What an audacious title! Is this an April Fools’ joke. The journalist reported that the newly launched map site, OneMap is “Singapore’s own version of Google Maps”.

First Impression of OneMap Singapore

The map is very high resolution and detailed. It is better than www.map.gov.sg which is now redirecting to www.onemap.sg.

In terms of resolution and information details, Google Maps really “got-no-fight”. Really impressed with what the Singapore government can do. I think I will start using OneMap to find accurate location of places and bus stop information but I am not about to abandon Google Maps yet. Google Maps still load up so much faster. And I am so used to using Google Maps – be it on the PC or iPhone.

OneMap Singapore may have very detailed information but not the latest. I could not find Parco Marina Bay at the time of writing.

OneMap SLA is Slower

With OneMap Singapore, there is still a lot more getting used to and if people don’t use it often then they won’t use it at all. I really think beside the detailed information on OneMap, SLA should also have to make it work faster. Imagine the agonizing snail pace if I were to access OneMap SLA with a cheap netbook connected to the free Wireless@SG.

Has the government invested in a technology that requires the general public to use fast computers and high-speed broadband? Hopefully, the slow loading webpage will not turn it into a white elephant.

Also, there is another “small” problem and I think it’s the common canonical URL issue. If you type in just http://onemap.sg you will get an error in Internet Explorer. I got similar error when I used Safari and Chrome too.

I think many people will just enter “onemap.sg” in the browser address bar. Otherwise, they will be using the search box to type in one map or onemap singapore or even onemap.com which will not yield any result related to the SLA’s site.

So do you think we can “Forget Google” and use OneMap Singapore instead?

Anyway, inSing.com was not intended to be a search engine, unlike Rednano which original intention was to “supplant the big names of Google and Yahoo as the prime tool for sourcing local information”.

What Are People Searching at inSing.com

My guess is people are using inSing.com to search for lifestyle related topics e.g. food, restaurant and shopping. You can take a look at Alexa Site Info on inSing.com to find out what keywords bring traffic to inSing.com.

For my blog to get a referral from inSing.com, I postulated that inSing.com had to have lots of people visiting its voluminous pages in order to capture even 1 visitor trying to search for reebonz at inSing.com.

The point is… some people are using inSing.com as a search engine!

Because my blog ranked among the top few listings in Google, it is also being displayed in inSing.com search and in turn brings visitors to my site.

The second point is that a properly SEO‘ed web page gets traffic not only from Google search but also from portals like inSing.com which implemented enhanced by Google search results.

Why inSing.com Criticism?

From Alexa’s Site Info, you will see that one of the top 20 search terms to inSing.com was insing.com criticism!

It really puzzled me that people are searching for “insing.com criticism”.

Does anyone really cares if there were negative comments on inSing.com or is it that someone trying to monitor inSing.com online reputation?

So what’s your take on inSing.com search? Please leave your comment below.

The Yahoo Search Marketing affiliate program is managed by CJ.com. And this Yahoo affiliate program actually earns me affiliate checks. Not a lot of money but still good pocket money.

Thank you for reading my blog and visiting those sponsored links.

I didn’t expect many people would be interested to use Yahoo Search Marketing in Southeast Asia. It was as popular as 3 years ago when Yahoo search had more than 50% market share. Still, Yahoo is the number 2 and there is still a lot of traffic going to Yahoo search.

Now I think it is time to consider and use Yahoo search marketing because:

1. it is pay-per-click, you pay only when people visit your page
2. there is lesser competitors compared with Google AdWords
3. people who use Yahoo are less tech savvy (actually less geeky)
4. your cost per customer is likely to be lower than AdWords or Facebook

So if you need an alternative to Google AdWords, go try out Yahoo Search Marketing. Click at the banner below and register today.

If you are not convinced that SEO can influence Google’s ranking and your online reputation, go read this article to find out how “SEO experts can bend the truth”

You may need the help of these SEO experts to help you manage your digital reputation and to control the damage caused by some uninitiated advertising agent.

SEO for CEO

If you are the boss of the company (and I mean a really big company) or a government agency, are you not concerned about what is listed on the first page of Google search result for search terms related to your company name or product?

Here’s three of the examples which I’ve witnessed firsthand over the past year in Singapore… Samsung’s Omnia Contest, A*Star’s Star Challenge 2008 and NTU AdWords Fiasco.

