Rnordman

A great thank you note is a lot more than a piece of paper with “thank you” written on it, however. This primer will have you writing thank you notes so good, people will want to give you presents just to receive one.

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I couldn’t handle the amount of people who were asking me to coach them. Even though I coach over the phone, and often in my pajamas, it takes a lot of energy and I can’t do more than two calls a day. It’s not like there aren’t other demands on my time and energy: I homeschool my kids, I have a VC-backed startup, and I am supposedly paying heed to the most obvious marriage advice in the world that says to make your spouse a priority.

So I raised my prices.

I started out at $250 an hour because I thought I was going to hate coaching because I hate talking on the phone, and I didn’t think I could stomach talking on the phone for less than $250/hour.

But it turned out that I really liked coaching on the phone. People who ask for coaching are generally smart and insightful because it takes an exceptional person to ask an outsider for advice. And I didn’t like having to turn people away because I was over booked.

So I raised my price to $350/hour. Which worked out perfectly because I still attracted the same type of people, but just a tad fewer so that I was able to say yes to everyone.

Then I invited my brother to spend his daughter’s winter break with us. We have goats, cattle, pigs, chicken, rabbits, cats and a dog. It’s heaven for children.

My brother said they can’t deal with the fact that we have only one bathroom for so many people.

It’s true we have only one bathroom. But my boys will just pee outside if someone’s in the bathroom. And since we are really rural, in a pinch, I will pee outside as well.

But I can see how this is not really okay for visitors. And I love my brothers so much and I want them to visit me so I decided to build a guesthouse. And to pay for it I raised my rates to $500/hour.

I figured the last time I raised my rates it was fine. So it would be fine this time.

But this time the clientele changed. It turns out that in order to afford $500 for career advice, you need to have a pretty amazing career. And in order to have an amazing career you need to have made careful, systematic decisions for most of your life.

I didn’t like coaching only one type of person. And also, I have to admit that each time I found myself coaching someone who makes $2 million a year at some huge company, I thought about how I’m nuts for charging just $500. I should be charging $5000.

I did some research about how to figure out how much to charge for yourself:

A site aimed at web analytics people suggests detailed evidence-based analysis to figure out how to price yourself. And, proving stereotypes are stereotypes because they are accurate, a site aimed at creatives suggests that to price yourself, you should go with your gut and keep all your options open.

In case those of you who are not freelancers are despairing that you are getting nothing from this post, here you go: Bloomberg recommends that you price yourself like a house. Which means you disregard what you negotiated last time and look at what the market can bear.

But even better:  As a general rule the sex industry is ahead of everyone, for everything, including freelancer pricing. On the site TrickAdvisor.com, freelance prostitutes list themselves multiple times, with multiple names and profiles so they can appeal to a wider range of people.

After getting totally sidetracked by that sex industry research, (and finding out, among other things, that men in a committed relationship subconsciously try to stay away from women who are ovulating) I decided on my own strategy for how to price myself.

I decided I need to figure out what I’m working toward, and how many hours I want to work, and then determine the hourly rate to meet my goal.

But when I did that, I came up with $1000 an hour. Even if I gave up on a cute little guest house porch, I was still at $850 an hour.

Then I decided that I should price myself so the work is most enjoyable. You want to attract the client that makes your work most fulfilling to you. And for my coaching business, that is $350. I love coaching the people who stretch to pay that rate, and I still get the excitement of talking with people who could pay fifty times that rate.

And proving we are most creative when we’re desperate for cash, I thought maybe I could rent out the guesthouse each week of the summer and then it would pay for itself. Or maybe I could do a startup weekend at my guest house. It would be like fifteen people in a three room house though… So maybe I could sell it to MTV as a reality show… Or maybe I could build the guest house and set the rent too high for anyone to book it, but I could deduct all my gardening expenses because I have a little farm-based B and B business. You’d be horrified to know how lucrative it would be for me to deduct all my gardening expenses.

I did arrive at a solution, though. I’m not building a guesthouse. I’m building a bathroom. But I’m keeping the door locked except for when we have visitors. Because the only thing worse than having to pay for another bathroom is to have to pay for it and then clean it.

Did you book your last trip through a travel agent?

Unless you work for a big company, probably not. The travel industry was one of the earliest to be disrupted by the digital revolution. This chart comes from the McKinsey report, "Digital America: A Tale of the Have and Have-Mores," and shows how the number of travel agents in the U.S. is less than half what it was 15 years ago. Meanwhile, the amount of revenue hotels get from online booking has gone up about 7x over the same period.

