tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18490267607883976772024-03-16T11:52:48.198-07:00Business for youstylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.comBlogger28422125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-70704626178931267192016-09-07T12:02:00.001-07:002016-09-07T12:02:44.639-07:00Making Design Choices to Fit Your Brand<p><a href="http://ift.tt/2ckSJcv" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2ckSJcv', '']);" rel="attachment wp-att-1326" class="external" target="_blank"><img class="wp-image-1649514 alignright" src="http://ift.tt/2ctw3UF" alt="branding design" width="391" height="391" /></a></p>
<p>By the time you begin making design choices to fit your brand, you should have a deep understanding of your company’s vision and mission—<a href="http://ift.tt/2ckVqug" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2ckVqug', 'your why']);" class="external" target="_blank">your <em>why</em></a>, as I like to call it. You also will know your buyer personas inside and out by this point. You’ll know what reaches them on both logical and emotional levels.</p>
<p>Without this knowledge, you shouldn’t make a single move toward your branding design. Anything you create should reflect your brand standards, not dictate them. When you’re ready to move forward, these tips will help you stay on track.</p>
<h2>Keep It Simple</h2>
<p>The most recognizable brands in the world have simple, easy-to-identify logos. Without much brainpower, you could easily conjure the images associated with Nike, BMW, or Apple, right?</p>
<p>Use the information you’ve gathered from your deep-dive branding examination to cast a critical eye on your logo choices. Will your design speak to the right audience? Will it convey your brand’s mission and vision? Take the necessary time to get it right.</p>
<h2>The Psychology of Color</h2>
<p>The <a href="http://ift.tt/1UhLTTD" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1UhLTTD', 'colors you choose']);" class="external" target="_blank">colors you choose</a> to represent your brand will speak to your buyers. For that reason, you can’t simply select a color because it’s your personal favorite. It’s important to study the emotions that particular hues evoke and pair them together for the optimum reaction.</p>
<p>For instance, if you want to grab attention and convey energy or passion, then red is your color. Yellow is the choice for optimism and happiness. Orange, an increasingly popular color, gives the impression of friendliness, creativity, and even youth. Perhaps that last characteristic is what makes orange the big choice these days, since many of the companies that use it target millennials.</p>
<p>The rest of the list looks something like this:</p>
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<ul>
<li>Black: credibility, power, decisiveness</li>
<li>White: simplicity, classic, innocence</li>
<li>Brown: rustic, historic, sturdy</li>
<li>Blue: professional, peaceful, trustworthy</li>
<li>Green: organic, earthy, growth</li>
<li>Purple: wisdom, spirituality</li>
<li>Pink: fun, flirtatious, feminine</li>
</ul>
<p>With these characteristics in mind, think of the most famous logos in the world. What do their colors tell you about the brand? McDonald’s would be energetic and happy, right? Starbucks conveys organic and simplistic values. BMW, with its black, blue, and white, says it is powerful, trustworthy, and classic.</p>
<h2>Focus on Fonts</h2>
<p>Choosing fonts that reflect your brand can also be difficult. In many cases, the font for your logo is created specifically for your brand. Not everyone can afford that kind of design work, however. Whether you’re planning something custom for your brand or choosing fonts that are already in existence, make sure the fonts speak even louder than the words you create with them.</p>
<p>You have so many to choose from: big, bold, serif, sans serif, script, thin, serious, whimsical… The list goes on. Some of these fonts will gain popularity so quickly that they eventually become passé. For instance, ask any designer how they feel about the Comic Sans or the Papyrus fonts. We can’t see into the future, but we can definitely keep an eye out for popular choices that may need to be avoided.</p>
<p>Your font doesn’t apply to only your logo. Other fonts will become a part of your font palette. You should choose something that will be easy to read on any platform, including print and web uses. This includes the copy on your website, in your brochures, and on your company swag. Before you start creating anything for your business, have all fonts selected and tested.</p>
<h2>Create Your Brand Profile</h2>
<p>When you have all these things selected, create a brand profile. This is where you’ll apply your colors and fonts to various situations that just might happen in your business. Create different versions of your logo, including the symbol only, logotype with the name of your company included, black and white versions, horizontal and vertical versions, and any other iterations you think you may need.</p>
<p>Not only do you get a chance to see all your choices together at once, but you also have a place to return when you want to refresh, rejuvenate, realign, or even redesign. Because, while you definitely need to get it right the first time, there may come a day in the future when you need a few tweaks to stay relevant. Nearly every brand mentioned in this blog has faced that eventuality during their long lives. How wonderful would it be for you to get your branding so right the first time that your company survives long enough to need a rebrand? Let’s make that happen.</p>
<p>Your branding design is only a small step on your marketing journey. See how it all fits together in my book, <a href="http://ift.tt/2ckU5nl" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2ckU5nl', 'Your Marketing Road Map']);" class="external" target="_blank"><em>Your Marketing Road Map</em></a>, available for presale now on Amazon.</p>
<p><a href="http://ift.tt/2ctwGxx" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2ctwGxx', 'Image source']);" class="external" target="_blank">Image source</a></p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/2bYErzL">Liz Papagni</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em>Driven by a passion for marketing and 25 years helping companies of all sizes drive awareness, engagement, response and ROI, I launched Marketing Initiative Worx to help companies and agencies drive their business by taking their marketing to the next level. I founded the company on the belief that defining a... <a href="http://ift.tt/2bYErzL">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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Making Design Choices to Fit Your Brand
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com103tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-58779357135842282072016-09-07T11:12:00.003-07:002016-09-07T11:12:47.713-07:003 Tips for Creating a Successful Customer Loyalty Program<p>Think about the companies you shop with on a daily, weekly, or even monthly basis. Each one of them probably has some kind of loyalty program that has you collecting points or receiving discounts. Even retail giant, Nordstrom, hopped on the customer loyalty bandwagon through adding a regular customer loyalty program outside of their exclusive loyalty debit and credit cards.</p>
<p>The fact that most retailers and brands are implementing customer loyalty programs is no coincidence. Adding a customer loyalty program has many benefits including:</p>
<ul>
<li>Boosting sales – With an incentive to earn rewards or discounts, customers are enticed to spend more in order to earn their benefits.</li>
<li>Happy customers – Shoppers expect to receive benefits from the companies they shop with. Whether you offer discounts, free products, or money back, everyone loves rewards which will keep customers coming back.</li>
<li>Reaching new markets – Loyalty programs allow you to reach the masses with discounts, but also provide you with a way to segment offers by affiliation such as student, military, teacher, employees, or even professionals in the industry.</li>
<li>Market research – By reaching out to different markets, you gain insight into important data such as what types of customers are shopping with you, what they are buying, where they are shopping, and how much they are spending.</li>
<li>Customer interaction – Having a loyalty program gives you the excuse to interact with your customers and keep them updated on your promotions and exclusive offers via email, mailings, SMS message, etc.</li>
</ul>
<p>While implementing a customer loyalty program may seem daunting, it’s not as hard as one might think and the benefits are worth it. Here are 3 pro tips to help create a success customer loyalty program:</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>Ask for the right information</strong> – While customers want access to your rewards and discounts, their personally identifiable data is not always worth giving up to save money. Stick to asking for simple information like name, email address, affiliations, or phone number and avoid getting too personal by asking for social security number or other highly secure information. In the survey <a href="http://ift.tt/2bUlywG" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bUlywG', 'College Student Buying Behaviors']);" class="external" target="_blank">College Student Buying Behaviors</a>, 88% of students said they would not be willing to give out their social security number in exchange for a discount.</li>
</ol>
<ol start="2">
<li><strong>Simple and consistent offers</strong> – There is nothing worse than signing up for a customer loyalty program and not knowing how it works. Complicated systems typically end in confused customers and frustrated employees. To ensure that your discounts and rewards are successful, make sure to implement an extremely basic system. Whether it’s one point in exchange for every dollar spent or 10% off every purchase, keeping everything transparent and consistent helps to avoid any misunderstandings.</li>
</ol>
<ol start="3">
<li><strong>Get exclusive</strong> – Offering general customer loyalty programs is great, but why not offer something extra special to the military, student, and teacher markets, or even your VIPs? Markets like teachers and the military love when companies give back by offering exclusive discounts and rewards as a thank you. In fact, <a href="http://ift.tt/2c5gX8d" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2c5gX8d', '84% of teachers and administrators said that they are more loyal to brands that offer teacher discounts.']);" class="external" target="_blank">84% of teachers and administrators said that they are more loyal to brands that offer teacher discounts.</a> With over 4 million educators in the US alone, that’s a huge market of potentially lifelong customers.</li>
</ol>
<p>Eligibility verification is a great way to make sure that your exclusive offers are only applied to the shopping carts of your customers who truly qualify. It also helps you to personalize your customer loyalty program like never before. Learn more about eligibility verification.</p>
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<p>Creating a successful customer loyalty program can be challenging, but asking for the right information, creating simple and consistent offers, and providing exclusive deals to target consumer groups will help to put you ahead of the competition and yield highly beneficial results.</p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/1L4W1Gh">Madeline Boehmer</a></h3>
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3 Tips for Creating a Successful Customer Loyalty Program
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-10934446079741695082016-09-07T11:12:00.001-07:002016-09-07T11:12:46.692-07:00The Apple Store’s Evolution of Customer Experience<p><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-1649636" src="http://ift.tt/2cCsAX5" alt="apple-customer-experience" width="600" height="462" /></p>
<p><span>Last month, Apple opened a</span> <a href="http://ift.tt/2aZiyuj" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2aZiyuj', 'new branch']);" class="external" target="_blank"><span>new branch</span></a> <span>of its retail stores in southern Manhattan. Apple World Trade Center welcomed huge crowds of zealous fans and customers, elated at the chance to sample the newest offering from the company. Considering the hype and magnitude of runway for any new Apple product, the enthusiasm displayed at the grand opening wasn’t unexpected.</span></p>
<p><span>The cheering crowds, meticulous building architecture, and grinning employees remained synonymous with the brand. Only one thing was different from previous such endeavors – the Apple</span> <em><span>Store</span></em> <span>had officially become the Apple</span> <em><span>store.</span></em></p>
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<h4><strong>The Significance of Proper Nouns: Value in Human Interaction</strong></h4>
<p><em><span>Wait, what?</span></em></p>
<p><span>Since May, with Apple’s new flagship store in San Francisco, all new retail stores have simply been named, “Apple,” plus the location. Apple Union Square, instead of Apple Store, Union Square. Apple Williamsburg. Apple World Trade Center. According to SVP of Retail,</span> <a href="http://ift.tt/2b3oQ0q" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2b3oQ0q', 'Angela Ahrendts']);" class="external" target="_blank"><span>Angela Ahrendts</span></a><span>, the company is focusing on making the stores “a community” rather than simply a retail space available for buying a new iPhone or MacBook.</span></p>
<p><em><span>Doesn’t this seem like a PR gimmick?</span></em></p>
<p><span>A gimmick, you say? Psh, only to the untrained Customer Experience eye! Upcoming changes to retail locations include decor revamps and the modification of the Genius Bar layout to allow customers (or non-customers) to gather at a location simply in a personal capacity. Remember that one library on campus that was</span> <em><span>the</span></em> <span>place to work, hang out, or meet up before an event? That’s what Apple wants to be, and to do so, an increase in human interaction must be made possible. Apple enthusiasts love to brag about the products, so providing them with a real, brick-and-mortar place to do it opens doors to customer loyalty and evangelism.</span></p>
<p><span>The best thing a brand can achieve is becoming so seamlessly integrated into a customer’s life, that buying from a competitor isn’t even an afterthought. Keeping that in mind, Apple’s new move is “genius”. Of course, there are moving pieces. Coming up with a clean focus for the Apple store brand with all its different purposes, from retail to Genius Bar support to community enrichment, will certainly be a challenge. If Ahrendts is successful in bringing more human interaction to the tech giant’s brand, however, this could be a revolutionary move in the company’s history.</span></p>
<h4><strong>What this Means for Apple’s Lauded Customer Experience</strong></h4>
<p><span>Apple has always been a</span> <a href="http://ift.tt/2b5M4k0" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2b5M4k0', 'front-runner']);" class="external" target="_blank"><span>front-runner</span></a> <span>in customer experience quality among its peers. What made the iPhone such a huge success? It customer-focused interface (ease-of-use) and the confidence that users have always had in the company’s ability to fix any problems with the product. This confidence is what makes the iPhone worth the relatively high initial investment.</span></p>
<p><span>It only makes sense, then, for the company’s next step to be to focus on strengthening this experience as the launch of the new MacBook Pro approaches. The applications of creating an in-house community could be endless.</span></p>
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The Apple Store’s Evolution of Customer Experience
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-20310415277201438632016-09-07T10:22:00.003-07:002016-09-07T10:22:37.147-07:005 Unexpected Advertising Alternatives to Drive New Business<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647213 size-medium" src="http://ift.tt/2cBFFNv" alt="AdobeStock_54354747.jpeg" width="600" height="336" /></p>
<p>Savvy internet users are getting REALLY good at blocking ad content. It all started with DVRs — after decades of watching commercials, we were finally able to skip right past the ads. And as consumers, we want that option everywhere. We consume content from Netflix, we install adblockers on our browsers, skip ads on YouTube, and purchase content directly to avoid extra ads. In 2015, the estimated number of active adblock users hit an estimated 198 MILLION.</p>
<p>So, that means that as marketers and business owners, we can’t rely on the same push tactics to get our ad messages in front of potential leads and customers. But, what options do we have? We’ve compiled a list of 5 unexpected advertising alternatives to help you break through and connect with your audience.</p>
<h2>1. Guest or Sponsored Content</h2>
<p>Do some research to find influential (non-competitor) blogs or websites in your industry. Many industry leadership blogs look for content from other industry leaders — if you are a well-known company with a well-established message, you might be able to get featured as a guest blogger without paying for it.</p>
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<p>If you can’t find a website that will let you submit a guest blog, sponsored content might be a great option. Craft a specific, actionable piece of content that helps solve specific problems and then pay for placement on a key industry website. The cost of the sponsored content should be proportional to the number of subscribers that will receive your content.</p>
<h2>2. SEO-Centric Blogs</h2>
<p>One of the greatest ways that you can get past adblockers is by creating organic, relevant content that meets customers where they are already searching. Look for opportunities to answer questions that prospective customers ask in the pre-purchase phases. Do keyword research to find the most relevant terms to optimize your blogs.</p>
<p>For most companies, this tactic is not a quick-fix, short-term solution, but instead, a long-term investment to serve content to users that is written for both Google and your target audience. Win win!</p>
<h2>3. Helpful Videos</h2>
<p>Creating helpful videos is a great way to rise above the noise of traditional advertising. Create video content that breaks the mold for your industry in some way. If customers are used to seeing advertisements pushing your products, focus on teaching viewers how to do something with your products. Give your audience creative and outside-the-box solutions to use your product in their everyday life.</p>
<h2>4. Incentive Sharing</h2>
<p>Stop promoting your own message and get happy customers to do it for you! I recently discovered Soothe, an app that allows you to book a massage and the therapist will come to your home (or whatever location you choose) within the next hour. It’s a little pricier than a normal massage, but the tip is also included. After my first appointment, I got an email that said I could share a $30 off coupon with my friends and if they booked an appointment, I would get a code for another $30 off for myself!</p>
<p>Incentive sharing is a great tactic that allows you to reward current customers while turning them into brand advocates that are always looking for opportunities to share about your products or services!</p>
<h2>5. Content Syndication</h2>
<p>Do you already have a library of great content and blogs but you aren’t getting the readership you really want? Look for opportunities to get your content syndicated through industry news sites. These sites will collect the RSS feed of relevant blogs and scan them, regularly looking for content they can republish. These types of websites are a great way to extend your reach to new viewers and also gain valuable referring links to your website.</p>
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5 Unexpected Advertising Alternatives to Drive New Business
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-16205017043852939842016-09-07T10:22:00.001-07:002016-09-07T10:22:36.320-07:00Who Should Own Sales Development: Sales or Marketing?<p><strong>Why can’t sales and marketing just get along?</strong> It would be in everyone’s best interest if we could all just sit down, sing <em>Kumbaya,</em> and share our peace pipe!</p>
<p>When you drill down into the complexities of each of their personalities, sales and marketing fall on both ends of the spectrum; either they are far too similar, or they are totally different. The key to their alliance, is finding a bridge between the two.</p>
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<h3>Where does the sales development team fit in?</h3>
<p>In most cases, the sales development team is sandwiched between sales and marketing. They are forced to bow to both departments, scrambling to meet each and every request. Rather than running around trying to keep both parties satisfied, sales development teams should act as a buffer, providing a voice of reason between the two departments. Sales development teams are an untapped resource in determining the true effectiveness of the teams they support. They are able to offer unbiased feedback (good or bad), and provide insight from both sides. They should be thought of as an internal consultant that can provide a <em>neutral</em> analysis on what is and isn’t working.</p>
<h3>Does that mean a new department needs to be created?</h3>
<p>One way to bridge the gap between the two departments, is by creating a third department independent of sales and marketing. What should we call this department? This is where it gets tricky. The problem is that we all have different terms for this function. Marketing tends to call it “Demand Generation”, and sales prefers to call it “Opportunity Generation”. As a result, it creates a shared ownership issue which can lead to the problem of each department wanting to dictate their own agenda into the program. The “Lead Generation” Department does not sound particularly sexy, but it doesn’t gravitate towards either marketing or sales, which is exactly the stance of the sales development team. Building a team that is neutral is the way to go.</p>
<h3>Where to start</h3>
<p>If you’re considering building a sales development team, you need to start by identifying where they sit within your org chart. In a perfect world, all three departments—Sales, Marketing, and Sales Development, would all report up to the same department head whether that be a CRO or CEO. Once it is determined where the sales development team will live, it is time to dictate what their responsibilities will include. What tasks will they handle for marketing? What function will they serve to the sales team?</p>
<p>There is no cookie cutter template of what a sales development team should look like, nor what their responsibilities should entail. Every team is different, and needs around marketing and sales vary from company to company. The one thing that can be derived here, is that having a sales development team can help sales and marketing <em>play a little nicer</em>.</p>
<p>What are your thoughts? Is sales development better off answering to sales, marketing, or both?</p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/1njruQQ">Craig Ferrara</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em>Craig Ferrara is a Director of Client Operations at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://ift.tt/1gxlQ7t" class="external" target="_blank">AG Salesworks</a>. He joined the company in 2004 as a Business Development Manager, transitioned to Client Account Manager, and was promoted to his current position in 2007. Craig’s daily responsibilities include inside sales team oversight, reporting, training, ongoing contact list... <a href="http://ift.tt/1njruQQ">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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Who Should Own Sales Development: Sales or Marketing?
