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Want to Quickly Increase Your Amazon Sales? Here Are 3 Key Tips from an Amazon Consultant

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By Tanner Rankin

Follow this simple guide of what’s working right now to grow your Amazon sales.

Increasing Amazon sales is more complicated than ever — especially for entrepreneurs without platforms like large social media followings, email lists or YouTube channels. What with Amazon prioritizing driving external traffic, the days of simply optimizing your keywords and listing are long gone.

With that being said, you can still increase your sales on Amazon, even if you’re a new Amazon seller. Here are a few ways to do it:

Amazon influencers

With the influencer marketing industry set to grow to over $21.1 billion in 2023, brands of all shapes and sizes selling on Amazon can take advantage of Amazon Influencers. Amazon Influencers have actually been around since 1996 when Amazon launched its affiliate program called the Amazon Associates Program.

Now, along with the Amazon Influencer Program, Amazon has influencers across blogs, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and beyond that Amazon sellers are partnering with to drive sales. Amazon Influencers work so well to drive sales because they create content covering the full spectrum of brand awareness to buyer intent.

Even if selling on Amazon is just a side hustle, there are Amazon Influencers who will fit your budget and can help you increase sales on Amazon. Not only can you get up to 10% cash back from Amazon for referring external traffic with your Amazon Attribution link, but the commission paid to the Amazon Influencer comes from Amazon’s referral fees and not from the brand. This is the type of content you will want to focus on:

  • Best lists: Consumers who already know what they want and are ready to buy go to the number one and number two search engines in the world, Google and YouTube, to search for the “best” of what they are looking to buy (for example, “best candles for a power outage”). Then, they watch or read and buy one of the recommendations. Your goal is to show up on as many of these “best lists” as possible.
  • Advertorials: Advertorials are product reviews with click-worthy headlines. Instead of a normal product review article like: “Brand X Ring Light Review” the advertorial is: “This $20 Ring Light Makes Your Selfies Look Professional.” This type of content not only does well on social media, Google News and Apple News but also in search results. Plus, the type of person who will read this content will want what you have to sell.
  • Amazon Influencer storefront videos: Amazon Influencers drive traffic from their platforms on social media back to their Amazon Storefront where their audience can purchase their recommendations through idea lists, videos and photos. The key here is videos, because not only do they do a great job at highlighting why someone should buy your product, but they are eligible to show up on your product page as well as the Amazon Influencers Storefront.

Speaking of external traffic sources eligible for the brand referral bonus program, enter Google Ads.

Google ads

Although savvy Amazon Sellers have been using Google Ads to grow their sales and drive traffic to their Amazon listings for ages, they recently became much more attractive since the launch of the Brand Referral Bonus Program. That means Amazon is paying you to run Google ads on your product listings to increase sales on Amazon.

Apart from tapping into the number one search engine in the world, Google, running Google ads on your product listings can also boost the organic traffic on Amazon SEO of your keyword rankings. This is because Amazon knows what keywords consumers enter Amazon through, and this translates to your product being more relevant for those keywords on Amazon. In other words, if you’re struggling to rank for important keywords on Amazon, running Google ads can help immensely.

In the past, Amazon sellers were averse to running Google ads or leveraging other external PPC channels because they couldn’t track the results. Now, as mentioned earlier, Amazon sellers can use their Amazon attribution links to track results.

This is what you’ll want to focus on:

  • Amazon/On Amazon: Run exact and phrase match targeting on keywords like: “Potato ricer Amazon” and “ring light for selfies on Amazon”
  • Buyer intent keywords: Run exact and phrase match targeting on very specific buyer intent keywords like: “recyclable French roast k cups”
  • Best: Run exact and phrase match targeting on keywords that indicate the customer is looking for the best of what you sell like: “best pillow for bed sores”
  • Top-Rated: Run exact and phrase match targeting on keywords like: “top-rated plant protein”

Driving external traffic goes a long way to boost your unit session percentage and educate the Amazon A10 algorithm that you should be relevant for your most important keywords. That said, if you want to increase sales on Amazon, you’ll want to avoid the biggest mistake I see.

Stop copying the big brand best-sellers

This one likely goes against what you’ve learned, but you’ll want to stick with me. If you look at the top sellers of what you sell, copy their images and product descriptions as well as download their keywords from your favourite Amazon tool, you’re making a big mistake.

This is because they make mistakes in everything from copywriting, art direction, keyword selection and more, but they get away with it due to brute force and significant budgets. Apart from having thousands of reviews, their products are talked about in major publications and by mega influencers — and their ads appear everywhere where your products do not.

So, what do you do instead?

  • Get good at selling: This entails learning copywriting, colour psychology, art direction and more. Your listings need to blow theirs out of the water.
  • Build your brand off Amazon: Make sure you’re building an email list, an audience on social media, traffic to your website and getting PR for your brand.
  • Focus on buyer intent: Don’t go after the broadest keywords with the largest volume. Instead, boost your unit session percentage by focusing on keywords that people search for that indicate they already know what they want.

Selling is tough, but you can increase sales on Amazon with these proven methods.

