Popular Articles on Business 2 Community |
- 7 Essential Writing Skills To Juice Up Your Social Media Marketing
- Infographics: The New Face of Content Marketing for Link Building in 2014
- 50 Unbelieveable Facts about Spain
- Online Marketing Trends Are Moving Toward Visual Assets
- 3 Top Metrics to Measure Your SEO Efforts
- Top Web Design Trends for 2014
- Cyber Bullying Just As Damaging As In-Person Bullying (Study)
- How Do You Make Your Content Share-Worthy?
| 7 Essential Writing Skills To Juice Up Your Social Media Marketing Posted: 20 Feb 2014 06:43 AM PST In this post I’m going to talk about the types of little tricks of the trade that allow social media marketing specialist to get the big bucks. The good news is that we can all do the same thing with a bit of practice. Tis'true! As for guaranteed results…there are none. Let's go. Skill #1: Being Highly AdaptiveThe digital culture is always shifting and adapting to an ever-increasing load of tech-innovation. We're all freaking ADHD now dude! Our attention is limited and there's only so much cerebral real estate to go around. You need to speak the language your audience responds to. Skip the sales-speak and only ask for things after giving them a ton of information/entertainment first. You've got to adapt the writing to suit their lingo. You've got to tailor the snippets of information to be relevant to what your audience finds engaging. Social media writing is both an art, and a science of understanding the click-generation. Skill #2: The Ability to Keep is ShortBeing able to keep things short isn't easy. You've really got to practice for a while and read legions of updates on pages that get tons of organic traffic. Approach it from a psychological angle. How much can you fit into four lines of text? In reality you can change the world with two sentences, it just takes a bit of brainstorming. Skill #3: A Snappy Wit that EngagesEveryone responds with a smile to wit because we understand that it takes a certain sense of inventiveness. We all smirk when we read clever uses of irony because we know it requires a keen intelligence. Wit is all about humor. If you can consistently write in a way that gets people to think and smile, they'll typically come back for more. Then it's a matter of sustaining that precedent. Now remember, a little bit of wit goes a long ways and it can quickly bog down the mind so use it sparingly. Skill #4: Tie-ins to Relevant News that WorksAlmost half of the time social media writers need to be witty in a hurry and then tie-in some kind of relevant news. It could be current events or it could be some consumer-based news (OMG the new PlayStation/iPod/you get the point). Regardless, being able to tie-in with style and finesse isn't that easy. We can all say, "Check out this article from so and so about this and that." But, being short, concise and witty as well takes more practice. Skill #5: Pro FormattingNo one, and I mean absolutely no one likes a huge block of text to read online. This is especially the case for people that are browsing using little mobile screens. Pro formatting in the social media realm is no different than in the blogosphere. We're talking short snappy paragraphs, witty subtitles and headings along with visuals and aesthetics that help us scan things. Skill #6: Mastering the DetailsThere's lots of little details that you come across when writing for an online audience that they don't know about unless they do it themselves. There's proper punctuation, spelling, meta-data, tags/hashtags, formatting, getting the pictures right (which also have meta-data to worry about), and on and on. Don’t forget about revising your writing. All these little details add up to either make or break user-experience. Part of social media writing success is in the understanding that it's more dependent on how your content is received than necessarily what it's composed of. For example, announcing maintenance isn't all that exciting, but it can be made exciting through the crafty use of a humorous picture/meme and some witty writing with candor. Skill #7: The CTA AbilityAt the end of the day the success or failure of social media writing is measured in action. How much action does the writing incite people to do? Do they click where you ask them to click? Do they sign up? Do they share, leave a comment, spread the word or subscribe to whatever it is? Furthermore, do they push your writing or post forward onto other social media platforms like Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, and so on? How it's done is hard to explain. You need to tell people what to do in a way that definitely comes across as non-sales, and genuine though. Social media writing is all about reaching people and getting them to pause for a moment to consider whatever your proposal is. Conclusion: Start PracticingSocial media isn't going away. The platforms will change and evolve, but not the medium of communication. Practice being short, relevant, authoritative, witty, humorous, and formatting with a clear CTA at the end. Once you get used to it and find the formula that works best for your audience, it's a snap!  |