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-72652386394664174552016-09-07T10:11:00.003-07:002016-09-07T10:11:44.556-07:005 Questions SaaS Sales Leaders Should Ask Themselves<p>Many believe that “sales is sales,” and that the fundamentals of the process are the same whether you traffic in agricultural commodities or commercial jet aircraft. It’s true in a sense; the basic requirements of a successful sales strategy remain the same regardless of the product, including connecting with a customer, communicating value, and understanding their pain points. That doesn’t mean however, that different industries don’t experience their own unique complications on top of those fundamentals, and this is certainly true when you consider sales operations within SaaS startups.</p>
<p>The SaaS industry has emerged so quickly and evolves at a rapid pace, making it hard to stick to any one sales playbook for an indefinite period. This can lead many SaaS sales leaders to question what specific circumstances related to their industry affect their processes the most. In order to build upon sales best practices that you would incorporate in any type of company and create specific avenues for maximizing your success in SaaS sales, these are the five questions you should be asking about your strategy.</p>
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<h2>1. Does our training program emphasize the ability to create powerful long-distance connections?</h2>
<p>Unless you’re in the minority, your SaaS organization probably focuses entirely on inside sales to grow your business. For this reason, SaaS sales reps are often required to create a lasting connection with prospects having never met face-to-face. Some sales professionals inherently excel at forging a long-distance connection, while others rely more on the non-verbal cues and other dynamics that make in-person communication unique. It doesn’t mean that they’re ineffective salespeople, it just means that your organization needs to take extra care to set them up to succeed in this environment.</p>
<h2>2. Could we get more reliable results by switching to account-based sales?</h2>
<p>It seems like the <a href="http://ift.tt/28O4s0a" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/28O4s0a', 'account-based sales model']);" class="external" target="_blank">account-based sales model</a> is on every B2B organization’s mind these days, and this is especially true when it comes to SaaS startups. Products and organizational structures are both increasing in complexity, which has led to an <a href="http://ift.tt/1U7YPuU" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1U7YPuU', 'increase in the number of key decision-makers']);" class="external" target="_blank">increase in the number of key decision-makers</a> in any B2B purchasing decision. By allowing sales reps to service an entire company and try to grow revenue from within it rather than expending energy and resources going after leads that have a much lower likelihood of materializing, you may be able to scale your growth more dynamically. Not only are clients more often satisfied, since they can get reliably excellent service from their point-person no matter who in the company makes contact, but the sales reps typically find it to be preferable as well. They can leverage previously-established relationships at the company to drive revenue, and use every tool in their sales toolbox to deliver a unique, customized experience for the client.</p>
<h2>3. Are we focusing on improving the metrics that the board really cares about?</h2>
<p>At the end of the day, the board of directors is going to have a significant say in the future of the company, and it’s up to SaaS sales leaders to deliver results in the metrics they care about (which aren’t necessarily the ones that are prized within the sales department). While sales managers at other types of businesses can often focus on low-level KPIs such as new bookings or opportunity win rate, the board likely wants to look at big-picture results that impact the long-term prospects of the organization in various ways. They’ll be paying attention to revenue growth, of course, but they’re also probably going to scrutinize the churn rate of clients. Studies have shown that <a href="http://ift.tt/VfVbzi" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/VfVbzi', 'minimizing churn, or even getting to negative rates of churn']);" class="external" target="_blank">minimizing churn, or even getting to negative rates of churn</a>, can lead to exponentially-higher valuation rates for SaaS companies.</p>
<h2>4. Is our hiring process optimized to produce technologically-savvy, adaptable SaaS sales reps?</h2>
<p>While every sales rep has to be fluent in the language of their industry in order to be successful, SaaS requires an even more specialized level of technical comfort. Both the types of products, and the customers’ buying environments change rapidly in the SaaS world, and sales reps must be able to learn new technological processes and adapt quickly in order to stay ahead of the curve.</p>
<h2>5. Does the customer onboarding program create opportunities to deliver an outstanding customer experience?</h2>
<p>The customer onboarding period is crucial for building long-term client relationships in SaaS, and the sales department needs to take an active role in helping to ensure that customers receive the best experience with the products. It’s important to train sales reps to get intimately involved in the onboarding process through various measures, such as soliciting feedback from the customers to build a better process, and coordinating requests and events across several different business units. Building a great onboarding program can help you reduce churn and maximize revenue from an existing account.</p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/1QuL06L">Danny Wong</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em><a rel="nofollow" href="http://dannywong.me/" class="external" target="_blank">Danny Wong</a> is an entrepreneur, marketer and writer. He is the co-founder of <a rel="nofollow" href="http://ift.tt/1lkaIsG" class="external" target="_blank">Blank Label</a>, an award-winning luxury menswear company, and leads marketing for <a rel="nofollow" href="https://receiptful.com/" class="external" target="_blank">Receiptful</a>, a platform to supercharge all customer interactions for eCommerce stores, and <a rel="nofollow" href="http://ift.tt/1CzGRoe" class="external" target="_blank">Tenfold</a>, a seamless click-to-dial solution for high-performance sales teams.... <a href="http://ift.tt/1QuL06L">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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5 Questions SaaS Sales Leaders Should Ask Themselves
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-49157637731909067422016-09-07T10:11:00.001-07:002016-09-07T10:11:43.874-07:006 Key Demand Generation Lessons Learned from Gated-Content Testing<p><img class="size-full wp-image-1648827 alignright" src="http://ift.tt/2cp0bl9" alt="6_lessons_gated_content.png" width="309" />In a previous post, <a href="http://ift.tt/2cC9pMP" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cC9pMP', 'Gated Content Marketing Strategy: Adding Steps Boosted Results 2X']);" class="external" target="_blank">Gated Content Marketing Strategy: Adding Steps Boosted Results 2X</a>, I discussed how adding steps to the conversion process went against traditional demand generation thinking, and actually created an increase in conversions.</p>
<p>Let’s take this concept a few steps further and discuss ways a gated-content strategy can help complement your entire lead generation funnel.</p>
<h3><strong>Key lessons learned:</strong></h3>
<ol readability="14.200988700565">
<li readability="5"><strong>Think about content as a free trial product.</strong> Your demand funnel does not always need to lead to the sale of your product or service. Spend time thinking about your name acquisition funnel, then apply a nurture funnel to those names to educate them and lead them through the sales process.
<p>When you begin to treat content as a free trial product, it changes the buying steps in the process so that you truly focus your funnel on content downloads. Once you’ve crossed that milestone, and you begin to build a strong prospect list, it’s time to nurture the leads and bring them into your buying funnel.</p>
</li>
<li><strong>Give before you get.</strong> What are you giving the prospect before you ask them to give you something? Before asking a prospect to pay you with their data, offer them additional useful content to help develop a stronger affinity. Being more generous in what you give can increase what you get in return.</li>
<li><strong>Know the goal for each funnel, and it’s OK to have multiple funnels.</strong> Are you immediately trying to sell product or are you inviting people into your inner circle? Consider several macro funnels for prospects and customers, along with numerous micro funnels (nurture funnels) based on various behaviors, activities and characteristics. Know the motivations of your end customer and how you can help make their life easier.</li>
<li readability="6"><strong>If you have a channel sales strategy, be aware of the small nuances that may require tweaks to your marketing funnel strategy.</strong> Pay attention to both your to-channel and through-channel conversion funnels. Your channel sellers have different motivations than your end user customers – i.e., channel sellers may place a higher emphasis on you as a thought leadership source to keep them educated and informed, which will increase their propensity to sell and recommend your products.
<p>It’s important to be generous in what you give, so that you will get something in return. When working within a channel strategy, and you’re “influencing the influencers,” there may not always be an immediate or direct correlation to the outbound activities you execute. You may need to develop more patience in your demand marketing and sales funnel, and think of it as an investment over time.</p>
</li>
<li readability="3.8010204081633"><strong>Develop your plan for third-party leads along with your own database development.</strong> <a href="http://ift.tt/2cp1lwW" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cp1lwW', 'Working with third-party lead providers']);" class="external" target="_blank">Working with third-party lead providers</a> can help bring volume and consistency to your funnels, and allow you to reach audiences who haven’t heard about you yet. When building your own customer database, the work is never done.
<p>All leads age, and prospects move in and out of the buying cycle. Work with your third-party providers to ask custom qualifying questions to further segment your leads. You will pay a higher cost-per-lead fee upfront, but it will cost you less to achieve the sale due to the higher sales conversions which result in a more cost effective ROI. I’ve seen clients drive their ROI from 4x to 10x by asking qualifying questions on the front end of the lead generation process.</p>
</li>
<li readability="7.4962962962963"><strong>Don’t forget about post-sale nurture funnels to drive retention.</strong> Once a prospect becomes a customer, it’s important to continue to the conversations, the conversions/upsells and drive retention.
<p>While you may choose to manage this communication through an in-app notification process vs an <a href="http://ift.tt/1LV5jd2" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1LV5jd2', 'outbound marketing automation tool']);" class="external" target="_blank">outbound marketing automation tool</a>, you still need to create the strategy with a marketing funnel mindset (i.e., create logical flows and offers, upsells, etc. based on customer actions or in-actions, then track response, and optimize as you go.)</p>
</li>
</ol>
<p>It’s important to have a cohesive gated content strategy, serving as the doorway to the beginning of the process in a complete prospect and customer funnel.</p>
<p><a href="http://ift.tt/2c4BQAi" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2c4BQAi', ' ']);" class="cta_button external" target="_blank"><img class=" wp-image-1648830 hs-cta-img aligncenter" src="http://ift.tt/2cp1Abr" alt="ultimate-guide-content-distribution" width="608" height="216" /></a></p>
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6 Key Demand Generation Lessons Learned from Gated-Content Testing
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com42tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-18620478133420883902016-09-07T09:22:00.003-07:002016-09-07T09:22:53.269-07:00How to Gather Data For Your Next Website Redesign<p><img class="wp-image-1649459" src="http://ift.tt/2cksYc4" alt="gather-data-next-website-redesign.jpg" width="723" height="296" /></p>
<p>According to HubSpot, <a href="http://ift.tt/2ct6piL" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2ct6piL', '38 percent of people will stop engaging with a website if the content or layout is unattractive.']);" class="external" target="_blank">38 percent of people will stop engaging with a website if the content or layout is unattractive.</a></p>
<p>We all know how important your website’s design is. Whether it’s making a good impression with new leads and prospects or serving and adding value for existing customers, your central hub on the web needs to look good, and more importantly, help you advance your business objectives and not hold you back.</p>
<p>But sometimes your best guesses about what works can fall flat. Making decisions is easier with data and a Growth-Driven Design methodology. Making assumptions about your audience and testing out your theories can lead to some valuable findings, but data spells things out in black and white—giving you actionable insights into what you can do to make your website experience more attractive and effective. And wouldn’t you rather meet and even exceed audience expectations than to underwhelm them?</p>
<p><strong>Here is how to gather data for your next website redesign.</strong></p>
<h2>What Is Growth-Driven Design?</h2>
<p>If traditional website construction was about designing based on theories and crossing your fingers at launch, <a href="http://ift.tt/2cktk2t">Growth-Driven Design</a> (GDD) is built on data and analysis. Even though you might still start with a website developed on hunches and gut-level instincts, it evolves with the close monitoring of your audience and ongoing tweaking.</p>
<p>In traditional models of website redesign, many organizations implemented redesigns in one fell swoop, often exceeding budgets and failing to meet deadlines as a result. GDD is an evolutionary approach, a process that happens in phases, making it more manageable.</p>
<p>The benefits of GDD are that you’ll be able to manage your timeline and budget goals, making them more achievable. It’s about taking one step at a time, not about getting it all done and waiting another three to five years to start planning the next website makeover.</p>
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<p>So how do you gather the data you need for a data-driven redesign? Read on.</p>
<h2>Gather Persona Feedback</h2>
<p>Copywriter <a href="http://ift.tt/1LD1OYr" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1LD1OYr', 'Marc Schenker']);" class="external" target="_blank">Marc Schenker</a> states, “If you’re designing a site with a main focus solely on fancy features, business objectives and the tech capacities of software tools and hardware, then you’re making a huge mistake because you’re neglecting the user. More importantly, you are contravening rule one of web design: <a href="http://ift.tt/1xELMo9" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1xELMo9', 'Design for the user experience']);" class="external" target="_blank">Design for the user experience</a>.”</p>
<p><a href="http://ift.tt/2ct6kvp">Interview your buyer personas</a> and delve deeper into them. How are they interacting with your website? What are they saying about it? Why do they leave your site? Why do they stay on it?</p>
<p>What you discover may not be pretty. They may tell you that your website is boring or clunky. Others may tell you that the navigation is unclear, or that they didn’t even know you were building out a new feature (even if you invested significant time and effort into the project).</p>
<p>These things can be hard to hear, but they help you discover the disconnect between user behavior and business objectives. The feedback you get from your target audience will ultimately prove invaluable to your website strategy.</p>
<h2>A/B Split Test</h2>
<p>A/B split tests give you valuable data you can use in your GDD process. Everything from call-to-action buttons, navigation, images, content upgrades and signup buttons to headlines, hyperlinks and other website elements all will be tested for their overall efficacy.</p>
<p>Siddharth Deswal at <a href="https://vwo.com/" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'https://vwo.com/', 'Visual Website Optimizer']);" class="external" target="_blank">Visual Website Optimizer</a> notes, “<a href="http://ift.tt/1E1iMIJ" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1E1iMIJ', 'A/B split testing has this interesting tendency to throw up results that are markedly opposite to intuition']);" class="external" target="_blank">A/B split testing has this interesting tendency to throw up results that are markedly opposite to intuition</a> and the design sense of a professional designer.”</p>
<p>What you think is right for your site may not produce the highest conversions or best results. Though you will never “nail down” your audience 100 percent, constant testing provides you with valuable data in the ongoing evolution of your website.</p>
<h2>Employ Heatmaps</h2>
<p>A heatmap is a tool you can use to track visitor behavior—where their eyes or mouse are traveling. By paying attention to the data you collect, you can determine what elements on your website are getting noticed, and which are being ignored. With this information in hand, you can figure out which sections of your website you need to improve.</p>
<p>Are your visitors seeing what you want them to miss, or missing what you want them to see? What could you purge from your site to clean it up and eliminate what isn’t essential? What could you do to make important elements stand out more? What could you do to get visitors to click on what you want them to click on?</p>
<p>Employing heatmaps will help you see what your visitors are paying attention to most on your site.</p>
<h2>Do Your Keyword Research</h2>
<p>Keyword research is another valuable source of data in your website design strategy.</p>
<p>In addition to the words searchers are using to find your business, you can also uncover the terms they are using to find your specific product or service offerings.</p>
<p>It’s easy to make assumptions about how people are finding you in search, but do you actually know? If your website uses industry-specific terminology to describe your products and services, you could be leaving a lot of money on the table. It’s important to understand not only how your prospects and customers are finding your business, but what terms they’re using to describe your services and products.</p>
<h2>Making GDD Work</h2>
<p>With Growth-Driven Design, there isn’t necessarily an end. You can keep learning about your audience, monitor key performance indicators, deploy adjustments and repeat the process indefinitely. But this is ultimately what’s most valuable about this approach—you’re not relying on a costly and time-consuming site-wide redesign to boost your sales—you’re making smaller changes in phases. This helps you to adapt continually, and that’s key because your visitors are moving targets, and their behaviors will keep on changing.</p>
<p><strong>To learn more about the comprehensive strategy for building high-performance websites, <a href="http://ift.tt/2ct6Nhi">check out this guide</a>.</strong></p>
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How to Gather Data For Your Next Website Redesign
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-2337970223399575452016-09-07T09:22:00.001-07:002016-09-07T09:22:52.221-07:00Geofencing As A Marketing Strategy – Learn From 8 Businesses Who Are Profiting From Geofencing<p><img class="size-full wp-image-1648764 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2cksRxe" alt="shutterstock_418431805" width="700" height="467" /></p>
<p>Have you gotten into your car after work when an instant traffic report for your commute home suddenly pops up on your phone? If this is not a phenomenon you’ve experienced yet, look for useful insights like these and many others to start showing up on your mobile device out of the blue.</p>
<p>It’s called geofencing, and studies show that this locally optimized approach to reaching customers boasts <a href="http://ift.tt/XI2tCN" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/XI2tCN', ' double the click through rate']);" class="external" target="_blank">double the click through rate</a> of normal mobile advertising. If you are a small business owner, you need to get on board with this marketing marvel right away. It’s an easy and affordable solution to engage your customers and grow your bottom line.</p>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648765 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2ct6KBT" alt="Blog 1" width="834" height="520" /></p>
<p>(Screenshot credit: <a href="http://ift.tt/16n1dbX" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/16n1dbX', ' Search Engine Land']);" class="external" target="_blank">Search Engine Land</a>)</p>
<h4><strong>Why You Should Adopt a Geofencing Marketing Approach</strong></h4>
<p>First of all, with any new and emerging technology, you need to see the evidence to support the hype. Data drives decisions, and in this case, the <a href="http://ift.tt/16n1dbX" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/16n1dbX', ' numbers speak volumes']);" class="external" target="_blank">numbers speak volumes</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li>60% of consumers look for local information on their mobile devices.</li>
<li>40% of consumers look for information while on the go.</li>
<li>70% of consumers are willing to share their location with you for something in return.</li>
