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Where Nonprofits Spend Their Time On Social Media in 2022

Marketing Strategy
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Where Nonprofits Spend Their Time On Social Media in 2022 There's no shortage of advice in the blogosphere on how and where to spend your time on social media. How organizations are actually spending their time online, however, is a different story. Unlike most marketing campaigns you see looking to get you using a product or service, non-profit social marketing is all about getting you to take action for a cause. Often, non-profit organizations are tight on resources and don’t always have the ability to produce large, high-visibility campaigns. That’s where social media can help. Let’s dive into the social media platforms that non-profit orgs can leverage today. How Non-Profits Leverage Social Media There are three major ways that non-profit organizations can use social media to get the word out on causes that matter. The first is through social challenges. Think back to 2014 when the ice bucket challenge went viral. This challenge involved taking a bucket full of ice water and pouring it onto yourself, posting it on social media, donating to the cause, then nominating friends and family to follow suit. This challenge, designed to raise awareness of ALS or Lou Gherig’s diseases, spread like wildfire through social media and helped the ALS association increase its annual funding by 187%.   ...

Inclusive Language: How To Use and Promote It at Your Organization

Company Culture
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Inclusive Language: How To Use and Promote It at Your Organization Language has the ability to build relationships and forge connections, but it’s equally liable for creating barriers and impacting someone’s sense of belonging.  Using inclusive language, and having workplace conversations devoid of exclusive language, means employees are more likely to feel like they belong and can be their authentic selves at work.  Here we’ll explore what inclusive language is and provide examples to ensure you create an inclusive workplace and inclusive marketing material and 2022 and beyond.    To explore how you might promote inclusive language at your organization, I spoke with some experts at HubSpot who have first-hand knowledge of incorporating inclusive language into their processes, products, and overall team culture. For instance, Hannah Fleishman, who led the charge on updating HubSpot's Careers website to be more inclusive, told me, "Language has a big impact on our sense of belonging in the workplace. The challenge is, language is nuanced. The changes we should consider making to how we talk and write are often subtle." Melissa Obleada, an Associate User Experience Researcher at HubSpot, echoes this thought, mentioning, "Many of us don't realize that our language has additional meaning hidden between the lines. Certain words can imply a certain age, gender, educational background, social class, and so much more. We see this a lot in the ways many folks write job descriptions." Consider, for instance, the last time you were in a meeting and a leader...

What is a Content Management Workflow? Why You Need One in 2022

Content Planning
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What is a Content Management Workflow? Why You Need One in 2022 Creating an effective content workflow is a lot like baking a cake. If you accidentally pour unfinished batter into an unprepared pan, the damage is done. You can’t go back and prep the pan after the fact. Imagine your cake batter is your content, and the cake pan is its publication. If your content goes straight from the writer to your consumers, you are running a lot of risks. You must first edit and fact-check the content before publication and distribution. Readers become disinterested or upset at careless, incorrect content. And once the information is out there, it is nearly impossible to recover. Having the right people in place on your content team is not enough. To create quality content every time you post, your company needs to outline its processes in a content workflow. In this post, we’ll cover the topic of content workflow — what it is, how to manage it, and how you can create one for your business. Strategists, writers, editors, and managers are people you would have on your content team. Their tasks, seen in a workflow, include planning, writing, editing, publishing, and more; however, each function is not necessary for every content type. Depending on the content type, your workflow will change. Businesses can publish various content like newsletters, blog posts, and social media posts. The content workflow is different for each asset. For example, compare the publication of a...

25 Copywriting Portfolio Examples That Will Secure Your Next Gig

Copywriting
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25 Copywriting Portfolio Examples That Will Secure Your Next Gig If you're reading this blog, you've likely decided to start or revamp your copywriting portfolio. With so many portfolios out there, it's hard to figure out how to make yours stand out from the crowd. What colors should you use? What kind of writing samples will show off your skills? Fortunately, I've put together a collection of copywriting portfolio examples that are sure to inspire you and guide you in the right direction. Each copywriting portfolio example I've included is unique in terms of color, layout, and personality — highlighting the various ways you can approach putting a portfolio together and how it's okay to get creative with yours. How to Create a Copywriting Portfolio When creating your copywriting portfolio, avoid cramming in too many of your writing samples. You'll want to show off your diverse portfolio —that's understandable — but too many samples can overwhelm potential clients and employers. Instead, opt for five or six writing samples that capture the different styles of writing you've done, such as technical, marketing, and business writing. Be sure to also include a balance of humorous and serious pieces, B2B and B2C writings, as well as short and long-form content. If you have little-to-no writing samples, build your portfolio by starting a website or blog to showcase your writing skills, or contribute to other websites. You can also write for nonprofits or work internships. Another method to build your portfolio is...

