Category Archives: creativity

Personal Freedom — Going “Off the Grid”

  By admin | March 24, 2017 - 11:28 am | , ,
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What is personal freedom? You may ask.  If you must ask that question, you are sorely in need of finding answers to it.  As well, going “off the grid” may be a new phrase to you.  Chances are that it won’t be foreign to you for long, as this type of lifestyle is expected to gain more and more followers in the future.  Let’s examine the potential for living this lifestyle.

PERSONAL FREEDOM

Personal freedom means you find ways to escape the normal stresses of daily life in the society in which we live right now.  Work, work, work.  Money, money, money.  More, more, more.  You may find that “more, more, more” is “less, less, less” when it comes to living a life that is meaningful to you.  People are in such a hurry as they struggle to adhere to the catch phrase, “time is money!”  No, time is the health and wealth (not in monetary terms) of your body, mind, and spirit.  Misplaced notions about responsibility to society may be weighing you down.  Do you “have” to “keep up with the Joneses?”  No.  Does society like to make you believe you need to do the same things that everyone else does?  Yes.  That’s how the cycle gets perpetuated.

GOING OFF THE GRID

Going “off the grid” means, basically, living a life independent of public utilities and other “modern conveniences.”  This way of living is gaining momentum and popularity primarily dusolar-panel-1424264e to the fact that the “normal” way most people live today has become just entirely too stressful.  People are finding that their quality of life has taken a remarkable downturn.  That’s just not right.  Life is short; make the most of it.  Benefits of going off the grid include:

  • Self-reliance
  • To live greener
  • To be a responsible steward of the environment
  • Give you more control over your finances

ENERGY CAN COME IN A VARIETY OF FORMS

The market for new and improved energy solutions has grown dramatically over the last decade.  As well, prices for items, such as a solar panel, have decreased significantly over the last 10 years.  You may also explore energy alternatives that come from wind turbines or hydro energy.  Water wells can also be extremely beneficial to your off-the-grid lifestyle.

It takes courage to jump off the hurry-scurry path that takes you to an 8-5 job every day, but what might you gain from the change?  Wouldn’t you like to find out?

 

Fresh Ideas. Fresh Words. How Your Business Can Use Them.

  By admin | July 15, 2016 - 9:00 am | , , ,
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light-bulb-2-1427493To keep growing your business, you will need to keep expanding your horizons and never, ever, forget that gaining a fresh perspective on the daily goings-on within your business and its marketplace in the world is essential.  Schedule time each week to take a step back and look with a critical eye at any recent successes … and failures.  Try to look at your organization as someone on the outside.  If you find that difficult to do …

HIRE A WRITER

Consider hiring a professional copywriter to add perspective, value, and quality content to your company’s blog.  And then READ what they have written.  Determine if you can glean any hidden gems of new thoughts or fresh ideas from what your copywriter has discovered about new trends in your industry.

LISTEN TO YOUR CUSTOMERS

Talk with and listen to what your customers have to say about your business.  Look at your products and/or services from their perspective.  A successful business owner/manager can learn a lot from listening.  You can also learn a lot about their prospective needs for the future to help determine a strategy for growing your business in the way that will lead to a successful future.

LOOK AT WHAT YOUR COMPETITORS ARE DOING

Read their blogs and discover if they are introducing new products or services.  Learn what their customers might be saying about them.  How can you take the knowledge of what they are doing and capitalize on it by structuring your products/services in a better way that will reflect users’ needs?

LEARN FROM OTHER SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS OWNERS

Connect on Social Media with other successful businesses and entrepreneurs to discover their marketing strategy.  Capture their thoughts on business matters and see if you can apply them to your own business.

Let an inspired copywriter help provide your business with a fresh perspective.

 

 

Why You Should Use The Rule Of Three

  By admin | July 8, 2016 - 9:00 am | , , , ,
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red-nr-3-1537717Is three a magical number?  Does three prove to be all-inclusive?  Does this, that, and the other cover it all?  Here is the answer: three is the number of elements required to make a pattern.  You will find, if you look, that throughout some of the greatest stories ever told, along with myths and fairy tales (ahhhh, see these three?  1) stories; 2) myths; and 3) fairy tales) that three (of whatever being talked about) pervades.

How Humans Process Information

By necessity, human beings have adapted to becoming experts at recognizing “patterns” of things and three is the smallest number by which to create a pattern.  The number three is just enough – just short enough and just long enough – to do the best job of capturing the attention of an audience.  Thought has also been given to the fact that, from childhood, we have been conditioned to respond well to things grouped in threes.  For example, as pointed out by Copyblogger:

  • Goldilocks and the Three Bears
  • Three Little Pigs
  • The Three Stooges
  • Three Blind Mice
  • The Three Musketeers

Also consider that:

  • Typically, there are three acts to a screenplay
  • Three bullet points are considered more effective than two or four

Comedians Also Use the Rule of Three

To get a laugh, humorists and comedians acknowledge they also use the rule of three because it fits “the classic joke structure of set-up, anticipation, and punchline.” (Copyblogger)  Insofar as comedy is concerned, the group of three can build suspense with the first two words/descriptions and then the final (and third) phrase in the set is designed to surprise you and throw you off-guard, thereby resulting in a laugh.

The number three can contain just enough, but yet not too much information for readers to take the time to read and be able to quickly grasp whatever message you want to impart.  Three truly can be a magical number.