Case 1: Samsung Omnia Contest

Can you imagine how you feel when you searched “samsung omnia contest” and see “Samsung Omnia Contest – Scam?” in the #1 position!

How will that #1 position affect potential customers of Samsung mobile phones?

It would be good if potential customers can hear from the contest organizer or Samsung regarding that “scam” blog post.

Whose responsibility? Samsung Singapore’s or the advertising agency’s?

Case 2: Star Challenge 2008

When you searched for “star challenge 2008″ on Google, you would see my earlier blog post on “Star Challenge 2008 Website Broken?” in the #4 position. I didn’t know it would end up there, oops… I just wanted to help.

This accidental first page ranking of my blog post makes me realize the importance to manage what people see in the first page of Google result for those keywords related to one’s reputation or brand.

Case 3: NTU AdWords Campaign Fiasco

Here’s another example of online advertising campaign went wrong:

Google SMU get NTU

And one of the comments was “Whoever did this for NTU should be sacked.”

Digital Reputation Management for Brick and Mortar Business

Even if your business do not have any online marketing campaign or advertise aggressively online, you still have to manage your online reputation.

Because you cannot control what people write in their blogs.

You may not even know you lost at least $3000 worth of business because someone talked about her excruciating encounter at her blog.

Don’t wait for negative publicity to surface on the Internet before you take action.

Because that can be too late and costly.

You have to set aside your company’s resource now for digital reputation management to prevent publicity catastrophe.

[Buy the Book]

SEO for the Rest of Us

[Updated 16 December 2008] Just came across this newly published blog article by Tony Hirst and realized that, in fact, even librarians need to understanding how search ranking works or risk innocent content being “associated with inappropriate material in a search engine results listing” unintentionally.

I have been using WordPress for about 2 years now. All this time, I left it to WordPress default settings to get my latest blog post updated with the major blog directories and blog search engines.

However, I didn’t realize that every time I save a published blog post, a ping is sent to http://rpc.pingomatic.com/ and this may cause ping spam or sping. So I installed the Ultimate Plugins Smart Update Pinger to ensure that it will only ping once when I published my post and will not ping again when I edit and save the post.

So far, I found http://rpc.pingomatic.com/ very effective. In additional, I added http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2 to make sure that Google pinger server is updated with my latest post.

Here’s the step-by-step guide to verify that you have http://rpc.pingomatic.com/ in place and also add http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2

WordPress 2.5 and above

1. At the Dashboard, click settings then select Writing
2. Scroll down to find the section Update Services, you should see http://rpc.pingomatic.com/ in the box
3. Add http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2 to the line below http://rpc.pingomatic.com/
4. Click Save Changes

Caution: Don’t use blogflux ping server, it is not working.

Visit my new hub now: http://hubpages.com/hub/Vivo-City-Singapore

Top Ranking in Google.com and Google.etc

Today, I discover that my Hubpages.com article: Vivo City Singapore is finally indexed by Google and ranked #16 for the search terms – vivo city and #9 for the search terms – vivo city singapore in Google.com.

Yes, it’s Google.com and not just Google.com.sg because I am targeting people living outside Singapore. I want it also to rank well in Google.com.au, Google.co.uk and Google.etc…

As for search.yahoo.com, the page is now ranked #5 for search terms – vivo city singapore.

The traffic to the page is definitely increasing.

How Do I Know?

You can find out all the vital traffic stats within your Hubpages.com
account. And it looks like this:

and the chart…

Creating Web articles with Hubpages.com is Easy

For the first time user, you will find the interface intuitive and can easily follow the step-by-step instructions.

Now, there are at least 3 revenue generating sources for your hub articles:

1. Google AdSense

2. eBay affiliate

3. Amazon affiliate

Hubpages.com make it easy for you to sign up with these affiliate networks and monetize the traffic when your visitors click at the
Google Ads or purchase some stuff at eBay and Amazon through the links in your hub.

You will need lots of traffic in order to make some money with these ads.

For beginners, you may want to try on various topics on niches that you are familiar with. Travel, shopping and food related topics warrant high traffic volume and are evergreen. You want your pages to make you money forever, don’t you?

If you are a fan of F1 racing, this is probably the best time write about what you know on Singapore F1.

Why Use Hubpages.com?

1. It’s free.

2. No need domain registration

3. No need Web hosting

4. Readily available traffic source – a high traffic social network

5. Better visibility in major search engines

You just need a computer with Internet connection and some good ideas for your story.

