Even though there has been a rise in the number of technology startups in India in the last few years, there have been very few product focused companies. There are many challenges faced by companies when they try to stick to the ‘only product focused’ mode. A product company is built on an idea or a belief and unlike service providing companies; they do not have any money inflow for days, weeks or even months.

YourStory in association with CNBC TV18 Young Turks is organizing Microsoft Canaan TechSparks 2010 on August 13 at Bangalore which would help technology product startups get the much needed platform. The event is aimed to bring together the product technology entrepreneur, investors and Media together to provide a launch pad to the deserving startups.

“The program promises to provide ample networking, media interaction, and investor handshake opportunities. Rub shoulder to shoulder with leading investors in India and media!”

18 selected startups will get to present their pitch to the investors and jury members and top 5 will be selected to participate in an “Incubation Week” at the IDC focusing on Software products, Mobile products, Cloud computing, Web 2.0 and Media exposure in India’s leading Business Channel, CNBC TV18 Young Turks programme and various other publications.

Initiatives such as these will surely help India build a strong base in tech products. We’d love to see India not only as a land of outsourced jobs and consulting services but a place where great products are made!

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Twitter App market is slowly becoming crowded and there are few good apps, which are trying to dominate the space. Hootsuite, SocialOomph and Buzzom are such three Web Apps, while Seesmic and TweetDeck are the top 2 Desktop Apps.

I have been using Tweetdeck for long and I have to thank the company for making my Twitter experience awesome. It gave a lot of features which were not given by Twitter or any other app. But later TweetDeck started giving too many useless features and made the application unnecessarily heavy. They made it complex and with lots of features but there are a several basic features which it does not give.
This forced me to explore other apps, and I found Hootsuite and Buzzom as really good alternatives. Hootsuite is great in terms of look but the application has several problems while using it. It does not provide easy interface to follow and unfollow people, and this leaves Buzzom as the application of choice for me.

Here are my 10 reasons why I choose to use Buzzom for all my Twitter needs.

All in one:

Buzzom is the most complete Web App present. It has all features from Timeline and Status Update to follow-follow.

Conversation:

It is always difficult to track friends talking about own Tweet. When there are several people talking and you have lots of Tweets, the conversation tracking is a pain. Buzzom has given the nested look for conversation. I simply love this feature.

Hide Spam:

Hide Hash Tags (#), Application or Person is the killer feature in Buzzom. Hats off to the team for making it happen. I can now get clean Twitter stream in spite of my following thousands of folks.

Feed Management:

Buzzom Feed Management is very scientific and the way they have implemented cycle for feed posting is awesome. You can repeat tweets to reach out to people of various continents by choosing the right options. This is just awesome.

Facebook Look:

I use Facebook more than Twitter and someone I feel the Facebook look is amongst the best possible for reading and posting status updates. Buzzom has brought that look to Twitter and I can ask nothing more.

Buzz Button:

Buzzom Team’s imagination is superb in the field of Social Media. The Buzz Button is one of the handiest Social Media toolbar I have seen so far. They have made it for Chrome and Firefox, and I am using both. It just ends the problem of searching Social Media share buttons in blogs or sites to share. It stays by the side of address bar and serves a lot.

Statistics at NXY.IN:

For several weeks of using Buzzom I didn’t know that they have such a fantastic statistics for posted URLs. It is bit painful to go to NXY.IN, login thro Twitter and view the stats but I feel with the quality they have provided; it is worthy to do this hard work.

Customer Service:

This is fantastic. It has never happened to me that I have raised any question to Buzzom Team and they have not replied me within a day. Hats off to the most efficient team of Twitter Ecosystem; I have never expected this to happen from a FREE app. But Buzzom Team has made it happen.

People Search:

TweetDeck and Hootsuite are great but only for external look. When it comes to advanced features like People Search and targeted grow; Buzzom is far more superior. They literally don’t have any good competition in this space.

Buzzom Premium:

It is a different service from Buzzom Team. I wonder why they have kept it different; it just does not talk to Buzzom in any way. But the app in itself is great. The Status Update scheduling is unmatchable. They have facilities of Excel upload to data download, and the best of all is the easy to download reports for the marketing campaign.

Buzzom is surely the king in Twitter Space. If you have not tried this app, do it today. You will be happy that you did.