<li>Secondary Action Rates–meaning people visit a store or take some other additional action after seeing an ad–are more than 2x as likely to occur with location-based marketing.</li>
<li>Home and trade services rank among the industries that receive the highest secondary action rates.</li>
</ul>
<h4><strong>How Can This Location Data Help Me?</strong></h4>
<p>How can you use this exciting and versatile technology in your business? There are many ways you can use geofencing to help increase customer interactions, employee productivity, accountability, and profits, as well as keep your property and assets safe.</p>
<p>The first step is to develop a mobile app that supports this technology. From there, the possibilities are endless. Just look at what ground-breaking steps are being made within businesses who have begun to use geofencing.</p>
<h4><strong>North Face Uses Geofencing to Boost Sales with Creative Alerts</strong></h4>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648766 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2cktwyx" alt="blog 2" width="873" height="593" /></p>
<p>North Face is one of the big guns when it comes to outdoor apparel. One of the reasons the brand is so successful is because it’s not afraid to experiment with new technology.</p>
<p>The company recently experimented with geofencing as a means to lure customers to their stores by using push notifications about the weather. Their weather-based geofenced alerts have been quite successful. The company boasts a 79% increase in store visits from customers who receive the alerts, and 65% of those customers make purchases.</p>
<p>There’s a lot you can learn from the marketing team over at the North Face—even if your business is on a much smaller scale. First of all, studies suggest that when a user isn’t surfing the web on his or her phone, he or she is likely to spend <a href="http://ift.tt/1dWmBc8" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1dWmBc8', ' 86% of smartphone time using apps']);" class="external" target="_blank">86% of smartphone time using apps</a>.</p>
<p>Pay attention to how the big guys are playing the mobile game—there’s a lot to learn, and in a digital world, your small business can compete. More importantly, don’t ignore a powerful resource because you don’t understand it—learn what’s new, and learn how to apply it to your business.</p>
<h4><strong>BMW Uses Geofencing to Offer Quality Customer Service</strong></h4>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648767 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2ct6jHR" alt="blog 3" width="837" height="558" /></p>
<p>BMW has also employed geofencing into their mobile business plan—in a rather different manner than most. Where most companies are using geofencing as a tool for garnering consumer attention with flashy promotions, BMW’s use is a little more pragmatic.</p>
<p>BMW incorporates geofencing in their BMW Trackstar and BMW Trackstar Advance services. After the activation of this service, your car’s position is pinpointed every 20 seconds. If the car is moved without the use of its keys, and the car moves out of a designated geofence, it will notify BMW who will then reach out to the car’s owner.</p>
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<p>Again, as a small business owner, you can learn a lot from BMW with regard to the customer service potentials of a geofence. You may not have the theft of an expensive car to worry about in your business, but you do have customers who need product protection, communication, and reliability. With about <a href="http://ift.tt/1Nu09GN" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1Nu09GN', ' 90% of customers']);" class="external" target="_blank">90% of customers</a> expecting some sort of self-service customer support, investing in the right solution will place your brand in your customers’ good graces.</p>
<h4><strong>Walgreens Uses Geofencing as a Means of Customer Retention</strong></h4>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648768 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2ckuj2D" alt="blog 4" width="874" height="583" /></p>
<p>Attracting customers is one thing but retaining them is another story entirely. Studies suggest that <a href="http://ift.tt/2c4Y1VC" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2c4Y1VC', ' 83% of millennial']);" class="external" target="_blank">83% of millennial</a>s connect with brands that appeal to their digital needs, and of that 83%, <a href="http://ift.tt/2bWaYDN" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bWaYDN', ' 62% become brand loyal customers']);" class="external" target="_blank">62% become brand loyal customers</a>.</p>
<p>Walgreens is using mobile marketing as a way to build trust and eventually promote brand loyalty in its customers through geofencing. Whenever a customer pulls into a fenced location a notification allows the user to open the app without having to look for it. After that, customers can scroll through their account details or view promotional offers.</p>
<p>Clearly the data shows that loyalty programs are a must for today’s consumers. Your business can mirror Walgreen’s direction when you add a geofence to your mobile app.</p>
<p>This specific approach to mobile marketing gives the user an experience of exactly “what they want when they want it” which is a hard feat to achieve in marketing. Service without interruption promotes customer loyalty.</p>
<h4><strong>Uber Uses Geofencing for Proactivity</strong></h4>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648769 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2ct5HlA" alt="blog 5" width="859" height="573" /></p>
<p>Following the lead of tech-giants around the world, Uber has also delved into using geofences. Uber uses geofences at Los Angeles International airport so that when users arrive at the airport they are notified about the number of cars available to meet their needs. This allows geofences to serve as a means of providing proactive customer services.</p>
<p>If you are in the travel niche, you can learn a lot from Uber’s proactive approach to catering to potential consumers. But, even if you are not in the travel businesses, thinking about ways to let your customers know you have what they need when they need it most is a great way to use the geofencing capabilities of your business’ mobile app.</p>
<p>It’s important to note that <a href="http://ift.tt/1RfKzvl" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1RfKzvl', ' 82% of businesses see quality information']);" class="external" target="_blank">82% of businesses see quality information</a> as the most important component of a customer’s experience. That means that your competitors are looking for ways to provide clients with the information they need. You need to stay competitive, and a lesson from Uber’s proactive geofences can certainly put you ahead of your competitors.</p>
<h4><strong>Honeywell’s Geofencing Approach to Going Green</strong></h4>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648770 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2cksSRR" alt="blog 6" width="867" height="578" /></p>
<p>Honeywell’s Lyric is a smart thermostat that uses geofencing to detect the presence of people in the room. It turns the heat on and off depending upon the presence of people in an area so that power can be saved.</p>
<p>People want to make the world a better place. There’s no better way to bring your brand into the limelight than aligning it with a noble cause that does just that—especially <a href="http://ift.tt/1RktUWL" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1RktUWL', ' since 95% of students']);" class="external" target="_blank">since 95% of students</a> say they are less likely to ignore ads or promotions that show a brand’s relationship with a good cause.</p>
<p>If you can set up a geofence to bolster your cause, your business is certain to reap the marketing benefits—and so will your cause.</p>
<h4><strong>American Eagle’s Geofencing Marketing Endeavors</strong></h4>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648771 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2ct6Rxm" alt="blog 7" width="872" height="654" /></p>
<p>American Eagle set its sights on foot traffic to boost sales at its outlet stores. The clothing giant sent customers who entered geofenced outlet mall parking lot notifications and promotions. The incentives led customers into the door of American Eagle vs. its competitors. The result was a <a href="http://ift.tt/2bWaZYn" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bWaZYn', ' threefold increase']);" class="external" target="_blank">threefold increase</a> in purchases.</p>
<p>As a business owner, you can learn from American Eagle’s success in sending push notifications. If you own a brick in mortar store, an incentive when people are in the vicinity is certain to remind them of something they need or want–let them know you have it when they are close. If American Eagle’s efforts show you anything, it is that paired with the right location, technology can minimize marketing legwork while maximizing customers’ responses—thus making marketing campaigns that much more effective.</p>
<p>Simply put, use the data to track your users’ behaviors. Then, build the right type of geofenced marketing campaign, and let your app do the work for you. The data shows it works.</p>
<h4><strong>Taco Bell Reaches the Right Crowd with Its Geofence</strong></h4>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648772 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2cktdE2" alt="blog 8" width="876" height="631" /></p>
<p>Taco Bell’s app is a crucial tool in their geofencing marketing plan. Its mobile ordering feature entices users to download it. With the app in place, hungry customers can order from their phones and then simply go pick up their food—no wait.</p>
<p>After consumers have downloaded the app, the restaurant utilizes geofencing as a way of targeting people under 30 years old with push notifications whenever they are in the vicinity of a Taco Bell. A quick reminder that they can order food from their phone and pick it up two miles down the road was a great way to appeal to the “Want it Now” generation.</p>
<p>Taco Bell recognized its consumer base, used the right tools to communicate with it, and showed an <a href="http://ift.tt/1Ga0aWI" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1Ga0aWI', ' increase in their annual sales of 6%']);" class="external" target="_blank">increase in their annual sales of 6%</a>.</p>
<p>Marketing to the right crowd is business 101. With the right tools, your small business can send notifications to your customers without breaking the bank. All you need is a mobile app with geofencing capabilities.</p>
<h4><strong>History Channel</strong></h4>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648773 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2ct6fIc" alt="blog 9" width="854" height="475" /></p>
<p>In order to keep up with the times, the History Channel has also begun to utilize geofencing in its Foursquare Campaign. This ground breaking idea gives history buffs something they yearn for—historical facts. In order to connect with its viewers, the History Channel setup geofences, so when any user checks into a particular historical location on Foursquare – say the White House of the Eiffel Tower – he or she gets historical facts about the place. The campaign generated a <a href="http://ift.tt/1iCNEaJ" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1iCNEaJ', ' surprising 400 million check-ins']);" class="external" target="_blank">surprising 400 million check-ins</a>.</p>
<p>Again the brainiacs at the History Channel can teach you a lot more than history. As a business owner, you can copy their thinking and use geofences to provide strong competition to similar nearby businesses and attract their consumer base. You can setup your fences so that users going towards your competitors are notified about your businesses promotions so that you can lure customers away from the competition.</p>
<h4><strong>Conclusions</strong></h4>
<p>It is safe to say that geofencing is powerful and affordable way to reach consumers. As an SMB, your growing business can easily learn to keep up with the big brand competition. Simply paying attention to how their marketing gurus are adopting geofencing into their mobile marketing plans can give you great insights to what your business is capable of achieving.</p>
<p>Any affordable option is worth exploring, and when you build an app equipped with geofencing capabilities, you are setting yourself up to stay current and competitive.</p>
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Geofencing As A Marketing Strategy – Learn From 8 Businesses Who Are Profiting From Geofencing
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-46514232515660489922016-09-07T08:41:00.003-07:002016-09-07T08:41:58.816-07:00Inbound and Outbound Marketing – What’s the Difference?<p><img class="size-full wp-image-1648743 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2bYiXjG" alt="In v Out WordPress" /></p>
<p>It is not easy to try to think of a world before the internet, and in the world of marketing that is even trickier. The evolution of the internet as a marketing tool has changed the way that marketers execute their marketing and changed the way that audiences experience and interact with that marketing.</p>
<p>Every day people see around 5,000 brand messages. What?! Well, that number includes branded labelling if you walk into a grocery store, but if we are just talking exposure to adverts, we see around 400……per day.</p>
<p>With that level of exposure, people have become very sophisticated when it comes to consuming media and marketing. People’s expectations from marketing have become higher: they expect to be ente rtained with something different and, where appropriate, expect marketing to be personalised to their individual needs.</p>
<p>These expectations are driven by the level of control that the audience now has. It is pretty easy to opt out of digital communications with unsubscribe options on every (legitimate!) email, and free ad blockers readily available.</p>
<p>So with these key changes to consumer behaviour in mind, what are the differences between inbound and outbound marketing?</p>
<p><strong>Inbound Marketing:</strong></p>
<p>Inbound marketing is marketing which is designed to engage with a specific audience and to pull the audience towards your company and product/service. It typically has the following characteristics:</p>
<ul>
<li>Customer comes to you: the customer will seek out your business and give you permission to communicate with them, something that would have been virtually impossible in pre-internet marketing.</li>
<li>Content is well targeted: inbound marketing allows the audience to be very highly targeted. The best inbound marketing is talking to people who are receptive to the marketing messages as a result of a highly targeted campaign – the ultimate version of this is personalised content, e.g. Amazon’s personalised recommendations based on previous purchases and search history.</li>
<li>Content is interactive: the audience has the opportunity to respond to marketing messages and often does. This opens up a two-way dialogue between the audience and the company, used to discuss both positive and negative experiences.</li>
<li>Content doesn’t (always) sell: the content is varied and is not centred on how amazing and unique your product is. Instead, the content is designed to inform, entertain or interest the audience. This builds the audience’s trust and makes the likelihood of a future conversion greater.</li>
<li>Content is geared around the broader interests of the audience: to attract the audience, inbound marketers recognise that their content needs to be broader than just their product/service – it needs to answer some of the wider-ranging questions that their audience are asking.</li>
<li>Easy to opt out of: the ease at which the audience can opt out of conversations means that those who are listening should be very engaged and almost looking for your content. This leads to great conversion rates.</li>
<li>Results are measurable: not only will you be able to see where people have come from when they find out about your business, you will also be able to tell which channels are working best for you in terms of conversion. OK, so this does take some infrastructure work to get in place, but it is very possible. Also, results are available almost immediately depending on the tool that you are using – you can use the metrics for the tool to understand whether a campaign is working or not within hours and tweak it accordingly.</li>
<li>You own the media: assuming that you keep working on the optimisation of your content, that content will be around forever. You own the media that it is published on and the content itself. With continued SEO investment, it will remain visible so that the content can keep working and working.</li>
<li>Tools which can be classed as inbound marketing include:
<ul>
<li>Search Engine Optimisation – audience segments itself through its keyword query</li>
<li>Pay per Click advertising – audience segments via keyword search as well as by location, device, geography, etc.</li>
<li>Display advertising / remarketing – but only if it is highly targeted, otherwise this is outbound marketing</li>
<li>Social media – the ultimate example of where the audience comes to you and asks to receive your content by clicking ‘like’ or ‘follow’</li>
<li>Email marketing – only if it is opt-in, not a paid database of unsuspecting recipients</li>
<li>Blogs, webinars, sound clouds, podcasts, etc. – all designed to attract audiences to your business, and put on the web for your audience to find</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Outbound Marketing:</strong><br />
Outbound marketing is marketing which is pushed out to the audience in the hope that some of the target audience will capture the message and act upon it. It is sometimes defined as anything that isn’t digital, but that is not accurate: not all digital marketing is inbound marketing – everyone receives random emails, right? Here are some characteristics of outbound marketing:</p>
<ul>
<li>Not everyone asks for it: due to the ‘push’ nature of outbound marketing, not everyone is receptive to the message: particularly with today’s audience, they may feel that they have not asked for it and as such should not receive it. You may well end up communicating to someone who isn’t interested at all.</li>
<li>Targeting is tough: targeting is not non-existent for outbound marketing, but it is very difficult: for example, a billboard is targeted geographically but not by age, gender, income, family status, social grouping, etc.</li>
<li>Costs are high: audiences tend to be larger because in order to find the target audience, the net needs to be cast very wide – you could upset a lot of the collateral audience who have no interest.</li>
<li>Difficult to say no: to opt out of certain outbound marketing is nearly impossible (e.g. TV) and even opting out of direct mail and telephone marketing can be very difficult.</li>
<li>Measurement is vague: unless you have enormous scale and can track brand awareness / recall / association, you will need to ask someone how they heard about your business. But who’s to say that they will provide an accurate answer? And if they say ‘internet’, do they mean your website, a review website, a social media site, a Google organic search, a display ad, a Google PPC ad, etc.</li>
<li>Desperate times: in order to attract a decreasing and mostly disengaged audience, the marketing tends to be dominated by rather desperate ‘buy now’, ‘huge savings’ and similar ‘sale’ messages – which ironically turn people off from marketing.</li>
<li>You rent the medium: when the newspaper becomes out-of-date or the direct mail is thrown in the recycling, the message has died – the following day there will be a new message in its place. You are only renting the space, your competitor could be in it tomorrow.</li>
<li>Outbound marketing tools include the more traditional marketing: radio advertising, TV, newspapers and magazines, direct mail, billboards, event sponsorship and trade shows. However, it also includes some online tools: poorly targeted online display advertising and using paid or rented email databases<br />
Summary</li>
</ul>
<p>Marketing has changed dramatically over the last 15 years, and will continue to evolve. The rise of inbound and content marketing has made outbound marketing look an out-dated and speculative way of finding customers. But that’s not to say that outbound marketing is dead: there is still a lot of money being spent on outbound marketing.</p>
<p>But not necessarily smart money. According to <a href="http://ift.tt/1mANequ" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1mANequ', 'Hubspot’s 2014 State of Inbound Report']);" target="_blank" class="external">Hubspot’s 2014 State of Inbound Report</a>, the cost per lead for businesses employing 1-25 people for inbound marketing is $37 – for outbound marketing it is $102.</p>
<p>The modern marketing emphasis on content drives the requirement for visibility of that content. People are using search engines to ask questions (why else would Google invest so much trying to understand the context of search), so if you do a great job on SEO for your content, then your answers to the keyword queries will appear in front of the audience…time and time again.</p>
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<p>What are your views on inbound and outbound marketing? How is your marketing budget split between the two, and what are the reasons why you would use one over the other? Is your industry still using traditional marketing tools when digital ones would do a better job? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.</p>
<p>Image via Obey Marketing Group</p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/23kww0z">Justin Wilson</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em>Justin is a Digital Marketing consultant based in Manchester, UK. He helps his clients harness digital tools to achieve their broader strategic marketing objectives... <a href="http://ift.tt/23kww0z">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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Inbound and Outbound Marketing – What’s the Difference?
