The number of Americans working from home is on the rise

Steve Cichon left a radio job to start his own company and work from home. He’s at his computer by 5:15 a.m

At 7:30 on a sunny weekday morning, as commuters begin to fill the Thruway on their way to the office, Steve Cichon pours himself a cup of coffee and takes a seat at his dining room table. The longtime Buffalo media man recently walked away from the grind of the office and joined a growing number of people opting to work from home.
Indeed, a report by Global Workplace Analytics found that more than 3.1 million Americans work from home.
Cichon is taking it a step further He left his post as news director of radio station WBEN-930 to start his own company, Buffalo Stories LLC. He said he now faces the challenges and opportunities that confront every former office dweller.
“For me, I feel like I’m still new to this and still getting settled in (to working from home). But right now, the challenge is getting into a routine and a flow,” he said.
Don’t be fooled by the image of him sipping coffee and playing with his dog Willow — who he jokes is his office manager and has her own LinkedIn page. Cichon is up and at his computer most mornngs by 5:15 and said he often works into the night.
One of the knocks against working from home is the potential for a drop in productivity. But he and others say it’s not true. The freedom and flexibility that come from working outside a traditional office are driving forces that lead to greater productivity, they say.
“At 5 o’clock, you shut down your computer, lock your office and go home for the day,” he said. “For me, I have that flexibility working at home, but that also means there are nights that it is 10 o’clock and I’m still working.”
For Cichon, being a business owner provides plenty of motivation — after all, he needs to generate business if he wants to continue eating and paying his mortgage. But what about employees whose boss works in a brick-and-mortar office while they telecommute from home?
John Cimperman is a principal at Cenergy, an East Aurora marketing business in which five of his 32 employees work remotely. So how difficult is it to motivate an employee living 1,500 miles away in Denver?
“With our employees, motivation is never an issue, but connectivity is,” he said. “We are in the business of generating ideas, and ideas are generated in brainstorming sessions around a white board, around the water cooler, at a happy hour. So for remote employees, we need to work harder to make sure they remain connected.”
Remote employees of Cenergy have home-based offices, he said, and in his field it makes sense, given that most are out on the road and meeting with clients every day. The company currently has remote employees in Boston, Atlanta, Denver and Chicago, he said.
“There are two reasons why we have folks work remotely,” he said. “Most importantly, we put account managers in the places where our clients are located. The other reason is, in the case of our event manager, he is probably on the road 200 days a year, so where he lives isn’t as relevant.”
Recruitment has a major impact on the decision to have remote employees.
“If we can’t find someone in this market that has the experience and talent that we need, then we will go find those people with national experience, wherever they may live,” Cimperman said. “And the fact is, there is more of the specific type of talent we need in those larger markets.”
Once seen as a non-traditional perk for employees, working from home has evolved into a strategy that many employers utilize to control office-related costs and other expenses.
But even with happy employees and a stronger bottom line, are there potential legal pitfalls to having employees working from home?
Yes, according to Michael Schiavone, an employment attorney and partner in Lipsitz Green Scime Cambria. He said the risks must be carefully weighed before an employer decides to let someone work remotely.
“The first concern that comes to mind (for the employer) is, how do you deal with the nuances of employment law in an ever-changing climate where technology may be outpacing the laws dealing with this issue,” he said.
He advises employers to have a strong policy set in advance.
“It is obviously easy today for many employees to work from home,” Schiavone said. “But employers need to be concerned about the criteria they set for eligibility.”
He has seen numerous cases in which an employee request is granted without the employer stopping to consider the pitfalls involved in setting a precedent.
“Do you wind up having different standards based on who it is that does what for the company? And once you permit people to work from home, how do you regulate what is going on in comparison to what you could do if the employee were physically present in the office?” he said.
Schiavone said another example where an employer could run afoul of the law is in dealing with the Fair Labor Standards Act, which governs employee hours and wages.
“Assuming that a workweek is 40 hours, how do you know that an employee isn’t working more than 40 hours from home?” he said. “What if the employee then makes a claim down the road that he has been working more than 40 hours and hasn’t been properly compensated?”
He said he doesn’t discourage clients from offering telecommuting as an employee option, but he does suggest that businesses of all sizes do their homework.
Example: If an employee slips and falls in the office and is injured, it is a clear-cut workers’ compensation claim. But what happens when an employee working from home slips on the kitchen floor on the way from the bathroom to his home office during so-called work hours?
“Well, (employers) need to talk with their insurance people who provide their workers’ comp policy to see where people are covered,” the attorney said. “Whether or not a workers’ comp policy would extend to the worker’s home is probably an endorsement that would need to be applied for by the individual employer.”
According to Schiavone, larger companies are typically well-versed in such rules and nuances, but there’s concern when it comes to smaller organizations in which the decision to allow telecommuting is more informal. “Small companies that may view this as a way to save on office space or other related expenses and elect to have people start working from home, (they) need to start thinking about the ramifications of those decisions,” he said. “And they need to consider whether they have the proper policies in place to protect the company.”

http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/blog/buffalo-law-journal/2013/08/the-number-of-americans-working-from.html?page=4

4 Ways to Optimize Your Referral Traffic

Between SEO, social media, email marketing, blogger outreach and paid media, getting people to your site isn't just a balancing act — it's a lesson in time management and attention to detail.
But spreading yourself — and your budget — thin on platforms that aren't actually converting is a waste of time. You need to know where your best customers are coming from and then spend dollars to earn more eyeballs on these sites where you know you already have fans.
"If you are serious about your online marketing, you have to know your referring traffic sources so you can identify where your audience is hanging out," says Maciej Fita, SEO director at Brandignity.com.

 

Analyzing and optimizing your referral traffic is how you'll squeeze the most out of your marketing strategy and ad dollars, build a dedicated fan base and find partners that will help develop your audience. We spoke with a handful of marketers who've mastered referral optimization to boost their bottom line; below, they let you in on how it was done.

1. Understand the Different Kinds of Referrers

There are two types of referrals in a referrals report — referring domains and individual referrals — and both are important. You'll want to analyze both metrics to get a complete understanding of your referral sources.

"Referring domains focus on which websites in aggregate are sending you visitors, and is useful for informing things like paid advertising efforts

"Referring domains focus on which websites in aggregate are sending you visitors, and is useful for informing things like paid advertising efforts," says Christopher Penn, vice president of marketing technology at SHIFT Communications. "If you see, for example, Mashable.com sending lots of traffic to you already, you may want to take out a campaign to advertise on Mashable to take advantage of an audience that is already interested in you." On the flipside, individual referrers point out what specific pages are driving traffic. "It's a useful way of measuring things like public relations efforts to see if an article that references your brand is bringing you a new audience," says Penn.

Referral reports are "the first place we look when we encounter unexpected spikes in traffic, as they allows us to quickly identify the source and the context for the spike," says Cathy Gribble, associate director of digital strategy at Team One. With that knowledge in hand, you can optimize traffic and continue to grow that audience.

2. Track Everything

Measuring your referrals isn't just about setting up campaigns, watching the numbers roll in, then deciding where to spend money to gain a bigger audience. You need to do some grunt work, or else your data might be vague and you won't know where to invest for your next campaign.
"There is often a measurement 'blind spot' when tracing the saliency of your digital paid media and your website," says Tony Clement, strategy director and head of data and analytics at Big Spaceship. Whether there's a lack of measurement planning or the tracking tags are stripped from the assets, there are several causes for cloudy referral information. "Not being able to identify which paid digital executions are working hardest from click-to-site conversion (vs. click-thru only) is potential revenue gone astray. Making sure that tracking codes are in place, and are firing under live testing is not a glamorous task, but well worth it."