| Infographics: The New Face of Content Marketing for Link Building in 2014 Posted: 19 Feb 2014 10:37 PM PST “Infographic" was one amongst the hot list of buzzwords in the Link Building Campaigns conducted by diligent search engine marketers across the globe in 2013. More and more SEOs are still coming up with the newest tactics to establish brand relevance and resonate customers on personal levels by visualising data and leveraging the power of Graphical content creation. But "Finding Link Prospects" and "Creating efficient Link Building processes" is something which is still a tough challenge faced by most of them and thus they complain of lacking a proper channel that can boost their response rates and can make them winners of the Content Marketing Game in 2014. What is so special about Infographics ?? According to a Link Building Survey conducted by Skyrocket in mid 2013, it was revealed that Infographics rank second amongst all Link Building Tactics adopted by most search engine optimizers throughout the world. At times, it becomes absolutely frenetic to manipulate large data sets and beefy statistics with just a couple of text paragraphs which in turn seem boring to most of the target audience and hence fail in fetching quality links subsequently. In such a scenario, endowing a marvellous visual delight that speaks of your message and convey the information quickly becomes an inevitable mandate. Below we have jotted down some points as to why Infographics are considered an important aspect in Link Building -:
The Quick Infographic Sharing Guide to help you Build Quality Links and Attain Traffic Tricks Step 1) – Focus on Looks Choose a burning topic, collect statistical data and come up with an exquisitely splendid infographic because "Looks Do Matter". You never know what grabs fascinates the audience, spreads like an epidemic and ends up being. Step 2) – "Post" and "Share" to Outreach your Targeted Niche
Exclusive Tip – Include a "Click to Zoom" option on the page/blog where you post your Infographic. This will help people to read the text incorporated in the infographic easily Step 3) – Try to generate Genuine Link Requests Creating genuine Link requests is one tactic that can prove fruitful in the promotion of your Infographic to a great extent. This is possible only if you have a long contact list of the people who trust you, who are really in touch with you and who are in the same business as you. In addition to this, you can build and maintain good relationships with the major search engine optimizers, bloggers, journalists, content marketers etc and ask them to publish your Infographic if they have already written or, if they are planning to write something similar to the topic covered by you. Exclusive Tip - Always keep a category-wise directory of all the potential connections on "Google Docs" to make this task even more easier. Step 4) – Include an "Embed Code" section on your webpage smartly !! Believe it or not, there will be many people who come across your Infographic and feel like adding it on their own Blog/Page etc. Some of them may even turn up saying that they want to write something that explains the Infographic well. This is where the need of an "embed code" section arises since it not only makes it easy for them to share your content but is likely to increase the probability of generating good inbound links. Plus, they will earn you a good amount of referral traffic by creating backlinks from sites that share or embed your infographic on their own Website/Blog etc. One can easily generate an embed code by using "Siege Media Embed Code generator" which can be found at "http://www.siegemedia.com/embed-code-generator". You just need to fill out some fields that ask for your site name, post URL and image URL, Image Alt text, Desired Widths & Heights of image and embed box. Soon a code will be generated which you can copy and paste into the HTML documents of your webpage wherever you want your code section to appear. Exclusive Tip – Always keep your "Embed Code" box above the "Leave comments" section because comments are likely to increase day by day and thus they will sink your Embed Code block downwards making it almost invisible for those who find endless scrolling as a cumbersome task. Also make sure that your code block offers easy copying through an "Autoselect All' functionality or otherwise folks will get frustrated selecting everything line by line and ending up inviting code errors. Shared below is a few lines of CSS clubbed with a Javascript function to help you accomplish this –
The Bottom Line is, until and unless you entertain your customers to the core by offering them something they are looking for, something they are in love with, something they perceive as a necessity instead of your cheap marketing tactic, something that they find worthy enough to share within their friends and colleagues; you won't probably land up 100% successful in any your Link Building Efforts. With 1+ billion people active on Facebook, 500+ million on Twitter, 300+ million on Google+, 259 million on LinkedIn and 70 million on Pinterest, one can't doubt the huge potential in the Online market , but the real Champ is the one who has the mettle to outreach them with Intelligent Content Marketing Tactics as well.  |