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-77766965806293951642016-09-07T08:41:00.001-07:002016-09-07T08:41:56.633-07:00Most Important KPIs by Funnel Stage: Consideration<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647147 size-large" title="group of businesspeople looking at graphs pinned on a wall and considering their options" src="http://ift.tt/2cBX4bK" alt="group of businesspeople looking at graphs pinned on a wall and considering their options" width="900" height="431" /></p>
<p>As you’re preparing your marketing budget for the next year, you’ll need to understand the effectiveness of your marketing efforts at each stage of the sales funnel—at the Awareness, Consideration, and Decision stages. Knowing where you’re succeeding and what areas need the most attention in the next year will help guide your budgeting decisions.</p>
<p>We’ve already walked you through <a href="http://ift.tt/2coRYxs" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2coRYxs', 'tracking your Awareness metrics']);" class="external" target="_blank">tracking your Awareness metrics</a>. Next, you’ll need to track your effectiveness at the Consideration stage. That means you’re tracking metrics that show you how well you’re converting visitors into leads.</p>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647153 size-medium" src="http://ift.tt/2cBW7Qr" width="600" height="207" title="" alt="" /></p>
<p>You could also track your nurturing in the Consideration stage, but we’ll cover that in another article.</p>
<p>Which KPIs are the right ones to track conversions? We’ll walk you through it.</p>
<h2>Visits by Source</h2>
<p>Run a <a href="http://ift.tt/297nXUX" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/297nXUX', 'Sources report']);" class="external" target="_blank">Sources report</a> in HubSpot (or analyze the channels in Google Analytics) and look at the number of visits you get each month from each source—organic traffic, search engines, referrals, social media, etc. Dive down on social media and identify which social media channels are performing best and worst for driving traffic.</p>
<p>Identifying top and worst performers will help you determine which sources you need to invest into. More traffic from those sources will help drive more conversions.</p>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647148 size-full" title="screenshot of the sources report" src="http://ift.tt/2cBXu1z" alt="screenshot of the sources report" width="766" height="551" /></p>
<p>Notice a spike? If you’re adding marketing actions to your campaigns, you’ll be able to attribute those spikes in user activity to specific marketing events that occurred.</p>
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<h2>Conversions by Source</h2>
<p>The HubSpot Sources report shows you how many new contacts you generated in a specified time frame. These are your conversions for the month. The % sign next to the Visits shows your conversion rate from that source. Aim for 30% for source that brings 1000 visits or more.</p>
<p>In addition to knowing which source brought in the traffic, you can do a more detailed breakdown of the who, what, and where—such as which keywords, which social profile, which post, and which referring websites are helping drive the most conversions.</p>
<p>This information shows you how well your sources are leading to conversions. Notice anything that stands out in your top- and bottom-performing sources. You’ll need to investigate what makes them stand out, and how you can improve the cellar dwellers.</p>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647149 size-medium" title="screenshot of sources report - drill down on referrers" src="http://ift.tt/2coQseL" alt="screenshot of sources report - drill down on referrers" width="600" height="143" /></p>
<h2>Visits to Your Website Vs. Visits to Landing Pages</h2>
<p>You could be getting a lot of traffic at the Consideration stage, but if visitors aren’t going to your landing pages, you’ve got some work to do. Check the breakdown of visitors to your site vs. visitors to your landing pages. In the Sources report, filter by your landing page domain to see how many of your site visitors are hitting your landing pages. If it’s lower than you’re aiming for, you’ll need to invest into improving that number in the next year.</p>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647150 size-full" title="Landing Page performance snapshot" src="http://ift.tt/2cBWLxE" alt="Landing Page performance snapshot" width="575" height="353" /></p>
<h2>CTA Performance</h2>
<p>One of the most important metrics to track at the Consideration stage is the <a href="http://ift.tt/2coRxD4" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2coRxD4', 'effectiveness of your calls to action']);" class="external" target="_blank">effectiveness of your calls to action</a>. If your visitors see your CTAs but don’t click on them, you won’t get them to convert on your landing pages. You can <a href="http://ift.tt/2cBXqyY" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cBXqyY', 'track CTA metrics']);" class="external" target="_blank">track CTA metrics</a> in the HubSpot Calls to Action tool.</p>
<p>For the Consideration stage, focus on tracking these two CTA metrics:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>CTA views to clicks.</strong> This is the click-through rate of the CTAs that your visitors encounter. In other words, what percentage of visitors did the CTA drive to a landing page?</li>
<li><strong>CTA clicks to submission.</strong> This is the number of form submissions that occur after the CTA is clicked. It shows how effective the CTA is in influencing form submissions on a landing page. Use this to compare different CTAs that lead to the same landing page.</li>
</ul>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647151 size-medium" title="screenshot of CTA performance" src="http://ift.tt/2coQSBv" alt="screenshot of CTA performance" width="600" height="68" /></p>
<h2>Landing Page Performance</h2>
<p>Just because someone gets to a landing page, that doesn’t mean they’ll actually fill out a form and convert to a lead. It’s important to know how well your landing pages are performing, once your visitors arrive there.</p>
<p>You’ll need to identify the top- and bottom-performing landing pages and make improvements to your lowest-converting pages, based on what you see in the most effective ones.</p>
<p>Go to the Landing Page Performance report in HubSpot and analyze the Views, Submissions, and New Contacts metrics for the past month. Notice the ratio of new contacts to submissions—this will tell you how many of your conversions are in the nurturing phase of the Consideration stage. As a rule of thumb, for every 1000 visits, you should have at least a 30% conversion rate.</p>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647152 size-full" title="screenshot of the landing page performance report, showing views/conversions/new contacts" src="http://ift.tt/2cBXL4U" alt="screenshot of the landing page performance report, showing views/conversions/new contacts" width="814" height="606" /></p>
<h2>Path Performance to Conversions</h2>
<p>Most of your visitors will come to a landing page from some other page on your site. And many of them will visit your site multiple times before getting to a landing page. It can be very revealing to track the pathways your visitors take before arriving at your landing pages. <a href="http://ift.tt/2coR8AB" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2coR8AB', 'The Attribution report']);" class="external" target="_blank">The Attribution report</a> shows you the journey someone takes from the first time they enter your website until they convert. This tells you what made your visitors convert.</p>
<p>Use this information to spot the marketing effort that led to a conversion and make smart decisions about where to invest your time and resources.</p>
<p>Tracking the right metrics at the Consideration stage will give you a good handle on the areas where you’re getting the most ROI and where you need to focus your efforts next year. Use that information to identify your needs for next year—and build your budget around that. Having concrete numbers and goals will set you up for a successful marketing budget.</p>
<h2>Take the Next Step</h2>
<ul>
<li>Get more great content about creating a marketing budget</li>
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</ul>
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Most Important KPIs by Funnel Stage: Consideration
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-86418601687921729332016-09-07T08:13:00.003-07:002016-09-07T08:13:53.474-07:005 Step Success Strategy to Prioritize Social Networks for Your Business [Podcast]<a href="http://ift.tt/2cBQjGG" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cBQjGG', 'http://ift.tt/2cBQjGG']);" class="external" target="_blank">http://ift.tt/2cBQjGG</a>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1647143 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2coMpPz" alt="prioritize social networks for business" width="900" height="470" /></p>
<p>Every marketer and business leader is faced with the challenge of where to prioritize their time and investment. Time is our greatest asset in both business and life. How we spend our time can make or break business and marketing success.</p>
<p>When it comes to digital marketing, social media and branding, it is no different. In my 20 years of business and marketing experience, I have never heard a marketer exclaim, “I have so much time, resource & budget I don’t know what to do with it.”</p>
<p>Unfortunately, there are far too many “experts” online touting that you must be on every new shiny object and social network. They’ll even go so far as to warn you that if you don’t start snapping on Snapchat, storytelling on Instagram and delivering live video on Periscope that your business is destined to fail. Let me tell you right now this is 100% false.</p>
<p>Marketing and business leaders must give themselves permission to prioritize. You do not need to be everywhere all the time. You do not need to treat every social network equal nor spend the same amount of time and investment on every social network. You do not need to work 24/7, 365 days of the year to be successful. Release your fear of missing out and start prioritizing your time and investment of money and resource.</p>
<p>The truth is that the more you focus and prioritize, the better your results will be. Stop only playing around with the social networks. Instead, get serious, get focused and you will start seeing real results.</p>
<p>What matters is where your audience and target customer is online. You must be where they are. You must deliver them value where they are, using methods, language and mediums that will inspire them, connect with them and bring them closer to your brand.</p>
<blockquote class="b2c-textpromo" readability="1.3333333333333">
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</blockquote>
<p>How do you prioritize what social networks you invest in for business success? How do you know where you should engage? How do you determine where your audience is hanging out online so you can build the most meaningful relationship with them as possible? How do you achieve a positive ROI using social media and digital technologies and strategies?</p>
<p>Take a listen to episode 214 of the Social Zoom Factor podcast to learn our 5 Step Success Strategy and Tactics to prioritize what social networks you invest in for your business.</p>
<p><strong>In this 30 minute podcast you will learn:</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>5 Step Strategies and tactics to prioritize what social networks you invest in for business.</li>
<li>Why you must get real on your time and budget available to invest in social media</li>
<li>What skills you must have to be successful at social media for business</li>
<li>How to leverage the data available natively via the different social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and more</li>
<li>The difference between a business goal, KPI and objective</li>
<li>Tips to set goals, measure results and continuously optimize</li>
<li>What to look for when you do a monthly audit and refresh of your online social presence and efforts</li>
<li>How to prioritize and select tools for analysis, measurement and audience research</li>
<li>Suggested tools for audience research</li>
<li>Why it’s not about what the technology can do for you, but instead what you can do with the technology</li>
</ul>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/1Ko4ZQ2">Pam Moore</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em>Forbes Top 10 Social Media Power Influencer - CEO / founder of <a rel="nofollow" href="http://ift.tt/Vg8Qrc" class="external" target="_blank">Marketing Nut</a>z, full service social brand, digital marketing agency. Social media marketing speaker, author, strategist, consultant, coach, & trainer. I help businesses of all size integrate social media into the DNA of their business, connect with target... <a href="http://ift.tt/1Ko4ZQ2">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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5 Step Success Strategy to Prioritize Social Networks for Your Business [Podcast]
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-30308791685599897042016-09-07T08:13:00.001-07:002016-09-07T08:13:52.903-07:00Scientists Unveil Fossil of 170-Million-Year-Old Sea Monster<div id="attachment_1649321" class="wp-caption alignnone" readability="32"><img class="size-large wp-image-1649321" src="http://ift.tt/2cdcqCo" alt="National Museums Scotland Facebook" width="900" height="367" />
<p class="wp-caption-text">National Museums Scotland Facebook</p>
</div>
<p>Move over Nessie, there’s a new (bona fide) sea monster in town. Scientists have unveiled the fossil of the Storr Lochs Monster, which wandered the oceans 170 million years ago.</p>
<p>The dolphin-like animal was originally discovered in 1966 on the Isle of Skye, according to the <a href="http://ift.tt/2c2q1Js" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2c2q1Js', 'National Museums Scotland']);" class="external" target="_blank">National Museums Scotland</a> Facebook page and was extracted from a rock that encased it for millions of years. “It is the most complete skeleton of a sea-living re<span class="text_exposed_show">ptile from the Age of Dinosaurs that has ever been found in Scotland.”</span></p>
<p>According to the <a href="http://ift.tt/2cdzanr" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cdzanr', 'BBC']);" class="external" target="_blank">BBC</a>, the extinct marine reptile was part of the family of animals known as ichthyosaurs. This fittingly-dubbed “crown jewel of Scottish fossils” will now be examined by paleontologists from the University of Edinburgh and National Museums Scotland to study the ichthyosaurs’ evolution. The Storr Lochs Monster will then be on public display for visitors to view.</p>
<p>The marine reptile measured in at 13 feet in length and had cone-shaped teeth, ideal for feeding on fish and squid. According to the BBC article, the Isle of Skye contains many fossils from the Middle Jurassic Period, which saw the emergence of “some of the first mammals, birds and reptiles such as snakes.” During this time, says Dr. Steve Brusatte of the University of Edinburgh’s School of GeoSciences, ichthyosaurs ruled the seas, while dinosaurs roamed the lands.</p>
<p>The fossils from the Isle of Skye have given scientists crucial insights into “the lives of prehistoric predators and their prey” and they hope the Storr Lochs Monster can now shed light on whether or not it was the <a href="http://ift.tt/2cdbxtA" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cdbxtA', 'first of its kind']);" class="external" target="_blank">first of its kind</a> or if it resembles other species.</p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/1rn6qur">Erica Abbott</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em>Erica has been a part of Business 2 Community since becoming an intern in 2014. During this time, she has focused on writing articles on trending and entertainment topics, and will be learning the ins and outs of the editorial side of the site in her current role. She graduated... <a href="http://ift.tt/1rn6qur">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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Scientists Unveil Fossil of 170-Million-Year-Old Sea Monster
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-6680735551972358672016-09-07T07:44:00.003-07:002016-09-07T07:44:27.319-07:005 Copywriting Techniques That Affect SEO<p><img class="wp-image-1649314 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2bT3ez7" alt="seo-1018442_1280" width="856" height="287" /></p>
<p>It’s easy to make the mistake of thinking copywriting and search engine optimization (SEO) are two separate things. Copywriting is for the user; it’s all about getting them to take action. SEO is for search engines; it’s about appealing to their algorithms. In reality, however, copywriting and SEO work together. Keep the following SEO copywriting techniques and tips in mind when writing for your website.</p>
<h2>1. Write for the User First</h2>
<p>When we think of SEO, we think of keyword research and content length, but search engine algorithms have evolved. Search engines care more about your content’s authority. They want to know whether or not people trust your content. And how do you earn that trust? By focusing on your readers.</p>
<p>This practice will enhance readability and make your content more natural and compelling, which both readers and search engines like. In turn, people will naturally link back to you, indicating to search engines that your content is trustworthy.</p>
<p>Plus, search engines have gotten smarter. Years ago, they’d return results containing the exact keywords you were searching for. Today, they realize that someone searching “cellphone” might equally benefit from results on “smartphone” or “mobile phone.” You don’t need to <a href="http://ift.tt/2bSEyqx" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bSEyqx', 'stuff keywords']);" target="_blank" class="external">stuff keywords</a> into your content to rank for a particular term. In fact, you can get penalized for this. So while keywords still matter, it’s more about relevancy than keyword density, and writing first for your audience will mean that these relevant keywords occur naturally.</p>
<h2>2. Pay Attention to Content Length</h2>
<p>Content length matters to your users, and that means it matters to search engines. According to the American Marketing Association, longer articles between 1,200 to 1,500 words perform better in search engines on average. <a href="http://ift.tt/V2ST8y" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/V2ST8y', 'Other experts']);" target="_blank" class="external">Other experts</a> have suggested that you may want to go even longer and shoot for 1,500 words minimum.</p>
<p>However, it’s important to understand <em>why</em> that trend occurs. <a href="http://ift.tt/V3IGXh" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/V3IGXh', 'Google has stated']);" target="_blank" class="external">Google has stated</a> that they don’t actually count words on a page and use it as a ranking factor. However, content length can affect SEO in other ways by:</p>
<ul>
<li>Providing more keywords, subheadings, and images for search engine bots to crawl.</li>
<li>Increasing users’ time spent on the site, which shows search engines your content is trustworthy.</li>
<li>Providing more value to the reader, which means you’ll get more shares and links back to your content.</li>
</ul>
<p>That said, always keep the user in mind. Longer blog post articles might perform well, but the same length for your home page or about page can seem daunting. Those longer form articles that rank well on search engines don’t manage it based on their length alone; they make it to the top by fitting useful information within their word count.</p>
<h2>3. Break Up Your Content for Readability</h2>
<p>Another way to write for the reader is to break up your content so it’s easy on the eyes. Examples include:</p>
<blockquote class="b2c-textpromo" readability="1.3333333333333">
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</blockquote>
<ul>
<li>Using subheadings</li>
<li>Writing short paragraphs</li>
<li>Including images/screenshots</li>
<li>Using bold and italic fonts to highlight important points</li>
<li>Using bullet points or numbered lists</li>
</ul>
<p>Making your content easy on the reader will help increase natural backlinks and authority. However, some of these suggestions also appeal to search engine bots.</p>
<p>For example, search engines look at <a href="http://ift.tt/2bTkTM9" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bTkTM9', 'header tags']);" target="_blank" class="external">header tags</a> to determine the hierarchy of your content and which parts are more important than others. Your headline uses the H1 tag. Subheadings should use the H2 tag, sub-sub-headings use the H3 tag, and so forth. (Typically, these settings are found in your formatting options in your content management system.) Utilizing this hierarchy and including keywords in your subheadings will allow search engines to index your site more effectively.</p>
<p>Furthermore, <a href="http://ift.tt/14zpdr5" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/14zpdr5', 'images can also help with SEO']);" target="_blank" class="external">images can also help with SEO</a>. Using alt tags and captions on images provides another opportunity to show search engines what your site is about. Plus, images themselves can rank on search engines, and relevant images surrounded by related text will rank higher.</p>
<h2>4. Quote Influencers in Your Niche</h2>
<p>Quoting influencers is not only an effective way to boost the quality of your content, but it’s also an effective SEO strategy. When you quote influencers, link out to the source of that quote. <a href="http://ift.tt/1Tpr5se" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1Tpr5se', 'External links']);" target="_blank" class="external">External links</a> serve as indicators of content relevancy and quality. Plus, they can attract attention from the sites you’re linking to, which can boost engagement and incentivize links back to your content.</p>
<p>As a bonus, you can use this strategy to reach out to influencers and let them know they’ve been mentioned in your content. Some of them may share it with their audiences to further boost your traffic.</p>
<h2>5. Include a Strong Call to Action</h2>
<p>Don’t forget that you are not the only one who has control over your search engine optimization. Your readers can also take action to boost your rankings. But how do you get them to help you out? Include a strong call to action in your content. Two major routes you can go for SEO include:</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>Asking readers to share your content on social media.</strong> Although <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udqtSM-6QbQ" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udqtSM-6QbQ', 'Google doesn’t use social shares']);" target="_blank" class="external">Google doesn’t use social shares</a> to influence rankings, social shares still matter. The more shares you have, the more people you can reach across the web, which again will lead to more natural backlinks. You can encourage social shares by including sharing buttons when you <a href="http://ift.tt/2a7Ncmg" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2a7Ncmg', 'set up your blog']);" target="_blank" class="external">set up your blog</a>, but you can also encourage social shares through your writing. For example, including click-to-tweet links in your content or asking readers to Tweet their opinion to you can boost shares on Twitter.</li>
<li><strong>Encouraging readers to leave a comment</strong>. Marketing professional Neil Patel says that <a href="http://ift.tt/1PdkLCJ" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1PdkLCJ', 'responding to blog post comments']);" target="_blank" class="external">responding to blog post comments</a> is worth it, and it actually has SEO benefits. The more comments you have on your blog posts, the more text you have on the page. That means you’ll rank for more long-tail keywords. Encourage comments by asking a thought-provoking question at the end of your blog posts.</li>
</ol>
<p><em>Keeping these tips in mind will boost the effectiveness of both your copywriting and your SEO efforts. How will you use these suggestions in your SEO copywriting? Let us know in the comments below.</em></p>
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5 Copywriting Techniques That Affect SEO
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-15729555745242458802016-09-07T07:44:00.001-07:002016-09-07T07:44:26.623-07:00Niche Social Media: Where Do You Fall?<p>Individuals worldwide can exhibit their crafty ideas by approaching social media in a more innovative path. Often, that path may differ from person to person. We like to call this, niche social media. Do you meet the niche for your favorite social network? Here’s some of our niche examples for users of two very popular social media apps: Facebook and Instagram.</p>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648871 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2bT4hPT" alt="Niche Social Media" width="752" height="564" /></p>
<p>While many social media users look to Facebook in order to <em>stay in touch</em> with old high school friends or view photos of their friends or family members on vacation, others might use it to <em>popularize</em> their musical talent.</p>
<p>For example, for progressing local musicians, Facebook can be an ideal place to gain a fanbase, as the network is based on mutual friends and connections. Developing high school or college bands who strive for a larger audience can use Facebook as a <em>tool to promote</em> their music.</p>
<p>Supportive friends and family can help expand the music by <em>sharing</em> links of videos or <em>posting</em> about upcoming shows and events.</p>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648872 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2bTK3Ku" alt="niche social media" width="735" height="551" /></p>
<h2>The niche? Using friends, family and friends of friends and family to spread news or messages in a widespread manner, usually involves feedback.</h2>
<p>Instagram is another social media tool that can be taken in several different ‘niche’ directions if you will.</p>
<p>For instance, artists and striving photographers can display their work and create special pages to <em>promote</em> themselves. Not only can individuals <em>post pictures of their work</em>, but they can also share 15 second videos. Some painters create rapid Instagram videos demonstrating the progression of their piece from start to finish. This approach offers people an <em>interactive experience</em> with the artist as well as understanding the process in a more imaginative sense. It can also inspire both skillful and novice artists to continue a piece even if it does not look spectacular from the very beginning.</p>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648873 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2bT3cY1" alt="niche social media" width="735" height="552" /></p>
<p>People attempting to <em>promote</em> a healthy lifestyle also post photos or videos on Instagram, which can be especially useful for those with limited downtime in their busy day. Posting pictures of healthy food items with a recipe and description as a caption can definitely <em>spark up ideas</em> amongst those who seek healthier alternatives. If the food options are successful for the individuals who recreate the item, they can then pass on the recipe to friends, ultimately advocating the original idea.</p>
<p>Additionally, posting workout routines on Instagram subconsciously <em>motivates</em> people as they scroll through their newsfeed. Evidently, this allows people who are generally occupied with a heavy workload throughout their day to watch a short clip and learn the correct deadlift form or simple, at-home squat exercises.</p>
<p>By creatively approaching Instagram, individuals can do more than simply post attractive photos of themselves, and instead discover ways to promote themselves and inspire others.</p>
<p>The niche: Show something off, what you did, what you made, what you ate or where you went. They key is do it with one stellar photo,video or <a href="http://ift.tt/1U40oLf" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1U40oLf', 'caption']);" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" class="external">caption</a>, this often leads to actions taken by viewers who want to do, make, eat or go where you did.</p>
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Niche Social Media: Where Do You Fall?