As McKinsey writes, the hotel industry itself could be the next to be disrupted in this way: "Value is shifting from physical intermediaries and asset holders (including not only travel agents but also hotel owners themselves) to digital intermediaries and consumers....By bringing together travelers with individual property owners who want to list their spare rooms or rental properties, platforms such as Airbnb, VRBO, Flipkey, and HomeAway monetize assets that might otherwise sit empty."

SEE ALSO: Want better Wi-Fi? Move to France

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The art world loves a good backstory. That’s why one man’s stuffed shark is worth $12 million and another’s … not so much. It would be difficult to come up with a much better backstory for the blockbuster exhibition coming to Berlin next fall, when 30 of the 20th-century Western art treasures of the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art will be presented along with 30 works by contemporary Iranian artists.

The Tehran Museum has the finest modern art collection outside the major centres in Europe and North America. Gathered under the personal supervision of Empress Farah Pahlavi Shahbanu in the mid-1970s before the 1979 revolution toppled the monarchy—years during which the rise of OPEC made Iran flush with oil cash and the international art market depressed—its gems include works by Warhol, Monet, Gauguin, Jackson Pollock and Francis Bacon, some 30 Picassos and a pair of nine-figure Mark Rothkos.

When the Shah of Iran fell and Ayatollah Khomeini took over, the museum’s art professionals fled to the West, and it fell to one man, a high school graduate who worked as a driver for the museum, to protect the collection. Firouz Shahbazi, now the “keeper” of the Western art, says he spent two years sticking by the vault in which he placed the threatened artwork, refusing to open it for anyone. “Only God knows where I got this courage from—I, who am normally so afraid,” he told Bloomberg News. “With this vault, with this museum, I am like a lion.”

For decades after that, the collection was buried by Tehran’s chilly relations with the West. Pieces occasionally made their way to museums, but as a collection it was seldom seen by anyone outside Iran. Germany was the Western nation that moved the fastest to restore links with Iran in the wake of last summer’s nuclear accord. It has thereby reaped the rewards, commercial and cultural.

News of the Berlin deal, announced in late October, immediately set off a race in the world of museum exhibitions. Within weeks, while its Frankfurt competitor, the Schirn Kunsthalle, dropped out of the running—because “the amount of money requested became an insurmountable issue,” according to its director—Rome’s MAXXI museum, as the Museo nazionale delle Arti del XXI secolo is known, announced it will pick up the Berlin exhibition in early 2017. The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, part of the Smithsonian Institution, opened preliminary discussions with the Tehran Museum. “We received a number of requests,” said an understated Ehsan Aghaei, deputy director of the Tehran museum.

The news also sparked myth-making. Curious journalists went to Tehran to see what the fuss was about and returned with tales of masterpieces locked away and forgotten for almost four decades. Not quite. The early years after Khomeini’s anti-Western revolution were dicey, and even by the most sober of accounts Firouz Shahbazi deserves his accolades. But the worst was over by the early 1980s and the art was essentially safe from revolutionary destruction. Some among the ruling authorities took a shine to it, more probably appreciated its value. Some of the art went on occasional display. In 2004 one of the most provocative, and valuable ($75 million), masterpieces, Bacon’s 1968 triptych, Two Figures Lying on a Bed With Attendants, travelled to the painter’s native Britain. Back in Tehran the next year, the work—full of naked men—was put on display by a brave curator, Sami Azar. (In authoritarian Iran, sensitivity about nudity and homosexuality, especially given that the Western artists were often gay or Jewish or both, is liable to keep many pieces in the vaults.) The Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance ordered it taken down. Azar demanded the decree in writing, successfully delaying officials until the British ambassador could see it that night.

Starting next year many of the works will get more exposure than they’ve had since the 1970s, but that won’t happen only to the Warhols and Picassos. What the exhibitions will really bring out of the shadows, notes Iranian art historian Shiva Balaghi, “is the treasures of modern Iranian art” never before seen outside the country. “And that will show how modern art was being made in a world that was connected and in dialogue.”

The post Tehran’s hidden cache of art treasures comes to the West appeared first on Macleans.ca.

Goldman Sachs put out an epic "year in review" style note of its 100 favourite charts that sum up the year this week and one that stands out relates to TransferWise, one of the few British tech unicorns (private companies worth over $1 billion).

TransferWise uses a peer-to-peer matching service to bring down the cost of sending money internationally online.