| 50 Unbelieveable Facts about Spain Posted: 18 Feb 2014 08:50 PM PST The whole good ingredients you are using for your delicious paella is easily made available to you from the wondrous life and culture of Spain. That football game you are enjoying? That wouldn't be made possible without the contribution of the people, animals, culture and atmosphere that only Spain can offer to the world. It's precisely that that makes Spain a worthy subject of study for academicians and focus for demography masters and sociologists. There's a lot of sociology study that could be made possible in Spain. One good study would be on the focus of how abortion is being made a subject of question for people in Spain. One good subject about Spain that needs some good discussion is its take on the historical past it has over the countries that had been subjugated to them. Today, Spain never seems to offer a great powerful nationalistic threat to other countries, and the culture that it has left over the years could only be rallied around that novel The Leopard. True, there's so much to know about Spain yet, but where will you start? Maybe this infographic is your start.  |
| Online Marketing Trends Are Moving Toward Visual Assets Posted: 18 Feb 2014 08:14 PM PST The online marketing industry is evolving with each passing year. Earlier, online marketers focused more on search engines for the promotion of their marketing content. Back in the previous decade, more focus was given on keyword-based website content, optimized blog posts and bookmarking techniques to increase rankings and to come into the limelight. Link building techniques were used to build traffic toward business websites. This included making a list of websites linking to your most challenging rival and attempting to submit your link in each directory, platform, etc., or you would try to discover a powerful blogger in your niche and send out an email asking him to buy a sponsored review. Now these trends are a thing of the past. The need to employ unique, user friendly and engaging marketing techniques gave birth to visual assets. Today, marketers need to keep coming up with innovative ideas and create marketing plans according to real-time customer insights through visuals. Related Class: Content Storytelling Rules for the Digital Marketer Different Genres of Visual Assets Let's explore the different kinds of visuals that are currently being used by marketers all over the world to promote their marketing campaigns and let's see how they are implemented into content marketing. Photos Everybody has a camera in their pocket today. With the increase in photo-centric networking forums such as Pinterest, Facebook, Tumblr and Instagram, photos have become a universal language for the Internet. Articles containing images receive 94% more viewership, and 60% of customers are apt to interact with a business that shows an image to support its credibility. Pinterest has grown exceptionally, surpassing both Tumblr and Flickr in February 2012 with 23.7 million unique American visitors. That's enough information to make photos an important visual asset for online marketing today. Memes A meme is a term coined by Richard Dawkins in the year 1976 that is short for "mimem," a Greek word meaning "imitated thing." The history of the meme dates back to the 19th century when Harry Whittier Frees, an American photographer, captured pictures of his pet cats and transformed them into greeting cards by adding texts. Infographics There are many popular memes on the Internet, one being the Success Kid. Generally used to announce triumphs over everyday problems, the Success Kid is extremely popular among Internet users. Memes can generate user interaction and help your consumers engage with each other to spread, discuss and spread your message on the Internet. For creating brand awareness and social buzz, the use of infographics has become a must-include feature of every marketing campaign. Mainly used in the 1970′s to present information in a clear and understandable manner, infographics are used heavily by today's businesses to get their brand message in front of millions of consumers. It is estimated that from 2011 to 2013, almost 110 infographics were published on the Internet every day! Infographics chalk out useful information, list several functions and tell success stories with comprehensible graphs, facts and figures. Infographics are also used as a popular marketing technique to have a long-lasting impact on the viewers. Here is such an example of a creatively designed infographic: http://visual.ly/how-did-fishmonger-content-go-viral Illustrations When marketers shifted from print media to digital media, they brought some old-school elements into the content marketing realm, such as illustrations. At one time, the role of illustrations was only limited to aid in the sale of products. Today, they are an important subdivision of content marketing on the Internet. As blogging began to emerge in 1998, many personal and professional blogs were accompanied by illustrations. Marketers have began to unfold the potential of these drawings and are not using them to support their content. While Neil Patel uses eye-catchy illustrations in his infographic "How to Double Your Traffic in 30 days," some companies include illustrations to define their work processes or brand features and usability. You can also use them as images to give a creative look to your blogs as shown below. Videos Probably the best visual asset to arrive yet, a promotional video. It's probably hard to imagine your business without a video now. Marc Fleishhacker, a marketing guru for 30 years and head of products for the enterprise division of Ebay tells us that a promotional video in your email marketing campaign can boost customer interaction by 200 to 300 percent. In the past, we have observed many viral videos explode such as the fishmonger's song, Charlie bit my finger, Obama