I am not paid by Google to advertise their services, honest! I know that many people have reservations about the way that the company will put to use information collected from us while using Google, with all sorts of accusations of plans of world domination, etc. I value my privacy as much as the next person, but don't really have much of an issue with them. However, since Google is one of the most blogged-about companies out there, I figured I ought to put in my own two pennyworth.
Please note that the following is written from the point of view of a Web amateur, and is aimed at similar people. Professionals and experts will either not need services like those Google provide, or already know all about them, or both. It might be useful to those running small small businesses and amateur Web publishers, though
I have mentioned earlier about signing up for Google AdSense and Google Analytics; I looked around their site for any more goodies they might be offering to Web publishers like me. I found Webmaster Central, which includes Webmaster tools, which allows you to submit your site to Google, and enables to to see such things as the most frequent search terms used to find your site, whereabouts on the Google search your site displays, and so on. It can also find things like dead links, etc.
Many people will know about Google maps; the Google Maps API enables you to put their maps on your own Web site. I read through the documentation and am afraid that it all looks too complicated for me, with my limited knowledge of such arcane subjects as JavaScript and XHTML, but there are plenty of of people out there with the necessary knowledge, I know. The Official Google Webmaster Central Blog is also a useful resource, and it has links to various other Google blogs.
Back in December 2005 I apologised for not making many posts and said I hoped to do better in 2006. Alas, I totally failed and only managed to start posting again a couple of days ago. At least the posts I have made so far this month have been fairly long! Note to self: must try harder.