By Tanner Rankin

Entrepreneur Leadership Network Contributor. CEO at The Source Approach & Referazon. For 10+ years as an author, speaker, Fractional CMO & CEO at The Source Approach – eCommerce Consultancy & Referazon – Amazon Influencer Search & CRM, Tanner Rankin has helped brands thrive at eCommerce quicker & easier.

Sourced from Entrepreneur

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The Recruiting Buzzwords Every Job Seeker Should Know

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By Meredith Dietz

Don’t miss out on a gig due to confusing language in the job posting.

As if searching for a job wasn’t hard enough, it’s made harder by the fact that many job postings are full of language that is either unnecessarily daunting or flat-out confusing. What does it mean to be a “social media warrior?” Should I not apply if don’t consider myself an “accounting rockstar?”

According to one study, 17% of applicants admitted to not applying for an opening because of “vague or confusing” language in the job description. While we may will never find a singular definition for buzzy terms like “dynamic,” “blue sky thinking,” or “self-starter,” there is some concrete vocab that every job seeker should understand. To this end, FlexJobs has created a glossary of terms you might come across throughout job search (and your career), and what they mean.

Vocab every job seeker should know

Chronological resume. You should always cater your resume to the specific job listing, and one may ask you specifically for a chronological resume. Luckily, this is the traditional resume format that you probably already use. The expectation for a chronological resume is to outline your job job history in reverse chronological order, beginning with your most recent position.

Compressed workweek. Any job posting the advertises a compressed workweek means the role entails working longer hours in fewer days. For instance, rather than five eight-hour days, you might work four 10-hour days or three 12-hour days.

Digital nomads. A digital nomad is someone who works virtually from various locations. Digital nomads may move from location to location but use technology and communication tools to stay digitally connected while and traveling. (We previously covered how you can afford to be a digital nomad.)

Distributed company. If you see a job listing from a distributed company, that means the majority (if not all) employees work from remote locations. Communication generally involves strategies to ensure everyone feels included, rather than focusing on physical interactions.

Nonexempt employee. If you work a regular 40-hour work week without an employment contract, you are probably nonexempt. A nonexempt employee is not exempt from federal and state labour laws and must be paid overtime at time-and-a-half for any hours worked beyond 40 hours in a week. This generally applies to those in hourly positions, rather than salaried positions. Examples include interns, servers, retail associates, and similar jobs.

Panel interview. A panel interview, otherwise known as a team interview, is an interview conducted by two or more people at the same time. A panel interview can include managers, supervisors, team members, HR representatives, and other company decision-makers. Here’s our guide to surviving the dreaded panel interview.

Personal branding. Anyone who has used LinkedIn in the past few years knows the pressure of “building your brand.” Simply put, personal branding is the way you market your career focus and expertise. Effective personal branding means providing a cohesive message across your social media channels and application materials. Practice creating your career elevator pitch now.

Remote-first/remote-friendly. If working from home is a priority for you, pay careful attention to the language in a job description. In a remote-first company, most employees work from remote locations, rather than a centralized office. A remote-friendly company, on the other hand, should have policies and procedures in place to accommodate remote work, but ultimately it is not a fully distributed team (see above).

ROWE. A results-only work environment (ROWE) is a type of work environment in which employees are assessed by the work they produce, as opposed to hours on the job or time spent in the office.

Resume summary. Including a resume summary is a great way to succinctly pitch yourself as a prospective employee. This summary is a brief statement (no more the two to four lines) near the top of your resume that provides a persuasive snapshot of your experience, accomplishments, and qualifications.

For more, check out the full glossary from FlexJobs here. And once your secure the bag, brush up on the most annoying corporate jargon.

Feature Image Credit: Prostock-studio (Shutterstock)

By Meredith Dietz

Sourced from lifehacker

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How to target ultra-high net worth individuals on social media

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By Lily Power 

Ultra-high net worth individuals (UHNWIs) use social media differently compared with the rest of us. Here, Relevance’s Lily Power reveals how to entice the 1%.

Social media is a powerful marketing tool for reaching ultra-high net worth individuals (UHNWIs), but it requires a tailored approach and a thorough understanding of this exclusive audience.

This group represents less than 1% of the world’s population and has specific expectations regarding digital marketing.

UHNW consumers frequently use social media platforms, with 99% using social media and spending close to 90 minutes per day browsing them. Brands can use these platforms to engage and build meaningful relationships with this audience.

What social media platforms do UHNWIs use?

Each social platform serves a unique purpose and typically attracts different users – including several social platforms used exclusively by the world’s wealthiest.

For example, Best of All Worlds is an invite-only app designed to ensure that members don’t find themselves ‘overwhelmed with irrelevant connections’. Rich Kids is a quasi-Instagram, with membership costing US$1,000 per month.

Yacht broker Northrop & Johnson’s UHNW clients are highly active on LinkedIn, Instagram, and niche investment communities such as Wealthfront and AngelList. Nearly seven in 10 of them use social media regularly, with LinkedIn (36%), YouTube (35%), and Facebook (34%) each cited by about one-third of respondents.

Here are five tips for reaching this powerful audience on social.

1. Create a targeted strategy

It takes more than just creating a social media profile and posting content; you must understand the individual and their goals to target UHNWIs effectively.

