The launch of Google Buzz prompted me to better explore the suite of Google Products , and I have to say I was pretty astounded by what I found. Once I started clicking around and adding Gadgets and experimenting with Buzz, Reader, Themes, Maps, Gmail, Google News and hopefully soon Google Voice , it was immediately clear that I was going to start using iGoogle and Gmail much more often. Now I am Not only that, iGoogle is now my new Homepage ( View Screenshots ). One of the coolest functions of Gmail and iGoogle is the ability to create a Social Media Dashboard

Set up a few key Google Alerts, and your listening task becomes a whole lot easier....( Tags: Non-profit technology nptech Google social medi If your nonprofit is active in social media, you already know the importance of closely monitoring what’s being said online about your organization and your cause. read more ) ...Tags:

Tags: General News Non-profit technology nptech Google research searc On the Internet, our challenge is not simply to find information, but to sift out the truly useful and reliable information needed to complete a task or accomplish a goal. Three new specialized search tools are available (or will be soon) to help save your organization time in tracking down public records, demographic data, research and statistics....(

In Part 1: How to Set Up News Alerts, we covered the basics of Google Alerts. few tweaks of your search terms can make Google Alerts work much better for you....( Tags: Non-profit technology nptech Google social medi Your first few Alerts may show a lot of irrelevant information mixed in with the notices about your website, blog, or cause. No problem!

When the National Women’s Law Center first applied for a Google Grant ? $10,000 10,000 worth of free advertising each month through Google’s AdWords program ? Google AdWords charges are calculated on a cost-per-click basis. Now, we’re seven months into our Google grant, and with my co-workers and I knew it was at least worth trying. It was free , after all.

Google is on a fishing expedition to see if we're willing to take web-surfing to a whole new level. My colleague Steve Backman introduced us to Google Wave a few months ago. Google's introduction of Wave is nothing if not ambitious. The early version of Google Wave I saw looked "The Great Wave off Kanagawa" by Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) . I

Last week, I discussed sharing research with Google Reade r; before that, filtering RSS feeds with Yahoo! Pipes , and I started with a post about integrating content with websites . Admitting that I might represent an extreme case, I subscribe to 96 feeds in Google Reader . I started with Google Reader last December - prior to that, I used a Mac RSS Reader called Vienna . For my last followup to my RSS article, Using RSS Tools to Feed your Information Needs , I want to discuss OPML, the standard for RSS Reader feed information, and talk a bit about why RSS, which is already quite useful, is about to become an even bigger deal.

The problem for many folks is that it’s very difficult to manage massive quantities of content, even with tools like Google Reader. So what does this have to do with Google Reader? 8221; I don’t know about you, but Google Reader has always been an ass-pain for me. I f you want to continue to pump out high quality content on your non-profit’s blog, you have to continually consume high quality content - every day . That all changed when Alltop recently announced MyAlltop.

You google "RSS readers" and you get "directories" listing hundreds of readers, or blog posts listing "top ten readers" - WTF? I have tried several readers, including the news feed that comes with Outlook, and right now I have settled on Google Reader . So say you've set up a Google alert with a couple of relevant keywords, so you are now getting emails that tell you that a couple of blogs in particular are about your association's field I have been thinking for quite some time about how somehow RSS (Real Simple Syndication, a name which is completely unhelpful - and not real simple - to those who need help understanding it) has a serious image problem.

At any rate, this week's assignment is a doozy-- A Week Without Google . That's right, no Google Search or Google Alerts, no Gmail or Google Talk, no Google Video, no Google Google Docs or Google Calendar, no Google Maps or  Google Earth, no Google News, no Google My daughter is taking a New Media Research studio class at NYU where (somewhat to my dismay), she's learning about using RSS and Delicious. I'm dismayed because I would have taught her about these things for free, but you know college students.