I was in a hurry when I wrote my first hub, Vivo City Singapore and I used about 90 words plus 2 pictures I found at Flickr and a video from Youtube. It took me less than 30 minutes and I actually enjoyed creating that page – it was quite fun doing it.

So, go create your first hub today at http://hubpages.com

More Hot Hubs

You can read more of my hot hubs at http://hubpages.com/author/hcshi/hot

Visit the URL above and join my fan club or request a hub from me.

Singapore Directory listing of SBS Transit is currently the Number 1.

Search Engine Result Listing: Google vs Yahoo

However, the same Singapore Directory listing was nowhere to be found in Yahoo search results. You can see that the algorithms used by Google and Yahoo are quite different.

Yahoo “correctly” ranked www.sbstransit.com.sg as No. 1. In this case, it seems that Yahoo search listing is more superior than Google’s.

The best judges are the users – you.

What are you looking for when you enter “singapore bus directory” into the query box?

Which set of results, Google top 10 listing or Yahoo top 10 listing, do you think provide the best answer to your search?

Please leave your comment in the box below.

So what happened?

Did anyone hear anything about the “re-branding” of googlereseller.com.sg to clicktrue.com.sg?

Apparently, the people at HWZ who came up with the new site did not say why the name change. The announcement was simply…

“With this re-branding, it hopes to strengthen itself as a leading service provider of Pay Per Performance online advertising.”

Google Trademark Infringement

Do you think a subsidiary of a public listed company in Singapore just go spend ten of thousand of dollars to “re-brand” with no good reason. Afterall, googlereseller.com.sg is a keyword rich domain name and the domain name alone is worth thousands in the domain name aftermarket.

Here’s the old screenshot of www.googlereseller.com.sg:

I guess it was more likely that SPH got a lawyer letter from Google for trademark infringement. Indeed, it was a sneaky, rotten deed for a company to blatantly use another company name in the domain name and profit from it.

Google has a team of lawyers going around sending nasty letters to owners whose domains consist of word/words related to Google, Adwords, Adsense and so on.

Why It Was Not A Genuine Re-Branding Exercise?

HWZ has been using googlereseller.com.sg since May 2006 and building its brand even before SPH paid S$7.1 million to acquire Hardware Zone.

Being a search marketing company, I am sure they realize the important of protecting their website search engine visibility. Unfortunately, just 2 pages were left in Google search index.

GoogleReseller.com.sg cached page showing the pricing of Adwords campaign packages.

Also, there are existing links from other websites still pointing to www.googlereseller.com.sg. A proper re-branding exercise will need at least 6 months to switch over to the new URL and allow time for the permanent re-direction of www.google.com.sg to the new www.clicktrue.com.sg to take effect.

Google took over the domain and killed website. All the time and effort invested by HWZ team over the past years is now wasted and a loss to SPH.

So what’s your take on this fiasco?

Write your thoughts in the comment box below.

The short answer is: “Yes, it does.”

The long answer is: “Not all the time, it depends who links to you, how they link to you and the keyword you’re competing.”

To get the full explanation, go visit Jonathan Leger’s blog now.

I think there is some truth in that statement.

However, if you search carefully, you will realized that the search terms seo singapore and singapore seo in Google, the results you get are not exactly the same. Why? Because, in our natural use of English, a different use in the sequence of the words gives different meaning. And Google algorithm is smart enough to distinguish that but not smart enough to realize seo singapore and singapore seo actually mean the same thing.

From my keyword research, I discovered that “SEO Singapore” is more often used than “Singapore SEO”. However, I suspected that those who searched for these terms are SEO professionals, SEO consultants and SEO practitioners.

Ordinary folks or most website owners may not be using these search terms yet. These folks probably use search terms like top search position, search engine ranking, how to get high ranking in Google and phrases that do not contact jargons such as SEO and search marketing.

In fact, you don’t see many Adwords ad for these search terms: seo singapore. Maybe the demand for SEO services is not big enough for advertisers to spend the money. Or, those top SEO consultants are already ranked high in the organic results and getting so busy with their business that they do not need to advertise for more business.

However, I think very soon this arena will become active and more ads with more competitions. Already, there is a growing numbers of SEO companies on top of those web designers who offers SEO services.

Whether it’s SEO Singapore or Singapore SEO, a capable SEO specialist or SEO consultant will be able to get her website in the top of the search engine listing.