The Advantages of Working for a Startup

There are many different risks that appear when working for startup companies. Over 75 percent of startups fail, so it is quite obvious that job security is something that is not a given, no matter how great the initial project is. Short-term risks are definitely high and the pay is not normally high when you are initially hired.

While the disadvantages are obviously numerous and should not be taken lightly, many are still highly interested in finding startup jobs. You have various different sites to help you find a startup job. The demand is high for these jobs, but why is that? Mainly: a startup job offers many advantages that often can’t be found in other traditional jobs.

Motivating Growth Environment

One of the advantages of working for a startup company is that the companies will encourage individualism and creativity, and strict hierarchy normally doesn’t really exist. This basically means that you will get a lot of freedom. The workers manage to directly influence the evolution of a startup, making this highly attractive for those that want to make a difference.

Working in a startup is something that is normally associated with risks but it is also something that is attractive because of the environment offered. Combine this with the potential growth that is much higher with a corporate job and you have something that is attractive for a large part of the population, especially younger people.

Attractive Extra Perks

The salary that you get in a startup job is normally lower than what you would obtain something else but the business owners do manage to attract many through extra perks. For instance, the company can allow you to work from home or can offer free meals. We can also highlight the fact that for many that look for a startup job it is the satisfaction of doing a really good job that is enough. While many work for salaries, some are attracted by other things.

Quickly Gaining Skills and Experience

The startup environment is naturally one that is sped up. You basically end up learning everything that you need to do in a much shorter period of time as you are forced to do this. Many skills can be gained and all those can be added to the CV.

A problem with the larger corporations is that job descriptions naturally limit duties. This is not actually the case in a startup since working there will force you to move to other duties and to constantly adapt. You can even end up mastering a brand new job, making you a lot more valuable for the future employer.

Should You Work For A Startup Company?

The truth is that working for a startup company is definitely not something that is for everyone. You may want to try it out though since startups can help you to grow at a much faster pace than regular jobs in large corporations. For many, this is the largest advantage associated with working for a startup.

 Source : http://bit.ly/1QryE0S

3 reasons social media relationships aren't virtual

I remember saying that if I could ever figure out how a person could be in two places at once I’d retire a billionaire.

Then, I figured it out.

Being in two places or more simultaneously is exactly what social media allows us to appear to do. With a nearly endless supply of apps designed to cross-post anything we can enter into a digital device, you’d think the impossible had finally been achieved.

Certainly a lot of innovative people have ensured a comfortable retirement by making that illusion easy to create. But what is it costing entrepreneurs who fall prey to it?

Back when I was lamenting the impossibility of being in two locations at the same moment I was working with service professionals, primarily doctors. We all know what happens when a doctor gets scheduled to be in two places at once; we have to clear our schedules because we’ll be spending most of the day in their clinic.

So, part of my consulting role was to teach micromanagement of the service provider’s appointment book to make the most of their available seconds while keeping their schedule as close to on time as possible.

You might think that showing up on social media has very little in common with being physically present with a patient, but you would be wrong. Social media gives us the opportunity to really show up, but most people confuse posting to a platform with having a presence in that space.

Thinking you’re really showing up on social media using apps to create and recreate content is like a doctor writing about the symptoms of a disease for WebMD. It’s marketing, it’s valuable content, but it is not the same as being present with the patient in the examining room.

1. Content equals marketing; conversation equals a relationship.

You post content, and with the magic of technology it shows up everywhere you tell it to go. Then, boom! There you are on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, any social media platform you choose.

That’s marketing. Sometimes it’s really good marketing, but like all marketing, the purpose is to make you visible, to make you valuable, to get you on the radar of prospective customers and brand ambassadors to invite them to raise their hands and say, “More please.”

Marketing doesn’t build relationships. Most of the people telling you that social media doesn’t work aren’t really building relationships, they’re marketing. These are often the same people who tell you networking doesn’t work because they go to live networking events with a stack of cards and an agenda to market to as many people as possible.

Perhaps all you need from social media is a place to promote yourself and your business. In that case, carry on as you have been; this discussion won’t apply to you. If building relationships is part of your success strategy, here are some things to remember.

2. People have relationships with people.

People might develop loyalty to a brand, but they have a relationship with the people who represent that brand. If you are the brand, then their relationship has to be with you. Show up as a person who has a brand, not as a brand who is a person.