Update: There are rumours of Buzzom being acquired by Yahoo! Yahoo meme revival maybe?

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Here I am! Lost in the light of the moon, that comes through my window Sitting at my office desk, staring at my macbook screen, feeling sleepier as ever. This was expected to be a long weekend, courtesy the ‘Bharat bandh’ organized by some political party.

If you happen to my friend on FaceBook, you probably already know how desparately I was waiting for the rains. Being in New Delhi, I think it’s normal to expect the seasons a little late. So here it is. Last night it rained, which kept me up till 4 am. On a side note, you have no idea how much you can enjoy the 80′s music on your porch while it rains cats and dogs outside.

Luckily there wasn’t any powercuts, which is something you can easily expect in ANY of the the Indian cities, sans Bangalore of course. And then there is a Bharat bandh today, which seems to have failed completely in Delhi. The cars and rickshaws are running normally, and the shops/markets are open and doing business as usual. That includes my office too. Apparently this bandh was organized to counter the fuel price hike. I’m not sure how on earth this bandh can help manage inflation, but then you don’t actually ‘understand’ a lot of things in India, you just have to get used to it. ’nuff said.

Photos courtesy: @snowsoulmate & Ajay Verma(Reuters)

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Most of us won’t be able to survive without it, but that does not mean we know what it is.

For most people, the first thing they see when they open up their browser is their search homepage. Who can blame them for mistaking Search Engines as Browsers?

What Google did some time ago was to ask over 50 passersby; randomly picked out from Times Square, New York a seemingly simple question,

“What is a Browser?”

Enjoy the results below and for the record, a browser is NOT a Search Engine.

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“Every entrepreneur has the power to change lives as he/she changes his/her own life. Its only the question of stepping up and leading! ” – Sonali Gupta

Today, we’re getting more and more dependent on technology both for our own health and the health of the planet. And this has made entrepreneurship and innovation vital for our survival. We need more inventors and we need more people supporting those inventors through venture capitalism; entrepreneurs are necessary to organize, advertise, and fund the newest products so that they can become available to the public and benefit the entire world. Without entrepreneurs, we would not have a printing press, an factory, an automobile, an airplane, a television, a telephone, a computer, the Internet. We would not have this incredibly interconnected world with a huge capacity for organized improvement and development. Without entrepreneurs, it would be a stale world indeed.

Given all the problems our world faces — in teaching, technology, health care, or finance — we need many more entrepreneurs and change makers. Progress against these problems will be intolerably slow if only 3% to 5% of world’s population thinks they can solve them.

We can see entrepreneurs everywhere. They come from different areas, different cultures and different niches. If there is one common thing among them, then that’s innovation. And that’s what makes them different from others. Entrepreneurs do something, create something, that has never been done before, or has never been presented in this unique form. They innovate, they inspire, they produce something new to the world, and if they are successful and people buy their product or service, then they have produced something that is useful to the world as well. They fuel the flame of invention and have contributed some of the most amazing advancements in human history that continue to propel our species forward.

That being said, it is also important to note that entrepreneurship isn’t for everyone. Yes, the world is badly in need of more creative and motivated thinkers. However, being an entrepreneur isn’t easy; it is a difficult road to follow with a lot of trial and error along the way and much room for adjustment and failure. It’s important to know that you have the patience and a thick enough skin for the long haul; in the end, entrepreneurship isn’t just a career, it’s a way of life, and you have to be prepared to throw yourself whole-heartedly into that way of life in order to achieve success.

Being an entrepreneur was hard, since there was no place to learn the basic skills and get the necessary motivation. Budding entrepreneurs are expected to fail and learn, and sadly, that’s the scary part. They wouldn’t have failed if they had got the necessary guidance from fellow entrepreneurs who have walked on that road already. Fortunately, things are chaging, and for good. We, a group of young entrepreneurs have started an “open school”, called Startup School, for entrepreneurs & startups where they learn the basics of entrepreneurship. We have already helped hundreds of innovators refine their entrepreneural skills and change the life of numerous entrepreneurs already from Romania to Kongo to India and even the Silicon Valley itself. We believe that the most common characteristic among all the entrepreneurs is the reluctance to give up. We help them build businesses, realize the extent of their full potential and nurture it. In short, we help young entrepreneurs understand what works and what doesn’t! A few weeks back, I wrote about the disappointing startup scene in India. This were not the case, if there had been proper light on entrepreneurship. At Startup School, you’ll be guided by dozens of other successful entrepreneurs around the world. You’ll learn by the mistakes others have done, instead of failing with your own startup.