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-65591173616968357402016-09-07T05:24:00.003-07:002016-09-07T05:24:55.077-07:00How to Showcase Your Hard Skills<p><img class="alignright wp-image-1646937 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2bTqkuw" alt="hard1" width="401" height="267" />Medicine, engineering, technology ― careers in these fields are incredibly prestigious and satisfyingly high-paying, making these jobs some of the most lusted-after openings in the market. Unfortunately, not just anyone can waltz in and snag a position in these industries. These fields and others require workers to have particular skills that require difficult training, so only a select group is capable of getting hired.</p>
<p>In fact, most employers expect job candidates to have similarly hard-to-attain (or simply “hard”) skills, but few candidates understand how to report their hard skills during the application process. Generally, at best, applicants include an uninspiring list on their resumes; at worst, they don’t mention them at all. Hard skills are quickly becoming the best resources to get workers hired, so it is important to showcase them on any and all application materials. Here’s how to do that to maximal effect.</p>
<h3>Use Flashier Formatting</h3>
<p>It may feel a bit too obvious, but <a href="http://ift.tt/2bQdJnx" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bQdJnx', 'altering the formatting']);" class="external" target="_blank">altering the formatting</a> of the section on your resume will naturally draw the hiring manager’s eye to your hard skills. This isn’t to say that it is appropriate to use bright red, block letters; rather, subtle differences, like italics for descriptions or distinct bullet markers, can set the section off. Alternatively, you can highlight your use of hard skills within your work experience section by bolding or underlining pertinent words or phrases. This is a good trick for when you must submit your resume before securing an interview because it grabs your potential future employer’s attention.</p>
<h3>Employ Industry Terms</h3>
<p>Likely, the hiring managers at your future employer isn’t as entrenched in your field as you are, and you might be tempted to dumb down your language so anyone can understand your skills. However, HR reps aren’t the only people to see your application materials, and your future co-workers and bosses like to see proof that you have applicable knowledge and experience.</p>
<blockquote class="b2c-textpromo" readability="1.3333333333333">
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<p>Using jargon may feel incorrect, but as long as you appropriately apply industry-appropriate terms, you can highlight your hard skills through your fluency with the language. Plus, when faced with an overabundance of applications, many hiring managers perform a keyword search for industry-related words and phrases, so it helps to use relevant terms.</p>
<h3>Quantify Everything</h3>
<p><img class="alignright wp-image-1646938 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2bTqfan" alt="hard2" width="400" height="267" />Simply claiming that you are a “proficient coder” or a “skilled designer” doesn’t prove anything to your potential future employer ― except that you might be able to use a thesaurus. Data and proof is the life-blood of modern businesses, and you should infuse your resume with hard facts and figures to establish your skills and knowledge.</p>
<p>As long as you aren’t lying about your hard skills, it shouldn’t be difficult to back them up. For example, if you want to brag about your experience as a server administrator, you might mention how many users you supported, what systems you ran, what types of issues you encountered, and what improvements you made. Data is easier to appreciate than vague verbiage, so be generous with your facts and figures.</p>
<p>Another way to quantify any hard skills you have is to include a list of any relevant certifications you may have earned, leaving HR and anyone who reviews your resume with proof of your knowledge. Certifications can boost your attractiveness, so if you don’t currently have any, consider taking relevant tech courses online to prepare for the exams, possibly for CompTIA or SSCP. If you’re applying for a medical position, some relevant certifications to consider are CCMA or CPT. Just make sure the certifications are relevant to the position, or they’ll look nice but won’t be as helpful.</p>
<h3>Be Liberal With Examples</h3>
<p>Numbers are good, but then again, actual examples are even better. You should work to compile a portfolio of your completed works to substantiate the claims you make on your application materials. Your portfolio should be available all over the place ― online on a dedicated website, in your hands during the interview, and passed to the hiring manager on a flash drive before you leave. You should also be able to provide anecdotes and explanation of your work during and after the interview to demonstrate your proficiency with your hard skills.</p>
<h3>Don’t Disparage Soft Skills</h3>
<p>No matter how important hard skills are to your line of work, every employer wants workers with soft skills. These are skills you don’t usually learn in school, skills that require emotional intelligence and for which the skills constantly change. At every job, soft skills like communication and teamwork are vital, so while you are highlighting your hard skills, you should be wary of being scornful toward the others.</p>
<p>In fact, showcasing your soft skills in the same manner might set you apart from your competitors, who choose to focus on their abilities and education. When trying to get a job, all relevant skills matter, so you should avoid being too judgmental of certain strengths.</p>
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How to Showcase Your Hard Skills
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-71287065008251244792016-09-07T05:24:00.001-07:002016-09-07T05:24:54.412-07:003 Common Sources Of Frustration In Sales And How To Deal With Them<div><img src="http://ift.tt/1ztUwjl" class="ff-og-image-inserted" /></div>
<p>A job in sales is not for the carefree. Hitting steep quotas and handling the push to <strong><em>always be on</em></strong> are things reps deal with every day.</p>
<p>However, we all have limits. And, sometimes, frustration sets in.</p>
<p>In a <a href="http://ift.tt/2bTqZw9" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bTqZw9', 'high-performance environment']);" class="external" target="_blank">high-performance environment</a>, getting frustrated is a recipe for disaster. I’m sure you’ve experienced some degree of this on the sales floor.</p>
<p>Here’s what it does to you: It interferes with your ability to do things right – things you normally have no issue with.</p>
<p>Performance suffers. Goals are not hit–resulting in even more frustration.</p>
<p>That said, it’s best to understand the common situations where salespeople get frustrated. This way, you know how to handle them when they arise.</p>
<h2><strong>1. “All I get are low-quality leads.”</strong></h2>
<p>Do you feel like you’re just not getting sales-ready leads you <strong><em>need</em></strong> in order to hit your quota?</p>
<p>You’re sure you’d get the numbers right– <a href="http://ift.tt/2bSJY4Q" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bSJY4Q', 'if only you’d get leads who are really interested in the product']);" class="external" target="_blank">if only you’d get leads who are really interested in the product</a>.</p>
<p>Sales reps from all industries work with leads of varying nature: warm, qualified, unqualified, and even cold.</p>
<p>At the end of the day, we want all of them to be sales-ready, but that’s wishful thinking.</p>
<p>Salespeople usually get two types of leads: Marketing qualified leads (MQL) and top-of-the-funnel (ToFu) leads.</p>
<p>MQLs are people who have demonstrated a desire to connect with the company–either through signing up for a trial, providing full information on a contact form, or directly reaching out to the sales team. Most of these leads are already in the consideration and decision stages.</p>
<p>ToFu leads are a different story. As your demand generation team works doubly hard to <a href="http://ift.tt/2bTqli0" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bTqli0', 'dish out content that attracts prospects']);" class="external" target="_blank">dish out content that attracts prospects</a>, you will get leads from ebook downloads, webinar signups, and other content opt-ins. These are ToFu leads who could be interested in your product but could also just be in it for the ebook. Some can even fill out the opt-in with incorrect contact info just to get the content. These leads are still at the research stage and could be unsure as to what their current unmet needs are.</p>
<p>Connecting with ToFu leads only to get brushed off or even hung up on can quickly become frustrating.</p>
<h3>What to do: <strong>Know the value of ToFu leads and how to handle them.</strong></h3>
<p>While MQLs have a much higher close rate since they’re already interested in the product, what you need to grasp is that the number of ToFu leads coming in exceed MQLs by a wide margin.</p>
<p>So, even if the close rate is much lower, the amount of business you can generate with ToFu leads is often more than what you get from MQLs if you do things right.</p>
<p><strong>How should you handle ToFu leads?</strong></p>
<p>See, you already have a rough idea of what ToFus need before engaging with them.</p>
<p>The content they opted-in for will give you an idea of what issues they’re facing.</p>
<blockquote class="b2c-textpromo" readability="1.3333333333333">
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<p>Did they download the “Top Time-Saving Tips for Salespeople in 2016” ebook? Did they sign up for the webinar on getting more high ticket sales? <a href="http://ift.tt/1Ohjm00" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1Ohjm00', 'The content should give you a heads up on what the ToFu lead']);" class="external" target="_blank">The content should give you a heads up on what the ToFu lead</a> is interested in and a rough idea of what the nature of their business is.</p>
<p>Your first conversation with a ToFu lead probably won’t be a selling one.</p>
<p>Take a consultative approach. Use the call to help them uncover inefficiencies and issues in their business. A helpful, non-pushy call will position you as a valuable resource for this lead. And in B2B sales, these types of relationships are what you want to develop with leads, especially with decision-makers.</p>
<p>Another upside of handling ToFu leads is that it gives salespeople the chance to do qualifying work on their own.</p>
<p>While the sales qualification and marketing departments do their part nurturing and qualifying ToFu leads, <a href="http://ift.tt/2a8Ara4" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2a8Ara4', 'sales reps develop great relationships with ToFus when they nurture these leads themselves']);" class="external" target="_blank">sales reps develop great relationships with ToFus when they nurture these leads themselves</a>. They get to uncover sales needs with these qualifying conversations, putting them in a better position to go for the close eventually. If it doesn’t end in a sale, the rep will have learned more about the buyer’s journey.</p>
<p>The key here is identifying which ToFu leads should be handled by marketing/qualification, and which ones should be forwarded to sales. Not all ToFus should be phoned, and it takes communication among departments to make the correct distinction.</p>
<p>Your gated content could act as a screen to help this process. For example, a sales VP who downloads a whitepaper should be sent to sales to get this person on the phone as soon as possible. On the other hand, someone who only gave their email could be sent to marketing for further qualification.</p>
<p>So don’t let “low quality” leads frustrate you. Making the most out of them just takes awareness of the different stages a buyer goes through and what role you can play as a rep who nurtures leads that are not sales-ready <strong>yet.</strong></p>
<h2><strong>2. “The sales process slows down the sales cycle.”</strong></h2>
<p>While there is no reason to ignore critical stances on existing practices, it’s still widely recognized that the <a href="http://ift.tt/25OZvxe" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/25OZvxe', 'top salespeople are those who follow the sales process']);" class="external" target="_blank">top salespeople are those who follow the sales process</a> in qualifying and closing deals.</p>
<p>Where does your frustration come from? Is it because you’re unable to close deals when you follow the outlined sales process?</p>
<p>Here’s the harsh truth: In sales, we need to be humble and trust the wisdom of management. We may think that we’re in better control of our sales calls when we don’t follow the process, but the reality is that when don’t follow the steps, we are really letting the deal slip out of our hands.</p>
<p>As Bob Urichuck of the National Association of Sales Professionals wrote in <a href="http://ift.tt/2bTql1K" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bTql1K', 'Are You Following A Sales Process?']);" class="external" target="_blank">Are You Following A Sales Process?</a>,</p>
<p><em>“Who is really qualifying? Who is really in control? The buyer!</em></p>
<p><em>Do you want to know why and how the buyer is in control? The answer is simple; buyers follow a buyers’ sales process, just like you do when meeting with a sales person. Sales people assume they are in control by answering all the questions, but in reality, it is the buyer who is in control. They actually carry out the rejection, not you.”</em></p>
<h3>What to do: <strong>Trust the sales process. Identify when the buyer is taking control of the call instead of you.</strong></h3>
<p>While we’re in the business of helping buyers solve their problems, they don’t always know what they need. A lot of people today are sales-averse, and if salespeople don’t create the opportunity to position themselves as consultants, deals will be lost.</p>
<p>This is where the <a href="http://ift.tt/2bSLsMy" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bSLsMy', 'sales process']);" class="external" target="_blank">sales process</a> comes into play. Sales processes are designed to lead the salesperson through the journey of uncovering buyers’ interest and match their need with a solution.</p>
<p>Using the sales process, reps qualify leads against buying motivation, financial status, and decision-making power.</p>
<p>Following the sales process gives you a complete view of your buyer’s situation. At each step, you get needed information important decide whether the deal is worth pursuing or not. Knowing exactly if a lead is worth your time will rid you of frustration. Letting the buyer lead conversations, however, will put you in a weak position and could get you exasperated.</p>
<h2><strong>3. “Do we really need to use the CRM all the time?”</strong></h2>
<p>Sales orgs these days are <a href="http://ift.tt/12AgcJv" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/12AgcJv', ' largely tech-driven']);" class="external" target="_blank">largely tech-driven</a>, but problems in CRM compliance can still be found in almost any sales organization.</p>
<p>Why do some salespeople dislike using the CRM? Why does a piece of technology that’s supposed to help salespeople end up getting them frustrated instead?</p>
<p>You feel like the only thing you need to concern yourself with is closing deals. Having to type information into the CRM is just taking away minutes you could be using on the phone</p>
<p>While some sales reps look at the <a href="http://ift.tt/1PICja2" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1PICja2', 'CRM an “un-productivity” tool']);" class="external" target="_blank">CRM an “un-productivity” tool</a>, the reality is they couldn’t miss the mark any wider.</p>
<p>Salespeople can’t be faulted for focusing on closing deals, no matter how they do it–but there’s a reason why CRMs are a mainstay in almost all successful sales organizations.</p>
<h3>What to do: <strong>Know what the CRM does for you and the company.</strong></h3>
<p>Customer relationship management (CRM) software paved the way for today’s sales acceleration solutions.</p>
<p>These tools help shorten the sales cycle, a goal all sales organizations have. And these days, reps who thrive are those who learn to embrace sales acceleration. Sales reps should understand that these tools were created to take out the frustration, not add to it. For some, there might be a moderate learning curve at first– but the results are worth it.</p>
<p>The benefits of using a CRM are quite straightforward:</p>
<ul>
<li>It is a more reliable place to store information versus your head or a notebook</li>
<li>Automates repetitive admin tasks</li>
<li>Speeds up the sales cycle</li>
<li>Saves you the deals you won’t forget to follow up on</li>
<li>Keeps the team on the same page about everyone else’s progress</li>
<li>Gives the sales manager a more streamlined way to communicate with reps</li>
<li>Gives everyone access to data for data-driven decisions</li>
</ul>
<p>The overarching <a href="http://ift.tt/2bTqAtr" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bTqAtr', 'benefit of using a CRM']);" class="external" target="_blank">benefit of using a CRM</a> is in getting the full view of your customers, prospects, and leads. Having this information gives you and your sales organization what’s needed to carry out a sales strategy that’s in line with where you stand and where you want to go.</p>
<p>Understanding the value of the CRM is crucial to the productivity of every sales rep. If you’re experiencing issues in this area, it’s best to communicate with your manager right away.</p>
<hr />
<p>Communicate with management, engage in continuous training and education, and focus your energy on <em>what can be done</em> in the midst of tough situations.</p>
<p>Frustration in the workplace is normal–but being equipped with the right information helps you avoid it.</p>
<p><strong><em>What are the sources of your frustration in sales? How do you deal with them?</em></strong></p>
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3 Common Sources Of Frustration In Sales And How To Deal With Them
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-49631960459638009302016-09-07T04:57:00.001-07:002016-09-07T04:57:49.476-07:00Nobody Wants To Admit This, But Good People Are The Ones Who Kill Startups<p>You keep your great people and terminate the bad people- we all do that. But it’s the <strong><em>merely good people</em></strong> that will kill you.</p>
<p><em>“Steve is a good guy”</em>, you tell yourself. He didn’t do anything so egregious that he deserves getting fired.</p>
<p>And maybe his performance will improve if you give him more time. After all, he’s relatively new and you feel guilt from not having as much time as you’d like to answer his every question multiple times.</p>
<p>Perhaps Steve is friends with another teammate, which creates an awkward situation. Maybe he has a new wife or has a kid on the way and you know they need the money. Or it’s Christmas. Nobody gets fired during Christmas, right?</p>