Girl and the recent Gangnam Style. All these videos forced online marketers to brainstorm different ideas as to how to include small videos promoting a brand image as well as providing a chance to get their campaign viral. The year 2013 witnessed 77 percent of the international market watching videos of some kind on the Internet. This means that in the future, marketing content without a video will have a lower chance of connecting with the audiences. Animated GIFs The GIF specification was first brought to attention by CompuServe in 1987. Earlier, GIFs were merely limited to flames and waving flags. In the last decade, GIF's began to lose their popularity after the division between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0. It was only years after the evolution of Web 2.0 that marketers began to realize that they could use animated GIFs in a lot of creative ways and inc lude them in their content, such as blogs and on social networks like MySpace, Tumblr and Reddit. While it has been around for 25 years, only recently has the animated GIF hit the online marketing industry with a powerful comeback. Usually incorporated in email marketing, classy animated images can do wonders to strengthen your brand when placed within the right kind of content. Also, many popular brands use animated GIFs to showcase their products, like the one shown below. Useful Resources to Build Your Own Memes, Infographics and Quote Graphics It is an interesting fact that 65 percent of people are visual learners. Visual information is processed 60,000 times faster than information presented in the form of text. There are many resources for today's marketers and worldwide users to design and showcase their memes, infographics and quote graphics.
Breakdown the basics in Online Marketing Institute's class, The Anatomy of Great Digital Visual Storytelling. You will learn how to implement strong content that uses visual storytelling on social platforms such as Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to engage the right audience in the right way. View this class and many more, today!  |
| 3 Top Metrics to Measure Your SEO Efforts Posted: 18 Feb 2014 07:12 PM PST There are lots of ways you can invest in online marketing, from banner ads and email marketing to social media. But, when it comes to lead generation it's becoming more and more apparent that the best use of your time and money is search engine optimization (SEO). Because SEO can tell you a lot about what potential clients are responding to, it shouldn't be just another part of your online marketing arsenal. It should be the foundation of your strategy. In an effort to weigh the efficacy of online marketing tools, Hinge surveyed 500 professional services firms. The firms were broken out into high growth and average growth. Thrown in the mix for good measure was a group of 20 online marketing experts. Guess what the high growth and expert firms picked as the top technique for yielding online marketing results? As you can see, SEO is the clear winner among the growers and knowers. But, if you're like most, the proof is in your own numbers, not anyone else's. That's why it's important to know how to measure SEO. There are three metrics that are key to understanding the impact of your SEO efforts. Let's take a look: 1. Traffic Everyone thinks to measure search rankings ("Are we on page 1 yet?"), but traffic is the metric that matters. Whether your ranking first or fifty-first place in Google searches won't matter if no one is searching keywords that lead them to your website. But if you monitor organic search traffic and the keyword searches that bring visitors to your site, you'll see that just how many views Google is sending you. 2. Conversion Once you've got the eyeballs aimed intently on your site, you're done, right? Success achieved! Well, no. Don't lose sight of the fact that conversion is one of the top goals of your online marketing efforts. And the goal of SEO is to drive relevant traffic to your site. Keyword relevant—meaning these visitors are looking for something you can offer. All the traffic in the world is irrelevant if it doesn't result in conversion. How to measure SEO effectiveness? Measure conversions. Are your visitors downloading a piece of content, filling out a contact form, registering for a webinar? Conversions can be any of the above and more—depending on the outcome you're looking for. What do you want them to do once they're on your site? Google analytics makes it simple to set up goals and monitor conversions. You'll be able to see what keywords and keyword phrases are creating conversions—and which aren't. By tracking these metrics, you'll see what's working and what's not. Remember, the key to knowing your SEO is getting the right results is knowing how much of your traffic is taking action. When the goal of your SEO and other online marketing efforts is lead generation and business growth, passive traffic is barely better than none at all. 3. Behavior In addition to conversions—forms filled out, content downloaded, etc.—you can use your analytics to measure visitor behavior. Google gives weight to things like the amount of time visitors spend on your site, how many pages they view, comments, shares via social media, and so on. By seeing the pages visitors view (and convert on), as well as these other metrics, you can form a thorough picture of what's working in your SEO efforts—and on your website. Once you determine what's working, you can concentrate your efforts on those techniques or concepts, while letting go of—or retooling—those that aren't. Remember Figure 1? Not only do expert users of SEO find it effective but high growth firms do as well. The correlation is clear: effective use of SEO will lead to high growth. Once you know how to measure SEO efficacy, you're on track to understanding the behavior of your potential clients. Stay on that track and you're sure to find growth.  |