How much does it bring down costs? An order of magnitude as the chart from Goldman below shows:

TransferWise's fees when sending money from the UK to Germany are sub-1%, compared to over 3% at a Western Union and over 4% for High Street banks.

Of course, that's just one currency route and the figures do all come from TransferWise. But it goes some way to explaining why investors value the business so highly.

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: JEFF IMMELT: Math and team sports were more important than my MBA

By Mars Dorian, {grow} Contributing Columnist

The end is nigh for 2015, which has been an interesting year for the online world, to say the least. Blogging has been declared dead, before it was revived, after it has been dubbed micro-blogging, but before it was dead again.

Today, I want to share the most important personal business lessons from my online career in 2015. It’s my hope that you learn from them so you can (mentally) plan for a more successful 2016…

You don’t buy where your customers are

My cousin from the countryside recently visited me in Berlin. She told me how much she loved writing stories and complained how hard it was to find a traditional publisher. As a self-publisher myself, I told her how simple it is to sell digital books via online platforms like Amazon.

She just cocked her eyebrow and said, “But I don’t look for books online. I only browse through bookstores.”

Welcome to the kiddie bubble thinking. Along the lines of: “If I close my eyes, the world doesn’t see me, because I don’t see myself.”

It’s natural to only distribute content and products on platforms you love from your point of view, assuming your customer does the same, but you should really put your customer’s preferred platform over your own biased preferences. Since my customers are predominantly in the US, I want to use networks that North Americans prefer, like LinkedIn, even though the European-centric rival Xing is much better for the local biz networking here. An American wanting to do biz with Germans for example should first focus on Xing, even though their preferred platform was LinkedIn.

Another example: Snapchat is big for marketing to US kids, but it would flop devastatingly in Europe because most kids here haven’t even heard about it. I’m not a big user of Pinterest or book sharing sites, but since my reader audience likes to hang out there, I have to be there. On the other side, I luv Twitter, but it’s terrible for book marketing.

Lesson: Common advice says you should use your favorite social media platform and become a power user. 2015 has shown me this doesn’t work. Pick the platform your customer uses, and even if you hate it, learn how to use it. In this case, the means justify the end;)

Networking: keeping instead of katching.

I love networking, to me it’s a not a dirty word that requires a mouth wash every time I use it. But I’ve made a huuuge mistake when connecting with people over the years, and it’s the same mistake I see big corporations committing: focusing on acquisition instead of retention.

You see, it’s easy for me to approach people via email, Twitter or Facebook and jumpstart an online relationship quickie.

But just the other day, when I did an inventory of my Facebook and Twitter allies, I realized I hadn’t talked to some of them in YEARS, even though we shared good biz relationships.

Don’t ask me what happened—I want to blame the demons of time and distraction. But the truth is I’ve desperately focused on upping my follower’s list instead of concentrating on the connections I already had. Loss of relevance and biz deals guaranteed.

Lesson: Stop turning into an online networking machine that collects connections like Pokemon—Gotta Catch ’em All style. Do what others won’t–reconnect with valuable folks you haven’t talked to in a while for no other reason than to show that you’re still thinking about them.

That’s why I’ve created a boring but useful spreadsheet with people I care about and want to stay in contact with. I draw personal b-day and ‘thank you’ notes to let them know how much I value them.

Fear the fatigue and fight it

Who would have guessed that good ol’ Steven Spielberg was going to change the way I looked at my online biz?

In an interview, the legendary director once said that with all the DC and Marvel superhero movies flooding the theaters, there was going to be a superhero fatigue in the near future, resulting in subsiding ticket sales–independent of the movie’s quality.

That made me think.

I remember reading Problogger because it was THE blog on blogging back in the day, when, well, blogging was still the new kid on the block (see what I did there). Recently, I’ve accidentally checked out the site again (my fingers pulled the Harry Potter on me) and I realized it still sported the same design from 3-4 years. It had few to none comments, the same article styles from years ago, and worse, the site wasn’t even mobile-friendly in frigging ’15.

Suffice to say the site has drifted into irrelevance.

About 3-4 years ago, I myself was a ‘mere’ blogger, before I shifted to online illustration and then upgraded to self-publishing, although I do both now. I reinvented myself multiple times to keep the money flowing and to prevent stagnation, which I see to a lot of other online outlets happening. Mark Schaefer calls it the content shock.

Creating the same content and/or products, no matter how good in quality, will sooner or later cause a customer/reader fatigue because limited attention but high competition, which will lead to losses. Premium blogs like Copyblogger and Buffer were the kings of content creation, but even they reported a 50% loss of social media referral traffic over the last year, even though their content is still stellar.