3. Optimize for Social

The numbers are out and, unfortunately for most online retailers, social media isn't a huge driver of sales. But while social media isn't likely to convert customers, it still offers great value for brands.
Social media is an excellent way to increase quality visits, develop brand affinity and stay top of mind, which can eventually lead to conversion. That might seem like a lot of work and delayed gratification to get that one user to your end goal, but the payoff is well worth it. And in the meantime, you can optimize the channels that are most effective.
 

"With social media budgets increasing and more pressure to increase 'earned' value, understanding what type of social activity is acting as a traffic source can [help you] find opportunities for innovation

"With social media budgets increasing and more pressure to increase 'earned' value, understanding what type of social activity is acting as a traffic source can [help you] find opportunities for innovation," says Clement. "And through re-allocating small amounts of budget from your least effective source, you can enrich the social content that intentionally delivers quality visits."

At female-focused content site PureWow, a hefty spike in Pinterest referrals informed modifications to the editorial and design strategy, as well as long-term goals for the site.
"We pay close attention to referring domains. Like many women’s lifestyle publishers, Pinterest has vaulted in the last two years from a top-20 traffic source to a top-5 traffic source. But, unlike some other lifestyle publishers, PureWow sees incredible visitor quality from Pinterest, in terms of depth of visit, engagement and consistently low bounce rates," says Alexis Anderson, PureWow's director of marketing and partnerships. To cater to the Pinterest audience, PureWow has redesigned image specs to be more Pinterest-friendly ("balanced, squarish images over very tall and narrow") and placed "Pin It" buttons on every image or idea that might be shared.

4. Discover Partner Opportunities

Tracking your referrals doesn't just provide insight to your core audience and valuable ad spending channels, it can also help to discover potential partners who are aligned with your mission and overall goals.
"Cross-checking site referrals can be a worthwhile exercise, especially during campaign periods. You may be surprised by not only the type of sites that are referring traffic, but also the page context in which your site is referenced," says Clement. "This data can be useful to management, especially if you are looking for prospects for potential partnerships for media placements, sponsorships, events or even SEO authority."
Over time, as new platforms emerge, your referrals are bound to change. Monitoring these new referrers and amplifying them on your own channels can help your site traffic, brand awareness and conversion rates stay strong.
"We look at changes in referrers as we watch for new sources of traffic that we may want to leverage, such as an increase in referrers from a blog that has a positive posting about our products," says Gribble. "We would want to help boost that blog to amplify the positive references."
In all, keeping tabs on your referrals, both big and small, will point you in the right direction when it comes to efficient ad spend and time management as you cultivate an engaged digital audience and convert them into customers.

http://mashable.com/2013/11/27/referrals-metrics/

Boomers with Home-Based Businesses Learn to Prioritize Tasks

Just ask any Baby Boomer running a home-based business – after a while, one of the most difficult aspects is to decide “What to do next?” Everyday presents new challenges. Hence, it is imperative to also maintain a prioritized list of tasks that will directly benefit your business. This is how home-based businesses survive and grow.
I like to keep a spreadsheet list for each of my businesses, one that can be easily sorted by priority. Since I’m at an age where if I don’t write down my ”brilliant” insights, they quickly vanish, I carry a notebook at all times. There, I jot down tasks, thoughts and actions that pop into my mind and then transpose them to my spreadsheet lists.
My priorities are totally subjective. Sure, there are normal business activities that must be accomplished, such as shipping products to customers or completing a consulting report to meet a deadline. These bring in money and pay the bills. And of course they typically have the highest priority.
Then there are the “fun” things. In this category, I include items that are creative or strategic in nature. For instance:

• Reviewing my website to enhance search engine optimization.
• Exploring adjacent markets for my products and services.
• Figuring out how to grow sales 20 percent this year.
• Thinking of ways to make my business run smoother.
• Determining who can I talk to get ideas for my business or to be a sounding board.

You get the idea.
Prioritized lists are key to organizing time and being productive during the hours devoted to a home-based business each day. They help Boomers accomplish more while freeing up time for “play” to enjoy golf, family and social time, trips, gardening or simply reading a good book.
Every morning, I review my lists and set an agenda for the day. Based on how much time I want to work today, I decide which items on my list to pursue. Now, they may not be items of highest priority. Some days, I just feel like doing lower-priority stuff that I enjoy, BUT at least I’m accomplishing something beneficial to my business.
I’m sure none of this is new to you. Boomers have been making lists for years. This is how we became successful during our employment years. Operating a home-based business, however, takes the art of prioritized lists to a new level.

http://www.boomerhomebizadvice.com/2013/11/boomers-with-home-base-businesses-learn-to-prioritize-tasks/

 

Managing Your Time at the Home Office

In my practice, I've discovered that a majority of the people coming to me these days are working remotely from a home base. The economy, the Internet and social media have changed the way we approach work. Many welcome the opportunity to work from home to cut commuting and to be able to spend extra time in their personal life. But while the new wave of employers may be saving on desk space, are you really garnishing more free time?
Ask yourself: When do I clock in and clock out of my workday? Chances are you probably never actually do either of those things. The convenience of tablets and smart phones has changed the way the business day is structured. That 9-5 job can easily turn into working around the clock, in your pajamas, with very little patience or time for family or anything else.

I am up against this myself as I split my business between my metaphysical center and a home office. When I am at my home base, I strive to balance my days by applying some rules to arrange my time so it works for me, while I work for my paycheck. Consider the following as a different way to look at your day.
1. Keep a time chart of when you intend to start and end your actual work day and respect it.
2. Be dressed and ready to work at your desk and treat it as you would any sacred space you work in. Make those family and friends aware of when you work and provide them with the best times for socializing with you.
3. Keep your personal day separate from your business day. If you use social media, focus on business tweeting and posting until after hours.
4. Be sure to take your lunchtimes and break times and do not skip them. Make sure they take you away from the computer screens and the work environment. Instead of looking at a virtual tree, get out and up and into nature, or open a window and gaze at the energy of the real one in front of you.
5. Once you clock out of your day, use your off time by actually being away from your computer. No matter whom you are with or where you are, it's important to actually focus on that person and that place.
By structuring your work day so that you are clocking in and out, you are opening yourself up to a more productive lifestyle and, ultimately, more free time to spend the way you wish.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-lauren/working-at-home_b_4273714.html

Working from home with young children

More and more of us are working at home these days due to the restrictively high cost of childcare – and a need for more flexible hours.

Working from home is a great way to fit your career around looking after your kids, but it's a lot easier when your children are at school. So how can you manage things when they're really small?

Remember you are doing two jobs

You're working and being a mum – two important jobs – so schedule things accordingly. "If you have small children at home with you, things will take longer to complete, so set realistic deadlines to avoid disappointing your boss or letting down your team", advises Kristen Harding, childcare expert at Tinies, the UK's leading childcare company and nanny agency network.

Create a workspace

Even if you don't have a home office, set aside a corner of the room that you can use as 'your space', while still keeping an eye on what the children are up to. "Having your own space will help you feel more secure in your role, but being able to glance up frequently will help you feel more at ease," says Kristen.

