When you're not reading online, pick up this information-packed book entitled Content Rules: How to Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webniars (and More).
The book co-authored by Ann Handley and C.C. Chapman is available from Amazon and is described as a how-to book of both the art and science of developing marketing content that people care about interwoven with case studies of companies that are successfully spreading their ideas online--and using them to establish credibility and build a loyal customer base. They want to inspire you to create bold stories, videos, and blog posts that cultivate fans, arouse passion for your products or services, and ignite your business.
To be successful, businesses must speak directly with their customers or prospects through a comprehensive strategy that allows them to reach new customers at every stage of the buying cycle. They must find their voice and create bold and compelling content that people want to consume.
The book is aimed at teaching business owners and marketers the following:
•The art of storytelling and the science of journalism
•What it means to be a "publisher" and why what you publish is the cornerstone of your marketing
•How to find an authentic "voice" and craft bold content that will resonate with prospects and buyers and encourage
them to share it with others
•How to leverage social media and social tools to get your content and ideas distributed as widely as possible
Amazon offers the Kindle edition for $10.99 kindle and the paperback for $12.03.
Thursday, February 22, 2018
Sunday, February 18, 2018
Dotbiz: Some New Business Stats For Bloggers and Other Content Providers to Consider
What does everyone need? Some new stats to ponder. Well it's likely to come as no surprise that if you are starting a business launching one in a profitable sector would be the thing to do. Same for blogging. If you're still trying to find your niche, before jumping into the blog stream, consider these five industries that rate as having the brightest futures according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and market research firm IBISWorld.
The top two job sector increases predicted by the BLS will be in the eco fields of photovoltaic installers and turbine service technicians. If you have friends in these industries, suggest blogging for them or just cover these sectors on your own to support the growing interest among consumers.
. Employment for solar photovoltaic (PV) installers is projected to grow 105 percent from 2016 to 2026, much faster than the average for all other occupations. So there will be a corresponding need for bloggers to serve installers whether they are self employed entrepreneurs or employed by a manufacturer of panels.
. Wind turbine service technicians will see their job sector grow 96 percent from 2016 to 2026, much faster than the average for all occupations. Because wind electricity generation is expected to grow rapidly over the coming decade, additional technicians will be needed to install and maintain new turbines. Job prospects are expected to be excellent.
Other top areas include the following:
. Health care
About half of the 20 occupations projected to have the highest percentage increase in employment by 2026 are in the health industry, according to the BLS. Meeting the needs of an aging population creates increased demand for physical therapists, nurse practitioners, physician assistants and other health care specialists to open their own practices. So, if you have any interest in these fields or friends in these fields, who may need help with blogging, this category is a no-brainer.
. Information technology
The information technology sector will grow 13% from 2016 to 2026, according to BLS, a rate that is faster than the average for all occupations. Information security analysts, in particular, are expected to see a boost in demand which the BLS predicts will spike 28% in growth during this same time period.
. Other personal care services
The broad category of “personal care services” was also earmarked by the BLS as one of the fastest-growing industries based on employment. This includes massage therapy, tattoo shops, wedding planning, wellness services and other trades.
. Marijuana
Twenty-nine states and Washington, D.C., have legalized medical marijuana. IBISWorld predicts that industry revenue for medical and recreational marijuana growers will jump 33.5% from 2016 to 2021. The retail side of the business is also expected to see sales increase this year, according to the firm. Blog copy for Maryjanepreneurs would seem to be a good fit, especially info about how to compete in what will one day become an increasingly crowded market.
. E-commerce
With personal disposable income projected to grow 4% a year from 2016 to 2026, according to the BLS, the “quantity and quality of online purchases,” will go up according to IBISWorld. It totally goes without saying that any e-comm business can benefit from creating its own blog to add voice and personality to help set it apart from all of the others in its field.
The top two job sector increases predicted by the BLS will be in the eco fields of photovoltaic installers and turbine service technicians. If you have friends in these industries, suggest blogging for them or just cover these sectors on your own to support the growing interest among consumers.
. Employment for solar photovoltaic (PV) installers is projected to grow 105 percent from 2016 to 2026, much faster than the average for all other occupations. So there will be a corresponding need for bloggers to serve installers whether they are self employed entrepreneurs or employed by a manufacturer of panels.
