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Why Writing Copy for Your Own Business Can Backfire


Secrets of Going Viral on Facebook



Going viral refers to the number of unique people who see some posts from a story that is published by a friend. This story comprises of comments, likes, responses to an event, sharing and answers to any questions. All businesses want more views, more traffic, more subscribers, interactions and followers for their online presence. If they have something that goes viral then it can easily get huge customers following in just a short span of time and without much effort. A viral Facebook post is something that all digital marketers dream about and is totally free. The next section highlights some secrets that can help you go viral on Facebook.
Content should not Be Boring
For going viral, you definitely need something unique. So, the content of your post should not be boring or similar to what is already present on other sites. Make people excited or offer them some things that force them to think. Do something that affects their feelings. If your post is some kind of story, make it inspiring, powerful and moving. Use a tone that is real and authentic. Its quality can be like casual conversation but it has to be touchy. It is assured that if you use these things in your post it will go viral within no time.
Focus on Current trends and Events
If any post is current then people would be interested in it. People love new content and often such content is viewed over and over again by many people. Therefore you need to check latest Google trends and its news section. You may also want to look for keywords as they are vital for your post to get discovered. Just like Google, Facebook's search bar also gives options about the types of phrases and keywords you type. Be sure that your ideal keywords are in headlines, text body and in the description. You can get tags and information about keywords through different available online platforms.
Integration
Post your content on different online platforms like YouTube and Twitter and start driving huge traffic to your site. This can be done from anywhere and will provide the opportunity for people to share the content. It is important that you never forget to integrate this content. For instance, once you have posted a video on YouTube, you should integrate it on other social platforms as well to enhance sharing.
Get Noticed by Some Celebrities
Celebrities have massive audience and so the Facebook content often goes viral just because a celebrity shares or comes across it. Unfortunately, getting attention of celebrities is not an easy task but still you can do this by the quality of your content. If your content has something which they require, they will definitely notice it and in this way you can get their attention. This is a positive sign for posts or product promotion.
Videos
There are no guidelines on how your content must look in order to go viral. So you can use any of the unlimited ways. One of them is the use of videos, which are the biggest part of web. If you have uploaded any video on Vimeo or YouTube and it is easy to discover by others, people will do the entire task of promotions on their own and they will share it in all other social networks.
Start Some Contest
Contests are the best way to grab the attention of people and interact with most of them. They spread words about something easily and fast. Facebook offers different questions that can be answered to grab the attention of many readers. Similarly, on a particular web page, you can hold contests about the best picture or any best information shared. This will attract lots of comments and likes and as a result make your post go more viral. In most social media campaigns, these contents are of extreme importance as they enable current viewers to engage with new people.
You may also hold an event where you invite different celebrities who will make your event even more powerful and resourceful.
Shocking and Controversial
In order to go viral, you may want to surprise your audience by comments and likes on controversial issues. This works best if you are the kind of person who does not mind being liked or hated. When seeing the content sparks the emotions of people then they will naturally want to promote it in order to see the reactions of other people. Bad or good, both cases are possible in going viral.
Use Humor
It is a fact that people come to social media sites for fun. They love laughing and feel happy to share anything that is funny. So, all those who have creative knack of comedy can use it to grab the attention and viral sharing of the humor. Use funny images and videos are recommended.
Use Images
As we all know, the average span of a general web surfer has gone down. Thus, you have a better chance to grab people's attention by using bold photos and photos with big block text. Facebook offers this service and makes the photos look large in news feed. You can also use different online tools to make your post more authentic and appealing.
Submit to Reddit
If you can come up to the first page of Reddit then you can certainly get thousands of viewers. You just have to submit your post in the Reddit and other people vote it down or up. If the post gets maximum votes it will surely get published at the front of Reddit. This task is a bit tricky and it is suggested that you take your time to interact with the Reddit community before posting your links into it for self-promotion. After that, if your post gets at the front, it will certainly get viral not only on Facebook but also on other social media sites.


Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/9131484

End Your Entroprise




Getting lost while driving is an exasperating and maddening experience. We've all been there; we all hate it.
Tempers flare. Schedules crumble. Time shrinks. Deals implode. Chaos abounds.
Maps, which many can't or won't read, and GPS services exist to avoid such chaos.
Newsflash: Whether driving or branding, absent crystal-clear purpose and destination, even the slickest navigation system - paper or electronic - is useless.
Entropy in the Enterprise
Chaos - also known as entropy - in the enterprise is no different: it angers and enervates those who buy from, invest in, report on, and work for your company. It causes customers to shop elsewhere and employees to build fiefdoms, go rogue, and battle each other in the dreaded internecine wars - all of which subtract from your top and bottom lines.
The biggest source of entropy in the enterprise? A weak brand. When people get no or weak or confusing direction, they fill that vacuum in ways of their choosing. The brand, not the products, determines if the enterprise reaches its destination - and when.
Let me reiterate, from my book and previous articles: the brand is the tip of the arrowhead; with a dull one, that arrow will NOT hit its target. Shareholders expect you to hit the target.
That said, often the brand - the destination, the value proposition, the reason for being - is crystal-clear, but the navigation system betrays it. Apple Maps, for example, has taken me and millions of others to incorrect locations and deadends.
Likewise, marketing teams around the globe continue to employ ineffective social media as branding and selling megaphones - thereby diluting their brands and, consequently, raising their costs of sales, capital, and media.
Do You Run an Entroprise?
I'll call the entropy-inflicted enterprise the entroprise. You've worked for entroprises. You've purchased from and partnered with entroprises. Do you run an entroprise? If so, end it.
Entroprises make bad hiring decisions, resist firing incompetent employees, implement poor policies, are slothful, develop off-target or inferior products, and are impossible to fathom.
Just the other day, my host deleted my website by mistake. Why? A tech-support employee blithely got the customers mixed up and almost ruined me. Nobody verified the deletion with me. Oops. My blood boiled! Good thing I pay for a nightly backup service. I'm still here.
Apple now wants to make cars. Hubris or pipedream? What will Apple's brand become? This is an inchoate entroprise. Cisco once tried to be all things to all people, failed, then reverted to simplicity. Apple does not have the DNA to make and market and sell cars... and iPhones... and headphones... and watches... and TVs... and music... and computers.
Parting Advice to CEOs
Don't create an entroprise; don't allow one to develop, either. Constantly monitor your level of entropy - the cost of being lost - to ensure the latter.
If you're running or have just joined an entroprise, end it.
Remember: branding is your #1 priority. A strong brand gets you to your destination at the lowest cost, via the optimal route, with the highest passenger satisfaction.


Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/9131283

How A Family Board Can Kill The Family Business




How Family Boards will kill Family Businesses; make sure the right people are on your board.
There are two different approaches to having a board. One approach is to have people on your board that have expertise in the business or related fields. Related fields often are customers that use your products or people from industries that help create visibility on where your market might be heading. A board comprised in this way is most helpful to the CEO in navigating the challenges of the business. Another way of comprising a board is the friends and family approach. A board like this ignores expertise or relevant experience and instead revolves around the family and friends they like to have around. This type of board is focused on family needs and how the company has to provide the means to fulfill those needs.
The friends only function to making sure there is a majority on the board for any vote. These are the two extremes and any combination can be imagined. The times that the family and friends approach also adds expertise is highly desirable but seldom the case.
In a company I ran, the patriarch of the family was the chairman of the board. This gentleman was acting CEO until he was in his 70's after which he relinquished the reins and hired a CEO. He remained chairman of the board and kept an eye on the business best he could. He had two children, neither one having any interest or expertise in the business but one of the children became a member of the board anyway. This was in the hopes he would warm up to the business and become interested in it. It was an embarrassment. It didn't work out at all and he never understood any aspect of what was discussed at the board meetings. It was obvious to everyone except the father that he would never be capable of running this company.
This went on for years before finally that father woke up and asked him to leave the board. He was replaced with a highly competent CEO from a multinational manufacturing business. This new board member was amazing and extremely capable. It transformed the board and energized it. It was amazing to see how everyone in the company knew of this change and how it initiated a change in culture company wide. Suddenly, everyone knew this business was being run as a business, not a family piggybank hobby club. The change in attitudes was immediate and palatable.
I was CEO at the time and spent a lot of time with the new board member. From my perspective, it was a brilliant move. I had frequent conversations with the new board member and he was instrumental in guiding me and the company through the 2008 crises. Without a strong board, the company might not have survived.
If you have a closely held company, how is your board? Are you on the friends and family plan or do you have an expert board? If you want your company to thrive, you might want to take a look at your board. Having captains of industry on your board is probably one of the best investments you can make in your company. Set clear mandates for your board members and reevaluate them periodically. As companies change, so should boards. They can be one of your best resources.
With your success in mind,
The Miami Turn Around Group


Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/9133797

Top 5 AdWords Tips From PPC Masters




A survey conducted among search marketers who received best high scores using AdWords Performance Grader, a free running tool which scores your AdWords account as compared to other advertisers with same budgets revealed some interesting facts. The following are the top effective tips from these AdWords masters:
1. Your Search Query Report should be familiar to you.
A search query report is a database of all those search words which triggers the appearance of your ads. By finding keywords that are irrelevant to your ads and thereby setting those search words as negative keywords, it is always possible to save money on clicks that do not convert. In addition, by finding new keywords that are relevant to your ads, it is possible to increase profits and clicks on them by writing particular ad text to support and making them new keywords. All these will only add to your benefit from the search query report.
2. Target on Relevance.
It is said that extreme relevance is the way to a successful AdWords campaign. Creating relevant campaigns, providing a precise result to the search query of an user, relevance between ad text, keywords and content of landing page are the steps to a good AdWords campaign. The metric showing relevancy is known as Quality Score, which increases by optimizing keywords, increasing CTR and landing pages. A higher value of the Quality Score means more relevancy with the search queries of the user.
3. Allocate Sufficient Data To Analyze.
Bidding high initially is highly recommended to get the first or second position in a search result because it will give you more data to analyze which you can:
· Adjust your bidding to meet the cost-per-conversion.
· Maintain record of conversions such as value for conversion, cost for conversion.
· Improve the rates of conversion and optimize your ads.
4. Separate Ad groups.
Create different and separate ad groups in a campaign. The keywords in an ad group should be tightly related and small. Creating campaign for every genre or theme also allows you to add sitelinks related to it.
5. Keep Track Of Your Account.
Maintain record of your account by using annotations in Google Analytics. This will help you in knowing which action led to dips or spikes in traffic, what isn't working and what is working in your account. To keep things organized use the comments function in AdWords Editor to keep notes of your action.
Therefore when you are aware of what brought out the improvement in your results, you are likely to repeat those steps to success.


Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/9131205