My belief is that good blog posts are losing the fight against quick videos and podcast audio because there are simply too many high-quality blogs out there.

Lesson: Even if you’re the king of your domain, you must see the changing trends and ride them. I now focus on Facebook indie-book marketing which makes me a middle-aged dinosaur in 2016, because I overslept the last two years. Don’t let it happen to you.

Which brings me to the last point:

Become a futurist to survive (and thrive)

Too many peeps online, and that unfortunately includes me, read only ‘contemporary’ sites teaching us tips about the online present, like “How to do X marketing in 2015”.

That’s short-term thinking, and it reminds me of an often cited and cheesy quotation that I’ll have to use here because it’s just too damn fitting:

“A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.”
— Wayne Gretzky

For example, three years ago, I would have thought that blogs would exist for many, many years to come. All the usual suspects I’ve read prophesied a loooooon-lasting How 2 Make a Full-Time Living Blogging era, and I too, jumped on the hypertrain. I’ve wasted almost two years on blogging instead of creating more of my own services and products.

It’s too easy to get stuck in the current bubble. Gary Vaynerchuk is right when he says you always have to look for the long-term because it’s gonna eat the present.

Lesson: Read blogs like Wired, FastCompany and {grow} or subscribe to YouTube channels like Dnews (Discovery) where you learn more about upcoming tech impacting your (work) life. As digital citizens and soon to be cyborgs, we should all minor in futurism.

Conclusion

2015 has taught me tons, mostly to keep changing my approach, to always adapt and to look out for the long-term. What’s your top (online) warning lesson from 2015 that you want to implement in 2016?

The post Personal business lessons from 2015 and what you can learn from them appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

Sales reps seem to have an answer for everything. If a customer says this, the rep can launch into a spiel about that. If a customer raises this objection, the rep can respond with that rebuttal. If a customer asks this question, a rep can quickly respond with that answer. And so they dance.

Everything is pre-prepared in a sales rep’s world. But is that a good thing?

Think about calling a company and getting an automated telephone menu. Ever find yourself yelling “customer service” into your phone to skip the automated service and go straight to a customer service rep? I know I’ve been there.

So why is it that we hate automated replies, but sales reps are still using scripts and pre-prepared responses?

While sales reps aren’t automated answering services, there are certain phrases salespeople commonly use that can make them sound a little … well, robotic. In light of the modern buyer’s impatience with overly general treatment, salespeople should drop these phrases and instead personalize their conversations and messages. After all, each prospect is unique, and deserves a real response, not an automated one.

Below are three robotic statements sales reps should avoid at all costs, and what to say instead. 

“I talk to X companies every day just like yours.”

This line signifies a scripted approach because no two companies are exactly the same. Each company has unique plans, pain points, and goals. When a sales rep mentions that they’ve spoken to 10 companies exactly like the prospect’s, the buyer can easily imagine the salesperson using the exact same line 10 different times. And that’s not good.

Instead, reps need to focus on the specifics of a target company. Rather than making generalizations about working with a certain type of business before, sales reps should mention specific traits about the buyer’s organization that they have experience with. For example, a rep might say that they’ve dealt with companies with 10-20 employees before, or worked with a business in the same industry.

“I’ve spent time looking into your business, and wow -- I’m impressed.”

Um … by what?

This line makes you sound robotic because it can be used with any business, in any market, at any time. What in particular about the business impressed you? A rep who uses this line shows that they have not done thorough research -- other than a quick glance at the company website to find the phone number.

This phrase, however, can be transformed to show the prospect that you’ve spent time carefully researching and qualifying them. At the end of the phrase simply add “because [point 1], [point 2], and [point 3].” By including three points of strength specific to the buyer’s business, a sales rep can show that they’ve learned about the organization and can offer informed insight.

Here’s an example:

“I’ve spent time looking into your business, and wow -- I’m impressed with your unique referral marketing strategy, the caliber of writers who are contributing to your blog, and the design of your website.”

“Let’s put some time on the calendar.”

This sounds like an attempt to shove the prospect through the funnel without any valid reason. Before using this phrase, think: Why should we put something on the calendar? Has the sales rep provided value to the prospect, learned about their pain points, and is now prepared to provide a tailored presentation on how to solve them? Or, is it just that the sales rep sent two emails to the prospect and wants to move onto a product demonstration because the end of the month is fast approaching?