Be organised

It's all about planning when you're a WAHM (Work At Home Mum). "Plan meals in advance, shop online and make it all as easy as you can" advises Personal Development Coach Cheryl Goldenberg of The Pickle Shed, who specialises in happy working mothers. "Plan the day, too – but be prepared to change the plan along the way! Think about what the kids will be doing while you're working and make sure everything they need is in the right place".

Have a working day

You might not be going to an office, but it's important to create a working day for yourself. "Dress for work so your brain knows what mode it's in", suggests Cheryl. "Then, when you're finished, leave your home office or workspace at 5pm and find a way to draw a line between work and home – get changed into 'home' clothes, go for a run, turn up the music...". Do whatever it takes to help you switch off!

Communicate with your partner

Talk to your other half and important people in your family such as grandparents. "Be open about how easy or hard you are finding it working from home", says Kristen. "Do you need help? What would help lighten the load? Remember only you know how you're managing: don't expect others to be able to read your mind."

Create a back-up plan

What will happen if your work throws you a curve ball? "Have a back-up plan in place for when you have a last minute meeting, or an urgent deadline", suggests Kristen. "Things don't always run smoothly but if you prepare for worst case scenarios, then every day is a lot less bumpy! A childcare website like Emergency Childcare is an essential for your SOS contact list."

Look after yourself

You need to be on the best possible form – physically and emotionally – to manage working from home. "If you fall apart then everything around you does the same", warns Cheryl. "Work out what it takes to keep you feeling fresh and schedule it into your diary. Connect with other mums and dads working from home, as isolation saps confidence. And find new places to work in child-free moments to refresh creativity – your local library, a coffee shop etc."

Try and prioritise

It's vital to set aside quiet time for the tasks that need greater concentration. "This might mean arranging play dates with other working parents so that you can have a few hours of total quiet, or arranging your work around nap times", Kristen says. "And remember, letting your kids have quiet times and learn to play amongst themselves are important parts of growing up – so you don't have to entertain them all the time!"

Don't be hard on yourself

Just because you do your work at home, it doesn't make it any less important, so talk about what you do to your children and partner. "Show the family what 'Mummy's Work' means – to help them to understand what you're doing and why", suggests Cheryl.

And remember, it's never going to go smoothly all the time. "If you have a bad day, accept it and start again tomorrow!"

http://www.parentdish.co.uk/family/working-from-home-with-young-children/

Does What You Wear Matter When You Work From Home

Switching from working at an office to working from home is a pretty big change. When I made the switch, I particularly missed my coworkers, the 10-6 structure, and the soda machine, but the biggest difference was definitely my wardrobe. Does it matter what you wear when you're working from home?
At first glance it seems like the answer should be a resounding, “no.” With no one to see me, whatever clothes I put on were just for me, and whatever neighbor could see me through my home-office window. As far as I could tell, there was no practical reason to put on my office drag when nobody would see me. I could stay in my pajamas all day if I wanted.
But while idea of perfect, 24-hour comfort is appealing, what a person wears can affect the way they feel, which in turn can affect job performance. Maybe I really was going to have to wear smart shoes and an uncomfortable bra to successfully monitor Twitter and conduct Skype calls. The only way to know for sure was to play Goldilocks and try all my options to see which ones worked best.

Office ClothesMy experiment began with the full Office Lady outfit, which was a complete non-starter. I made it about 10 minutes before realizing high heels do not work at a standing desk and kicked them off. (That’s also right about when I realized that standing on my yoga mat made my standing desk experience much more pleasant.) Pantyhose and a pencil skirt always seemed perfectly comfortable at the office, but in my apartment they suddenly felt distractingly uncomfortable. That outfit was supposed to get a week of testing, but I gave it up after a day and a half.

PajamasWorking in pajamas was much more fun, but it did make me wish I had more sets of cute, matching pajamas like Zooey Deschanel on The New Girl. As long as I was clean and tidy, I did not notice an appreciable decrease in productivity between wearing pajamas and wearing my office garb. Personally, I think I was more productive because I wasn't fussing with tights or wandering skirts all day.
I didn't like wearing the pajamas I had slept in, though; that was just a step too far into sloppiness for me. Getting up and putting on a new set of pajamas for work was much better. I highly recommend it.

Casual ClothesBetween those two is the middle option of wearing comfortable, casual clothes like jeans and a comfy sweater. That was pretty much as comfortable and productive as wearing pajamas, with the added benefit of not being embarrassing on the rare occasions someone dropped by.
Having committed myself to wearing either regular house clothes or clean pajamas during work, I asked some other work-from-home types about their preferred options. I expected the answers to run the gamut, but of the eight home-office workers who responded, all but two said they wore pajamas or pajama-type clothes to work unless they expected to have to meet people. Of the two holdouts, one wore jeans and a hoodie, and the other said he started the day in pajamas and changed to jeans and a T-shirt around lunchtime. Nobody wore shoes.
When you do your job from home, do you find that what you wear makes a difference in your work?

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/does-what-you-wear-matter-when-you-work-from-home-197194

Are Retargeting Ads the Future of Online Advertising.

Twitter made headlines in recent months after announcing that it’s going to support retargeting ads. Following Facebook’s lead, Twitter will experiment with using people’s behavior to tailor ads on their network. If the two biggest social networks are doing it, then retargeting ads must be the future of online advertising, right? They have been embraced by the marketing industry and many e-commerce websites, so retargeting ads seem to have a place in the future of online advertising. Here’s what you need to know about retargeting ads, and why you should consider them for your next campaign:
What are Retargeting Ads
Retargeting ads are banner ads on other sites, specifically shown to people who visited your site previously but didn’t buy. Only 2% of web visitors are ready to buy when they visit your site, so the idea is to remain fresh with the other 98% by tracking their behavior and presenting ads when they surf other websites so they’ll come back to your site when they are ready to make a purchase. Some companies have had great success with this strategy. Consumer-package goods company Kimberly-Clark reports that its retargeting ads have a conversion rate between 50-60 percent.
Unlike regular banner ads, retargeting ads are measured in two ways: click-through conversions and view-through conversions. Below are the definitions of both measurements, according to Moz.

• Click-through conversions are any conversions that happen as a direct result of someone clicking a retargeting ad they were served.
• View-through conversions are like assists. They are conversions that are attributed to another channel, like Google AdWords, but these people were at one point served a retargeting ad before that. Another example of this would be someone who saw the retargeting ad, but went back to the website on their own and made a purchase.

