How Much Do Social Media Workers Make

I often tell my clients not to pitch their services - ever ! Not that there’s anything wrong with pitching. We all need work, and directly asking for it is one way to get it. But over the past 35 years helping creative freelancers with their marketing, here’s what I find works better than pitching: Offering help. It’s a subtle difference. Pitching is about you. It’s asking for and expecting something. That can feel uncomfortable. Offering help is about the person you’re reaching out to and giving them something without expectation. That feels great actually! It’s one more way to use generosity as a marketing tool. When it comes to getting the clients and projects that you want, leading with generosity makes outreach easier and more natural for you to do… And easier for your prospective clients to respond to. Not sure what “generosity” looks like in outreach? Instead of thinking about what you want out of the interaction, switch your thinking to how you can help them. Q4 is

Data science has become increasingly ubiquitous over the years. From measuring customer expectations to conducting transactions, almost every aspect of a business is based on data. Even though data has turned out to be crucial for businesses to thrive in this highly competitive world, the risks of information overload cannot be ignored. This risk poses a threat to the very thread of communication between businesses and consumers. Rows of numbers and facts will hardly make sense to the customers if there isn’t a way to convey the brand’s message to them in a way that is relevant to them. This is where digital storytelling becomes relevant. What is Digital Storytelling? Stories have the power to surprise and inspire us. Stories are memorable. They make us think and help us remember concepts and ideas in a way that numbers don’t. Storytelling through digital media helps brands convey their ideas and market their products to the customers. The idea is, if customers buy what you are sa

Early fall is an excellent time to focus on outreach for two reasons: 1. Business tends to pick up. Company decision-makers are coming back from summer vacation - which means you’re more likely to catch them refreshed and ready to start new projects. Take a look at this comment from last week’s SMP Office Hours session:     I love it when people “come out of the woodwork” seemingly by chance… when you’ve done the marketing to make it happen! 2. You’re setting yourself up for the future. As the leaves change and everything turns pumpkin-flavored, it’s the perfect time to “plant the seeds” for a strong start in the year ahead. Sometimes it takes a couple of months to get a project rolling. Offering to help now - and then following up later - will keep you top of mind when the time is right. Are you doing your outreach – whether to ideal prospects, potential collaborators or referral sources? I hope so, because it really works! Over a dozen people shared successes they’ve had with outreac

Small businesses beware: If you run a website, an online service or a mobile app that collects information from children under the age of 13, you could be liable for hefty fines if you don’t comply with the Children’s Online Protection Privacy Act (COPPA). What is COPPA? In a nutshell, COPPA forbids website operators from collecting any personal information from any child under the age of 13 without explicit parental permission. Personal information can include things as simple as names and addresses or even more complex identifiers such as geolocation identifiers, pictures or audio files, where such files contain the child’s voice. COPPA is the main reason why Facebook and many other popular Websites do not allow users under the age of 13. Even seasoned website operators have found themselves on the wrong side of the law and were held liable by the Federal Trade Commission. For example, online reviewing site Yelp agreed to pay a civil penalty of $450,000 in 2014, while mobi

Content marketing is all about generating traffic. If you can’t attract visitors to your site, your chances of online success are virtually non-existent. Yet over the past couple of years, there’s been a surge of marketers and small business owners trying to find an easier route to bolster ftraffic by producing and promoting so-called ‘clickbait’. When used shrewdly and sparingly, clickbaiting can be an effective marketing tool — but you’ve got to tread carefully. More often than not, clickbait is a recipe for disaster. What is Clickbait? You’ve seen clickbaiting everywhere, even if you aren’t always aware of it. Simply put, clickbait is a piece of content that intentionally over-promises or misrepresents in order to pull users onto a particular website. Clickbait generally captures users with a snappy, sensationalist headline — such as “you won’t believe this”, or “you’ll never guess what happened next” — but then fails to deliver on the user’s implicit expectations. One of the

Sometimes surveys and second hand research are not enough to understand what’s going on in people’s minds. That’s when you need to get a group of target customers in a room to hold a focus group . But to the uninitiated, doing this could seem more challenging than it is. In this article we look at what a focus group is, consider its pros and cons and look at the challenges you will face. What is a Focus Group? A focus group is a marketing research method involving a small group of diverse people tasked with experiencing and discussing a particular product, service or subject. The reactions of the focus group participants form qualitative data that can be analyzed and extrapolated to predict how said product or service may be perceived by the larger population. When to Use Focus Groups The best time to use focus groups is when in-person, social-oriented feedback is most important. For example: Seeing and handling a product is essential: Customers experiencing a new product fi