Scheduling a meeting or a product demonstration is the next step for a highly qualified prospect. To make this phrase less robotic, add clear points explaining why you believe a meeting would be valuable, and consequently, why it’s time to advance to the next phase of the sales process. 

For example:

“After reviewing your business plan, learning about where you want to grow and where you struggle, and hearing about your plans for next year, I think it’s time we put an hour on our calendars to discuss my proposed strategy further and determine if it is right for you.”

The most important part of the word “salespeople” is people. When a prospect purchases a product, they’re banking on the fact that a human will be there to provide insights and help them reach their goals. Sometimes, though, it can feel as if a prospect is dealing with a scripted rep, which might derail the deal. Instead of using robotic phrases like the above, throw the script away, and personalize your message.

Remember, you can’t automate a relationship.

Ever feel like you’re in a content rut? Feel like you finally have a great content marketing strategy, but you need some inspiration to kick-start your creativity? Trust us, we’ve been there before. Some days we can’t wait to jump into the content calendar and pour our ideas onto the pages. Other days … not so much.

For days that look a little more like the latter than the former, check out our handy list of 101 content ideas to add to your editorial calendar. For each idea, we try to include some insight, guidance, how-tos, or even links to additional resources we hope will help you along the way.

1. Lists

Lists are a tried-and-true content marketing favorite. You love them. We love them. But, most importantly, readers love them. In fact, some of the most popular content on the Convince & Convert blog is in the form of lists. Just take a look at “25 Best University Websites for 2019” as an example.

2. How-To

How-to content offers step-by-step, process-driven information to help your audience do something better. It’s specific and to the point. As a bonus, how-to content is naturally Youtility-based content, meaning that it helps instead of hypes, so it’s going to do a great job of building affinity. Really, it’s win-win for both your audiences and you brand.

And just like list articles, there is a ton of how-to content on Convince & Convert’s blog, like “How to Build a Content Calendar (Plus a Free Template)” or “How to Manage a Social Media Crisis.”

3. Questions and Answers (Q&As)

Q&As are fantastic because they’re genuinely helpful. We can take the questions our audiences are already asking us and turn out great content just by answering them. Oh, and Q&As can be incredibly entertaining. Just look at how WIRED does their Autocomplete Interviews, which is where celebrities and other public figures answer questions in the form of Google’s Autocomplete feature.

4. Why

“Why” content explains in detail how something came into existence, or more generally, why things are the way they are. It can be extremely powerful when combined with fact-driven information, or even a controversial flare.

Just take a look at Co-Schedule’s “Why People Share” post, which was based on research and has received a ton of shares and comments since its original publish date.

5. Topic Archaeology/Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO has changed so much over the years. While focusing on target keywords was a hugely successful tactic in the past, Google’s all about semantic search today. Instead of prioritizing content around keywords, focus on uncovering hidden content opportunities instead with our Topic Archaeology process, which focuses on assessing opportunity by looking at a variety of channels, not just keyword volume.

6. Case Studies

You don’t have to tell your story all by yourself. Case studies tell the story of how you’ve helped your customers solve their problems—and they can be extremely influential in helping prospects make a purchase decision.

7. Testimonials

Testimonials are very similar to case studies, except that a specific customer of yours tells the story directly from their perspective. These are their own words—a form of word of mouth—that you use to inspire interest in your company, products, or services.

8. Quotes

Think of quotes as short-form testimonials. Alternatively, you can use quotes from influencers to complement your content—which works particularly well in shareable graphics embedded in your content.

9. Interviews

While interviews may be an avenue to gather testimonials and quotes, you may also use them for gathering insight from industry influencers you may have never met before. Late night shows are famous for their interview content, and an easy way to incorporate that into your content marketing is through podcasts.

10. Demos

Demos are a virtual show-and-tell for your product or service. While some demos can take up to an hour, and many users just don’t have that kind of time or attention span, you can always break demos down into shorter snippets, kind of like chapters in a book.

11. Product Review

Have a product you love that you think your audience will really dig? Do a review of it, telling your audience how it’s helped you solve your challenges, and how you think it’ll help them out, too.

12. Comparisons and “Versus” Content

You may see this a lot for product reviews, comparing one product to another. However, you can apply this storytelling tactic in many different ways to compare or contrast topics to help your audience learn the better option to pursue.

13. Company News

Just like the news in 2020, your company is ever-changing, too. Share your latest adventures with your audience to show your business is made of humans who are dedicated to making their lives even better every single day. Even silly, simple news can help your customers feel a connection with your company.