3. To have a relationship you have to relate.

Some of us are very private by nature. But if you can’t be personal, even vulnerable, people will see you as a personality, not a person. The admonition to “get real” has never been more applicable than here.

4. We bond over things we care about.

If your posts are never about anything except yourself and your work your family and your pets and your life, you’re sending a message that you are pretty much all that matters to you.

This may not turn people off initially, but it creates a revolving door of relationships with people who thought they had something in common with you, then slowly realize the only thing you have in common is that you both like you.

5. Relationships are built on know, like and trust.

Letting people get to know you is all about putting yourself out there. If you’re charming enough, people might like you just from what you have to say, but to trust you they need to believe you care about them.

Take the time to show up in their space. Do more than just like, retweet, or leave a “You go, girl!” Respond, engage, invite dialog, and demonstrate that you recognize the unique value of their personhood.

6. You really can only be in one place at once.

I really thought I could have overcome the impossible by now, too. Though I can market in multiple places at once, I can’t really show up as a person and engage in multiple places at once. I spend most of my “person” time on Facebook, that’s my home base of choice. What’s yours?

Source : http://bit.ly/1NMFOf4

4 Ways To Boost Your Social Media

You’ve taken the time to set up social media accounts for your business on all the major sites. You’re posting regularly, taking the time to interact with your customers, and using your social media platforms as an opportunity to share information about your products or services. Social media marketing, however, isn’t just about regular posts. It’s also about providing your customers with opportunities to interact with your business. Through that interaction, you’ll be able to build relationships with your customers and increase their opinion of your business substantially.

1-Look for Opportunities for Discussion

What’s the latest hot topic in your field? Are there questions that are truly important to your customer base? If you’re marketing chocolate bars, the question might be simple: do customers prefer an entirely sweet bar with cookie pieces inside, or a slightly salty bar with nuts or sea salt? How do customers select that perfect chocolate bar? For situations like this, a simple poll might be enough to tell you what the majority of your customers prefer, but it’s not always about simply answering the question. Instead, offer your customers the opportunity to engage in discussion or debate. “Sweet or salty? Tell us why!” “What’s your favorite chocolate add-in? Tell us in the comments.” “If you could design the perfect chocolate bar, what would it look like?” Open-ended questions create far better opportunities for discussion and debate than multiple choice questions.

For more complicated marketing campaigns, you have an equally complex array of topics that will give you the opportunity to keep your followers up and debating long past their bedtime. As an added advantage, every time someone comments on your posts, it increases the odds that they’ll see the next one and that others will see it, too. You don’t want your question to be too complex, however! Ideally, you want to ask a question that your customers understand well enough to debate while still leaving plenty of room for differing opinions.

2-Set Up Chat Times

The larger your business, the more trouble you’ll have connecting with any of your customers on a personal level. For many small businesses, however, personal interaction can be the best way to increase customer satisfaction. Choose a social media platform, create an event or a hashtag, and take the opportunity to really chat with your customers. Offer troubleshooting tips about how to use a product that might be causing customers problems. Offer suggestions about how to make their experience with your company or product better. Ask for their questions and give serious, thoughtful answers. Chat times are a wonderful customer interaction tool because they are specific times when your customers know that they’ll be able to reach you.

When you plan chat times, go in with a list of topics ahead of time. Don’t, however, feel as though you have to be trapped by those topics. Let your customers take the lead and guide you through the topics that are of greatest interest to them. When conversation starts to lag, you have your list of topics to help re-engage them in the discussion. Often, it’s helpful to have several members of your marketing team available to help deal with the traffic and answer questions. It may take some trial and error to discover the mix that’s right for your business, but once you do, you’ll discover just how advantageous it can be.

3-Look at the Content that Drives Interaction

Your goal on social media is to engage your customers, so let your customers determine the type of interaction that you use. First, look at which social media platforms are getting the most engagement. Are your customers primarily interacting with you on Facebook, or do they prefer Twitter? How many views do you get on your products when you put them on Pinterest? What about pictures on Instagram: which ones do your customers really care about?