. Wind turbine service technicians will see their job sector grow 96 percent from 2016 to 2026, much faster than the average for all occupations. Because wind electricity generation is expected to grow rapidly over the coming decade, additional technicians will be needed to install and maintain new turbines. Job prospects are expected to be excellent.
Other top areas include the following:
. Health care
About half of the 20 occupations projected to have the highest percentage increase in employment by 2026 are in the health industry, according to the BLS. Meeting the needs of an aging population creates increased demand for physical therapists, nurse practitioners, physician assistants and other health care specialists to open their own practices. So, if you have any interest in these fields or friends in these fields, who may need help with blogging, this category is a no-brainer.
. Information technology
The information technology sector will grow 13% from 2016 to 2026, according to BLS, a rate that is faster than the average for all occupations. Information security analysts, in particular, are expected to see a boost in demand which the BLS predicts will spike 28% in growth during this same time period.
. Other personal care services
The broad category of “personal care services” was also earmarked by the BLS as one of the fastest-growing industries based on employment. This includes massage therapy, tattoo shops, wedding planning, wellness services and other trades.
. Marijuana
Twenty-nine states and Washington, D.C., have legalized medical marijuana. IBISWorld predicts that industry revenue for medical and recreational marijuana growers will jump 33.5% from 2016 to 2021. The retail side of the business is also expected to see sales increase this year, according to the firm. Blog copy for Maryjanepreneurs would seem to be a good fit, especially info about how to compete in what will one day become an increasingly crowded market.
. E-commerce
With personal disposable income projected to grow 4% a year from 2016 to 2026, according to the BLS, the “quantity and quality of online purchases,” will go up according to IBISWorld. It totally goes without saying that any e-comm business can benefit from creating its own blog to add voice and personality to help set it apart from all of the others in its field.
Thursday, February 8, 2018
Does Your Blog Have A Voice? It Can Now with Amazon's Pollycast
Today Amazon is launching a new Amazon Polly WordPress plugin that gives your blog a voice by creating audio versions of your posts. The resulting audio can be played from within the blog post itself, or accessed in podcast form using a feature called Amazon Pollycast.
The plugin itself was jointly designed by Amazon’s AWS team and managed WordPress platform provider WP Engine, and takes advantage of Amazon’s text-to-speech service, Polly.
Polly uses machine learning technologies to deliver more life-like speech. For example, Polly understands that the word “live” would be pronounced differently based on its usage. In the phrases “I live in Seattle” and “Live from New York,” the word is spelled the same but is not spoken in the same way. That means the voices sound more natural than some other, more basic voice-to-text engines.
The Polly speech engine supports 29 languages and its technology has added support for things like whispering, speech marks, a timbre effect, and dynamic range compression. These sorts of voice technology advancements are also things that make Alexa sound more natural, too.
The launch of the WordPress plugin is not the first time Polly has been used to turn digital text to speech, of course. The service itself has always been capable of turning any text such as news articles, blog posts, RSS feeds, PDFs, and more into audio. However, making this functionality available as a WordPress plugin makes Polly more accessible to a wider audience.
However, the plugin is only available to anyone running their own installation of WordPress on their own infrastructure or on AWS, and does require a bit of configuration.
The plugin itself was jointly designed by Amazon’s AWS team and managed WordPress platform provider WP Engine, and takes advantage of Amazon’s text-to-speech service, Polly.
Polly uses machine learning technologies to deliver more life-like speech. For example, Polly understands that the word “live” would be pronounced differently based on its usage. In the phrases “I live in Seattle” and “Live from New York,” the word is spelled the same but is not spoken in the same way. That means the voices sound more natural than some other, more basic voice-to-text engines.
The Polly speech engine supports 29 languages and its technology has added support for things like whispering, speech marks, a timbre effect, and dynamic range compression. These sorts of voice technology advancements are also things that make Alexa sound more natural, too.
The launch of the WordPress plugin is not the first time Polly has been used to turn digital text to speech, of course. The service itself has always been capable of turning any text such as news articles, blog posts, RSS feeds, PDFs, and more into audio. However, making this functionality available as a WordPress plugin makes Polly more accessible to a wider audience.
However, the plugin is only available to anyone running their own installation of WordPress on their own infrastructure or on AWS, and does require a bit of configuration.