UHNWIs are often highly sceptical of marketing messages and will not respond to traditional marketing tactics. When targeting them through social media, focus your efforts on the correct channels. It’s imperative to understand their lifestyle, interests, and values to develop content and messaging that resonates with them.

Once you have identified the right platforms, create a targeted strategy focused on UHNWIs’ unique needs and interests. They are accustomed to being presented with tailored offers, so your message must stand out.

2. Find out what content resonates with your target audience

UHNWIs are seeking content that fulfils their needs beyond purchasing a product or service. For the world’s wealthiest, luxury is a baseline, and nothing is a ‘dream purchase’. Brands can engage them with crafted, strikingly beautiful content and by creating events or experiences tailored to their interests.

This higher-quality and bespoke content develops trust and helps build ongoing relationships while increasing loyalty and adding value to engagement. Create a sense of exclusivity through your brand messaging and content to ensure success.

This group is protective, valuing privacy and security. Instead of being sales-led, you should focus on sharing aspirational content. UHNWIs are a common target for various online crimes and intrusions due to their lifestyle. Privacy and security should be at the forefront of your strategy.

3. ‘Genuinfluencer’ marketing

There is a fine line between promotion and saturation, especially for ultra-luxury brands. Many luxury brands are using ‘genuinfluencers’ due to their high-quality and authentic content, engaged communities of followers, and actionable insights. This makes genuinfluencers valuable partners for luxury brands seeking to reach and engage with UHNWIs.

Genuinfluencers work on establishing trustworthy relationships, making them a highly effective brand partnership. UHNWIs relate to people who are similar to them, so they will be influenced by genuinfluencers only if they are carefully selected. Self-made UHNWIs might relate to self-made genuinfluencers, whereas heirs and heiresses might be influenced by people of similar background.

Executing campaigns over a social platform where your target audience is most active is essential. The right geninfluencer can help you reach UHNWIs and drive engagement, if they’re similar to your target demographic.

4. Targeted ads on social media

Luxury brands can use social media ads to target UHNWIs based on their interests, demographics, and other factors, as well as targeting custom audiences and lookalike audiences.

Paid ads on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter have layered and targeted options, which brands can use to target UHNWIs based on their demographic information like industry sector, interests, high-powered job roles or even income level. There is ample opportunity to connect and build relationships with this exclusive audience by sharing content on existing social media groups and pages.

Start by researching UHNW profiles and identifying their interests, hobbies, and lifestyle. This will help you create ads that are tailored specifically to them. Use language that resonates with their demographic and include a strong call to action.

Leverage retargeting; it allows you to advertise to users who have already interacted or had some level of engagement with your brand, ensuring higher conversion rates.

These highly educated individuals embrace emotional intelligence principles such as trustworthiness and empathy, which is why some platforms may perform better than others. For example, LinkedIn is an excellent platform to share thought leadership and research pieces.

5. Track campaign success

Keeping track of your efforts will enable you to understand what is and isn’t working and adjust your strategy accordingly. The best way to know if you are reaching and resonating with your audience is to track business metrics such as leads generated, quality of leads, cost per lead, conversion to sale and overall revenue.

Feature Image Credit: Laila Gebhard

By Lily Power 

Sourced from The Drum

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Twitter Engineer Reveals Just How Deep Elon Musk’s Desperation Goes

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Mass layoffs are the source of much of the chaos at the company, according to both current and former employees.

Current and former Twitter employees have said the company has suffered an inability to protect users from trolling, disinformation and child exploitation, a BBC story asserts.

The company is also said to have been experiencing chaos as a result of staffing issues since Tesla  (TSLA) – Get Free Report owner Elon Musk bought it in October 2022.

Twitter’s former head of content design, who worked on the microblogging site’s features to protect users from hate speech, said her team was making progress.

“It was not at all perfect. But we were trying, and we were making things better all the time,” Lisa Jennings Young told the BBC.

One of the features implemented by Young’s team was the “harmful reply nudge.” When artificial intelligence detected certain trigger words in a user’s tweet, it would alert the user before they posted it.

“Overall 60% of users deleted or edited their reply when given a chance through the nudge,” Young told the BBC. “But what was more interesting, is that after we nudged people once, they composed 11% fewer harmful replies in the future.”

When Musk took over the company, Young’s whole team was laid off. She chose to leave the company in November 2022.

Young said she does not know what’s happening with the features she worked on.

“There’s no one there to work on that at this time,” she said.

An engineer at Twitter, who was granted anonymity by the BBC because he’s still working there, described conditions at the company.

“For someone on the inside, it’s like a building where all the pieces are on fire,” he said.

“When you look at it from the outside the façade looks fine, but I can see that nothing is working, he continued. “All the plumbing is broken, all the faucets, everything.”

He said not just engineers, but cleaning and catering staff, were among the employees that were let go since Musk took over.

Musk even tried selling plants from the office to employees, he also said.

He described the mass layoffs since Musk bought the company as the source of the chaos.

“Twitter has around 1,300 employees today, per CNBC, from 7,500 in November,” tweeted @unusualwhales on Jan. 20.

“The note is incorrect,” countered Musk in a tweet of his own. “There are ~2300 active, working employees at Twitter. There are still hundreds of employees working on trust & safety, along with several thousand contractors.”

The anonymous employee offered his view.