Look over that content regularly. Pay particular attention any time you see that a particular post has received far more or far less interaction than usual, but keep an eye on your median interaction, too. What are the surefire topics that are going to draw out your customers and have them returning to the post to chat with one another over a period of hours or even days? If you’re a clothing company, it might be the season’s newest designs or colors. Produce collectibles? A new announcement is sure to generate attention, but preparing for the big reveal ahead of time can help increase customer excitement and generate more interaction

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4-Tie in Blog Posts

Most social media posts are intended to be relatively short. There’s a minimal amount that can be said before your platform cuts you off and tells you that you’re out of space; and even if you have unlimited characters to work with, you don’t want to write more than you know that your customers will read. That doesn’t mean, however, that you can’t share longer content on social media platforms. Use your social media platforms to drive greater traffic to your blog and your website. Offer a teaser, a graphic from the post that’s sure to catch your customers’ attention, or a question that will require your customers to read the entire post. Not only will this draw more in-depth interaction to your social media platforms, it will increase traffic to your blog.

Building an effective social media marketing campaign involves some trial and error. You won’t instantly know exactly what to post or how to engage the greatest number of people. With time, however, you’ll learn how to take full advantage of all of your social media accounts.

Source : http://bit.ly/1Q94IHi

The Latest Rules of Social Media Marketing

Social media is no doubt an ideal way for you to acquire new fans/followers and engage with them. It’s also an ideal tool to boost the reputation of your company/brand. In a way, social media has become an integral asset in marketing your business.

But how are you going to maximize its tools for your company?

Listed below are some new do’s that you should follow when it comes to your social media marketing so you’d be able to achieve your goals in no time.

Social Plan

Do you have one?

Most of us don’t.

Social plan is essential to make your social media marketing more powerful.

It’s a plan that compiles all fresh contents on your social media. You can create a daily, weekly or a monthly theme.

With a plan, you’ll have consistency. This will also allow you to send out your social updates at the right time.

When your audience knows when you’re going to post your content, they’ll go back to your site and wait for your next awesome piece of content.

Then again, what you post should provide them value. Else, they’re going to leave or unfollow you.

Even though you have a social plan, you should still monitor your channels.

Don’t just post and leave. You want your social media accounts to be as professional as possible as they reflect what your brand is.

That said, you’d want to monitor your channels and take out those spammy comments or inappropriate remarks.

Monitoring your channels will also help you find some comments and questions posted by your prospective clients.

When you’re there monitoring, you can make an instant reply and begin a real-time conversation with them.

Content Should Reflect Your Brand

It simply means that your content must provide value to your audience by sharing content that’s information and educational.

This gives them a sample of what they can expect when they visit your site. It also gives them a preview of what type of information is housed on your own site.

You already have followers. So, give them a reason to click through your link and visit your site.

But never assume what your audience wants. Just because you share your content on your social media accounts doesn’t mean that you’ll increase your CTR.

For that reason, you should know the profiles of those who interact with your content. In this way, you can share content that attracts attention to your potential customers.

Test the Times and Types of Content

A good social media marketer will always test the best time to post content in a social media channel. In this way, you’ll know what content works and what needs to be improved.

As you survey the activities on your social channel, you can generate useful pieces of information that may increase engagements and schedule your post during optimal times.

The best time to post is different from one company to another. That said, it’s necessary that you know your audience.

You can do so by using Google Analytics and check out your demographics, location and so on and so forth. Use these pieces of information to get to know more about your followers.

Source : http://bit.ly/1P7peIf

Three Social Media Marketing Myths Debunked

Social Media is similar to Pandora’s Box.  It holds powerful tools which can help boost your business to new customers, retain loyal ones, and help to engage online within the digital world, or if can be a ton of wasted resources if not used properly.  Along with anything new comes a lot of misconceptions.  Although you maybe questioning the most efficient ways to maximize social media with your audience, don’t give up! Here are three major myths I come across which I’d like to take a stab at debunking.

Myth #1: I Don’t Have Enough Content to Fill my Social Media Feeds 

Social media outlets are fast paced and constantly changing.  Content gets posted online, flooded, pushed down, and becomes irrelevant quickly and before you know it.  Although this may seem like a wasted effort it reminds us that it’s important to repost the same content in different ways to best represent your brand.  Getting creative and thinking of interesting and exciting ways to share your content while avoiding making it seem too repetitive is important.  People often miss things, forget them, and if it’s evergreen content, then it’s always useful.  Putting a new spin and angle on how you repost it will help it live long and prosper. One of my favorite tools is pablo by buffer or canva, both can help quickly create visual content to accompany your content, and did I mention they’re both FREE.  Remember, the human brain processes images 60,000 times faster than text (click to tweet this) so visual content within social media is a MUST if you want to stand out and drive engagement!