<p>But the trouble with merely good is that you’re spending so much time on them, while neglecting your star performers. Because the <a href="http://ift.tt/2bTozNZ" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bTozNZ', 'squeaky wheel gets the grease,']);" class="external" target="_blank">squeaky wheel gets the grease,</a> you’re penalizing your best people.</p>
<p>Unless your company or group doesn’t have to be efficient, you should be spending at least 50% of your time on the top 10% of your people if you want to maximize productivity.</p>
<blockquote class="b2c-textpromo" readability="1.3333333333333">
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<p>That leaves no room for the “good” people that you’d very much like to keep around. It’s not that you’re a heartless manager or don’t care– see it as you stealing time from those who deserve it and have earned it.</p>
<p>My mentor, <a href="http://ift.tt/1xSC8R7">Al Casey</a>, who was CEO of American Airlines, taught me that there are 3 types of managers- those who are loved, those who get results, and those who do both.</p>
<p>95% of people are in the first two categories. The loved ones are pushovers who don’t enforce the rules, so their teams don’t feel any discomfort or need to improve their performance. The results-oriented managers are often task masters- the bosses mocked by Dilbert and Office Space.</p>
<p><img class="size-full wp-image-1648877 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2bTr1DW" alt="Quot+yeahhhhi+m+gonna+need+you+to+come+in+on+saturdayfinish+up+_7fad687ad3da645e335fcb0db5f0b230" width="350" height="282" /></p>
<p>But the managers who are loved and get results are those who have high performance teams to start with, then have clear standards. If you are frustrated with the merely good people, I assure you that you aren’t keeping or attracting the high performers, as they see they aren’t getting love.</p>
<p>A great team member is not just slightly better than a good employee. They are TEN times better or more.</p>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648878 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2bSJkoh" alt="13730866_1253550667991101_6749881445587457183_o" width="814" height="458" /></p>
<p>One of our star FB ad specialists, Jason, might cost double what a good employee makes, but their output is 20-50 times better. We don’t have to hold his hand, he achieves stellar results in an hour that an average specialist can’t do in 50 hours, and is better all around.</p>
<p>Have you identified your Jason’s and Steve’s?</p>
<p>The longer you wait, the worse it is for morale.</p>
<p><a href="http://ift.tt/2bToyJT" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2bToyJT', 'Original post']);" class="external" target="_blank">Original post</a></p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/1TfDcKu">Dennis Yu</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em>Dennis Yu is the CTO of BlitzMetrics. He is an internationally recognized lecturer in Facebook marketing, having been featured in The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, LA Times, National Public Radio, TechCrunch, Fox News, and CBS Evening News. He is also an author at Adweek's SocialTimes column.<br />
Dennis has... <a href="http://ift.tt/1TfDcKu">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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Nobody Wants To Admit This, But Good People Are The Ones Who Kill Startups
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-13508310199578699292016-09-07T02:22:00.001-07:002016-09-07T02:22:18.725-07:009 Services to Raise Cash for Your Business<p><img class="size-medium wp-image-1647654 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2cgoBQq" alt="to Raise Cash for Your Business" width="600" height="435" /></p>
<p>No matter what type of business you own, you have probably discovered that there are always times when you need more money. In many cases, it is impossible to rob from Peter to pay Paul, so to speak, because you don’t have a lot of extra money at your disposal. So, you need to find ways to be able to raise more cash for your business that you can use for day to day expenses and more. Here are nine services that we really like.</p>
<p>When you need to boost sales, increase productivity, and manage your business on a day to day basis, Zoho is the tool you need. Apps include CRM to help you close more deals, clean and advertising-free email, smart accounting, and custom built apps. All of this is free to use.</p>
<p>Sometimes, finding extra cash is simply a matter of not making mistakes in your books. Often, business owners do not use the right accounting software, and they end up missing a lot of things, which can affect the cash flow for a business. Using FreshBooks will ensure that you are able to create invoices, track how long it takes clients to pay, and profit and loss statements, quickly and easily. You can bill up to 25 clients for just $19.95 monthly.</p>
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<p>When you want to really make a great digital presence, this service can help. They take care of all of the digital stuff, and you get that digital presence you want. You will not only end up with a great website, but also an increased customer base. The user interface is completely customer oriented, bounce rates are reduced, and new customers will be converted through unique designs and visuals.</p>
<p>You can use this service to easily set up conference calls without bothering to take the time to set up an account. International clients will receive a local number to call you at, so you can continue to use your domestic number. This service is free to use.</p>
<p>Here is a social platform that businesses of all sizes can use. You can use it to offer products and services, hire new staff, work with various other businesses, etc. Some of the best features are increased revenues, the ability to showcase skills, and the ability to interact with other businesses.</p>
<p>Your employees are the heart of your business. If they aren’t happy, your business is going to suffer. By using 15Five, you can find out what is frustrating them and easily communicate with them to learn more about how you can help, which is going to help your bottom line in the long run. Each week, employees take 15 minutes to answer a few questions, and then you read and respond to their answers. The cost is $49 monthly for up to 10 people.</p>
<p>This site helps creative types find the cash they need to turn their ideas into reality. Tens of thousands of artists, musicians, designers, etc. have used this tool to finance their projects, which may never have come to life without this type of help.</p>
<p>This app is easy to use, and it allows you to track all of your business expenses. You can also use Expensify to create digital images of all receipts, submit reports, reimburse employees through the payroll or PayPal, and more. It is just $5 per month per each active user, and well worth the cost.</p>
<p>Loads of new businesses are started every year, but very few receive any funding to speak of. This business crowdfunding platform can change all of that, and make sure that new businesses get the funding they need from investors, customers, and friends. The team is with you every step of the way, from creating your business profile to marketing and more.</p>
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9 Services to Raise Cash for Your Business
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-51457749562528230712016-09-06T15:14:00.001-07:002016-09-06T15:14:49.520-07:00Should You Rely on Your Logic or Intuition?<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1646689 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2cqCQyp" alt="In Customer Success, Should You Rely on Your Logic or Intuition?" width="840" height="400" /></p>
<p>Your Customer Success dashboard says everything is fine with a key customer. But you’re not so sure. The data looks positive, but your intuition nags at you. Is it time to check in? Should you trust your head or your gut?</p>
<p>The vast majority of business leaders espouse data-driven decision making. Looking at the numbers, they assert, keeps employees from making erroneous choices. Convention holds that taking the time to carefully analyze objective evidence is the best way to make decisions.</p>
<p>But blind reasoning can be dangerous. Consider the case of a gunnery captain on a British ship under attack during the first Gulf War in 1991.<sup>1</sup> The ship was just a few miles off the coast when the crew saw an unidentified radar blip heading towards them at high speed. The commander had only seconds to decide if the image was an allied aircraft or an enemy strike. If it was an inbound missile and he didn’t fire, his crew faced certain death. But if he fired on a friendly aircraft, he would take the life of the pilot.</p>
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<p>At the last possible moment, the gunnery captain fired. He was right—it <em>was</em> an enemy missile—but how he had correctly identified the blip was a mystery to both him and the crew. Investigators concluded that the captain had subconsciously detected a threatening flight path. Allied aircraft typically flew at 3,000 feet, but missiles starting from the surface were invisible to radar until they reached an altitude of 1,000 feet. Although the gunnery captain was not aware of it at the time, analysis showed the blip had in fact, suddenly appeared on the radar display. His intuition had saved the ship.</p>
<p>Neuroscientists say we are always of two minds: logical and intuitive. We are most familiar with our conscious, rational side. Contemplative and controlled, it deliberates options and makes careful decisions. We tend to overlook our primal, subconscious, emotional side. Our reflexes hide in the shadows, making lightning-fast decisions sifting through vastly more stimuli. Lacking the power of language, our enigmatic subconscious communicates information through somatosensory responses. While we can’t put a finger on it, we get a gut feeling whenever something seems out of place.</p>
<p>There’s a growing body of evidence that good decisions access intuitive processing. Using brain imaging techniques, neuroscientists have discovered that when executives consider strategic options, their minds recruit centers known for inferring the impact on people.<sup>2</sup> With experienced leaders, data informs but doesn’t direct outcomes. Superstar investor Warren Buffet, for example, regularly looks past the numbers and makes gut decisions.<sup>3</sup></p>
<p>But having mental abilities just below the surface doesn’t mean we should always trust them. Author Malcolm Gladwell tells the story of how four white police officers mistakenly shot Amadou Diallo, a black man from Guinea, in the Bronx.<sup>4</sup> After seeing what they thought was suspicious activity, the police confronted him. When he turned away, they fired instinctively, believing he was reaching for a gun. But after the smoke of 41 gunshots cleared, none could be found. Gladwell says the officers subconsciously made tragic errors. In a blink of an eye, they had completely misinterpreted Diallo’s background, motivations and state of mind. Rather than observing a curious foreigner reaching for his wallet, their instincts told them he was a brazen thug, intent on killing them.</p>
<p>To speed processing, the subconscious uses mental shortcuts which can be a blessing or a curse. With enough experience, the adaptive unconscious can find meaningful patterns in data far more quickly than the conscious mind. But the same machinery produces phenomena such as <em>confirmation bias</em>, our tendency to notice information that supports our beliefs and ignore information that contradicts them.</p>
<p>Our goal then is to use both logic and intuition optimally to make decisions. Becoming aware of our natural tendencies and developing greater emotional maturity are key first steps. Author Julia Galef recommends that we spend time thinking like “scouts” investigating possibilities instead of “soldiers” defending our positions.<sup>5</sup> When we remain curious, grounded, and open to the possibility our conclusions may be wrong, we leverage our intuition while logically checking the blind spots that naturally come with it.</p>
<p>So should you follow your head or your gut? Use your head—<em>unless</em> your gut, guided by experience, says otherwise. Investigate further and then be open to changing your position.</p>
<hr />
<p><em><sup>1</sup> Klein, G. (1999). Sources of Power: How People Make Decisions, pp. 75. MIT Press, ISBN 0262260867<br />
<sup>2</sup> Blackman, A. (2014). <a href="http://ift.tt/1K0cW04" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1K0cW04', 'The inner workings of the executive brain']);" class="external" target="_blank">The inner workings of the executive brain</a>. The Wall Street Journal, online edition, April 27, 2014.<br />
<sup>3</sup><a href="http://ift.tt/2cqDsDR" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cqDsDR', 'How Buffet relies on his emotions']);" class="external" target="_blank">How Buffet relies on his emotions</a>, The Emotionally Intelligent Investor: How Self-Awareness, Empathy and Intuition Drive Performance blog. Accessed August, 2016<br />
<sup>4</sup> Gladwell, M. Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, pp. 189-196. Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 0316172324.<br />
<sup>5</sup> Galef, J. Why you think you’re right—even if you’re wrong. <a href="http://ift.tt/294fPBz" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/294fPBz', 'TEDx PSU talk']);" class="external" target="_blank">TEDx PSU talk</a>, February 2016.</em></p>
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Should You Rely on Your Logic or Intuition?
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-52826073342940449522016-09-06T14:44:00.001-07:002016-09-06T14:44:13.778-07:00How to Grow Your Blog While You’re On Vacation<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1646557 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2cEuAPW" alt="How to Grow Your Blog While You’re On Vacation" width="500" height="332" /></p>
<p>It’s time to go on vacation and enjoy some well-deserved rest. Vacations are great for your health, your social life and even your business, because a fresh, well-rested mind is a creative and productive one.</p>
<p>Even though you probably need a vacation, you also probably feel tense about leaving your blog unattended – and it’s not just about the possibility of finding hordes of spammers and emails on your return, but also about your readers and their continued satisfaction, because you know they’ll be eager to come back and read new content.</p>
<p>Still, vacation is your blogging-free time (unless it’s your personal blog) to recharge your batteries, so you may not want to research, interview experts and write when all you need is to forget all duties and just relax on the beach.</p>
<p>As a solo blogger or a small business owner, you want to <a href="http://ift.tt/29pxmDA" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/29pxmDA', 'ensure your blog will keep attracting traffic and possibly growing']);" class="external" target="_blank">ensure your blog will keep attracting traffic and possibly growing</a> while you are away and relaxing.</p>
<p>How to do that?</p>
<p>This guide offers advice based on 3 types of business decisions:</p>
<ol>
<li>Open hiatus</li>
<li>Scheduled content</li>
<li>Hiring an editor and a blogger</li>
</ol>
<p>I will go in detail about each of these below, and you will decide which one is best for your business model, what kind of time off you’re taking (summer vacation, holiday, time off to recover from a health issue, etc.) and how long you will be away.</p>
<div id="attachment_1646558" class="wp-caption alignnone" readability="32"><img class="wp-image-1646558 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2cEucRq" alt="How to keep your blog traffic incoming while you" width="750" height="563" />
<p class="wp-caption-text">How to keep your blog traffic incoming while you’re at the beach?</p>
</div>
<h2>1. Putting Your Blog On Open Hiatus</h2>
<p>For this business decision, you will put your blog on a temporary hold and suspend all blogging activities. However, you will not rely on a splash page announcing that you’re on vacation (the kind that obscures your whole website and makes your past content inaccessible), but you will put up an announcement and leave the blog open so users can still read your content and engage with it.</p>
<p>In other words, you let users know you won’t be around for a while and you will stop producing new content until you return.</p>
<p>Of course, that doesn’t mean you can’t schedule a few posts to go online while you’re away – you can still write round-ups, link parties, Q&A posts, or reshare your older posts on your email list, but your users know to not expect the next memorable piece during this time.</p>
<p>Regarding social media, you can either announce that there will be no updates or replies for the duration of your vacation, or you can automate the re-sharing of old posts and discussion posts. Here, your users know they’ll be reading scheduled posts.</p>
<p>If you choose to put your blog on open hiatus, it’s better to <a href="http://ift.tt/1vlekUf" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1vlekUf', 'hire a social media manager to take care of the social part of your blog and other channels']);" class="external" target="_blank">hire a social media manager to take care of the social part of your blog and other channels</a>, since your readers may still want to leave feedback while they wait for your return, and a social media manager can reply to their comments and provide some kind of feedback while you’re away.</p>
<p>This would play a positive influence on the emotional impact of your brand on your readers, who will feel taken care of and trust that you left them with someone who can help them when they need.</p>
<h3>Traffic Tips For Open Hiatus</h3>
<ol>
<li>Turn your most popular and engaging post into a sticky post. It will stand out and it will be the first piece of content users will see. <a href="http://ift.tt/1pX7PAy" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1pX7PAy', 'Make sure the headline is captivating']);" class="external" target="_blank">Make sure the headline is captivating</a>.</li>
<li>Setup your email autoresponder to recommend a few of your best articles.</li>
<li>Schedule social media posts to offer your past content to followers and new visitors alike. Make it clear you appreciate debate on the ideas proposed in the posts.</li>
</ol>
<h2>2. Scheduling Content to Go Online While You’re Away</h2>
<div id="attachment_1646559" class="wp-caption alignnone" readability="32"><img class="border wp-image-1646559 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2c5slzR" alt="Scheduling posts in advance" width="750" height="500" />
<p class="wp-caption-text">Scheduling posts and guest posts in advance</p>
</div>
<p>If you decide to schedule content that you would normally post according to your regular calendar, you don’t even need to announce the vacation – simply work on a batch of quality posts for your blog and your social channels to go live on the days you’ll be offline and you’re good to go.</p>
<p>You may, however, alert readers that you will be busy, so you will reply to comments and emails only after a specific date.</p>