50+ entrepreneurs pitched and launched their company on Startup School – some are successful or received funding.

Startup School is a super open environment that attracted a wide variety of entrepreneurs, investors and experts. Famous entrepreneurs like Brad Feld (Founder of Foundry Group), Marc Benioff (Founder of Salesforce), Bill Liao (Founder of Xing) and many more donated their time to fill this school with more than 100 hours of recorded live classes.

With a little bit of money we will be able to scale and improve Startup School in order to reach out to rest of the world. We believe by giving people access to startup education we can make the world a better place for all of us. Every entrepreneur on Startup School may influence the life of thousands of people around the world. And this is exactly where we need your help.

We are trying to raise funds to be able to continue the project. We need your help to guide hundreds of young minds to the path of success. The world is badly in need of more entrepreneurs. And we believe we can be able to create a big society of elite entrepreneurs with YOUR SUPPORT.

This is the IndieGogo page where you can help. Every dollar counts! If you need more information about Startup School (or need an invite), feel free to contact me directly at arun@supercoolschool.com.

See you there!

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SocialOomph is one of the most used social media management tools and the new Buzzom Premium looks like it will give a tough fight to SocialOomph. So we decided to see how both the tools fare on a variety of parameters and decide which one stands out.
Here we go.

Features:

Status Updates:

Both have almost all the things, URL shortener, status scheduler,updates to multiple social accounts, drafts, bulk tweet upload,etc. No one is a clear winner here
Buzzom: 0.5 SocialOomph:0.5

Direct Messages:

Direct Message Manager of both SocialOomph and Buzzom Premium is good. Both give spam control, however SocialOomph gives more options to act based on spam unlike Buzzom Premium which gives it a slight edge.
Buzzom: 0 SocialOomph: +1

Monitors :

SocialOomph has the option of creating channels (groups users based on some commonality) and keyword monitoring which can help in brand management. Buzzom Premium doesn’t have these features. SocialOomph clearly wins here.
Buzzom:0 SocialOomph:+1

Statistics :

Both Buzzom Premium and SocialOomph give click and twitter statistics. Buzzom Premium beats SocialOomph here outright. Buzzom Premium has been into this right from the start and is its strong point while SocialOomph has added some features recently.
Buzzom: +1 SocialOomph:0

Social Accounts:

While both have multiple twitter accounts, socialoomph has more channels like GoogleBuzz, Ping.fm and it has the option to delegate accounts to other users of socialoomph which Buzzom Premium doesn’t have currently. This makes socialoomph a candidate for managing corporate twitter accounts to some extent.
Buzzom: 0 SocialOomph:+1

Interface:

The interface of SocialOomph is organized but the landing page is pretty cluttery and not pleasing to the eye. Users will get comfortable using SocialOomph over time. Buzzom Premium has much better look and feel when compared to SocialOomph.
Buzzom: +1 SocialOomph:0

Performance:

The only pain point with SocialOomph is when you are doing something that takes a lot of processing power like accessing followers list, etc. SocialOomph does it offline and sends you an email when done. You cant blame the product completely because the sheer number of users of the product has taken a toll in its performance. Buzzom Premium has no issues on this front.
Buzzom: +1 SocialOomph:0

Value for Money:

SocialOomph gives unlimited twitter accounts for $29.97/month. Buzzom Premium charges $10/month for the base account and $5/month for every subsequent account. So it all depends on how many twitter accounts you need to manage. For individuals, Buzzom premium provides more value while for corporate accounts SocialOomph provides more value considering they have multiple accounts and twitter account delegation is a necessary addon.
Buzzom: 0.5 SocialOomph: 0.5

Summarising things, we have
Parameter SocialOomph Buzzom Premium
Features – Status Updates ✓ ✓
Features – Direct Messages ✓
Features – Monitors ✓
Features – Statistics ✓
Features – Social Accounts ✓
Interface ✓
Performance ✓
Value for Money ✓ ✓

Conclusion:

Both SocialOomph and Buzzom Premium are at 4 each. It’s a tie.
SocialOomph maynot have the looks but it is a decent solution for the corporate customer and its rich set of features also make it a good candidate for users who like lot of control. But for individual users and customers who need statistics, Buzzom premium offers more value than SocialOomph.