Myth #2: My Social Media Channels Can’t Show Personality

Although your content should be targeted around your industry and demographic to best optimize, don’t be afraid to show personality.  Behind your brand you’ve got REAL people following you and engaging online.  Even if it doesn’t directly relate to your brand, product, or service spreading some humor can help to humanize your brand’s message.  We’ve found quotes, funny gifs, and office photos and interesting news articles helpful at CFA Institute.  Have a little fun, let your hair down, and get creative with your social media posts!

Myth #3: My Demographic Is Older, So Social Media Isn’t Relevant or Worth It

Contrary to what you believe, the older crowd is quite active on social media.  According to comScore Mobile Matrix the average tablet minutes spent on social networks per visitor is up 115% from 2015 in the 55+ age bracket.   According to FastCompany the fastest growing demographic on twitter is the 55-64 year age bracket   This demographic has grown 79% since 2012. For Facebook this group has jumped 46%, for Google+ 56%.

Not broadening your brand to reach an older age group, or ignoring their presence on social media outlets will severely limit your company’s potential for growth.

What do you think of these three myths debunked? Would love to hear your thoughts, leave a comment below or send me a tweet, thanks!

Source : http://bit.ly/1GvMWem

Quote of the day.

Content marketing probably won't help you acquire customers

For digital marketers, content is now part of the furniture. Content is everywhere and every brand owner has invested in content marketing at some point.

According to 2014 figures from the US-based Content Marketing Institute, 71% of B2C marketers use content for acquisition, the second highest score. Top was brand awareness on 79%.

Acquisition means getting something from a consumer, from a sale down to an email address. This is what starts a relationship.

But what if much of the budget spent on content was wasted, if consumers are at best only marginally interested in it? New research by the marketing organisationDMA, my employer, and The Media Octopus suggests this is the case.

The Customer Acquisition Barometer (CAB) is in its second year, looking at how, why and where consumers turn into customers. The research comes from responses from Beautiful Insights’ demographically representative YouSay panel of 1,072 people.

According to these responses, only a minority of consumers, 10%, had exchanged information with a brand in exchange for “exclusive content” over the past year, and that’s for brands they know. For brands they don’t know, this dropped to 9%.

Much more popular were loyalty schemes (46% had exchanged information with brands over the past year, down to 21% for unknown brands), competitions (33% for known brands, 23% for unknown brands), coupons (31% for known brands, 20% for unknown brands), and free products or services (27% for known brands, 17% for unknown brands).

Content barely made an impact against these more traditional forms of acquisition, and backs up our Consumer Attitudes to Privacy research, published in June, where content rated bottom in a list of inducements to share data. This automatically raises one big question: do paywalls work if customers are reluctant to exchange data for content? For acquisition, is content futile?

Now before you abandon your content marketing, a quick disclaimer. This new research focuses solely on acquisition, not retention, not engagement, not brand building.

One side-effect of the fragmenting media pie is the changing way people interact with these new media. For example, last year’s research showed social media to be somewhere only 4% of people would want to be contacted by a brand they are interested in. This year, that number rose significantly to a more respectable 13%.

Look closer and you see that for the 18–24 age group, this figure increases again to 30%. Our relationship with new media is changing.

The same may be true for content. For 18- to 24-year-olds, the proportion who shared their data in exchange for content over the past year almost doubled to 19%, and for those aged 25–34 it’s 20%.

But if content is to have a hope of persuading consumers to part with their data or money, then they need to trust that brand.

The CAB research suggests that marketers are actually retreating here, putting up barriers to consumer trust. Last year marketers were conscientious about giving customers control where possible: 93% gave clear opt-outs at every stage of their marketing, the same proportion clearly stated how customer data would be used (one of the principles of the Data Protection Act). This year those proportions fell to 56% and 62% respectively.

Finally, and this is the elephant in the room for content marketing, nobody will give anything for bad content. Those 10% of people who chose to exchange something for content – it must have been worth it.

So what should marketers do?