14. Industry News

Monitor your or your customers’s industry and report on the biggest news that may likely make an impact. Your audience will notice when you are the first to market with great news consistently. Just take a look at the growth of blogs like The Next Web.

15. Roundups

Roundups: the content of choice for marketers who may not have a ton of time on their hands. Simply take a look at the most popular and impactful content in your industry, and compile a comprehensive list for your audience to save them from doing the research themselves.

16. Book Reviews

If your continuing education is anything like mine, you’re reading new material constantly to stay ahead of the curve. When you read something amazing that your customers will love, share it with your audience.

Convince & Convert’s own Jay Baer actually does this quite a bit:

17. Opinions and Rants

Controversy is one of the ways to publish viral content. Now, that shouldn’t be your goal, but rants have the potential to be super-interesting. Take a stance on a popular belief, and turn it on its head.

18. Metaphors

Try writing content that begins with an unrelated story and includes a unique angle as the foundation of the content. There is too much “How To Write A Blog Post” out there but not enough “What My Stubborn, Opinionated Grandma Could Teach You About Writing An Awesome Blog Post”.

19. Personal Stories

When Greg Digneo laid out his life story on Copyblogger, the audience responded. He told the story of why quitting was the most profitable thing he’s ever done, and it was super-inspiring for tons of other readers. Connect the dots between your personal story and what your readers really care about, and they’ll eat it up.

20. Predictions

Joe Pulizzi is notorious for making content marketing predictions. They’re always interesting, and he jokes about them when they don’t come to fruition. So he gets to become a thought leader while also showing his humanity—creating a personal and somewhat humorous connection with his readers—all at once.

21. Successes

You’ seen these awesome headlines from folks like Neil Patel and Brian Dean: Tell your audience how either you or someone you know was successful using the tactics you recommend.

22. Failures and What Not to Do

Just as successes are fun for your audience to read, outlining techniques that don’tt work well is also interesting because there is an element of controversy to this type of content that people crave. Turn a generally-accepted-as-true idea into a lie, and people will read. This is also one content area that I am fortunately and unfortunately very familiar with, as evidenced by my COO article, Failure: The Ultimate Content F-Word.

23.  Company Goals

Groove has caught the attention of our friends at CoSchedule, because they’ve laid out exactly how they want to grow their business and give reports on their progress. The best part is that their blog reflects it, too.

Every post seems like a story on their blog that helps you understand how they’re reaching their goals all while drawing you in to become a customer. It’s a brilliant, bold, and super-unique type of content.

24. Transparency

Similar to Groove’s blatant outlining of its goals, transparency in the form of open information on your business’ financials and growth in general can build trust with your audience. Buffer does this well with its “Open” blog, telling their story as a startup while building a connection with their audience.

25. Research

Your customers and audience are a perfect source for your own research. Become the source for industry research and studies. Speaking from our own experience at Convince & Convert (see our Instagram for Tourism report), research helps you understand your audience better than ever while helping you become a credible and respected source in your industry.

26. Facts and Stats

Similar to research, this is when you heavily research a topic with existing studies and present the findings to your audience. This can save you a bit of time from doing the research yourself, while also helping you become the go-to source that has compiled all of the information available on a specific topic.

27. Guides

Guides dive deep into detail on a topic to help your audience do something better than ever before. Some awesome guides use the skyscraper technique to provide more robust information than any other source.

28. Worksheets

Worksheets are perfect for turning the actionable advice from guides into printable materials for note-taking, brainstorming, and ideation. Think about elementary school and your teacher’s handouts for homework—it’s the same thing, just helping your audience work through the material you’re helping them learn.

29. Checklists

Checklists are a type of worksheet that helps your audience follow a step-by-step process to achieve a desired outcome. Think about using checklists to complement list posts, for example.

30. Templates

Templates may combine information from guides, worksheets, and checklists all into one type of content to walk your audience through a step-by-step process, blatantly telling your users how to do something.

Our own Content Calendar Template is one of the most popular pieces of content on our website and helps support our lead generation goals. Check it out.

31. Tear Sheets

One of the most-downloaded pieces of content at CoSchedule is a tear sheet compiling a massive list of emotional words that help people using their headline analyzer get even better scores for their content. Think of this as a quick-glance document to help your audience do something better, faster.

32. E-Books

Ebooks are a perfect way to round up individual posts as chapters in a larger content format. Make ebooks to provide long-form content that tells a bigger, more comprehensive story.