| Top Web Design Trends for 2014 Posted: 18 Feb 2014 07:09 PM PST Last year was indeed an interesting time for web designers and many new ideas came bursting through the development stages. Some of these are destined for obscurity but a fair number will become rather successful in 2014. This article takes a look at the ones that made it through to the big money stages of the website design tunnel. Fixed Navigations When websites first hit our shores and designers pretty much had free rein to do what they wished, over-design was probably the name of that particular game. And although the results did impress us, the lack of usability was a bigger deal altogether. The essential requirements for a website are fairly basic, and you simply need to be able to navigate your way around without getting a migraine. The fixed navigation toolbar has become a must have feature for 2014 and for that we are truly thankful. Newsletters come of age This design is vital for the email marketing strategy that is still doing rather well out in promotion-ville, so it's refreshingly cool to see that this area of design has been tweaked into a very usable piece of interface display. You can get so much information onto a single page and the real juicy stuff is always just a click away from your potential audience. Presentation videos rule okay? Vine has a lot to answer for and most of the questions are pretty complimentary. A short movie clip is certainly the way to go when you have a point to make in a very short time window. They are real simple to make and we've yet to hear a bad word said about them. Apparently 2014 will see a rather heftier 30 second clip becoming de rigeur, and we can't wait! Content based websites Another trend that looks to be welcomed across the board is the text based approach that does away with meaningless gimmicks. The content has always been king as far as we are concerned and the search engine crawlers are certainly going to have their work cut out for them in 2014. Typography The old tried and tested fonts such as Times New Roman and Calibri are destined for obscurity as the gazillion smartphone apps have redefined the possibilities available for our website design requirements. Instead of having to pay through the nose for these exclusive letter designs, they are becoming affordable enough for the man in the street to play around with until the cows come home to roost. Infographics When it comes to the most eye-catching way to represent some not so interesting data, you have to doff your cap to infographics. You can get a whole lot of statistical juice onto a single page and make it stand out to anyone who should chance upon the web page. Not only does this provide a valuable educational tool but it also makes the creation of this once boring aspect of data analysis a whole lotta fun! Parallax – hype or hot? This website variant is undoubtedly popular with all sets of user demographics and it has definitely made a very big impact in its own right. The powerful imagery and creative typography is going to be more noticeable than ever in 2014. Responsive Web Design If your business does not yet have a responsive website up and running, you could soon be counting the cost of this folly, and it will not make for pleasant reading. Forget about mobile websites, responsive design is what you want. Just look at the millions of potential customers who wouldn't dream of doing business with a company who can only offer a scaled down version of their website for smartphone and tablet users. Not only will these be nigh impossible to navigate around comfortably, you'll be sending a big message to these tech-savvy individuals and they'll be muttering 'loser' under their collective breathe as they scroll onto your rival companies who actually made the effort. Flat Design Although you may be of the mindset that a minimalist approach is pretty one dimensional, maybe you need to think again. Flat design websites are going to be massive in 2014 and this simple yet powerful imagery is a refreshing change from the cluttered norm. Listen to your clients and really concentrate on the words that keep cropping up again and again. You'll hear 'simple' and 'modern' as well as 'clean'. There is a reason for these phrases and when you see the flat design websites in action, you'll be able to connect the dots. Offering a better user experience without going around the houses really cuts to the chase and they can get on with doing business far quicker than previously. You'll get more transactions and your client base will have more time on their hands to see exactly what it is that you are selling.  |