Trust would be a good place to start. Consumers want control over their data and their personal information, so give it to them. Content may not be a reliable way to acquire customers now, but as our relationship with content changes, so may consumer attitudes. But if those consumers don’t trust you, it’s a non-starter.

Source : http://bit.ly/1NktlgI

10 ways to combine SEO and content marketing

Gone are the days when search engine optimization was enough to land your website onto Google's good graces.

Now you must to add content marketing to your arsenal of digital marketing tool if you want to gain search engines’ approval and ultimately win the heart of online users.

Given the important role content marketing now plays in the success of online business, it's time that SEO ties the knot with content marketing.

The two digital marketing tools that were once viewed as separate entities are now an inseparable couple, promising to inch businesses closer to the proverbial “overnight success. ”The amazing duo can greatly help your online business reach the pinnacle of success and outwit your competitors.

Here are 10 ways you can ensure that the two digital marketing tools work in harmony:

1. Set common goals.

Setting common goals is the first step to make SEO and content marketing work together to bring additional revenues.

Ask yourself what activities overlap between the two digital marketing techniques. Is it increased online traffic, rankings or links? How can you align the activities to achieve common goals?

The answers to these and other similar questions will give you a starting point in creating an integrated SEO and content marketing strategy with clear and focused goals and strong communication.

2. Establish key performance indicators.

Another way to optimize synergy between SEO and Content Marketing is to establish key KPIs that will track performance, and ensure that it is on track for achieving common goals.

These KPIs include content sharing, links to content, online user engagement, call-to-action conversion rates and several others. 

3. Understand your target audience.

Understanding your audience is the key part of an SEO and content marketing strategy. Create personas of the target audience and develop a unique digital marketing strategy for each group. The personas can be based on age, location, gender, hobbies or interests.

Don’t undertake any digital marketing activity without considering what your audience wants, and also what you want them to do in return of fulfilling their demand.

4. Create SEO-optimized content.

Google places great emphasis on quality content. You can make the content more relevant for the search engine by incorporating high-impression keywords. Optimizing the content in this way will allow your Web pages to become visible to online users by appearing on the search results.

Avoid overstuffing keywords into website content. In order to play it safe, limit the keyword density to 1 percent or less. This will ensure that your site doesn't get penalized by the search engine, decreasing online traffic.

5. Research high-impression and relevant keywords.

Include high impression and relevant keywords in the website. Each keyword that you select should be researched properly using online tools such as Google Planner, Google Trend, Word Stream and other similar tools.

Optimizing your content in this way will ensure that your online content is able to attract maximum number of online users.

6. Attract online consumers through link building.

Another way you can make SEO and content marketing work together is through link building. Link building is a pure SEO strategy that results in distribution of online content to a large number of targeted, qualified audiences. You can greatly increase your content’s effectiveness through these efforts.

The links pointing to the published online content is placed on various high authority and high page ranked sites. These sites attract thousands of online visitors that can be diverted to your site by placing targeted links on the site they first visited.

Enlist SEO professionals to enhance your link building strategy. Here are some reputed SEO companies, based on user reviews:

TIS India

SE Media Online

Anpee Media

7. Focus on internal link building.

Internal link building works wonders in increasing your website’s ranking along with your published content. Moreover, creating internal links will also result in improved user experience due to easy navigation around the site.

Internal link building is simple to implement, and should be part of your digital marketing arsenal. This will help to improve your ranking and guide users with the content that is relevant to them.

8. Optimize your website content’s title and headings.

Your website content’s title and headings should also be optimized using relevant keywords and phrases.

The title is displayed on top bar of the browser, and headings are included inside the content. Your title should be descriptive, persuading users to click. Headings should be catchy enough to make the content readable.

Both must also be SEO-optimized to make your content more visible in the search results page.

9. Measure your results.

Make use of various online tools to measure the outcome of your combined SEO and content marketing efforts. Google Analytics can track changes in search volume over time. You will also know which pages and content attracts the most visitors, and the keywords they type to enter the website. The information gathered can help you fine-tune your content.

10.Keep your efforts going.

Combining SEO and content marketing must be an on going effort that should not stop at any time.

Make the most of the opportunity and watch the extraordinary combination of SEO and content marketing work wonders for your organization or client. It will position you perfectly on the fast track to success.

Source : http://bit.ly/1hIC8xr