Tuesday, February 6, 2018
What Can You Learn From Ten of the World's Most Successful Blogs?
•Huff Post
•TMZ
•Business Insider
•Mashable
•Gizmodo
•LifeHacker
•The Verge
•The Daily Beast
•TechCrunch
•Perez Hilton
•The Phrasee blog
For one thing, you can visit each one of them and read their story. These are all giants, but they all started somewhere and wrote about things that attracted more and more readers, which attracted more advertisers or more subscribers. At a glance you can see that many of them cover general areas such as news, or specific news such as entertainment news or tech news.
What does that mean? You can start blogging on specifics and continue to drill down or you can cast a wide net and see what attracts the most readers. Is one way better than the other? Not really, because you will either be very knowledgeable in a particular area or very interested in many different things.
Readers who are interested in a particular topic logically want all of the information that they can find of value to them. Readers who want to stay broadly informed, whether that is about newsmakers worldwide or what's happening locally, will appreciate a site that helps them filter the sea of information.
So what is the most important factor in starting a blog? Is it your knowledge or talent or is it what the vast reading or viewing online populace wants? If you want to eventually make money from your efforts, the answer is both. If there is already a vast number of blogs about your particular area of expertise or interest, you have to ask: what can I contribute that is not already being said or how can I say it better.
If there are only a handful of blogs or sites on a topic that interests you, do come research and ask yourself why are there so few? Is there really very little interest in the subject or could you say that most of the information was not presented in a way that would interest potential readers.
There is general agreement that the opportunity to make money might be easier for bloggers in the following list of niches. Each of these topics are broad enough to be sliced and diced into much finer areas of focus, a fact that allows you to choose what suits you best. Food, for instance, could include a category, such as desserts or foods of a certain country. It could be focused upon things to make at home or the best places to find specific foods. It could be recipes that run the gamut from gourmet to home-style and from grilled to slow cooker. You could become a food critic, a restaurant reviewer, a shopping advisor, a coupon guru, and the list goes on.
.How to Make Money
.Personal Finance
.Health and Fitness
.Food
.Beauty and Fashion
.Lifestyle
.Personal Development
•TMZ
•Business Insider
•Mashable
•Gizmodo
•LifeHacker
•The Verge
•The Daily Beast
•TechCrunch
•Perez Hilton
•The Phrasee blog
For one thing, you can visit each one of them and read their story. These are all giants, but they all started somewhere and wrote about things that attracted more and more readers, which attracted more advertisers or more subscribers. At a glance you can see that many of them cover general areas such as news, or specific news such as entertainment news or tech news.
What does that mean? You can start blogging on specifics and continue to drill down or you can cast a wide net and see what attracts the most readers. Is one way better than the other? Not really, because you will either be very knowledgeable in a particular area or very interested in many different things.
Readers who are interested in a particular topic logically want all of the information that they can find of value to them. Readers who want to stay broadly informed, whether that is about newsmakers worldwide or what's happening locally, will appreciate a site that helps them filter the sea of information.
So what is the most important factor in starting a blog? Is it your knowledge or talent or is it what the vast reading or viewing online populace wants? If you want to eventually make money from your efforts, the answer is both. If there is already a vast number of blogs about your particular area of expertise or interest, you have to ask: what can I contribute that is not already being said or how can I say it better.
If there are only a handful of blogs or sites on a topic that interests you, do come research and ask yourself why are there so few? Is there really very little interest in the subject or could you say that most of the information was not presented in a way that would interest potential readers.
There is general agreement that the opportunity to make money might be easier for bloggers in the following list of niches. Each of these topics are broad enough to be sliced and diced into much finer areas of focus, a fact that allows you to choose what suits you best. Food, for instance, could include a category, such as desserts or foods of a certain country. It could be focused upon things to make at home or the best places to find specific foods. It could be recipes that run the gamut from gourmet to home-style and from grilled to slow cooker. You could become a food critic, a restaurant reviewer, a shopping advisor, a coupon guru, and the list goes on.
