resident Indians deposited nearly US$1.17 billion as deposits with the banks in the first two months of the current financial year vis-à-vis US$ 452 million in the corresponding period last year.

Areva planning major investments in India

Areva, the French nuclear reactor maker, is expanding its business plans for India with massive investments in its strategic joint ventures like Bharat Forge, Tata Group, Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL) and Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL).

3M to enhance its R&D capabilities in India

3M India, a subsidiary of the US$ 25.3 billion diversified technology

focused 3M Corporation, is expanding the company’s R&D capabilities in India.