“A totally new person, without the expertise, is doing what used to be done by more than 20 people,” he said. “That leaves room for much more risk, many more possibilities of things that can go wrong.”

“There are so many things broken and there’s nobody taking care of it, that you see this inconsistent behavior,” he said.

By 

Sourced from The Street

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Facebook Is Bringing Messenger Back to Its Mobile App

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By Kourtnee Jackson

Meta is testing how to unify functionality for both apps.

Meta is working on a way for you to view your messages from Messenger within the Facebook mobile app, according to a blog post from Facebook boss Tom Alison. Facebook reports that it has 2 billion active users who connect on its platform daily, and its team is working to enhance how people have online conversations.

The company is “testing the ability for people to access their Messenger inbox within the Facebook app,” Alison wrote. Facebook plans to expand testing in the coming months.

First launched in 2011 as part of Facebook’s functionality, Messenger was dropped from the social media platform and became a standalone app in 2014. Shortly after, it added the ability to share locations, handle voice calls and enable peer-to-peer payments.

Over the last decade, Messenger has received a variety of new features, including encrypted chats, custom emojis and video chats. Facebook has also been working to integrate and enhance multiapp communication among Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram. Those who use Messenger and Instagram can already contact each other with the direct messaging feature.

Meta says it also saw some success with community chats, a conversation feature that it rolled out to Facebook Groups in 2022. The company aims to fold in more messaging functionality within Facebook to make it easier for people to connect.

Feature Image Credit: James Martin/CNET

By Kourtnee Jackson

Sourced from CNET

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The Ultimate Guide to Selling Your Blog for Profit

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By Shama Shafiq

There’s a lot of money to be made in the blogging world; whether you’re a small blogger who makes money selling digital products or the owner of a high-trafficked blog that earns through affiliate programs and ads, there is something for everyone.

But as a blog owner, have you ever considered selling your blog?

Selling your blog can be a great way to earn a significant amount of money, especially if it is properly monetized. You can use the money to invest in another business or just give yourself a new start.

This article is here to provide you with all the information you need about selling your blog and how you can get the best price.

How much can you sell your blog for?

Identifying your blog’s worth is the first step in selling it. While there are no standard formulas for calculating a blog’s value, some basic guidelines can help you determine how much your site is worth.

The most basic measure of a blog’s value is its traffic. The more visitors your blog gets, the more valuable it is.

For example, suppose you have a blog that gets 500 visitors per day and another that gets 2,000 visitors per day. In that case, the latter is obviously worth more money than the former, even though both blogs may have similar designs and content quality.

Another way to determine this is by looking at how much money you make with your blog. If you’re making $1,000 per month, then it might be worth $12,000 or more. However, If you’re only making $50 per month (after years of working hard on your blog), then maybe it isn’t worth much.

Once you’ve figured out these two, it will be easier to understand the value of your blog. Of course, keep in mind there are other things to look at too, such as DR, domain age, niche, and audience.

Why should you sell your blog?

Selling your blog is a big step, and hanging on to it for as long as possible can be tempting. But there are some good reasons why you might want to sell your blog.

Here are a few reasons why:

1. You can earn money from an asset that’s currently not producing any income. Even if your site doesn’t generate much traffic now, it may still be worth something because of its potential value in the future.

2. You can achieve financial freedom sooner than expected by investing money in another business.

3. Selling a blog can take away the daily grind of running a website and let you focus on other things in life.

4. If you’re in a time crunch, selling your blog can help you get out of debt or fund an emergency expense.

If any of these apply to you, it’s best to sell your blog while it has some value in the online market.

Where to buy and sell blogs

The market for buying and selling blogs is large, with hundreds of websites offering their services. However, not all of them are worth using. Here are four great options for selling your blog:

Flippa

Flippa

 

Flippa is one of the most popular sites for buying and selling websites. The platform has sold thousands of websites across all industries and provides a safe, secure, and easy way to buy or sell websites.

EmpireFlippers

EmpireFlippers

Empire Flippers is another popular marketplace for buying and selling websites with various payment options, including PayPal and Escrow.io. The site also has an advanced search function that lets buyers find what they want based on their budget and other criteria, including niche, traffic, revenue, and more.

Go Daddy Domain Auction

Go Daddy Domain Auction

 

GoDaddy domain auction is a self-service, online auction platform where you can list your domain names for sale. You can list your domains in a variety of categories, including “Buy Now,” “Make an Offer,” and “Auction.” It’s worth noting that GoDaddy charges sellers a small membership fee for using its selling service.

Motion Invest

Motion Invest

 

Motion Invest is an online marketplace for buying and selling websites. It allows sellers to list their sites for sale and buyers to search for sites that meet their needs. The platform offers a 0% listing fee, so if you want to sell a blog and stay on budget, Motion Invest is a good option.

The process of selling your blog

There is a lot of pressure involved in selling your blog. You’ve probably spent years building it, and now you need to find a buyer. Follow these steps, and you’ll be able to sell your blog for a good price.

Step 1: Make sure your blog is ready for sale

The first step to selling your website is to ensure it’s ready for sale. This means getting rid of personal information and ensuring the design is clean, professional, and easy to use. Also, check that your site has no broken links or other technical flaws that might turn off buyers.