33. Audio Books

Now that you’ve written your ebook, complement it with an audio version for your auditory learners. Adding an audio element to your content increases engagement and time spent interacting with content. See how adding audio articles (not quite audio books, but similar) to our own site increased time on site.

34. White Papers

Used to provide robust technical information, white papers are perfect for telling complex stories in a concise format, often appearing as PDFs. They are also a perfect format to complement case studies to show the problem, solution, and outcome of how you help your customers overcome their challenges.

35. Infographics

Some of your audience’s learning styles lean heavily toward visual content. Infographics help tell a story by showing key statistics, facts, and short-form text in a visual format.

36. Data Visuals

Bring research-intensive content to life with data visuals, like pie charts, bar graphs, line graphs, and more to prove the points you’re making throughout your content.

37. Listicle Infographic Summaries

Infographics are a great way to visually surface big points in content. These visuals work extremely well to draw attention on pretty much any channel you can think of. Here’s an example of an infographic we created for the release of Jay Baer and Daniel Lemin’s book, Talk Triggers.

38. Diagrams

Sometimes, a complex pattern is best told in a visual way as a symbolic representation of information. Diagrams are awesome for demonstrating relationships and organizational flows.

39. Posters

Did you know that posters date back to the mid-nineteenth century? Even in our digital age, posters can still work. Offer them as digital downloads, or consider printing them off for in-person events or conferences.

40. Photography

Thankfully, stock photography has gotten much, much better over the years, but custom photography is alway the first choice for the best results. Also, be sure your photography shows the faces and places where you work and the humans behind the scenes at your company.

41. Memes

Sure, sometimes these have no business value at all. However, humor and entertainment is one of the main reasons people share content on social media. When you want to show a little personality in content like a blog post, memes get the point across with a little flare.

42. Comics and Cartoons

Humor gets your point across in a memorable way. But not all comics or cartoons need to be funny, necessarily. Hand-drawn or even computer-generated cartoons can tell a step-by-step story, too.

43. Screenshots

Ah, screenshots—one of the best ways to show examples of digital content to prove your point. Social Media Examiner almost exclusively relies on screenshots to complement their blog posts, including one in at least every five paragraphs to break the monotony of text.

44. Animated GIFs

Animated GIFs take screenshots to the next level. These work super well for complementing demo content to show how something works or how to use a new feature on your website, blog, or in your software.

45. Illustrations

The CoSchedule content marketing blog uses tons of illustrations to highlight the main points of their articles. An illustrated post of theirs even turned humorous by featuring a unicorn with the headline, 5 Unicorns Of Refreshingly Unique Marketing That Will Make You Stand Out. Illustrations create visual interest in your content and make for some very shareable graphics.

46. Hand-Written Notes, Sketches, and Brainstorms

Some solo marketers may not have the luxury of a designer on hand. There are times when images of sketches, written notes, and brainstorms work well to illustrate your concepts.

47. Texts, Short Message Service (SMS), Web Push, and Push Notifications

Texts work for some businesses to share content, while others may opt for mobile push notifications from tools like Pushbullet. Or maybe your audiences could benefit from website push notifications from tools like PushPros.com?

48. Emails

Sometimes, it’ best to just go back to basics. Emails work, and they work incredibly well, especially when content fits the medium. In fact, according to a recent report, email generates $38 for every $1 spent, making it one of the most effective channels and types of content available.

49. Courses

Courses are a great way to create content dedicated to education. We would even add workshops to this category, too. Convince & Convert is no stranger to offering content marketing courses, and we know first hand how valuable they are for growing your email list and building a community around your brand.

 

50. Certification Programs

When you find courses work well for your business, certification programs take them to the next level. Imagine even more robust courses that provide your students with homework, tests, and certificates of completion. Make your students feel special with exclusive membership in a special network.

51. Marketing Automation

Courses often run on marketing automation, but there are even more ways to use it. Marketing automation, at its core, involves sending emails to your audience after they complete a specific action. It works extremely well when coupled with new signups (whether it’s email subscribers or customer conversions) to onboard them and keep them engaged.

52. Newsletters

Most newsletters work well through email, though now printed newsletters may be a way to stand out from the crowd, since only .5% of bloggers include printed newsletters in their content strategy.

53. Websites and Web Pages

We’re pretty sure we don’t have to go into too much detail on this one. Just make sure to tailor your messages to answer the WIIFM (what’s in it for me?) for your customers, and you’re set.

54. Landing Pages

Like websites, we’re pretty sure you’re all up to speed on landing pages. We like to use landing pages a lot for specific content campaigns.