| Cyber Bullying Just As Damaging As In-Person Bullying (Study) Posted: 18 Feb 2014 04:04 PM PST The effects of cyber bullying are just as damaging as real, in-person bullying – both to the emotional and psychological health of the victim. Cyber bullying is the use of technology to harass others in a deliberate, abusive manner – either through email, text message, instant message, or through posts on website forums and social media pages like Facebook and Twitter. Various studies have shown that children and teenagers who are subjected to daily abuse at the hands of their peers have an increased risk of developing anxiety and panic disorders, as well as depression. This can persist well into adulthood and later manifest into other physical health issues. The same can be seen with cyber bullying victims, as one in four children on average are bullied online. While the assailant is not physically shoving them around, they are still able to instill a sense of fear and hopelessness in their victims; tormenting, threatening, and harassing them through online mediums and cell phones. Nearly 80 percent of kids believe it is easier to get away with cyber bullying than it is in-person, says DoSomething.org. And girls are twice as likely to be both the victims and perpetrators of cyber bullying. Bullying victims are up to nine times more likely to entertain thoughts of suicide, according to Yale researchers. The death of Megan Meier, who hung herself in 2006, was attributed to cyber bullying through her MySpace account. Phoebe Prince's death, led to the criminal prosecution of six teenagers who were charged with statutory rape. Prince committed suicide in 2010 after months of merciless bullying from her classmates following the reported sexual assault. In the 2013 case of Rebecca Ann Sedwick's suicide, two girls were arrested for terrorizing her online, posting ugly taunts and gossip on Facebook even after the girl was dead. One of the girls was quoted as saying in the Huffington Post, "Yes, I bullied Rebecca and she killed herself but I don't give a …" The hate-speak is more than just words on a screen and can be just as damaging as taunting someone in person. [Image: kid-josh]  |
| How Do You Make Your Content Share-Worthy? Posted: 18 Feb 2014 06:41 AM PST No matter how great that article, blog post, or video is, it doesn’t do you any good if no one sees it! Sure, you’ve probably got a list of things that you do to promote each piece of web content, but if you REALLY want to get exposure, you’ve got to make a splash on social media.
But how exactly do you DO that? How do you make your web content share-worthy? 1. Provide genuine information This might sound a tad over-obvious, but you’d be amazed at how many people don’t do it! Lots of people post any ol’ content in hopes of getting some quick and dirty social media love. However, that plan never works! If you want people to take up valuable space on their Facebook timelines and Twitter feeds with a link to your content, it needs to be worth it. People can tell when you’re trying to pass fluff off as facts, and they’ll never share things that don’t have hard-core information in them. After all, they don’t want to be associated with your BS! Take the time to do real research, so that you can provide legitimate information. After all, people are looking for genuine answers and solutions. If you offer them, you’ll wind up making the rounds on the big social media sites. 2. Offer a unique point of view If you offer the same vanilla commentary that everyone else in your industry is offering, there isn’t a reason to “Like”, re-Tweet, or +1 your content. After all, the things you’re saying can be found in every corner of the web! That’s why you shouldn’t be afraid to go against the herd. If you’ve got an opinion that’s different from what most people in your industry think, show it off! Your readers will appreciate seeing something different, and they’ll be more likely to share it. Don’t have any opinions that go against the grain? You can still be different! All you have to do is put a unique spin on the argument that everyone else is making. For example, if you’re in the SEO industry, and everyone around you is writing about how SEO isn’t dead, take the argument a step further. Compare and contrast old SEO techniques with new techniques that work better today. That way, you’re not just saying that SEO still works. You’re also describing new things that can help people get to the top of the search results. Above all else, you have to remember that social media sites are today’s version of the workplace watercooler. You need to give your readers something interesting to talk about “around the watercooler”. Otherwise, your content will fade into oblivion. 3. Evoke emotion Things like anger, sadness, humor, and sarcasm all make content more memorable — and people are much more likely to share things that made an impact on them. If people don’t FEEL anything when they’re reading your content, they’re not going to be compelled to tell anyone about it. 4. Inject plenty of personality People like other people. They don’t like muddling through a sea of corporate-speak that looks like it was written by some kind of robot. If you inject some of YOU into your web content, it will be easier to build relationships with your readers. Once you do that, you’ll have all kinds of people sharing your content. After all, people like to share their friends’ stuff!  |
I’m not just talking about putting a link to your newest post on Facebook, though. Instead, you’ve got to get as many people sharing your content as possible.| You are subscribed to email updates from Popular Articles | Business 2 Community To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
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