Step 2: Determine the value of your blog

Before you start looking for buyers, determine whether your blog is worth selling in the first place. This means you’ll need to make sure that it’s generating enough revenue for its age, has a good number of visitors per month, and has a solid reputation in the niche.

Step 3: Decide how you want to sell it

There are several options for selling a blog, including selling directly to another blogger or using a third-party website such as Flippa or Empire Flippers that specializes in this type of transaction. Each option has pros and cons, so think carefully before deciding.

Step 4: Set a price range

Selling a blog is like selling any other business. You should set a price range to see what kind of offers you get, but also make sure your blog is worth what you are asking. When setting a price range, consider how much time you’ve spent building the site and what it would cost to build an equivalent website from scratch today.

Step 5: Make it easy for buyers

Put together a detailed guide on how to buy the blog and what the buyer needs to know before buying it. This will help eliminate any confusion from buyers interested in purchasing your site and help them make an informed decision about whether or not they should go ahead and purchase.

Step 6: Know your buyer

Many bloggers who want to sell their blogs don’t realize buyers look for more than just traffic numbers and social media followers when they buy a blog. A large audience doesn’t mean anything if the traffic can’t be converted into sales or leads, so make sure that you have a plan in place to convert visitors into subscribers before listing your site online

Step 7: Close the deal

Once you’ve found someone who wants to buy your site, it’s time to start thinking about closing the deal. This is where things get complicated. There are all sorts of documents that need to be signed and hoops to jump through for everything to go smoothly on both sides.

What to do when you receive an offer

  • Before committing to anything, take your time and understand what’s being offered and what happens next.
  • If your buyer has already sent over a purchase agreement, read it carefully and make sure everything is spelled out clearly.
  • Ensure you’re familiar with any contingencies in the seller’s contract (i.e., conditions that must be met before closing takes place).
  • Set up an escrow account for payment. An escrow service holds on to your money until all of the terms have been met by both parties involved in the transaction.
  • After you’ve agreed on a price for your blog, you and your buyer will sign some documents that finalize the sale. These include a contract between both parties and a deed transferring ownership of the blog from one person/entity (you) to another (your buyer).
  • Once all of these papers have been signed and ownership has been transferred. It’s finally time for the buyer to approve the domain on escrow and send the payment to your bank account.

 How to create a blog and sell it from scratch

Don’t have a blog to sell yet? Here’s what to do if you’re starting from zero.

Target the most profitable niche

The first step to building a blog is choosing a niche. To find a profitable niche, start by looking at other popular blogs that are already established in your desired field. What kinds of topics do they cover? What kinds of problems do they solve for their readers? How could you create something similar but different enough to be unique and valuable?

Once you have an idea of what niche you want to target, try searching Google Trends to see how popular the topic is with people online right now. The more searches related to a given topic, the more potential there is for making money from it.

Write high-quality content

The most important aspect of any blog is the content. Without it, your blog will not be as successful as you want it to be. This doesn’t mean you need to be a professional writer, but it does mean you need to write articles that are interesting, informative, and useful.

In order for people to want to click on your links, they need to trust you first. That’s why you need to create an image of yourself as an expert in your niche. You can do this by consistently publishing high-quality content that demonstrates your expertise and helps readers solve their problems.

Also, you need to pay close attention to grammar and spelling; only then can you expect your readers to take you seriously.

Get traffic

To attract organic traffic, you need to make sure that people can easily find your blog when they search Google or other search engines. This means having a good title tag, meta description, and content that is relevant to your target keywords.

Also, you can use social media like Facebook and Twitter. These sites allow you to post links directly from your blog so that people can see what you’re writing about in real-time.

Try using Google Analytics to track how many people visit your site daily, weekly, or monthly. This will give you an idea of your post’s popularity and help you determine what type of content works best for attracting new readers.

Monetize your blog

When it comes to monetizing your blog, there are many different ways you can do it. The most common way is through affiliate marketing, which means you promote other people’s products and earn a commission when someone buys something through your link.

Other options include Google ads, courses, e-books, and selling products. The best way is to combine different monetization strategies.

Consider buying and selling other blogs for profit

Another great way you can earn money with blogs is through blog flipping. But what exactly is blog flipping? Blog flipping is the process of buying a blog with existing content and then shaping it into something more profitable.

The idea behind blog flipping is to purchase a blog that has an established readership and turn it into a money-making asset. You can find blogs that have been neglected by their previous owners, which means they may be available at a relatively low cost.

Once you’ve purchased the site, you’ll need to fix any technical issues (such as broken links), update outdated content, add new content and then promote it through social media channels and search engines.

If you’re able to transform the site into something that generates income from ads or affiliate marketing commissions, then it will be worth more than what you paid for it.

The best part about blog flipping is that you don’t need any prior experience; all you need is an entrepreneurial mindset, some cash in your bank account, and some basic web knowledge.

Wrapping it up

It’s important to remember that selling your blog can be a rewarding experience but also a lot of work. You need to know what you want out of the sale and go about getting it accordingly.

You’ll need to do some research to find the right buyer and then prove to them that your blog is worth buying. But once you’ve gone through all the effort, selling your blog can be highly profitable.