What is “Adaptive Content”?

  By admin | July 1, 2016 - 9:00 am | , , , ,
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shine-and-happy-1440357Adaptive content is a strategy that can be utilized across multiple channels and throughout all types of content.  The goal of adaptive content is to personalize interactions between business and consumer to the maximum extent possible.  It is developed and designed “around” your particular set of customers and includes sensitivity to their moods and goals.  Statistics from an Econsultancy.com article show that, “94% of businesses say personalization is critical to their success.”  That is a statistic that every business should know and take into consideration.

 

Personalization and Delivery

Adaptive content is a necessary requirement for a successful personalized experience across many channels (i.e., print, sales, training, customer support, etc.).  Adaptive content is geared away from the “one-size-fits-all” strategy.  Retailers need to learn to leverage this type of content.  It has proven highly successful in the marketing and consulting industries, taking client conversion rates to an all-time high.

Content Strategy and Karma

According to the Intelligent Content Conference web site, “The underlying ethos of content marketing and user-centric content strategy involves karma: The more real value you give to consumers, the more that will come back your way.  The more we can make our content adaptive, the more we can realistically deliver tailored, high-value content without running out of budget, resources, or time.”

A New Look at the Five Ws

ICC invites us to take another look at those classic five Ws: Who, What, When, Where, and Why.  To really understand adaptive content and get to the heart of the strategy, you will need to look at each “W” with a new vision and two different perspectives.  Who is your target audience really?  Who/What is your company/business/organization and Why?

  • Who are your customers?
  • What kind of content will provide your customer with the most value?
  • When should you display which type of content?
  • Where should you display your content so that it attracts the largest audience?
  • Why are you creating this adaptive content (i.e., what value do you want it to provide to your business?)

Your customers are ready for personalized, adaptive content?  Is your business ready to deliver?

 

Is SEO Still An Important Concept?

  By admin | June 24, 2016 - 9:00 am | , , , , ,
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glasses-1421589In 2014, in a LinkedIn article about the most talked about skills for the best jobs available, number 5 was said to be the knowledge of how to use SEO and paid search (based on recruiter searches).  Why are there so many articles that negatively discuss whether SEO is dead or alive?  While we all know the phrase “Content is King,” that doesn’t mean that SEO is dead or even in a coma.  Plenty of uses still exist for SEO and opportunities abound where SEO can be quite an advantage.

SEO – ALIVE FOREVER!

Well, at least for the foreseeable future.  Why?  Because what companies and businesses care about most – driving oodles of traffic to their web site and then converting those travelers to loyal and devoted customers for life – can be greatly enhanced by utilizing SEO.  While shifts have occurred to the strategies and tactics of SEO with regard to how search engines see those efforts and apply them to the analysis of page ranking, the skills of writing with SEO remain necessary and desired.

GET CONTENT SEEN

With more writers and written text in the form of blogs, articles, web pages, landing pages, etc., how in the world are you going to get your little blog and, thereby, your company noticed?  You need to think up more creative and constructive ways to get your content seen.  What do you need to do that?  A terrific writer who knows how to address the philosophy of your company’s product line or service.  SEO knowledge incorporated into a text, whether it is organic or paid, is still the best way to get your business noticed.

SEO AND GREAT CONTENT

Your business needs great content; that’s a fact.  When you combine naturally flowing and authentic content with the dynamics of SEO optimization, you have a vibrant end result that will do everything within its power to get your business noticed, traffic driven to your web site, and sales conversions almost a given.

Employ high quality content and SEO techniques to get your business and web site acknowledged through waterfall of noise that is your competition.  Drive your targeted audience right where you want them.

 

 

How Content Marketing Can Help Your SEO Efforts

  By admin | June 17, 2016 - 9:00 am | , , , ,
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seo-1241596It has been said that you can’t have one without also having the other: content marketing and SEO.  Why is that exactly?  Utilizing successful SEO tactics and techniques, content needs to be of high quality and provide value to the reader while also, and by natural inclusion, skillfully connect the reader to the business with words employed to strike at the core of the product or service the business offers.  The goal, of course, is to entice the purchaser that whatever the company is selling is absolutely essential for the reader to have.

High Quality Content

Content that is of high quality and value to the reader is the most sought-after arrangement in the global world of marketing today.  It is important to search engines, most notably Google who has, in the past, offered many updates to how web sites are scored and ranked in search results.  Google’s Panda, Penguin, and Hummingbird algorithm updates strive to make high quality text the winner every time in search-based results that want to be organic.  After several years of “keyword stuffed” fluff and filler articles, the current mainstream endeavors to provide the highest value content to the consumer.

The Importance of SEO

While the practicing of stuffing as many keywords as possible into text (blogs, articles, etc.) has long been seen for what it is, that is not to say that keywords are not still useful; they are.  Keywords play a fundamental role in optimizing your web page to help drive relevant traffic to your site, as well as on-page optimization which helps determine page rank.

The Hummingbird Algorithm

This release from Google addressed page rank requirements beyond the use of keywords.  While it is true that greater emphasis is now placed on conversational and organic searches, the practice of targeting keywords is still seen as beneficial.  While keywords should not be the sole focus of a content marketing strategy, they should necessarily be blended with titles, URLs, internal links, meta tags, etc.

Successful marketing efforts will incorporate the use of SEO keywords and optimization, along with high quality content text.  This integrated effort is more likely to capture the attention of your target audience.