<p>From the readers’ point of view, nothing will change. They will still see regular posts coming up on your blog that they can consume, share, discuss, link to, etc.</p>
<p>If you choose this option, then hiring an SMM manager will turn out to be even more critical because readers will notice that, all of a sudden, you’re no longer responding to comments and social media posts. An SMM manager can respond for you and keep the communication open on your site.</p>
<p>You might either tell your manager to ghostwrite the replies or you can announce that you hired an SMM manager to help you respond to comments.</p>
<p>Eric Brantner, founder of <a href="http://scribblrs.com/" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://scribblrs.com/', 'Scribblrs.com']);" target="_blank" class="external">Scribblrs.com</a>, uses CoSchedule to schedule content for when he goes on vacation:</p>
<blockquote readability="15">
<p>Just because you go on vacation doesn’t mean you have to put your blog on pause. With the right tools and some planning ahead, you can make sure you have posts scheduled to publish and get shared out to your social media accounts while you’re away. Personally, I use CoSchedule. Using this platform, you can plan out content, assign content to writers, schedule posts for publication at future dates, and automate sharing via social media–all in one place. It has streamlined our content marketing dramatically, cutting out hours of work and allowing me to know things will run smoothly while I’m away.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>To lighten your pre-vacation workload, you can announce that you’re accepting guest posts for the entire month (if you do this sparingly), or you can contact bloggers you know and trust to invite them to guest post on your blog. In this case, you can focus on writing and scheduling less of your own posts and focus on quality.</p>
<h3>Traffic Tips For Scheduled Content</h3>
<ol>
<li>Write at least one quality post to schedule for your vacation period. That post alone will drive the most traffic to your blog and keep it coming for at least a full week.</li>
<li>Add an introduction to each guest post you decide to publish and let your readers know why you think it connects with your existing content. The more readers can trust guest writers on your blog, the more they will engage with them and their posts.</li>
<li>Follow the traffic advice given for #1 (open hiatus).</li>
</ol>
<h2>3. Hiring an Editor and a Blogger</h2>
<div id="attachment_1646560" class="wp-caption alignnone" readability="32"><img class="wp-image-1646560 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2cEvyvd" alt="An editor can take care of your blog while you" width="750" height="500" />
<p class="wp-caption-text">An editor can take care of your blog while you’re away</p>
</div>
<p>If you have no time to dedicate to writing and scheduling content before you go on vacation, you have the option to hire an editor and a blogger to take care of your editorial calendar for the time you’ll be on vacation.</p>
<p>This is a much better decision to make if you have the budget to pay an editor and one or two bloggers, because you would be effectively building a team behind your blog that will be much more successful in keeping your blog alive and thriving than what you would be doing with a few scheduled posts and SMM manager.</p>
<p>You have two ways to go about this:</p>
<ol>
<li>Introduce your readers to the editor and blogger(s) so they will know who they’ll be interacting with while you’re away.</li>
<li>Let both the editor and the blogger(s) ghost for you, so from a reader’s point of view nothing will change – they will still see new posts coming and updates from your social media channels.</li>
</ol>
<p>I did this for a client in the past – I took care of the editorial calendar, ghostwrote blog posts and updated my client’s social media channels. The blog’s readers never knew I was doing the background work unless I got permission to mention my presence as a “team member” whenever the task at hand made it a necessity.</p>
<blockquote class="b2c-textpromo" readability="1.3333333333333">
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</blockquote>
<p>This is not an option for anyone that cannot afford an editor and bloggers, but as per option #2, you may still involve your blogger friends or your wider community with guest posting or swapping favors.</p>
<h3>Traffic Tips For Editor and Bloggers</h3>
<p>Ask your editor and bloggers to follow the traffic tips given in #1 and #2, plus any other editorial plans you want them to follow.</p>
<blockquote readability="14">
<h3>What Kind of Content Should You Schedule?</h3>
<p>Eric Brantner says “I wouldn’t say there’s necessarily a specific type of content I prefer to publish while I’m away, but I definitely don’t schedule anything I think has viral potential and requires more hands-on promotion and outreach.”</p>
<p>The best way to go is to create a blog schedule for the entire period of your vacation and to do it before you start writing any posts. Your pre-vacation work has to be meaningful for the purpose of keeping the traffic flow as high as possible, so creating a blog schedule first and then writing according to it will ensure that no step taken will turn out to be ineffective.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>More Blogging Vacation Tips</h2>
<div id="attachment_1646561" class="wp-caption alignnone" readability="32"><img class="wp-image-1646561 size-full" src="http://ift.tt/2c5sALf" alt="Tips to help your blog thrive while you enjoy your vacation" width="750" height="500" />
<p class="wp-caption-text">Tips to help your blog thrive while you enjoy your vacation!</p>
</div>
<p>When you have decided how to leave your blog before you go on vacation, and made all the necessary steps, here are a few more pieces of advice on how to keep traffic coming to your blog.</p>
<h3>1. Content Planning and Guest Posts</h3>
<p><a href="http://ift.tt/2cEvpIx" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cEvpIx', 'Saurav Kumar Nayak']);" target="_blank" class="external">Saurav Kumar Nayak</a>, content manager at Temok.com, shares his advice on how to plan your content for your vacation and get the guest posts you need to keep your pre-vacation workload slim and beneficial for your traffic stats:</p>
<blockquote readability="25">
<p>1) Keep posts scheduled in advance – I never let my posting schedule get affected, and the best way to make sure that the posts are coming is scheduling them in advance.</p>
<p>2) Allow Guest Posts – Time is a luxury we bloggers never have and that is why accepting guest posts to speed up content posting is helpful. I don’t give author access to my guest writers, though – I simply allow them to contribute it so that I can schedule some of their posts to get published while [I] am away. This way, they take care of replying to commentators too while am away!</p>
<p>3) Buffering Socials – It is important to keep the social profiles updated with fresh micro-updates. While [I] am away, I make sure to buffer some of those updates that get posted during my vacation.</p>
<p>4) Posting vacation updates – I do take selfies or pictures and post them on my social profiles during my vacation. This step isn’t really recommended for everyone and shouldn’t be done aggressively. Vacation is meant to have fun, not waste it by keeping yourself busy with your blog that you do 24*7 on any other regular working day anyway!</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Stay in the habit of scheduling at least one extra post every month as it will help you stay on track when something happens and lessen your workload when you are about to go on vacation.</p>
<p>For guest posts, make it clear before hand that you will require writers to respond to readers’ comments the day the post goes online – if they are busy on that day, or can’t be online, ask them to respond to comments within the following 48 hours and, possibly, continue to check the post for comments for the remainder of the week. In fact, in my experience as a blogger and a hungry blog reader, I’ve noticed that not all readers will comment the day the post goes live – some will take a few days to sort through their thoughts and comment then.</p>
<p>Check your comments moderation log when you come back from your vacation, because it’s possible that the spam filter caught some legit comments.</p>
<p>If you don’t wish to dedicate full days to blogging, create short posts complemented with video content. Videos may appear more intimidating to make at first, but they will take you less time to produce and your audience is guaranteed to enjoy them and put them to good use. Make sure you attach a downloadable transcript to your post for those readers who prefer text over video.</p>
<h3>2. Schedule Follow-Up Emails Recommending Your Best Articles</h3>
<p>Blogger and digital marketing strategist <a href="http://raelyntan.com/" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://raelyntan.com/', 'Raelyn Tan']);" target="_blank" class="external">Raelyn Tan</a> explains how you can leverage your email list to send out a series of follow-up emails that offer your most successful past content:</p>
<blockquote readability="10">
<p>If you have an existing list, schedule a few follow-up emails recommending your best articles. Your email service provider can easily do this for you. This will keep a steady flow of visitors who come to your website and even share your content, and also encourages your current audience to continue building that relationship.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Evergreen articles are good picks for recommendations, but if you have published content earlier in the year that’s timely but still valid, do give that priority over your evergreen pieces.</p>
<h3>3. Email Mini-Course</h3>
<p>In addition to Raelyn Tan’s follow-up emails, you can create an email mini-course for your visitors to sign up for while you’re away, and promise that you will be looking at feedback and student questions as soon as you come back.</p>
<p>This idea works better if you are putting your blog on an open hiatus, so your readers won’t be distracted by new blog content and will be able to focus entirely on the mini-course.</p>
<p>The mini-course length should match the time you will be on vacation. For example:</p>
<ul>
<li>1 week – 3 to 7 lessons</li>
<li>2 weeks – 4 to 14 lessons</li>
<li>1 month – 4 to 30 lessons</li>
</ul>
<p>The number of lessons will depend on the frequency with which you will send out emails. You can dedicate the last lessons to a recap and homework that you will review when you are back from the vacation.</p>
<p>If you opt for a mini-course, make it something your readers really need. I recommend you read or listen to <a href="http://ift.tt/2c5tbfV" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2c5tbfV', 'Rob Walling’s podcast at TheMcMethod.com on how to create an opt-in mini-course that will boost your conversions']);" target="_blank" class="external">Rob Walling’s podcast at TheMcMethod.com on how to create an opt-in mini-course that will boost your conversions</a> – one of the good points he makes is that you can save time and create an effective mini-course by building upon your existing content.</p>
<h3>4. Out-of-Office Automated Response (With A Bit of Humor)</h3>
<p>Jerry Low shared the “funny out-of-office auto reply” he sends to people, with a link to WHSR and his Twitter account. “It’s a small hack that I use to grow my social followings and website visits”, he says.</p>
<p>Here is a past out-of-office message Jerry used:</p>
<blockquote readability="16">
<p>Hey there,</p>
<p>Thanks for your email.</p>
<p>I am on holiday, and hence can’t read your message right now.</p>
<p>For urgent matters, please tweet to https://twitter.com/WebHostingJerry using hashtag #youareruiningmyholiday :)</p>
<p>I’ll be back to my desk first week of the year. Till then, take care and Happy New Year!</p>
<p>Cheers, Jerry Low<br />
Also visit – http://ift.tt/1ax7ekQ</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Takeaway</h2>
<p>In the end, going on vacation doesn’t mean your blog traffic has to suffer unless you keep blogging or checking your blog even when you are trying to relax. The key is planning the smart way and giving readers as much as you can afford while you are away, via content scheduling and social media automation.</p>
<p>Whether you choose to put your blog on open hiatus and schedule minimal remarketing content, or write and schedule posts according to your regular editorial calendar, or to leave everything in the hands of an editor and one or two bloggers, you will still be giving your readers what they are looking for — fresh, interesting content and food for thought that they need to up their game.</p>
<p>Now you better go – get everything ready and enjoy your vacation!</p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/1VQWIg1">Luana Spinetti</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em>Luana Spinetti is a freelance writer and artist based in Italy, and a passionate Computer Science student. She has a high-school diploma in Psychology and Education and attended a 3-year course in Comic Book Art, from which she graduated on 2008. As multi-faceted a person as she is, she recently... <a href="http://ift.tt/1VQWIg1">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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How to Grow Your Blog While You’re On Vacation
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-86152068988801434012016-09-06T14:36:00.001-07:002016-09-06T14:36:33.371-07:00Having Trouble Keeping Up With Social Content Demands?<p>You’re Not Alone. Influencers May Your Silver Bullet.</p>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-1646420 size-medium" title="influencer_inspiring_content_creation" src="http://ift.tt/2c5oPFE" alt="influencer_inspiring_content_creation" width="600" height="361" /></p>
<p>Marketers today have a lot on their plates. They face an ever-growing landscape of channels to connect with their community and each channel poses it’s own content demands. Plus there’s the time it takes to properly engage with audiences on those channels. If you’re feeling the squeeze from all of this social pressure, you’re not alone. <a href="http://ift.tt/1uFdJw1" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','download','http://ift.tt/1uFdJw1']);" class="external" target="_blank">54% of B2B marketers</a> and <a href="http://ift.tt/1EXdQHL" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','download','http://ift.tt/1EXdQHL']);" class="external" target="_blank">50% of B2C marketers</a> cite creating enough content for their marketing efforts as a top priority for their marketing initiatives.</p>
<blockquote class="b2c-textpromo" readability="1.3333333333333">
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<p>Creating quality content for social channels and managing the conversation happening around that content could be a full-time job. But few marketers have this as their sole task. So, where can marketers turn to supplement their content creation needs?</p>
<h2>Power of Visual Content</h2>
<p>46% of marketers say photography is critical to their current marketing and storytelling strategies. This is in part due to the value and impact of visual content. From hieroglyphics to emojis, humans have always communicated with visuals. The reality is that people have historically needed images as a form of communication that builds social intimacy. This is especially true in our modern world, where much of our communication takes place exclusively in virtual ‘communities’ that have replaced face-to-face communication (Ayres, 2016). Without images, we would have lots of trouble sharing thoughts and feelings with one another. The goal of marketing is to strike an emotional chord, to gain the attention, emotion and ultimately the trust of your audience. Visuals are valuable to marketers because of the speed at which they elicit a human response. There are a million examples of how the image has been employed by marketers over the years: billboards, posters, mailers, newspaper ads and glossy photo shoots. In fact, it’s hokey and quaint (even bizarre) to think of a day when the marketing message was not accompanied by a high-impact visual.</p>
<p>Savvy marketers are leveraging captivating visuals and photography to connect with their audience. In fact, when people hear information, they’re likely to remember only 10% of that information three days later. However, if a relevant image is paired with that same information, people retained 65% of the information three days later. On top of that when these visuals are produced by their peers it increases the value and receptiveness of the content. This user-generated content has been found to be <a href="http://ift.tt/2cEqNC5" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cEqNC5', 'more memorable and influential']);" class="external" target="_blank">more memorable and influential</a> especially when it comes to the ever-elusive millennial audience. Marketers are looking for engaging content and user-generated visual content is exactly what they need. But how do you get your hands on it?</p>
<h2>Producing Enough Content</h2>
<p>Many marketers are turning to trusted influencers, not only for sharing branded content to their large audiences but also for their content production needs. Influencers serve as their personal branded content creators. This content may be passed directly to the brand for use on their social channels or website. Repurposing this influencer content is much easier than attempting to create the content yourself and more relatable than stock photos or catalogue-style shoots.</p>
<p>We’ve seen influencers share amazing content for some of the top brands. And we’ve written about the benefits of tapping creators to promote your brand many times before. But in addition to amplification gained by sharing, the content itself is also valuable for brand use. You gain the value of an influencer’s personal style and creativity, plus the peace of mind that you’re choosing content that will resonate because it has already been validated by the influencer’s audience. This test can also help with deciding where to use certain pieces of content. If you know @thebalancedblonde’s post performed well with fitness-focused millennial females, then include her photo in your next product announcement to that audience. Influencers are effective because of the trust and respect they’ve built with their audience, you can tap that trust and respect by leveraging the content they create.</p>
<h2>Repurposing Ethically</h2>
<p>There are important legal and ethical things to account for when deciding to use influencer content for your next program. Any post created by a content creator needs to be shared with full attribution. This isn’t just a safe idea, it’s a smart idea. It helps build community and collaboration between you and your content creators as well as drawing the influencer’s credibility even closer to your brand. And most importantly, you need to make sure you have permission to re-share that content.</p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/1U1SmSg">Alex Ditty</a></h3>
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Having Trouble Keeping Up With Social Content Demands?
