Business As Usual In The New Silicon Valley

Now here is one spectacular tale. A company, with little PR or marketing, grows in just a handful of years to connect half a billion people around the world through a simple messaging app. The company gets acquired for a hefty sum; in this case, the largest sum ever in the history of venture-backed startup acquisitions. Billionaires and millionaires are created almost out of thin air.

How Facebook's WhatsApp Deal Compares to Other Tech Acquisitions

Facebook announced Wednesday that it will acquire popular messaging app WhatsApp for $16 billion ($19 billion, if you include restricted stock units for the WhatsApp staff). It's hard to believe that only two years ago, the social network acquired Instagram for a then-shocking $1 billion. How times (and dollars) have changed.

20 Tools To Stop The Social Media Timesuck

The longer I work in social media, the more I realize that the biggest danger for a social media marketer isn’t proving ROI, anticipating Facebook algorithm changes or even dealing with Twitter trolls — it’s the dreaded Social Media Timesuck. You’re probably familiar with it. It’s what happens when you go to Facebook just to post a link to that latest blog entry but somehow end up staying for an extra 30 minutes and opening 7 new tabs.

Facebook Buying WhatsApp For $19B, Will Keep The Messaging Service Independent

Facebook is purchasing messaging giant WhatsApp for $16 billion in cash and stock, according to a regulatory filing. The deal is being cut for $12 billion in Facebook shares, $4 billion in cash and an additional $3 billion in RSUs for employee retention. A termination fee is attached to the deal that would cost Facebook $1 billion in cash and $1 billion in shares if the deal fails to pass regulatory muster.

Facebook to Buy WhatsApp for $16 Billion

Facebook has entered into an agreement to acquire WhatsApp, the popular messaging app, for $16 billion in cash and stock, according to a filing Wednesday. The deal is by far Facebook's largest acquisition to date and comes after rumors in late 2012 and early 2013 that Facebook and Google were vying to buy the messaging service. According to the filing, Facebook has agreed to pay $12 billion in stock and $4 billion in cash for the company. Facebook has also agreed to pay an additional $3 billion

LinkedIn’s Long Form Professional Publishing Tools Opens To All Members

Since launch in 2012, LinkedIn’s dynamic publishing platform has been aimed toward top societal influencers like Richard Branson, Tony Robbins and Bill Gates. Today, LinkedIn is opening their publishing platform to all users so they can publish long-form original content. The program to date has been very successful with Influencer posts seen by 31,000 professionals on average.

60 Percent Of Internet Access Is Mostly Mobile

In a new global Mobile Media Consumption report, ad networkInMobi asserts that, outside the US and UK, mobile media time spent now exceeds TV. However in the US, TV is still the top screen. The Mobile Media Consumption research was conducted by Decision Fuel and OnDevice Research and had roughly 14,000 respondents in 14 countries. In emerging and especially less affluent markets, the InMobi report also confirms that mobile media time exceeds the PC internet.

10 Big Brands That Were Penalized By Google, From Rap Genius To The BBC

It’s been a busy year already with big brands getting hit by Google penalties. First came Rap Genius, slammed so hard that you couldn’t find it for its own name. Then came Expedia’s suspected penalty that may have hurt its traffic. But these are also a familiar tune. Big brand violates Google’s rules, gets in trouble but ultimately returns to Google’s good graces with what may seem a virtual wrist-slap.

5 Times Google Penalized Itself For Breaking Its Own SEO Rules

Make no mistake. Plenty of sites — big brands included — willingly do things in an attempt to rank better on Google that go past SEO tactics that Google itself considers acceptable. However, there’s also no better poster child for how complicated and confusing Google’s rules can be than the fact that Google has had to punish itself with penalties over and over again.

101 Best Websites To Make Money Writing Articles

101 Best Websites To Make Money Writing Articles "There are many of us who know a number of useful websites using which we are earning couple hundred dollars, but we would never want to share that website with anyone else. Why would we? The world is full of competitions."

20 Sites To Get Paid For Writing And Blogging

It’s not like writing for a book, or publication, a newspaper or magazine but blogging is prevalent on the Web because we love sharing, reading and hearing about new experiences. And unlike freelance writing, you don’t answer to a client’s demand or write to adhere to a blog’s direction or scope. Still, it feels good to be paid to write articles, and you don’t have to manage a blog to actually make money out of your writing.

26 Sites That Pay You To Blog

Writing paid post is perhaps the most straight forward ways to earn some revenue from blogging. The way pay post works hasn’t changed much; after reaching mutual agreement with advertisers, you write about them, they pay you. And if there is a 3rd party (middle man company) involve, they take cut. Most middle man company provides marketplace for advertisers to look for publishers, vice versa.

Five Hidden Gems in Google Webmaster Tools

Within Google Webmaster Tools, hidden gems abound. But, there are five very special hidden gems that will help make your life as an SEO easier. Most webmasters are familiar with Google Webmaster tools. It is a toolbox created by Google to help uncover technical issues. In fact, if you are considering buying another analytic tool, I highly recommended you explore GWT first. You may not need another tool at all if the issues on your site are restricted to those found in GWT.

What Facebook Will Look Like by 2024

Online empires come and go. At one time, Alta Vista was the top search engine and Netscape was the only web browser. Both are now gone. Will the same happen to Facebook? It's unlikely the company could completely exit the stage. However, the Facebook of 2024 will look very different from today's version. Primarily, the company will continue to morph from a social network to a more traditional media company.

Top 10 Tools For Managing Your Social Media Accounts

Attempting to juggle each and every one of your social media accounts can be tricky, scary, and time-consuming. For example, while you’re busy updating your Facebook status, you might have forgotten to favorite a tweet. Speaking of tweets, when is the best time to send one out to followers? Ugh. It can seriously give you a migraine. Thankfully, we live in a world and time where developers are rectifying that problem! Now, there are plenty of tools that can easily sync with all of our social media accounts

Yahoo Mail Accounts Hacked, Passwords Reset

An unspecified number of Yahoo Mail users have had their usernames and passwords compromised, the company announced late Thursday. The hack appears to have taken place via a compromised third party database, and Yahoo has taken the precaution of resetting the passwords of affected users.

The 7 Best Tech Companies to Work For

Tech and social media are booming, and it seems every company these days is offering a position for someone to handle its social accounts and applications. However, with such an influx in the market, it can be hard to tell which companies are actually the best to work for in what is a relatively new career path.

How to Increase Your Pinterest Engagement by 275%

Top 10 WordPress Plugins That You Need To Be Using In 2014

If you’re running a WordPress-powered website or blog, then you’re always searching for a way to innovate and make your site easier to use –for both you and your visitors.  This is one reason why WordPress plugins are so unbelievably awesome, because they seem like quick little cheats and hacks that take little-to-no time to learn, install, and use. 

One of the most important parts of the plugins we chose is that all ten of them can help just about any blog in some way.

101+ Sources for Blog Content Ideas

Finding topics for blog posts on an ongoing basis can be intimidating for beginner bloggers. But there are actually many ways that bloggers and content writers can find a never ending supply of content ideas.

Creating great content is critical and becoming even more important, not just for bloggers, but all website owners. Great content will get you higher search engine rankings from more links, increased visitors and subscribers, and credibility.