By Shama Shafiq

Author and the founder of Blogituplife, Shama Shafiq, writes about blogging and marketing on her blog. Her goal with her blog is to help beginner bloggers who need step-by-step guidance.

Sourced from JeffBullas.com

 

 

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Beware The Back-To-The-Office Backfire

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By Deborah Lovich

Do all the CEOs who have been ordering their employees to return to their offices really think it will benefit their organizations? In what way? Will it create a talent advantage for them by increasing worker satisfaction and reducing attrition? How about productivity; do they expect that to improve? Or is the real motivation more personal? Are they really nervous about their ability to lead, inspire, motivate, and coach across distributed teams?

Some leaders probably have issued blanket office-return mandates simply because they can, or think they can—especially in the tech community, where RIFs have been cascading for months now. [For younger readers who have never lived through tough times, RIF is an acronym for a large layoff, or a “reduction in force.”]

However, the back-to-the-office lemmings are reading things wrong and their push will backfire. We’re already seeing this, with employees at some companies pushing back. More are likely to follow. Here’s why:

Talent shortages persist. Despite the Big Tech layoffs, which already have surpassed 100,000 according to news reports, many U.S. companies remain seriously understaffed. And there’s little relief in sight, Bureau of Labor Statistics data suggest, with only half as many people looking for work as the number of job openings across the economy. In short: workers still appear to have the upper hand. Their retention should be among every CEO’s top priorities.

Dictated flexibility is not true flexibility. As DJ Casto, Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer of Synchrony Financial, told CNBC last fall: “flexibility and choice are the new currency” of the American workplace. What employees mean when they say they want flexibility is that they want agency, trust and accountability. When employers dictate which days employees have to be in the office and which days they can work from home, they are stripping employees of self-determination and telling them that they don’t trust them to deliver.

Teams should decide. Work models should differ among units, departments and teams. Tech teams may be better off with one sprint done together in person and the next one done together online. Finance teams may only need to be together for a few weeks per quarter when the books are closing. Marketing teams may require weekly creative face time for brainstorming, conversation, testing. The appropriate unit for deciding work rhythms and routines is the team, not the boss or the individual. Mandating the same schedule for everyone likely will trigger resentment from employees forced to schlep into the office just to do Zoom calls all day from their desks.

One size will not fit all. The back-to-the-office push, in many cases, stems from a CEO’s personal desire to go back to 2019, before the pandemic. This ignores the fact that 2019 wasn’t as great for everyone as you might think.

The past few tumultuous years have shown many leaders that the reality of the day-to-day lives and needs of their employees is vastly different than their own. If they’ve been paying attention, they should now appreciate the fact that remote-native new hires, stressed-out dual-career parents, single workers living in shoe-box-sized apartments, introverts who never liked office socializing and extroverts who really suffered during the Covid-induced isolation all need different settings to perform at their best. To address this, leaders need to empower their teams to align on whatever working arrangement is most likely to improve teamwork, maximize productivity and results, and meet team members individual needs. And then, of course, hold them accountable for delivering. The entire organization will benefit.

Making hybrid-work work effectively takes both effort and investment. Think about it: You’re rewiring your organization at one of the most basic levels—how people work.

This requires empathy and understanding, equipping teams with norm-setting guidance, and providing managers with the new capabilities, tools, and technology they need to manage, inspire, coach and build connections across distributed teams (which, by the way, most leaders of global organizations needed even before Covid-19).

We found out during the worst of the Covid-19 crisis that some people were naturally good at managing distributed teams. They were the ones who called a team member after a Zoom meeting and said, “Hey, you were unusually quiet today, is everything okay?” They were the ones who sent a private note to a colleague thanking her for her suggestion and encouraging her to “keep the ideas coming.” And they were the ones who were attentive enough and cared enough to ask a team member how his son’s college applications are coming along. These managers delivered a clear message: We care. We’re invested in you. We value you. You are important to me.

Those who can work remotely continue to favour flex-work by large margins. Responsible decision-makers, therefore, need to think long and hard before they issue office-return ultimatums. Any decision to act unilaterally should be made the same way other important decisions are made: based on data, experience, intuition, and in consultation with others. Here is a short guide:

1. Identify the problem. What problem are you attempting to solve by mandating a return to the office? Productivity? Culture? Learning? Innovation? Are butts in seats the only way to achieve that? As with any business problem, think broadly about alternative solutions.

2. Analyse the data. Do you have objective—not opinion-driven—data that support the thesis that returning to pre-Covid ways of working is the best way to solve the problem?

3. Consider other options. Did you try other ways to improve things—such as revamping leadership training and investing in new communication and collaboration technology and tools—before deciding to change your flexible-work model?

4. Consider the consequences. Have you considered the likely consequences of rolling back your flex-work policy? For example, how will it affect recruitment, retention, absenteeism and morale? How will it affect your office space (and related) needs?

5. Co-create. Before you do anything, engage your people in building the future work model they will live with. Designing the future of work is not an undertaking for leadership and management alone. What works best for the boss isn’t necessarily what works best for the bossed.

So, before you order everyone back to the office, or even dictate the fixed days of the week when work will be hybrid, you need to engage the folks whose lives you’re impacting. Not only do they have a big stake in your decision, they also have great ideas.