Local SEO Audit: Everything You Need to Know [+ How to Perform One]

Local SEO
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Local SEO Audit: Everything You Need to Know How can you be sure that your business is taking advantage of every opportunity to attract local customers? One way is to perform a local SEO audit — a thorough assessment of your search engines rankings and the actions you should take to improve or maintain your local online presence. While a local SEO audit may seem daunting if you've never done one before, it can actually be completed in seven easy steps — and there are several tools that can make yours quick and efficient. A local SEO audit can be done on its own or as part of an overall digital audit. Local SEO Audit Guide Our guide to completing a local SEO audit is broken down into the following steps: Keyword research Website audit Google Business Profile analysis Local business citation analysis Client/customer review performance Analytics review Competitor analysis How to Do a Local SEO Audit 1. SEO Keyword Research Figure out the keywords your potential customers are typing into search engines to find businesses like yours. Different customers will use different keywords to find what they are looking for, so make sure the keywords you optimize for aren't too narrow. To broaden your keyword list, think about where your customers could be in the buyer's journey. If they're in the early stages, they're likely searching "Where can I find X near me?" or "X in ." While...

How To Make Your Own Ecommerce Strategy

SEO
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How To Make Your Own Ecommerce Strategy As an online store, you drive traffic online. This means that, when people search for products or services related to what you sell, you want your business to appear in their search results. Enter ecommerce SEO. Read on to learn more about ecommerce SEO, why it’s important, how to create an ecommerce SEO strategy, and discover tools that will help you with your process. What is ecommerce SEO? Ecommerce seo is the process of making your online store visible in search results so that people doing searches related to what you offer are likely to come across your website. An optimized ecommerce site is more likely to rank highly in SERPs and drive organic traffic. Ecommerce SEO is important because 60% of people research a brand online before making a purchase. When your site is optimized, they’ll be able to find your product pages in search results and learn about what you offer. When people can find your site and learn about what you offer, they’re also more likely to make a purchase. This type of SEO is not that different from general SEO. Still, you will focus your efforts on optimizing your site to benefit your products, like writing high-quality and keyword-rich product descriptions. Ecommerce SEO Strategy 1. Keyword Research Your ecommerce SEO process should begin with keyword research for your site, especially for your product pages. This research will help you learn the words most commonly used when people search...

YouTube Thumbnail: Your Guide to Making a Scroll-Stopping Image

Youtube Marketing
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YouTube Thumbnail: Your Guide to Making a Scroll-Stopping Image YouTube thumbnails, the small, clickable snapshots that viewers see when they search for videos, can be just as important as a video’s title because they provide a preview of your video and entice viewers to click through.  If your video has an ordinary or sub-par thumbnail, it won’t persuade anyone to watch your content. YouTube could deem the video irrelevant and won’t rank it in the search results or distribute it through the "Recommended Videos" feed. Since your video’s click-through rate is one of the most important ranking factors in YouTube’s search algorithm, especially during its first hour on the platform, an eye-catching thumbnail can make a huge difference in ranking number one for a query and not ranking at all. Creating vibrant YouTube thumbnails can also instantly grab people’s attention and this can help you differentiate yourself on a platform full of standard thumbnails all screaming for attention. Below, we’ll guide you through an easy four-step process for creating visually appealing YouTube thumbnails that will cut through the noise, boost your video’s click-through rate, and lift your rankings. Table of Contents: How to Make a YouTube Thumbnail 8 YouTube Thumbnail Makers   1. Visit a free online YouTube thumbnail maker. There are eight free online YouTube thumbnail makers listed below, but we featured FotoJet in this guide because it’s one of the only YouTube thumbnail makers that doesn’t make you sign up...

How to Leverage the 5 Stages of the Customer Buying Cycle for More Sales

Buyer's Journey in Marketing
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How to Leverage the 5 Stages of the Customer Buying Cycle for More Sales Let’s face it – there are many marketing tactics that boost conversions. However, to make your marketing effective, leveraging the customer’s buying cycle is the key to a successful online business. Understanding a customer’s buying cycle is how you can have the right marketing for a successful commerce site. Online Buying Cycle The online buying cycle is very similar to the original buying cycle; however the key difference is the online buying cycle occurs online. Because it is online; many ecommerce sites and brands will utilize social media platforms and email marketing as marketing tools to help market and sell to consumers and generate leads back to their ecommerce site. The buying cycle and online buying cycle will go through the five stages of closing a sale. 5 Stages of the Customer Buying Cycle You can look at a customer buying cycle as a customer’s purchasing cycle. ;Many customers go through stages during their purchasing process to educate themselves before they either make a purchase. There are five stages that you have to consider: 1. Awareness Awareness is the first stage in a customer’s buying cycle when customers realize that they have a problem that needs a solution. ; A company will be able to reach the target customers given the right marketing strategies and campaigns. For example, a customer is trying to lower plastic waste from water bottle usage. A customer then sees...