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.”

http://www.freep.com/article/20130902/NEWS06/309020080/hot-sauce-business-peppers-handy-township