At First If You Don’t Succeed Google me?

The popularity of social networking sites is exploding in 2010. Nielsen recently reported that membership on both Facebook and Twitter is up nearly 50 percent, and time spent on the platforms has nearly doubled in 2010. Facebook has become the leader in Social Media Sites. With the recent accomplishment earlier this year Facebook has by passing search engine giant Google in most-viewed site in US.

Google has taken notice of these trends and is taking the social network very serious now. Initial word of Google’s project came from Kevin Rose, co founder of the social bookmarking site Digg. Rose tweeted that the site would be called Google Me, though the Tweet has been removed from Twitter.  Oops! The Secret is out! This coming out shortly that Facebook announced their Open Graph Protocol.

Then, on Tuesday, former Facebook executive and Quora cofounder Adam D’Angelo said that Google Me “is not a rumor. This is a real project. There are a large number of people working on it.”

This isn’t Google’s first attempt at a social networking site. Outside of Buzz, which Google launched in February, the search giant also owns Orkut, which is popular in many foreign countries. Now remember folks Google hired Joseph Smarr, CTO of Comcast-owned Plaxo last December 2009 and Orkut has been working on some sort of project since January 2009.

Jessica Guynn from the L.A. Times put it well as saying “It’s unlikely that Google is preparing to roll out a Facebook clone. Whereas Facebook is basically a universe unto itself, Google emphasizes openness. A Google service that runs on open standards and with an open ID system, i.e., letting users punch in one password on multiple sites, take their personal data with them when they leave a network or maintain the same profile on multiple services, could give Facebook a run for its money.”

With hundreds of millions of consumers using social media worldwide, the platform has quickly become one of the most effective marketing tools for many businesses. If you are not already using social media for your company you should be and there are many businesses out there such as BizNdex that can help you achieve your online branding.