How Retargeting Ads Can Help Your Business
Retargeting ads are different from banner ads, and can be helpful to your business because of the better conversion rates. Although Kimberly-Clark is seeing 50-60 percent conversion rates on its retargeting ads, the average for them is .7%. It doesn’t seem like much, but the average conversion rate for a normal banner ad is just .07%, so retargeting ads have 10 times the conversion rate of a normal banner ad!
One reason why retargeting ads have a better conversion rate is because they can be tailored to the visitor, and even more specifically than just showing ads to people who have been on your site before.. For example, visitors can be segmented by what they were browsing. If you ran an online clothing store, people who looked at shirts could be shown different ads from those that looked at pants, so that the retargeting ads are much more relevant to the individual. This segmentation can also include a time factor, where someone searching for travel or concert tickets needs to be retargeted immediately, while someone looking for a new suit can be retargeted later.
Another reason why retargeting ads work better than display ads is because they are reaching people who have already had an experience with your brand, whether that experience is passive interest in your product, a strong intention to purchase a product in your category, or somewhere in between. In this case, retargeting ads can be used to move your visitors through the buying process and to get them closer to making the purchasing decision. Each stage would use a different message or piece of content in the retargeting ad. The person with a passive interest doesn’t want a coupon or a demo, while the person that already knows about your company and is strongly considering hiring you as a provider doesn’t need an ad explaining who you are and what you offer.
Don’t Rely on Retargeting Ads, However
The numbers show that retargeting ads work well for businesses, but they also shows that the idea of retargeting ads doesn’t sit well with consumers. Unless the consumer understands the marketing aspect of it, the process feels invasive as a brand suddenly follows them all over the Internet, showing them ads for the exact same items they browsed through on the company’s website. And it’s the brand that will pay the price for being persistent and pesky, not the third-party ad companies who serve the ads in the first place. The ads can be even more bothersome if the consumer didn’t even put anything in a shopping cart and just was window-shopping online. “Ad fatigue,” as this phenomenon is called, can sometimes be solved by limiting the number of ad impressions a visitor sees per day, but simply reducing their exposure might not be enough for some of the most sensitive consumers.
Overall, retargeting ads are a way to take your banner advertising to the next level of segmentation and specificity. They can reach people in a way that regular banner advertising can’t. When used appropriately, they can lead to a substantial increase in sales. They aren’t necessarily the future of online marketing for everyone, but for the right companies they could be an effective new addition to your marketing strategy.

http://www.business2community.com/online-marketing/retargeting-ads-future-online-advertising-0683163#BCsu8XJbLpEKOgOp.99

Four important online marketing trends for 2014

Greg Schwartz outlines four important trends for online marketing going into 2014.

In this highly competitive world, achieving any marketing success depend hugely on responding to cultural and consumer trends. Internet marketing is constantly evolving. Keeping up with web design and social media trends can only prevent your website from dropping down the search engine ranks.
Many companies face a dilemma today as there are so many trends introduced to promote and manage the products online. However, a basic market research can provide you a clear understanding of future direction of product or service platform. It’s a time where you can build your own crowd and increase the sales without paying the mass media gate keepers.
Some of the hottest trends that will continue to dominate this niche in 2014 are as follows:

1. Content Marketing continue to rule:  A valuable content through a variety of channels has always helped companies to establish authority and to gain trust with consumers. This includes relevant industry information that provides insight or entertainment to an audience. A strategy for high quality content makes the difference between appearing on Google’s page one review and disappearing from your customer’s view.  Indeed, it is the foundation of all digital marketing and this is the reason why people read, view and share.

2. Social Media Marketing will be bigger than ever: Social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter have attained a cult status. Millions of users subscribe these sites on daily basis. Smart marketers will optimize the power of social media platforms to generate more business in 2014.
However, it is also realized that promoting brand on social media sites is extremely complex. You need to invest a considerable amount of time to get the most from your campaigns. A research report indicates that marketers who spend 40 hours or more for social media marketing carry out their campaigns strongly through You Tube, Google+, Pinterest and Instagram. Also, forum marketing has decreased to 16% this year.

3. Mobile Friendly Content will be necessity: The moment when every business thought their web design was finally perfect, all the users went mobile. The rapid rise of smart phones and tablets led many marketing managers to develop a mobile friendly content. It is predicted that mobile browsing will soon overtake desktop computers and laptops as the most common way to search and buy products online. If mobile users are your target, make sure you have put most eye-catching headlines or images at the top of the page. Remember, people want pages to load quickly and they don’t like to scroll around to find information they need. By having a responsive website, you can grab the attention of the viewers and to stop them at your page.

4. Image-Based Content: Due to the increasing number of advertisements, it is extremely important to make content more easy and digestible. Ever if you have looked at social media sites like Buzzfeed and Pinterest, you might have noticed the viral potential of their image-based content. Even blog posts that receive most social shares have the same characteristic. They place the pictures in a good way to break the content up and emphasize certain points. Hence, it’s pretty clear that incorporating images is beneficial to a marketing campaign.

Author’s Bio: Gregg Schwartz is an accomplished Internet marketer for the past decade. He helps many businesses to increase their revenue by search engine optimization and lead generation services. He continues to find new and innovative ways to earn money from Internet enterprises.

http://www.businessreviewusa.com/marketing/web/four-important-online-marketing-trends-for-2014

Why You Shouldn't Say "You're Welcome

The script is so deeply ingrained that you don’t even need to think about it. When you do a favor, and someone says “thank you,” the automatic response is “you’re welcome.” It’s a basic rule of politeness, and it signals that you accept the expression of gratitude—or that you were happy to help.
But according to one leading psychologist, this isn’t the best choice of words. After four decades of studying persuasion, Influence author Robert Cialdini has come to see “you’re welcome” as a missed opportunity. “There is a moment of power that we are all afforded as soon as someone has said ‘thank you,’” Cialdini explains. To capitalize on this power, he recommends an unconventional reply:
“I know you’d do the same for me.”
There are at least three potential advantages of this response. First, it conveys that we have the type of relationship where we can ask each other for favors and help each other without keeping score. Second, it communicates confidence that you’re the kind of person who’s willing to help others. Third, it activates the norm of reciprocity, making sure that you feel obligated to pay the favor back in the future.
As Guy Kawasaki writes in Enchantment, “Cialdini’s phrase tells the person who received your favor that someday you may need help, too, and it also signals to the person that you believe she is honorable and someone who will reciprocate. If this is the spirit in which you’re saying it, your response is far more enchanting than the perfunctory ‘You’re welcome.’ ”
Although the logic is compelling, and I’m a longtime admirer of Cialdini’s work, I’ve never felt comfortable saying this phrase out loud. At first I thought I was too attached to politeness rules. How could I leave a “thank you” just hanging in the air without the proper acknowledgment? Awkward.
That explanation fell apart, though, when I realized I could just combine politeness with Cialidni’s response: “You’re welcome—I was happy to do it. I know you’d do the same for me.”
It didn’t change my mind. The response still left a bad taste in my mouth. Eventually, I realized the problem was the subtle appeal to reciprocity. There’s nothing wrong with trading favors or asking others to repay the help you’ve given, but when I chose to help people, I wanted to do it without strings attached. I didn’t want to leave them feeling like they owed me. So I stuck with the familiar, banal “you’re welcome,” which was mildly dissatisfying. Why do we utter this strange phrase?
In English, it’s a relatively new arrival. Over the past century, “you’re welcome” has evolved to connote that it’s my pleasure to help you or “you are welcome to my help,” which we tend to say more directly in other languages like Spanish and French (“the pleasure is mine,” “it was nothing,” “no problem”). Is there a better alternative?
I stumbled upon an answer after meeting Adam Rifkin, a serial entrepreneur who was named Fortune’s best networker. He goes out of his way to help a staggering number of people, doing countless five-minute favors—making introductions, giving feedback, and recommending and recognizing others. After Rifkin does you a favor, it’s common for him to reach out and ask for your help in return.
At first, it seems like he’s just following the norm of reciprocity: since he helped you, you owe him. But there’s a twist: he doesn’t ask you to help him. Instead, he asks you to help him help someone else.
Rifkin is more concerned about people paying it forward than paying it back. In his view, every favor that he does is an opportunity to encourage other people to act more generously. That way, a broader range of people can benefit from his contributions.
After watching Rifkin in action, it dawned on me that Cialdini’s line could be adapted. Instead of “I know you’d do the same for me,” how about this response?
“I know you’ll do the same for someone else.”
Just like Cialdini’s reply, it affirms your character as a person who’s happy to be helpful. Unlike his version, it doesn’t deliver the implicit message that you’re indebted to me, and I’m waiting for you to repay it.
It’s just a sentence, but the underlying values have the potential to fundamentally change the way that people interact. In traditional direct reciprocity, people trade favors back and forth in pairs. In contrast, Rifkin’s approach is called generalized reciprocity. As described by political scientist Robert Putnam in Bowling Alone, “I’ll do this for you without expecting anything specific back from you, in the confident expectation that someone else will do something for me down the road.”
If you follow this approach, when you really need help, you have access to a broader range of potential givers. If you stick to direct reciprocity, you can only ask people you’ve helped in the past or might be able to help in the future. In generalized reciprocity, you can extend your request to a wider network: since you’ve given without strings attached, other people are more inclined to do the same. In fact, social scientists James Fowler and Nicholas Christakis have conducted experiments showing that acts of giving often spread “up to three degrees of separation (from person to person to person).”
So next time someone expresses appreciation for your help, it might be worth stretching beyond politeness to ask them to pay it forward. I know you’ll do that for someone else.
By Adam Grant.

