How to Find the Right SEO Service Provider for your Business?

In the current digital age, it would be fair to say that almost all the businesses need a good online presence. By that, I do not mean that you only need to have a website and the related social media handles. You may build a fantastic website and regularly spend money on advertisements through Facebook or Twitter, but that’s not suffice and search engine optimization (more importantly known as SEO) still plays an important role in attracting targeted visitors to your website and converting them into your customers and leads.

Over the discussions I’ve had with a lot of my friends and clients, I’ve figured out one thing that remains consistent – the confusion of picking the correct SEO service. Some bloggers prefer to do SEO by themselves, but let me be frank here (no offense meant to anyone) – it doesn’t work. Unless you can dedicate more time to SEO than to actually writing or blogging, you’re not going to see results. Trust me, I speak from personal experience.

SEO needs time. And a specialized team doing just that on your website is the best way to make sure your traffic spikes. Undoubtedly, optimizing your website for different search engines is one of the best strategies that you can have for your long-term goals – and in this article, we’ll see how to pick a service and what service I recommend. So, read along!

Social Media: A New Marketing Channel

Social Media has grown as a new marketing channel in this world of digitalization. Audiences today are “CONNECTED CONSUMERS”. Almost 70% of World youth is connected to the digital world through the means of internet networking. They communicate, socialise, access news, shop, research and engage with businesses through multiple digital platforms, and many of these are on the go (iPads and Smartphones).

Social Media? More like Social Me-Yeah!

Someone (probably my parents) said, “Everything in the entire world has a good and bad aspect. There’s nothing that will not have a good aspect (except Donald Trump) or vice versa.” This statement holds true for most of the things, especially debatable topics like social media.

For everyone at first, social media was (literally) a foreign concept. My entire life exposed on the internet? No way, you say. As reasonable as feeling scared about exposing what you’re doing, where you’re travelling to and what you’re eating on social media also helps bring everyone in your life, closer. Your office friends know your college friends, you know your friend’s work friends and thus, instead of it being five different circles, it is a huge circle.

Man is a social animal. Everyone needs someone and social media provides exactly that. Micro-blogging websites like Tumblr has brought together similar minded people, people with similar issues and problems from all over the world on one platform, which is amazing. Not only do people have someone they can talk to, they also have people who can empathise with almost everything they go through. They act as a therapy session. 

It has obviously made the world a smaller place. You’re more in touch with your relatives (seems like a disadvantage, but shout out to the cool aunt), your friends who have gone abroad or if you’ve gone abroad or if you both have gone abroad to different places. They seem closer than they are.

Social media keeps you in touch with the entire world. You log into twitter, see what is trending and you instantly know about it. Who needs news when you have the top trends? You know what is happening in Africa by just following a person who actively tweets or updates his status on Facebook regarding the situation there.

Digital foot printing has allowed people to keep their original content safe on all the social media websites and thus cases plagiarism have been easier to solve. Social media is also a very helpful platform for businesses as advertising has been much easier. Since everyone is addicted to the social media websites, products easily gain attention by eager customers.

Social media has also broadened many people’s horizons and have opened their minds to various new cultures and different ideologies. It has removed any barriers there were between interaction and communications.

Online petitions promoted by social media networks have also promoted change in the society. For example, in 2012,a  teenage girl started a petition on change.org to stop photo-shopping models in magazines. Soon, Seventeen, a mainstream teenage magazine announced (after she collected 10,000 signatures) that they will not Photoshop their models.

Aside from these fabulous boons, there are also banes that most people focus on. Not that they should be completely ignored, but people tend to overhype the negative aspects more. There are two types of people on the internet: one, who judge themselves based on the likes their posts get and two, who lie. This attitude affects a lot of people and they start judging themselves more which is a negative aspect of social media. 

Regardless the bans, people are going to use, love, get addicted to social media any which ways. What the haters fail to understand is that if social media didn’t exist though, where would they show case their ‘oh my life rocks and yours sucks’ attitude?


Written by Durva Bhatt
A bibliophile who is fuelled entirely by caffeine, sarcasm, fandoms and random thoughts.

The shift in the strategy of Indian Politicians due to Digitalization and Social Media

Politics is a game of power and there are no fixed rules of the competition. When Narendra Modi took everyone by surprise in 2014 elections, it was evident that once again politicians have to remodel themselves to match the tides of time.

The more than usual dose of rhetoric about youth and jobs after 2008 financial crisis made it an important electoral plank. The smartphone boom coincided with flooding of social media sites. Suddenly but subtly mobilization in a predominately agricultural economy like India happened virtually. The 35 crore middle class was enamored by a corporate style aggressive and charismatic Modi. The BJP successfully stuck a balance between this style of campaigning as well as showcasing Mr. Modi’s oratorical skills in mammoth rallies across the country.

Image credit: cearsleg.com

More importantly, Modi was able to woo the aspirant urban and rural classes through the rhetoric of development. His government is too actively engaged in social media; with BJP leaders having twitter accounts and ministries like Railways promptly replying the passengers in distress.
Not only in Centre, the recently bifurcated Telangana and Andhra Pradesh have seen their Chief Ministers too bitten by ‘development bug’. This collusion between technology, jobs, development, reform and social media marketing for the same has seized the electoral space. Political parties are now engaging professional political strategists like Prashant Kishor to win elections. Gone are the days of veteran party leaders delivering old wine in new bottles.

It would be a mistake to account for digitalization only by focusing on youth. Disposable incomes have risen as capitalism makes in-roads in the interior of the country, rural to urban migration has fueled middle-class dreams, an acute shortage of employable people and a rise of an aggressive-communally polarized-economically sensitive middle class are the reasons for it.

Social media is maybe a boon for an information-starved country but it too has its shares of troubles. Many communal riots were fueled by misstating facts and deluding people. Due to utter political opportunism, social media has become a political slugfest where there are no norms for civility and decency. Innumerable examples can be quoted for the same. Information overload over unnecessary pieces of news also disturbs one’s peace of mind. Cyber crimes like trolling, delivering threats due to expressing different political views are common.

Despite these drawbacks, the age of social media had dawned over the great Indian political circus where the hopeful and ascendant classes have pinned their hopes on ‘development’ with a hefty dose of job promises too. Political actors have understood the reach of social media and its capacity to get viral and generate news. Strangely, only a minuscule percentage of Indians have an access to these sites but it is their common demands that have made them important political constituency.


Written by Rishya Dharmani
"Life is not a mystery, as they say, rather it is simplicity itself. Unlearn, fail and realize the true joy."