.How to Make Money
.Personal Finance
.Health and Fitness
.Food
.Beauty and Fashion
.Lifestyle
.Personal Development
Monday, February 5, 2018
Dotbiz Scopes Out February, March and April 2018 Blogging Conferences to Check Out
Although you may feel as though you are "glued" to your computer most of the time, bloggers can socialize and benefit from meeting other bloggers, not just online but in person. Some conferences coming up in February, March and April that may interest you include the following:
Social Media Marketing World – February 28 – March 2, 2018, – San Diego, CA
The place where you’ll find the best insider secrets, the latest developments, tools that will help you grow your business, and where you’ll become a social marketing master. Take in 120+ powerful and practical, action-oriented social media marketing and creator training sessions from the world’s leading experts—all in beautiful San Diego, California.
Design Bloggers Conference – March 4–6,2018 – Beverly Hills, CA
Conference for professionals actively using or interested in learning about new media and the interior design industry.
Christian Writer’s Conference – March 21–23,2018 – Pre-Conference Boost Clinics, March 23 – 27, 2018 Main Conference. Mount Hermon, California
Visit the site which offers First-Time attendees a contest for a chance to win a full scholarship, including economy lodging and conference meals. No fee to enter contest.
Craftcation – April 4–8,2018 – Ventura, CA
Craftcation is an annual 4-day business + makers conference featuring industry professionals leading attendees in hands-on food & craft workshops, as well as lectures and panels on creative business. Craftcation ignites the entrepreneurial spirit, strengthens craft and business skills and builds relationships in the creative community. Conference is designed for crafters, blogger, creative entrepreneurs, food artisans or creative.
Social Media Marketing World – February 28 – March 2, 2018, – San Diego, CA
The place where you’ll find the best insider secrets, the latest developments, tools that will help you grow your business, and where you’ll become a social marketing master. Take in 120+ powerful and practical, action-oriented social media marketing and creator training sessions from the world’s leading experts—all in beautiful San Diego, California.
Design Bloggers Conference – March 4–6,2018 – Beverly Hills, CA
Conference for professionals actively using or interested in learning about new media and the interior design industry.
Christian Writer’s Conference – March 21–23,2018 – Pre-Conference Boost Clinics, March 23 – 27, 2018 Main Conference. Mount Hermon, California
Visit the site which offers First-Time attendees a contest for a chance to win a full scholarship, including economy lodging and conference meals. No fee to enter contest.
Craftcation – April 4–8,2018 – Ventura, CA
Craftcation is an annual 4-day business + makers conference featuring industry professionals leading attendees in hands-on food & craft workshops, as well as lectures and panels on creative business. Craftcation ignites the entrepreneurial spirit, strengthens craft and business skills and builds relationships in the creative community. Conference is designed for crafters, blogger, creative entrepreneurs, food artisans or creative.
Saturday, February 3, 2018
The 2018 Changing Online Landscape for Written Blog Content, Video Content and Podcasts
From all across social media new trends are influencing shifts in popularity and growth. Some of the factors and Predictions that may affect online Blog Content, Video, and Podcasts include the following:
*Content Costs Rise
*Creators Reduce Content Output
*Content Repurposing of Established Content Rises
*Complete Content Assets Replace Individual Blog Posts
*Creators Personalize Content Delivery and Focus on Lead Funnels
*Video’s Rise Continues With Live Video Dominating Content
*YouTube Visibility Drops as ISPs Compete With YouTube
*Video Creators Move Beyond YouTube
*Facebook and Instagram Attracts More Video Creators
*Video Optimization Is Necessary
*Podcasting Moves into Prominence
*Small-Batch Podcast Production Increases
*Guests Partner With Podcasters for SEO Benefits
*Brands Outsource Production and Distribution to Influential Creators
*Shows Will Build and Retain Community
*Content Costs Rise
*Creators Reduce Content Output
*Content Repurposing of Established Content Rises
*Complete Content Assets Replace Individual Blog Posts
*Creators Personalize Content Delivery and Focus on Lead Funnels
*Video’s Rise Continues With Live Video Dominating Content
*YouTube Visibility Drops as ISPs Compete With YouTube
*Video Creators Move Beyond YouTube
*Facebook and Instagram Attracts More Video Creators
*Video Optimization Is Necessary
*Podcasting Moves into Prominence
*Small-Batch Podcast Production Increases
*Guests Partner With Podcasters for SEO Benefits
*Brands Outsource Production and Distribution to Influential Creators
*Shows Will Build and Retain Community
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