http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20131112175357-69244073-why-you-shouldn-t-say-you-re-welcome?trk=tod-home-art-list-large_0

How to Productively Work From Home

With the internet allowing modern age business owners to run their operations from just about anywhere in the world, many are choosing to run their business entirely out of their house. Those who choose to forego the office and instead work from the comforts of home need to learn to manage their daily schedules in a manner that will keep productivity at a maximum.
Organize an At-Home Office
Aside from the tax benefits that some at-home business owners are entitled to, creating a space in your home that is specifically for work has advantages for your mental health as well. Creating a space in your home that can function as your office will allow your brain to transition into work mode and allow you to focus without the distractions of the television and other domestic chores that may call your name when spending time at home. While it may seem tempting, simply waking up and pulling your lap top into bed with you is not the recipe for a productive work day.
Set Your Daily Work Hours
It’s important to make a distinction between the time you spend working at home and your personal time at home. Making sure that you stop dealing with work and start spending time with your friends and family during the evenings is beneficial for your own mental health. By setting specific daily work hours, your associates will know which times they can contact you via phone or email. Putting down your laptop at 5pm and leaving it until the next morning will ultimately make you more productive during your set work hours.
Take Advantage of LinkedIn
Being active on LinkedIn is a great way to make sure that your face is recognizable to your business associates as they will not be seeing you around the office.  LinkedIn is the preferred social network for business networking as it is a strictly professional network where experts share articles with others in their industry. Unless you’ve built a personal relationship with a business associate, connecting on LinkedIn is the most appropriate social network to use that can still keep your personal and professional life separate.
By Brendon Pack.

http://www.webwire.com/ViewPressRel.asp?aId=182405#.UnvIgttFDIU

Google Study Reveals Internet is Top Choice Among Shoppers this Holiday Season

The internet will be a top resource for many shoppers this holiday season,  smartphones will be the device of choice, online marketing will influence holiday shopping, and cross-screen shopping will be a big deal, according to a recent study conducted by Google.
This holiday season,  89% of shoppers plan to use the internet for holiday shopping.  Seventy-nine percent of  shoppers consider the internet the most useful resource for holiday shopping.
Three in four of shoppers say online research will help them decide which gifts and brands they’ll buy this holidays season. Online research will influence brands bought (76%),  retailers shopped (76%)  and type of gift (77%).
According to Google 2013 Holiday Shopping Intentions study,  online ads will influence holiday shoppers more than television.  Display ads, email offers and search ads as a whole influence more than television.  Six in 10 shoppers will pay attention to search ads and one in three will pay attention to video ads.
What are shoppers using this holiday season to help them shop online?  The study revealed more shoppers will use  a smartphone to help with their online shopping.  In fact, 41% of all adult shoppers will use a smartphone for their holiday shopping which is seeing a 17% increase from last year.
Seventy-six percent of smartphone owners will use their smartphones for holiday shopping, according to the study.  One in four smartphone owners plan to make a holiday purchase on their smartphone, which is up 21% from last year.
Google expects mobile shopping to increase on traditional in-store shopping days – weekends,  especially the one between Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
The study shows that 53% of smartphone shoppers will use their device to help with ecommerce shopping,  an increase from 46% last year and 53% of shoppers will use their smartphone while in the store.
This holiday shopping the Google study revealed that cross-screen shopping will be huge.  Eighty percent of shoppers will use more than one device at once while holiday shopping and 84% will start gift shopping on one device and finish on another.
This year mobile holiday shopping is being driven by millennials, according to the study.  Eighty-eight percent of millennial smartphone owners will use their devices for holiday shopping, a jump from 67% last year.  Thirty-one percent of millennial smartphone owners plan to make a holiday purchase on their smartphone, a jump from 17% of adults last year.
Shopping for the holiday season has begun early this year, according to the study.  Shopping for the holiday season, the study revealed began before Halloween.  Half of shoppers will research before Thanksgiving weekend and 60% will purchase that weekend.
It’s all about the bargains this year , 81% of shoppers will rely on discounts and 76% will take advantage of free shipping and 60% of shoppers will act on purchase incentives.

http://multichannelmerchant.com/marketing/google-study-reveals-internet-is-top-choice-among-shoppers-this-holiday-season-05112013/