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The Prime Features that Made Buzzom Popular

Buzzom.com was formed as a free Twitter account management tool in order to help people grow in Twitter. Often, a person who has newly joined Twitter has these questions in mind- “How do I grow my follower list?” or “How do I find people having similar interests?” or “Whom do I follow?” and such. Buzzom was launched in an effort to answer all these queries, as well as to manage and grow the network of its users. Since its debut, Buzzom has got rave reviews from numerous experts for its easy-to-use interface and a host of features.

Let’s take a look at some of the features Buzzom offers to its users-

1. Flush: This feature lets you see the list of people whom you are following but who are not following you back. You can select people from that list and unfollow them.
2. Grow: If you intend to follow more people, you should use this feature which gives you a list of interesting people. You can select people from that list and start following them if you like.
3. Reciprocate: This feature shows you the list of people who are following you but whom you are not following back. You can follow them back by selecting people from this list.
4. Buzzom Score: This score is a measure of your social activity on Twitter. Users should try to push their scores higher up.
5. Tweet Efficiency: Suppose you have a low follower list, and your rate of tweeting is very high. This reflects the fact that a majority of your tweets have gone to waste. This is where the feature of tweet efficiency comes in- this score is a measure of the efficiency of your tweets. The higher the tweet efficiency more is the likelihood that your tweets are getting a good response.
6. Search: It becomes difficult to search people who share the similar interests and hobbies on Twitter. Buzzom comes with the search feature that helps you find people based on their Bio information as well as on the nature of their tweets. This way, Buzzom makes it a lot easier to follow people based on keywords in their Tweets.

Over all, there are many features that enable you to grow your network in Twitter and let your profile be visited by thousands of visitors each day. Buzzom is an extremely beneficial tool for marketing and advertisement purposes. Aspects like Influence Ratio, Retweet Ratio, Retweet Count and Follower Count gives you an edge over other tweeters for effective management of your twitter account. The application has been growing more popular every passing day, and it is estimated to be more popular than naukri.com in the US. Experts from PCWorld, shoutmeloud, webanalytics and blippr have all highly recommended Buzzom. You should try it out for yourself- it’s a great new social media experience.

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Here’s a quick update. I have joined SlideShare last week and it’s already a not-so-good feeling here . I just hope I’m wrong this time! I’m almost living in a horror story. I mean Delhi is good and winter is awesome though. I miss the awesome people I’ve left behind at Bangalore. I just wanted to know how does it feel to work in a stable work environment. SlideShare is one of the companies which I consider are in the phase of Startup-to-Business transition (but it has taken a long time to do so for sure).

Besides, ever since I came to Bangalore (Thanks to Globals Inc )I always wanted to go back to north India. And this was the chance. I’m not sure it was a right decision though. I’ve already started missing living in a city which breathes and speak technology. Nowhere in Delhi I expect to see a man whipping out a laptop in a amusement park. Delhi is, somewhat, boring compared to other cities: especially when you come from a city like Bangalore . Let’s see what Delhi has to offer.

Anyway that’s it. I know it’s a lame post, but I kinda had to write it. Coz I promised

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It happened awfully fast. I barely spoke to a few interesting people in the team about a week back and that’s it. A very interesting fact is that I had uploaded my CV to SlideShare as a test file and that’s what caught their attention. I’m happy happy happy.

Finally I’ll be moving back to North India . Can’t wait to join SlideShare. Looking forward!

btw, here is a recent presentation I’ve uploaded to SlideShare:

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Here is the presentation on slideshare:

It’s interesting to see that almost all the successful startups (now businesses!) started as private beta, as an invite-only platform. The biggest example would be Google’s Gmail (and now Wave). One of the most promising invite-only which I’ve been a part of is Startup School. One big reason behind the success of invite based platforms is the feeling of being priveleged over friends and acquaintances. For a startup, it could be a bit risky though, since they risk losing a lot of direct type-in traffic, who could easily be their potential members if the system wasn’t invite-only.

Here is a video of Bill Gates speaking about Xobni!

Do you know of any startups who share a similar success story? Let me know.

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