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-22631376221383636772016-09-06T12:39:00.001-07:002016-09-06T12:39:44.004-07:00How Pokemon Go is Influencing Tech<p><img class="attachment-medium_large wp-post-image alignnone wp-image-1646317 size-medium" src="http://ift.tt/2cEeDcv" alt="How-Pokemon-Go-is-Influencing-Tech" width="600" height="401" /></p>
<p>No one saw Pokemon Go coming, and now no one can avoid it.</p>
<p>The small app game has become a juggernaut that has influenced everything from culture to business operations. It has made a huge impact on the <a href="http://ift.tt/2b6eiMh" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2b6eiMh', 'marketing world']);" target="_blank" rel="nofollow" class="external">marketing world</a>, showing brands just what’s possible even with a simple app.</p>
<p>The game’s unique use of augmented reality has also shown what is possible with technology. Here are a few ways that the game is influencing tech (including the potential it shows):</p>
<h3>Entertainment</h3>
<p>Over the years, technology has improved significantly so that we no longer have black-and-white movies or simple line drawing animation.</p>
<p>Now, we have graphics that seem so real that you expect the dinosaur to jump right out of the screen during the chase scene. The picture is so crisp that you can almost feel the same breeze that is rustling across the leaves and the tiny hairs on the caterpillars and flies.</p>
<p>Augmented reality doesn’t necessarily improve the quality of the picture, but it makes for a more immersive experience that brings that scene into your world. Pokemon Go not only includes virtual items on the physical world, such as different types of Pokemon, but it also creates virtual spaces from physical ones, such as PokeStops and PokeGyms.</p>
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<p>The game has shown that there is vast potential for other mobile games and apps. Not only can augmented reality help to create a more engaging game experience, but it can also help businesses better <a href="http://ift.tt/2cEgxcM" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/2cEgxcM', 'connect with customers']);" target="_blank" class="external">connect with customers</a> through their games.</p>
<p>For example, augmented reality could easily be used in a game that helps visitors at Disney theme parks find beloved characters on the park map. They could appear just like the Pokemon characters do on the game. The park could use the game to reward visitors with special perks, like an extra fast pass to cut the line on a popular ride or a discount at the gift shop.</p>
<p>There are numerous ways that Disney could use such a game to drive purchases. It could make characters appear at restaurants or shops during slow hours when it needs extra sales, and it could pair those appearances with special discounts or other promotions at the locations. It could make rare characters appear only at specific parks, which could generate multiple-park ticket sales.</p>
<p>There are endless possibilities for businesses of all types to use augmented reality games in similar ways to drive sales and user engagement.</p>
<p>The travel industry, movie studios, chambers of commerce, museums and more can also take advantage of these opportunities to drive sales.</p>
<h3>Healthcare</h3>
<p>The technology used in Pokemon Go can be used for much more than entertaining or marketing. It could save a life.</p>
<p>Apps that use augmented reality can be used for a variety of healthcare applications. For example, they could be used to help people find the location of a defibrillator in an emergency. Similarly, it could be used to find the location of a fire alarm, fire extinguisher, or other emergency device. Instead of just showing these items on a map, it could include a bright graphic over the actual location through the lens of your camera.</p>
<p>Other potential uses include helping seniors remember to take their medication or to find the location of their pill bottle. The app could guide them to the location through their phone camera, and users could keep track of what pills they have taken for the day by capturing a pill just like they would a Pokemon.</p>
<p>Apps could turn healthcare treatment into a kind of game. Kids and teenagers who are resisting taking their medication could get points for taking their pill or shot at a certain time or win special rewards for taking it a certain number of days in a row. They could win special items for taking additional measures, such as drinking enough water or doing enough exercise.</p>
<p>The augmented reality portion of the game could turn the house into a game map. Maybe they have to go to different areas to do exercises or get enough sleep, and so on.</p>
<p>There are numerous potential applications for both personal healthcare monitoring and professional healthcare management. People can use it for their own treatment, and nurses and doctors can use it to encourage patients to get the right care.</p>
<p>Pokemon Go has not only shown the potential for augmented reality technology but also for marketing through apps and games. The technology shows that marketing should go beyond in-app advertisements and should instead focus on how apps and games can be merged with the real world.</p>
<p>If you are feeling especially motivated by the game’s success, you might even consider developing your own augmented reality game or app for your business or your niche. You could make money on the app itself or through the sales it helps generate for your business.</p>
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Content Manager & Editor-In-Chief at CodeFuel by Perion.<br />
Jonny has years of content based, tech wizardry under his belt . He specializes in user engagement, monetization platforms, hungry start ups, SMB/B2B hubs and all things Minogue.<br />
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How Pokemon Go is Influencing Tech
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-56760715941712158132016-09-06T11:21:00.003-07:002016-09-06T11:21:15.304-07:00Taking a Closer Look at Social Media Buzz Metrics<p><img class="wp-image-1648355 attachment-medium_large wp-post-image" src="http://ift.tt/2chvWON" alt="Taking-a-Closer-Look-at-Social-Media-Buzz-Metrics" width="744" height="610" /></p>
<p>Generating social media buzz is a great way to create more exposure and excitement for your brand.</p>
<p>When most brands put together a plan to create social media buzz, it revolves around the posts they are publishing rather than the posts that others are publishing about the brand.</p>
<p>To really measure your brand’s influence, you need to look beyond your own social media buzz metrics. You also need to look at posts that are being made about your brand and the engagement those posts are getting.</p>
<h3>Comparing Metrics</h3>
<p>You need only look at the 2016 presidential election to understand why it’s important to look at the right social metrics.</p>
<p>When asked about the buzz for their candidates, campaign workers attending an event at the Microsoft Innovation Center talked all about the number of likes they were getting, the number of shares and retweets, and other signs of engagement.</p>
<p>However, none of them talked about measuring the reach of posts shared by others about their candidates.</p>
<p>When the numbers were analyzed, researchers found that the buzz generated by the politicians’ own social media posts accounted for only about 10 percent of the buzz generated by the posts shared by other businesses, advocacy groups and users.</p>
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<p>If the numbers are the same for your business, that’s a huge amount of data that is left untapped. Do you know what kind of buzz is being generated about your business?</p>
<h3>Looking at the Data</h3>
<p>When analyzing your social media buzz, there are a number of metrics you should look at, as well as some that you need but that aren’t yet available.</p>
<p>The easiest way to find out what kind of buzz your brand is getting on Facebook is to look at the “People Talking About” data that the site provides. The feature shows how many likes, comments and shares a page gets over the previous seven days.</p>
<p>You can use this tool to find out what kind of buzz you are getting both on page and off. You can also use it to track what’s happening with your competitors so that you know where you compare.</p>
<p>Previously, you could get even more information from a tool provided by USA Today called the <a href="http://ift.tt/1Jv8UcX" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1Jv8UcX', 'Facebook Barometer']);" target="_blank" rel="nofollow" class="external">Facebook Barometer</a>. The tool showed you all the data that Facebook offers plus the total number of mentions for a brand across the site. However, the tool is no longer being updated, and no comparable tool has been offered to replace it.</p>
<p>Twitter makes it a little easier to track mentions since most people either tag the user or include a hashtag. You can also search the site by keywords, which will return your brand mentions.</p>
<p>What is missing is a tool that helps you understand not just the mentions you are getting but also the sentiment behind those mentions. In other words, are people talking a lot about your brand because they hate you or because they love you?</p>
<p>The trouble is that there is no easy way to do this. Artificial intelligence just isn’t advanced enough to interpret the comments. Keywords aren’t enough to deliver the answers. How does the computer interpret sarcasm? Or references and inside jokes?</p>
<p>Until the day that our technology is able to scan and interpret these mentions, you’ll have to rely on the hard data that you have available.</p>
<p>You can also appoint monitors who routinely scour social media and join groups and pages to report back on how your brand is being discussed. The strategy won’t give you the full measure of your social media buzz, but it will give you a representative sampling from which to extrapolate how your brand is viewed.</p>
<h3>Making the Most of Social Media</h3>
<p>The best thing you can do to influence the buzz you get on social media is to create an active presence on these sites and to proactively shape your reputation.</p>
<p>Don’t just post updates passively. Start conversations and then remain an active part of them.</p>
<p>Don’t avoid negative comments either. Engage followers to make up for the issue that caused the complaint and find out how you can avoid future problems. When followers see you handling negative situations well, they will respect you more and think more of your customer service.</p>
<p>Look for other ways to <a href="http://ift.tt/1pNhnFb" onclick="_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'outbound-article', 'http://ift.tt/1pNhnFb', 'improve engagement']);" target="_blank" class="external">improve engagement</a>, as well, such as hosting contests, posing interesting questions, or highlighting customers themselves. For example, you can highlight customer success stories, share photos of them wearing your products, publicly wish them happy birthday and more.</p>
<p>You can check out the metrics on page to determine how successful you have been, and you can measure your own website metrics, such as increased traffic, time on site, leads and more.</p>
<p>Make tweaks as you need to along the way to increase your buzz and start meeting your goals.</p>
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Taking a Closer Look at Social Media Buzz Metrics
stylehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10190141957117932259noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1849026760788397677.post-64407764139394216162016-09-06T11:21:00.001-07:002016-09-06T11:21:14.322-07:00Making Social More Legitimate: Getting Buy-in from Senior Executives<p><img class="attachment-thumbnail wp-post-image alignnone wp-image-1648374" title="Making Social more Legitimate: Getting Buy-in from Senior Executives" src="http://ift.tt/2cq5r6S" alt="Making Social more Legitimate: Getting Buy-in from Senior Executives" width="871" height="301" /></p>
<p>Whether it’s explaining your role to executives or relatives, people in the industry are weary of having to justify the merit of their projects and for many organizations it can feel like a constant battle for resource and vindication.</p>
<p>That’s not to say things are bad. It’s been a long road from isolated social media managers ‘sitting on Facebook all day’, and those working with social data now enjoy larger budgets and team sizes as the field grows ever more sophisticated and valuable to the operations of a business – but it can still seem like an uphill struggle for many.</p>
<p>A social data leader, depending on circumstance and organization type, can include anyone from social media managers to CMOs. A common challenge sticks out among these leaders and that’s the very nature of proving the worth of their programs. It’s the struggle to establish internal credibility, gain recognition of successes with social, and about securing resource for future initiatives.</p>
<h2>Proving ROI</h2>
<p>Wrapped up in this topic is the issue of demonstrating return on investment. Proving ROI holds the keys to unlock the justification challenge – especially as social continues to carve out more budget against traditional forms of media.</p>
<p>There is plenty of broad data that demonstrates the value of many social endeavors in general. It’s a smattering of micro case studies, but both Unilever and Coca-Cola have publically stated that they have observed a direct relationship between social activity and sales.</p>
<p><img class="size-full wp-image-1648375 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2chwPXp" alt="Screen Shot 2016-08-30 at 10.56.17" width="800" height="291" /></p>
<p>The trouble is that these case studies mean nothing when faced with a disapproving executive. Management teams aren’t typically interested in such generalizations, and walking this path is unlikely to get many social leaders very far in achieving their objectives. So what else can be done?</p>
<p>Many are moving towards using social to represent the value of other programs, and are extending the tendrils of social data across their organizations.</p>
<p>Measuring the performance of, say, a TV campaign or product launch, is a means of associating social data with something bigger than just social media marketing. It also distinguishes the value of social programs as something inherently and continuously useful, not just something tied to the success of a social campaign.</p>
<p>Whatever your ultimate goal and specific strategy for getting management buy-in for your social initiatives, there are a number of techniques that can be employed to convince and convert those at the top. These principles can provide a helpful process to follow for those seeking to get a bigger chunk of attention from the individuals that matter.</p>
<h2>Establish</h2>
<p>Setting out the expectations as early as possible with social data projects is critical. Very often the cause of friction between management and social teams rests upon a disparity between what is expected and what is delivered.</p>
<p>Take ownership of this from the start. Make the terms and desired results of the work as clear as possible. Ensure they are documented and agreed upon by the relevant stakeholders, as it can act as a stabilising point of reference as further decisions and reflections are considered in the future.</p>
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<p>Ask yourself – what do the management expect from this? Is what she wants from the investment the same as what you want? Don’t do anything until you’ve spent some serious tame making sure that those expectations are aligned.</p>
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<h6><strong>TIM GRIMES,</strong> SOCIAL ANALYTICS expert</h6>
<p>A vital part of this process includes listening and making sure the goals of the social leader meet the goals of the organization overall. When setting out the objectives for a particular initiative, the most successful leaders will spend time understanding what executives actually want – vital information when planning the program.</p>
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<p>Listening will inform the process and provide the justification for why then we need to expand the analytics, why we need to engage, why we need to be there.</p>
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<h6><strong>TRACY BELL,</strong> ENTERPRISE MEDIA MONITORING EXECUTIVE, BANK OF AMERICA</h6>
<p>A common problem in this area is that, like all other disciplines inside an organization, social data is inherently flawed. There are drawbacks to social, and fundamentally it’s important to acknowledge the parts that aren’t going to work.</p>
<p>Dark data and the unseen offline effects of social will never find their way into monthly reports, yet social analytics teams regularly find themselves forced to defend the integrity of their data. The answer here is to confront those weaknesses, those biases and blind spots so closely entwined with social media, and present them as valid caveats to management before projects are undertaken and deliverables agreed.</p>
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<p>You can use all the quantitative data you can get, but you still have to distrust it and use your own intelligence and judgment.</p>
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<h6><strong>ALVIN TOFFLER,</strong> AMERICAN AUTHOR AND DIGITAL REVOLUTION EXPERT</h6>
<p>This mind set should continue as programs are rolled out and enacted. Admit failed endeavours and accept shortcomings as they happen.</p>
<p>While agencies may feel the need to desperately defend the success of their campaigns, and will seek to distort the data in such a way to paint the most positive picture they can, someone that is brand-side will be in a position to assess each piece of work in a more honest way.</p>
<p>Once again, exposing the real disappointments as they happen will serve to create much more robust foundations for the moments when you really need to underline the value of your work.</p>
<h2>Prove</h2>
<p>Quite soon after establishing the purpose of a project or investment comes the inevitable demands for proof. Proof that it was a good idea. Proof that it delivers results.</p>
<p>Cintas are probably the largest organization you’ve never heard of. With over 30,000 employees, Cintas are behind the unmistakable employee uniforms of brands as instantly recognisable as Starbucks and UPS. Troy Pfeffer started the enterprise’s intelligence department eight years ago, and discovered that achieving executive buy-in was the biggest obstacle he faced in making the program a success.</p>
<p>“Establish a new program with no precedent immediately puts you in risky territory. Winning the trust of the executive team was essential if I wanted this thing to work.”</p>
<h6><strong>TROY PFEFFER,</strong> COMPETITIVE INTELLIGENCE DIRECTOR AT CINTAS</h6>
<p>Typically it’s from the very first moments after the initial sign off takes place when pressure begins to mount on those proof points. Troy believes this is one of the most crucial periods in any project involving new budgets or resource: “Until you do anything worthwhile, the jury is very much out. Your first priority should be to start delivering value as soon as you can, and not to get distracted by the big payoff in a few years’ time”.</p>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648376 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2cq67sT" alt="Cintas_Ready_ad_" width="743" height="495" /></p>
<p>Long-term decision-making should, of course, not go neglected, but there is genuine merit in the idea behind front-loading your communication of results.</p>
<p>With any project, there is likely to be an air of apprehension that can be swiftly blown away by some real, value-laden results.</p>
<p>Look for low-hanging fruits and go after those first, focusing on the elements that are easier to demonstrate the value of. With social data, a key part of this will be to distance the results from socially native metrics, such as followers and mention counts, and move towards universal business language such as sales, retention or net promoter score.</p>
<p>Compartmentalization can be an effective strategy. Rather than attempt to justify the entire social operation, sometimes isolating the ROI for each project, or even hire, can make it easier to communicate the value upwards.</p>
<p>This is echoed by comments from the VP of Analytics at a popular teleshopping retail brand in the US, who says that she isolated the specific benefits associated with new hires not in terms of input, but in output.</p>
<p>Speaking on the topic of weighing in on securing new headcount, she revealed she was able to add people to her team one person at a time in a piecemeal fashion – with associated increases in committed metrics for each new person added to the team.</p>
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<p>We were looking at two potential new roles. For me, I knew they were going to make a difference, but I had to get management to see that too. In the end, I wrote down all the ways in which these people would affect the team’s performance – not just in the amount of work we could get done, but in the results of the department overall. And I committed to those results. That was enough to seal it.</p>
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<h6><strong>VP ANALYTICS,</strong> TOP 20 US RETAIL BRAND</h6>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648377 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2chvBeQ" alt="Shopping Cart" width="831" height="550" /></p>
<p>This partitioned concept can be taken further. One of the most potent ways in which social resources are appropriated is through innovation programs or, more specifically, pilots. As a disruptive and novel discipline in general, social lends itself well to small-scale, focused pilot schemes to explore the value of new ideas.</p>
<p>Senior management like them because they are cost-efficient and can be side-lined relatively cheaply if need be, helping risk-averse executives feel more comfortable with what may be seen as a risky investment. See hesitant, limited backing of projects as opportunities for trial and experimentation. Then, when projects go well, it’s easier to build a case for evolving them into something more serious, well armed with data and first-hand practice.</p>
<p>Speaking to Tracy Bell, Enterprise Media Monitoring Executive at Bank of America, she revealed that in the early stages of developing a social intelligence program, social data leaders should target forward thinkers that will be receptive to social insights. As she points out, they should “go after business lines that will actually take actions on it.”</p>
<p>After social media intelligence has proven its ability to inform business decisions, it’s much easier to carry the torch for social and build a case around future insights.</p>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648378 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2cq5q2O" width="852" height="333" title="" alt="" /></p>
<h2>Share</h2>
<p>As well as simply proving the worth of your initiatives, it should be considered best practice to maintain constant communication with project sponsors. Having secured early wins and starting to build more trust among senior management, social leaders should develop strategies for disseminating updates about the work in general.</p>
<p>Momentum can be a powerful force, and for meaningful long-term success it is important to occupy as much of those sponsors’ headspace as possible.</p>
<p>A tale about fighting for this headspace comes from Anthony, leader of social analytics at one of the big west coast technology firms.</p>
<p>Speaking to Anthony at an intelligence event in Madrid in 2015, he revealed he initially found it frustrating that his team’s monthly reports were being sent to board members yet were so often left unopened in inboxes or otherwise not acted upon. He needed to change something.</p>
<p><img class=" wp-image-1648379 alignnone" src="http://ift.tt/2chwTqe" alt="Hands typing on laptop computer" width="731" height="487" /></p>
<p>Recognizing the need to grab the attention of those with little spare to give, Anthony recruited the help of an internal designer to style the reports in a more visually engaging way. Fewer words, more images.</p>
<p>He also took the time to prepare highlight emails for those still unwilling to open the PDF itself, which included bold callouts of what he likes to call ‘key insights’.</p>
<p>Anthony jokes that his seniors didn’t respond well when they were named ‘recommended actions’, and these suggestions ended up landing in the wrong way. So he changed the name to ‘key insights’, and, somewhat amusingly, they are now received much more positively.</p>
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<p>Many organizations are providing guidance to data scientists on how to make results easier for managers to digest: storytelling, for example, is now becoming a standard part of analytics training curricula.</p>
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<h6><strong>SAM RANSBOTHAM,</strong> ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF INFORMATION SYSTEMS AT BOSTON COLLEGE</h6>
<p>Things had improved, but something was still missing.</p>
<p>Anthony spoke privately to some stakeholders on the project and a few colleagues close to his seniors to understand more about what might be lacking. He soon discovered that there was a perception among those above him that his reports didn’t have much in the way of credibility – they were packaged in a way that relied on the reader’s faith that the insights within were true.</p>
<p>Anthony again adjusted quickly, and began attaching raw data files along with the highlights email and report. These attachments included the verbatim comments from real people gathered by social listening tools, and exposed the data behind all the calculations and graphs featured in the report.</p>
<p>It felt a bit like data overload, but it didn’t take too long for this to make a noticeable difference to the reaction – and adoption – of the ‘key insights’ generated by his team.</p>
<p>Anthony’s experiences point to two considerations that often seem in conflict with one another. Social leaders must strike a balance between distributing coherent, digestible findings and still maintain the trust and credibility that comes with data-driven decision making.</p>
<p>Social media data, initially unstructured, can be difficult for those unfamiliar with it to understand. Before a social data leader can expect social insights to actually inform business decisions, “creating a common language across the organization” and “educating the consumers of data” is a valuable prerequisite, according to Bank of America’s Tracy Bell.</p>
<p>Troy Pfeffer at Cintas puts it nicely with his heavy repetition of the phrase “what’s in it for me?”</p>
<p>It’s a phrase he regularly drills into anyone responsible for sharing findings with other people, and has been shortened among his team as WIIFM. Constantly framing the WIIFM factor for the recipient of any distributed intelligence can fundamentally change the way insights are shared.</p>
<p>Creating such reports with what may (or may not) be in worthwhile for the recipient is an incredibly helpful method for making sure work gets noticed.</p>
<p>Perhaps it’s this phrase that unifies the many techniques that get talked about in this area. Considering the WIIFM factor is a helpful reminder to bear in mind across any activity you might be undertaking in generating more credibility for your program.</p>
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<h3 class="author-name">Author: <a href="http://ift.tt/29aCJ9w">Joel Windels</a></h3>
<p class="hidden-xs"><em>Joel is the Marketing Manager EMEA at Brandwatch, a social media analytics platform. As well as spending much of his time in the social media sphere, Joel's background has been in the computer games industry, spanning development, usability, marketing, journalism and community management. He is currently based in Brighton, UK. ... <a href="http://ift.tt/29aCJ9w">View full profile ›</a></em></p>
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Making Social More Legitimate: Getting Buy-in from Senior Executives
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