The other side of working from home

"You are so lucky," grumbled an acquaintance at a party. "No commute, no boss, no office politics. I would love to lounge around in pyjamas and work when I want and how I want." "It is not that easy," I protested but he was carried away by his own misery and refused to believe me. I work from home. The key word is WORK but what seems to stand out is home. It seems enviable to many, especially the men who are denizens of the corporate world. Working from home conjures up images of leisure, freedom and flexibility. You don't have to get up to an alarm and rush around getting ready, gobble up a hurried breakfast and brace yourself for the traffic. Instead, you can take your morning breath to the computer which will not complain about your hygiene or dress sense. Shower in the afternoon, if you feel like a shower at all. And when you need a break, just shout out to the spouse/servant who brings a hot cup of tea made just the way you like, along with some fresh pakodas. What's not to like? When I decided to quit a full time job and become a consultant and a writer, I believed that working from home would be a blessing- the ideal solution that would let me work at my time, be with my daughter and keep a gentle eye on the goings on in the household. I saw myself deftly juggling a rolling pin and rolodex, seamlessly switching from the key board to the blackboard. Ours is a small household of 4 including my full time help who is the cook and housekeeper. I could easily manage. I don't cook or clean. I do have some flexibility and freedom. Yet working from home requires truckloads of discipline, oodles of self motivation and nerves of steel. I can recall a day last week when I thought I would have a productive day at work. A typical day when I am not in a workshop or client site begins at 6.30 in the morning when I get up to send my daughter off to school. The husband and I have a brief chat on the plan for the day and he leaves for office. I do my yoga and/or walk, breakfast, shower and move to the study which doubles up as my place of work. I have plans for this day. I need to complete a proposal to a client, attend a conference call , send a couple of emails and write at least 500 words for an article. So far, so good. At 10.30 a.m,I switch on my laptop and start with the proposal." Didi, Colin nahin hai." my cleaning maid pokes her head in. I make a note in my list of Things to Do. I remember that she had not dusted the sideboard. I notice a stray cobweb. Instructions are given.Back to proposal. The intercom rings. I rush to the phone and pick it up only to have it disconnected. Where is the maid and why is she not picking up the phone. Just as I settle down again, it rings again. I ignore it.My housekeeper announces that someone is coming with a parcel. Turns out to be a courier with my husband's credit card. I am asked to produce identification to receive the credit card. I manage to get type up something on the design of a workshop that I am proposing. My mobile pings. It is already the time for my call."Didi, gas khatam hua," says the help. 5 minutes to the call. I tell her to change the cylinder. It is stuck she says. We push and pull and fix the thing togetherI get on the conference call. In the middle of the call, the maid enters and gesticulates wildly. She holds her nose and makes some gagging sounds. Something is not right. I can't focus on the call. Finally, I am done.I rush out to discover that there is a leakage of some sort from the gas cylinder. The kitchen smells of LPG. There is a defect in the new cylinder. She is in the middle of cooking and we are out of fuel. I call some neighbours and someone kindly offers me her spare cylinder. I call the Gas agency but no one picks up. I make a note in my Things to do.The cleaning maid comes in to tell me that she is leaving. She wants a day off. No, I almost shout. You take too many holidays. It is my son's school meeting she says. They have called the parents. Her husband is quite useless in this matter. I negotiate for a late arrival. She will try, she says , making no promises. I relent, one working mom to another. Back to proposal. Is it already lunch time?I get into my wannabe Multitasking avatar. I am halfway through lunch and The Lowland. The Lindt chocolate in my fridge beckons. I ignore it until it becomes an insistent shrill summon. The book is interesting. I continue with a few chapters after lunch. Surely, I deserve a break of half an hour. I promise to myself that I will finish my proposal today. I still have time.2.30 p.m. I go to the bus stop to pick up my daughter. We discuss what happened in school. We have Bio test tomorrow she says. And there is some Hindi project. Something needs to be researched and written about Chanakya. I think school is a great institution but I have my reservations about homework. Especially the kind that makes the parent work at home.Start reading Bio. I will finish my work and we will revise. I check my mails and see that there are two new ones that need to be answered.My daughter comes in to negotiate. I will study Bio and you can research my project, she starts. No way. I have too much work to do. We discuss what she can write about Chanakya. One thing at a time, I insist. Finish Bio and then we will do Hindi. I need to finish the proposal. I notice an email reminder for my credit card payment .I add it to my Things to do.I get an unexpected call from a client. She wants to discuss the dates for a workshop that had been planned for the month. They may need to change it. As we discuss options, my daughter mouths something to me. I shoo her away and try to shut the door. She glares at me and marches off. The maid shouts from the kitchen- something about jeera or Kheera . I ignore her. Finally I finish my call and step out- Can't I even talk for a few minutes in peace, I say but no one cares to respond.My daughter looks at me accusingly. You forgot. I told you the light in my room wasn't working. Now I can't study. Damn. Didn't I put it in my Things to Do. I call the electrician.I reconfirm dinner menu and give the maid money to buy cucumber for the salad from the shop in our condominium complex. I check on the state of bread and eggs and find we need to replenish that too. Why does she tell me these things at the last moment?Is it evening already? I have to make the last page of the proposal. I have to check the research on Chanakya. Why do 12 year olds need to write about Chanakya in Hindi? Why do they also need a printout of a picture which can be seen anytime on Google Images? I open up the Google Hindi website on Chanakya and toggle between that and my proposal. In the meantime, I am also giving my daughter some questions to answer in Bio. My husband calls and asks if I have paid the electricity bill due three days back. Pay it yourself, I want to shout. I make a mental note to make an actual note in my Things to Do.Is it dinner time already? My husband is home. Horrible day, Terrible traffic he says. You are so lucky you don't have to go out to work everyday! I glare at him. We do dinner. I am almost done with the proposal. I tuck my daughter into bed. It is only 10.15 p.m and I feel terribly sleepy. I drag myself back to the computer and send off the proposal. I still have the article to write but my brain has gone into deep freeze. I can't get a word out. I read a few pending emails.I shut down the machine and decide to go to bed. My husband is checking Facebook. Other people seem to have interesting things to do and say. What did you do today? He asks. I rack my brain. I finally sent off that proposal to ABC, I say. That's it? That's all you did the whole day, his look says but he wisely restricts it to a 'Uh uh.'Another day of work has gone by. My Things to Do list has grown exponentially. I shouldn't complain. I know I have to be more disciplined, more assertive, more focused, more tenacious. Some day, I will get there. Someday I will also get myself a little office-away from home.

 http://ibnlive.in.com/blogs/nirupamasubramanian/3585/64908/the-other-side-of-working-from-home.html

Science reveals what really increases Twitter followers

The world of science has some new advice for people who want to increase their Twitter following, and it may sound something your mother used to say: If you don’t have anything nice to tweet, don’t tweet at all.
“Expressing negative sentiments in tweets is the second most harmful factor to growing a Twitter audience,” say researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology. They speculate about why: “This might be because Twitter is a medium dominated by very weak social ties, and negative sentiment from strangers may be unpleasant or uncomfortable for a potential new follower to see.”

C.J. Hutto, Eric Gilbert and Sarita Yardi tracked data from over 500 active Twitter users as they tweeted more than 500,000 times in the course of 15 months. The Twitter users were randomly selected from the public timeline over a two-week period, and then screened for requirements like English language, an active account that was at least 30 days old, with at least 15 friends and 5 followers. Hutto elaborated by email:

Although we did nothing to specifically exclude institutional/brand accounts, a quick investigation of a subset of the ~500 users that passed all filters every 3 months indicates these are mostly “everyday” typical non-celebrity users… Very few (if any) are brand or institutional accounts.

About every three months the researchers recorded each user’s follower growth, and analyzed what it was about their tweets and behavior that seemed to lead to growth.
They say this is pretty groundbreaking work — “the first longitudinal study of audience growth on Twitter to combine such a diverse set of theory inspired variables” — and it seems so.
Another bit of advice based on the findings: Stop tweeting so much about yourself.
“Informational content attracts followers with an effect that is roughly thirty times higher than the effect of [personal] ‘meformer’ content, which deters growth,” the researchers wrote. “We think this is due to the prevalence of weak ties on Twitter.”
In other words, your Twitter followers don’t know you that well and thus don’t care about what you’re eating. Feed them information instead. Among the accounts studied, users talked about themselves in 41 percent of their tweets while informational content accounted for only 24 percent.
Overall, the study tracks and compares three types of factors — the content of your tweets, the dynamics of your social behavior and the structure of your follower network. Or more simply: What you tweet, how you interact and who you know.
This chart illustrates the statistically significant factors with the biggest impact on follower growth (translated into lay terms in the list below):

1. Number of connections in-common with potential new followers (good)
2. High frequency of others retweeting your tweets (good)
3. High frequency of informational tweets (good)
4. Too many “broadcast” tweets not directed at anyone in particular (bad)
5. Too much negative sentiment in your tweets (bad)
6. A detailed profile description or “bio” (good)
7. Profile has a URL listed (good)
8. “Burstiness” of your tweets, or the peak rate of tweets-per-hour (more is good; Twitter agrees)
9. High ratio of followers to following (good)
10. Lots of tweets with positive sentiment (good)
11. Cramming too many useless hashtags into your tweets (bad)
12. Use of long, fancy words (good)
13. Your tendency to follow-back those who follow you (good)
14. Profile lists your location (good)

As always with research like this, consider it a helpful framework but not a step-by-step rulebook. Twitter users in general seem to want you to be positive, informative and interactive — all good advice — just remember you also need to be yourself.

http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/mediawire/205411/science-reveals-what-really-increases-twitter-followers/

If you are wondering why you are struggling to succeed with your online business, this article by David DiSalvo gives some insight into how your brain might be working against you ...