Feature Image Credit: getty

By Deborah Lovich

I’m a Boston Consulting Group Managing Director & Senior Partner who leads the future of work program and a fellow with the company’s think tank, BCG Henderson Institute. Since joining BCG in 1994, I’ve learned that the most important (and challenging) lever for change is people. I work with companies across the global economy on leadership enablement and culture change; HR issues along the entire employee life-cycle; and digital upskilling to unlock new sources of speed, productivity, value delivery, engagement, and impact. I’ve applied my practice inside BCG to create and scale a program to improve BCG’s culture and work-life balance. Today, the program–known as PTO (predictability, teaming & open communication)–is a key factor in BCG’s consistent ranking as one of the top companies to work for.

Sourced from Forbes

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4 Ways To Improve Your Creative Thinking Skills In The Workplace

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By Anouare Abdou

Whether you’re a financial analyst or graphic designer, you need creative thinking skills at work.

“I am considered a ‘creative’ by trade: My undergraduate degree is in design, and I worked as an art director for many years. Today I run my own company and I have never had my creativity put to the test more often than when I am wearing my CEO hat,” says Valerie Jimenez, the founder and CEO of full-service branding and digital marketing agency Bold Entity. “I wish more professionals – especially those in leadership roles – understood that being creative in the workplace doesn’t mean finding the most off-the-wall ideas.”

What creative thinking skills are all about (and why they matter) 

So, if creativity is not about coming up with the next Netflix, what is it all about? Jimenez says that it starts with welcoming change and exploring things with curiosity, vulnerability, and empathy to find innovative solutions to your business’ most pressing problems.

She shared an anecdote that perfectly illustrates the power of creative thinking skills in action. Her agency has a large number of clients in the construction/contractor sector. It doesn’t sound like the most creative field at first glance, right? But Jimenez and her team were tasked with a problem to solve: recruiting talent, a common pain point in the industry.

“It took some doing, but I convinced them that they needed to think like a consumer company when it came to attracting talent,” she shares. “I found that most construction companies have amazing cultures: they know how to have fun, they solve difficult challenges, the workers enjoy a large degree of autonomy, no two days are ever alike, and most employees are rarely confined to a desk. The co-workers formed such a strong bond that they often socialized after work.”

By creating employer brands and strong web presences that allowed construction companies to showcase their appealing cultures, Jimenez and her team helped their clients reach and attract young talent. Recruiting difficulties diminished.

“The trick here wasn’t building a visually appealing, informative website – most good media companies can do that – it was finding a creative way to apply traditional marketing techniques to solve a problem in a non-traditional forum.” Now that’s creativity at its finest.

How to improve your creative thinking skills at work 

In order to think outside the box and pull off that sort of impressive and innovative problem-solving, you need to actively work on improving your creative thinking skills. Here’s how.

1. Create time and space for creativity 

First, you need to create the time and space for creativity. “In my case, at least, great ideas don’t just pop into my head. I make sure to give myself chunks of time to just … think,” says Jimenez.

While scheduling creativity may sound counterintuitive, it’s a powerful practice. You send your brain the signal that now is the time to free-think. You remove distractions and set boundaries around your availability. And you allow your thoughts to roam, even if it means ruminating or not finding an immediate solution. It’s through that blocked-off time when you take a step back from daily deliverables that creative solutions start to emerge.

2. Avoid idea overload 

Coming up with ideas is not always a problem. “Sometimes it’s having too many ideas that get us in trouble. Knowing which ones are feasible and which ones will make the most impact on the larger goals of the organization is key,” says Jimenez. “Bombarding your team with lots of great ideas can get everyone confused.”

Keep a notebook or living document to store all your ideas. Let them simmer. Don’t act on them right away. Then, on a quarterly basis, review them and how they align with your larger goals, recommends Jimenez: “Are any of your ideas worthy of exploring? Would any of these ideas help solve the problems you are focusing on?”

3. Go crazy with your team 

That being said, you don’t want to stop brainstorming. Crazy brainstorms are good. “Riffing, spitballing, ideating: whatever you want to call it, let your team (and yourself) go crazy!” says Jimenez. “There’s really no such thing as a bad idea because even the worst can lead to a good one. If you – the leader – really walk this walk, your team will feel safe saying what’s on their mind and they are sure to offer up some gems, either for the task at hand or for the future.”

Take a page from her book by doing an exercise called the Worst Possible Idea, which involves coming up with the silliest, craziest ideas possible. “It is a lot of fun and very productive. I can assure you that most of the best commercials, advertising campaigns, and business ideas around the world have been created with this exercise,” adds Jimenez.

4. Prioritize and foster curiosity 

Finally, always remember that curiosity precedes creativity. “Some of the most creative people I know would be hard-pressed to draw a stick figure. So what do they all have in common? They’re insatiably curious about the world around them,” she says.

Observe the world around you. Ask questions. Soak up information from various sources. Connect dots that are seemingly unrelated. Make unexpected comparisons that help you see things from a unique perspective. From that place, formulate new ideas. That’s the true meaning of creativity, after all.