"Luke: I can’t believe it.

Yoda: That is why you fail."

My research into the traits of influencers and achievers continues, and as I turn more pieces of this puzzle around to fit the whole, more ideas appear to me as a fit for this space.  In this edition, reflections on falling short — more precisely, why we fail despite ourselves.

1. Like Yoda said, you just don’t believe it. 

The crucial part of Yoda’s dialogue with Luke is “believe.”  The human brain is a powerful problem-solving and prediction making machine, and it operates via a multitude of feedback loops. What matters most in the feedback loop dynamic is input — what goes into the loop that begins the analysis-evaluation-action process, which ultimately results in an outcome. Here’s the kicker: if your input shuttle for achieving a goal lacks the critical, emotionally relevant component of belief, then the feedback loop is drained of octane from the start.  Another way to say that is — why would you expect a convincingly successful outcome when you haven’t convinced yourself that it’s possible?

2.  Other people have convinced you of your “station.”

I’ve always thought the “know your station in life” idea to be among the most pernicious we humans have ever come up with.  The only version of it I like is Tennessee Williams’:   “A high station in life is earned by the gallantry with which appalling experiences are survived with grace.”  Love that Tennessee Williams.  What’s more pernicious than the idea itself is that it’s often heaved upon us by other people, and they convince us that we are what we are and we’d better just live with it because, well, that’s what we’ll always be.  Really? Says who? Show me the chapter on predetermined stations in the cosmic rule book, please. This also gets back to the feedback loop dynamic, because if this external “station” scripting is part of your input, you can expect sub-par outcomes all the time.

3. You don’t want to be a distrupter.

The word “disrupter” has taken on such a heavy, mixed bag of meanings in the last few years.  Reading both popular psychology and business books, I’m not sure if it’s a good or bad thing to be.   One thing seems certain — the notion of disrupting anything–of being the water that breaks the rock–is scary to most of us.  Reason being, disruption is perceived as a threat to our threat-sensitive brains. Disruption means that consistency, stability and certainty might get jettisoned for a time, and that puts our hard-wired internal defense system on high alert. Sometimes, though, you have to override the alarms and move ahead anyway.  If you never do, you’ll never know what could happen.

4. You think, “what if I die tomorrow?”

We all think this from time to time.  And you know what, sure, any of us might die tomorrow — all the more reason not to waste time thinking about it and hamstringing yourself from going after what you want to achieve.  Would you rather die as a monument to mediocrity or as someone who never quit striving?  Which leads to the next one…

5.  You wonder how you will be remembered.

The rub here is simply that, if you “die tomorrow,” will people remember you as someone who clung to stability like an existential life preserver — and is that what you really want?  I know for a fact that many people do want exactly that, because it’s a comfortable niche to occupy on the obituary page.  ”She/he was a good person, good friend, good….”  Good is fine, but it ain’t great. You can’t strive for great achievements by dropping anchor in Goodville.  My take on this is: it’s OK to wonder how you’ll be remembered, but don’t let thoughts of “good and nice and stable” effect that all important feedback loop, because if you do your brain will be happy to oblige with lots of good and little else.

6. You think there must be a pre-established role for your life, and you might be screwing with  it.

This one also touches on the “station” idea discussed above, but it goes deeper than that. We humans are prone to believing in something psychologists call “agency.”  We want to believe there’s a reason for everything, and that everything has a prime mover — an agent, whether human or otherwise. So, we think, what if there’s a reason we are what we are — what if celestial agency has determined it so?  Should we be messing with that?  The error in thinking here is clear — agency is a figment our brains rely on to manage difficulty with as little trauma as possible. The first thing to do is recognize that, and then recognize that the role for your life has only one true agent — You.

7. Your career appears to be well-established and that’s good…right?

Well, maybe that’s good, sure.  The question becomes, is “established” what you really want?  Maybe it is, and that’s cool. But if “established” means you can’t reach beyond certain imposed parameters to achieve anything else that you truly want, then maybe it isn’t so useful after all.  Like most things, this is a personal choice and it doesn’t have a right or wrong answer.  But it’s worth acknowledging that you may very well be “establishing” yourself out of greater achievements.

8.  You are afraid of losing what you have built.

A totally legitimate fear, and one we should kick out of our perspectives as quickly as possible.  Here’s one example why:  Remember this little thing we’ve been suffering through for sometime now called a recession?  Remember how many people lost all or nearly all they’d “built” during these last few years of economic erosion? The reality is, you can lose everything in a heartbeat through no fault of your own, so why allow that fear to stop you from reaching out for what you really want?  This goes in the same basket as “I could die tomorrow.”  Yes, true, we can lose, we can die. So what? Push forward.

9. You think, “maybe I’ve hit my ceiling.” 

The proverbial “ceiling” — so long have ye been with us, and yet so little have ye given us.  I side with the late great Peter Drucker who said (paraphrasing from this classic article on Managing Oneself) if you reach a point in your career where you think you won’t progress any further, then start focusing on the next part of your life.  Actually, he added, you should start thinking about the next part of your life well before you begin it.  The point is, forget about ceilings and focus on achievement. When you start using the cultural shibboleth of the ceiling as an excuse, you are achieving nothing and will continue to do just that.

 1o. Confusion about where to go.

Of all of these 10 ideas, this one is to me the most difficult because it plagues me almost constantly. Gearing up the cerebral feedback loop for achievement is one thing, but without a sense of focus and direction, all of that energy isn’t going to yield very much in the end.  My experience has been that sometimes you have to let the energy flow for a while without too firm a sense of direction and see if focus emerges organically. Once it does, you can then nurture it into a more structured method for getting where you want to go.

 

http://startinganonlinebusinessfast.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/the-10-reasons-why-we-fail.html

9 Ebooks Internet Marketers Must Read in 2013

As a professional dedicated to marketing on the internet, you know how important it is to hone your skills and stay up-to-date with the latest information. Internet marketing is constantly changing, and we’re on a constant quest to keep up with the latest strategies and tactics.
To help you with this task we’ve compiled a list of our top ten must-read eBooks from some of the best sources for Internet marketing.

1. An Introductory Guide to Content Marketing

Content Marketing has become the latest catch-phrase. Everybody seems to be talking about it. But so many  people that are talking about content marketing get it wrong. Content marketing is not advertising, it’s  not the marketing of content, and it’s not social media. Circle S Studio has developed a great beginner’s guide  with An Introductory Guide to Content Marketing.

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2. 26 Ways to Generate More Inbound Customers in 2013

A lot has been written about inbound marketing, but how exactly can you generate customers with it? In  this eBook John Bonini from Impact Branding & Design discusses 26 ways to generate customers using  inbound marketing in 2013.

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3. Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide

SEO is one of the most misused and misunderstood aspects of internet marketing, yet probably the most  important. Black hat, white hat, Penguin updates, Panda updates. The acronyms abound, and we don’t  know who to trust to tell us. So why not go straight to the source? Google has written a great little guide,    their Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide, to help you begin to navigate your SEO journey.

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4. The Beginners Guide to SEO

As if an eBook from Google wasn’t enough, we thought we’d include a second authoritative resource on SEO –  this time from SEOMoz, the company many consider to be the best source for SEO knowledge available today.  You can read their Beginners Guide to SEO either as a series of articles, or you can download a PDF version of  their eBook.

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5. Market Like the Ultimate Marketers

Infusionsoft has taken the marketing world by storm, with their combination CRM, e-commerce,  social media and email marketing tool for small and mid-sized businesses. Every year they hold a  contest to see which one of their customers are using the most innovative and effective marketing strategies.  In this eBook you’ll learn how The Rocket Company used Lifecycle Marketing to grow their business.

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6. 58 Social Media Ideas to Inspire your Content Marketing

So you’ve created a great content strategy, your editorial calendar is set for the next six months, and you’ve  written some great thought leadership articles, eBooks and blog posts. Now what? The Content Marketing  Institute has an answer to your content distribution problems with their eBook 58 Social Media Ideas to  Inspire your Content Marketing.

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7. A Guide to Creating Content for Demand Generation

The term ‘Content Marketing’ contains two words. Unfortunately, many marketers have focused on only one  word: the ‘content’ piece, while neglecting the ‘marketing’ piece. Thanksfully Marketo has come to the rescue  in their eBook A Guide to Creating Content for Demand Generation.

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8. Best Practices Guide to Landing Pages

Being a landing page company ourselves we kind of took a shine to this eBook. Pardot takes a unique approach  to landing page best practices by discussing content on branded landing pages, sending download links in  auto-responder emails, progressive profiling and A/B testing.

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9. Landing Pages: The Ultimate Guide

Finally, we’d be remiss not to include our own eBook. We provide tips on how to create a landing page, how to  improve your landing page, how to test your landing page, and some advanced material. Download Landing  Pages: The Ultimate Guide.

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We also wanted to include a few more resources that didn’t make it on our top ten list, but that we think are valuable nonetheless.

• One of the most important yet neglected aspect of online marketing is customer segmentation. Get Found First does a great job explaining this with their eBook Consumer Segmentation for Online Marketers.
• In addition to our eBook on landing pages and the Pardot guide, we thought Ion Interactive’s book Landing Experiences The Visitors Love was great too.
• Pardot has a few more eBooks (they’re still calling them “white papers.” That’s so year 200!). Check out their content creation guide and 5 Steps to Double your Web Marketing Value.
• Finally, we wanted to share a link to Copyblogger’s 14 eBooks on Internet marketing, with advice on content marketing, copywriting for the web, landing pages, how to build authority, SEO, and email marketing. Check out Copyblogger’s eBooks here.

Read more at http://www.business2community.com/books/9-ebooks-internet-marketers-must-read-2013-0605415#iFTxyulzdWwXgpLm.99

HANDY TOWNSHIP, MICH. — Matt Blauer and Mandy Tefft are making the world a hotter place one bottle at a time.
The husband-and-wife team have been making and selling Papa Turts hot sauce since early 2011.
The seeds of the business were planted with their love of spicy foods and an abundance of peppers in the garden at their rural home near Fowlerville in Handy Township.
“We had all this land, so we planted a big garden and put in a bunch of chili peppers,” Blauer told the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus. “We got a lot more than we bargained for.”
The solution was for Blauer to turn the peppers into hot sauce.
“I messed around with it for a while. Everybody liked it and said I should try and market it,” Blauer said. “It took a long period of trial and error to get the recipe where I wanted it.”
Papa Turts — the name is a play off Blauer’s high school nickname, Turtle, and his becoming a father — makes two varieties of sauce: So Hot It Hurts and Smoked Peppa. The sauce is available in nearly 30 stores and restaurants, and it can be ordered online.
Tefft says the hot sauce is popular at Olden Days Cafe in Fowlerville, where diners often drizzle it over breakfast items such as eggs and potatoes.
“We put it on everything,” she said. “The So Hot It Hurts is hot, but not so hot that you can’t taste anything else. It adds to your food instead of overpowering your food. We put it on pizza. We use it in deviled eggs and Bloody Marys.
“I like the (Smoked Peppa) on lasagna and spaghetti,” she added.
Tefft says her husband is an “awesome cook,” and he often posts recipes that incorporate the sauce on Papa Turts’ Facebook page.
“We recently did a spicy tuna melt recipe online that is amazing,” Tefft said.
Creating a commercial kitchen to make the sauce in the basement of their home required a financial investment of a couple of thousand dollars and approval from the Michigan Department of Agriculture.
“We had to tear up the carpet, put in a triple sink and a hand-washing sink, and put up a curtain and epoxy the floor. We put a vent in, too,” Tefft said.
While the idea for the sauce originally grew from their own garden, the couple rely on other sources for their produce. They get most of their habanero peppers from Wilczewski Greenhouses in Oceola Township.
“It’s two local businesses helping each other,” Tefft said.
Blauer said each batch of So Hot It Hurts sauce — about 120 5-ounce bottles — requires 16 pounds of habanero peppers and nearly 2 pounds of dried arbol chiles, as well as some roasted carrots. The peppers need to cook down for about 90 minutes. Blauer later uses a wooden stick to skim off the skins and seeds.
“It’s a real hands-on process,” he said.
For the Smoked Peppa sauce, Blauer uses chipotle peppers as well as tomato paste.
After the sauce is made, it’s bottled, sealed and labeled by hand.
“We learned pretty quick that places don’t want to sell it if it doesn’t have a bar code on it,” Tefft said. “So we went to Buyabarcode.com and purchased bar codes. Some stuff we’ve just had to wing it and learn as we go along.”
Fans of the sauce can even have custom labels made for the bottles. Hometown Bicycles in Brighton created its own label and sells the hot sauce in its store. Papa Turts has also had personalized labels designed and printed for special events such as weddings and bachelor parties.
Blauer, 40, and Tefft, 37, have two children, ages 11 and 4. Tefft, a 1994 Fowlerville High School graduate, keeps busy as a stay-at-home mom while working to grow the sauce business. Blauer, who grew up in the Detroit suburb of Huntington Woods, is a FedEx driver who owns his own route.
While attending college in Kalamazoo, they met at Bell’s Brewery. The brewery recently began selling Papa Turts sauces, which Tefft called “very exciting.”
Blauer works 10- to 12-hour days, leaving only the weekends for making his namesake sauce.
“When I first started, I’d make a batch every couple of months. Now, I’m working at it one full day every weekend,” he said.
The couple think about the day when Papa Turts can become their full-time occupations and Blauer can sell his FedEx route.
“We’re not quite ready to do that just yet,” Blauer said. “Slowly, over time, I may do less FedEx and more hot sauce until one day I’ll be doing hot sauce full time.”
Tefft said they “broke a little more than even” on the sauce business in 2012, and she’s sure they will do even better this year. When her youngest child starts preschool in the fall, she hopes to have more time to dedicate to Papa Turts. She also plans to revamp the Papa Turts website, where sales currently require a PayPal account.
“We don’t take credit cards, and I think some people just don’t like PayPal,” Tefft said. “When our website gets better and we show up in more searches, we can get the credit card thing going.”
Still, they count people from as far away as California and Texas among their loyal customers.
“It’s been fun; it’s a really cool thing for Matt and I to do together,” Tefft said. “It’s something that we really like that we believe is a quality product.”

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