By Anouare Abdou

Sourced from Hive

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How Self-Published Authors Can Successfully Promote Their Work Online

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By Courtney Jeffries

The rise of online platforms like social media, blogs and podcasts has changed the publishing industry. They have led to new avenues of marketing, cultivated collective spaces for those with purpose-driven interests and opened a discussion about what drives consumer engagement with authors, bookstores and literary events. Now is the time for self-publishers to take advantage of the tools that enable a successful launch and campaign without promotion from the traditional publishing industry.

In my experience working with independent publishers and mission-driven authors to plan and execute virtual events, a few best practices have emerged that apply to all genres and levels of publishing, but especially authors who are operating independently or without the backing of a publishing or marketing team. Here are four tips to help you successfully self-promote your work:

1. Establish your social media presence.

Many modern authors create an active social media presence for visibility and to engage with fans. In recent years, this has become a primary source for audiences to stay updated on news and connect with the person behind the art. Therefore, a cultivated social media network should not be underestimated for its marketing power amid a generation of consumers that look to thought leaders’ social media to sway their buying decisions and overall engagement where themes of social justice, self-improvement and other nonfiction categories are involved. This goes beyond advertisements and websites by providing timely personal tidbits of information that organically entice the audience, confirming the notion that access to talent is what fans are most interested in.

2. Contribute to the conversation.

In addition to establishing a social media presence, it’s also important for self-publishers to contribute to the larger conversation. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and, more recently, TikTok have become essential tools in every self-promoter’s kit. Blogs and podcasts are other self-ownership platforms of social discussion that can be utilized in long-form promotion strategies. If the book has a meaningful subject matter to readers, sourcing platforms that allow for open discussion forums can be extremely beneficial as it invites fans to join and create meaningful conversations. This, in turn, helps to build buzz and broaden the author’s reach.

3. Consider virtual gatherings if in-person events are too costly.

If hiring an agency to conduct a book tour is outside of an author’s means, there are still options to create dynamic experiences for fans that accomplish promotional goals. A key element that self-publishers should look for includes platforms that will host fans virtually, with free sign-ups or a low cost to produce and host. This allows fans to maintain access to talent and ensures the entire fan base is included, while removing the limitations and expenses of in-person events.

4. Quantify your success.

Producing content that is relevant to your followers and including calls to action for talent access when it’s time to promote can take shape in a number of ways. This may be in the form of a rewards program, such as buying the book and/or leaving a review that results in an exclusive invitation to meet with the author. Another approach could be to highlight and track engagement levels that are most important. This might be minutes spent with fans, the number of fans engaged, promotion currency or time and money saved using virtual platforms versus a storefront. While this is likely to vary for each self-publisher, it is still important to record in order to measure the success of the campaign and to apply key learnings going forward.

To run a successful, self-promoted campaign, independent creators can leverage virtual tools for their own business objectives, but this is not just limited to publishing. The impact of social media has changed the way talent can achieve their goals throughout all industries. This independence can lead to greater revenue opportunities without having to rely on agencies, thus creating new avenues for self-publishers to monetize and explore.

Feature Image Credit: getty

By Courtney Jeffries

Courtney Jeffries is CEO of Virtual Tables, a virtual event solutions company designed to re-create in-venue live experiences. Read Courtney Jeffries’ full executive profile here.

Sourced from Forbes

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WhatsApp’s Upcoming Feature to Let Users Set Expiration Dates on Group Chats

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By April Fowell

WhatsApp will soon release a new feature called “Expiring Groups” to let users set an expiration date for group chats, according to Engadget.

Expiring Groups

The Expiring Groups feature will appear within the group chat’s settings. Options include day, week or custom date for the group chat to expire. Users can also cancel an expiration to keep the chat intact.

One thing to remember is that expiration dates set will only apply to the user who set it, not to the other people in the group chat. With that, the group chat will still continue to exists, just not with the user who placed an expiration date.

It seems that the messaging platform will not just delete a group chat without notifying users. According to the feature description, “You will be prompted to clean up groups on the expiration date.”

Still, this is helpful when you want to reduce clutter in your account. This can also help save more storage space on your device.

Other Features That Will Be Rolled Out

There are other features that the messaging platform plans to roll out soon. A feature discovered by WABetaInfo, it saw a recent beta version of the app for Android.

It states that the app will have the option to silence calls from unknown numbers. That said, it seems that the feature will acknowledge calls, keep them in the calls logs, and also let them pass through and show up in notifications.

What’s great about this is that users won’t be distracted or alerted by incoming calls. And if you happen to miss a call from someone you know, you can always find their number and just call or message them back.

The feature is not available yet and it seems that it’s still in development. There is also a chance that the feature won’t make it to a full release or the possibility that it could be released. For now, nobody knows yet if the WhatsApp feature will be released to the public.

WhatsApp is one of the most popular messaging platforms today. It has over 1.6 billion users and is growing rapidly. It is used for both personal and business communication, and it is available in over 180 countries and in multiple languages. It is also available on a variety of platforms, such as Android, iOS, Windows, and Mac.

Overall, WhatsApp is continuing to evolve and improve its services. It is a great platform for both personal and business communication, and users can expect to see more features and improvements in the future.

Feature Image Credit: MANJUNATH KIRAN/AFP via Getty Images

By April Fowell

Sourced from TechTimes

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