55. Feature Pages

Some people talk about feature pages interchangeably with landing pages, but we like to think of feature pages as deep-dives into the details. Target these more toward the benefits of how your offering solves your customers’ challenges.

56. Microsites

When AT&T addressed a huge social problem with texting and driving accidents, they launched a microsite to complement the social media campaign #itcanwait. The site is a great outlet for information on the campaign, only more targeted than if they included the information on AT&T’s own website.

Pro Tip: Supporting social causes is a fantastic way to create shareable content.

57. News Releases and Pitches

While news and press releases themselves are targeted more at journalists and editors who write publications your audience loves to read, the idea here is to get coverage in influential publications to reach your audience.

58. Pitch Packets

Pitch packets are sort of like public relations gift baskets that are specifically themed around what you’re pitching. For example, when I worked at philosophy (the skincare and cosmetic company), they were launching a brand-new perfume that had slightly effervescent, champagne quality to it. Their pitch packet to each targeted media outlet contained a full-sized bottle of the yet-to-be-released perfume, a marketing piece about the perfume, and a mini bottle of Veuve Clicquot.

59. Public Service Announcements (PSAs)

Yes, seriously. PSAs are great, and you can actually have some fun with them. Make them animated, get special guests, deliver important information in lighthearted ways—the opportunities are endless.

60. Awards

Whether it’s awards for your customers, suppliers, or even your industry in general, these are a powerful way to show you’re listening and supportive. And the folks who receive your recognition? You can bet they’ll share it with their networks, too.

61. Polls

Ever have that feeling when you just want to know your audience’s opinion on something? Polls are great for a quick, one-question dialogue to get you the information you need. Ask a question to get information on upcoming content ideas to create even better content based on your audience’s advice.

62. Surveys

Surveys are perfect for gathering data you can use in research-based content. They’re also great for getting to know your audience’s needs, so you can create even better content. Use surveys when your readers and customers sign up and unsubscribe to understand areas where you can improve.

63. Quizzes

Quizzes complement courses super well and are a fantastic way to teach your audience something and measure what they’ve learned. You can use them for data points, but these are best used simply for engagement.

64. Games and Gamification

If your content marketing includes education, entertainment, or social causes, how can you turn your content into a game? Games are terrific for engagement with an interactive element.

65. Web Apps and Tools

When CoSchedule found out that nearly 800 bloggers and marketers searched for the term “headline analyzer,” and that there wasn’t a great solution for them, they decided to research 1 million headlines in their database to build a tool that would help them write better headlines. It’s their #1 driver for new email subscribers.

66. Voice-Activated Content

From Alexa to Google and more, voice-activated content and apps literally surround us, yet it’s so often overlooked when we think of creating content. Instead of optimizing like we would for search engines, we need to optimize for conversation, because we don’t say, “Hey, Google. Time now.” Instead, we say, “Hey, Google. What time is it?” It’s a whole different way of thinking about how users engage with our content, and how we answer their questions in return.

67. Plugins

When CoSchedule launched a Click To Tweet WordPress plugin, they found an opportunity to help their audience enable their readers to share content directly inline in blog posts. It was also a terrific way to add “Powered By CoSchedule” to more than 10,000 blogs.

68. Contests

By now, everyone is familiar with the Lay’s Do Us A Flavor contest, which used social interactions as votes to choose a new flavor of potato chip that would be created. Your contests can be as simple as replies or likes on social media, or as elaborate as the Lay’s contest. If you go the Lay’s route, be prepared for some … interesting submissions.

69. Challenges

Challenges are like contests, except that it’s up to each individual reader to compete with themselves to improve. Think about 30-day challenges where you can provide your readers one thing to do every day to build a new skill.

70. Video

Video is one of those content types that every brand should be investing in and creating, but they’re not. If there’s one thing social media platforms have been telling us over and over again, it’s that video consistently generates more engagement, and they prioritize video content in our audiences’ newsfeeds. To be honest, video is really not a nice-to-have content type any more. It’s a must-have. See the video marketing statistics you need to know for more proof.

71. Paid Social Media

There are so many ways to better reach your audiences on social media, thanks to paid advertising. From sponsored posts, to dark social, to paid ad placement, social media has just given old-school advertising a new place to spend. Remarketing is also a great option for targeting those who have visited your website or even certain posts.

72. Sponsorships

Sponsorships are on the rise for content marketers to fund events, podcasts, webinars, and more to reach new audiences. Some larger brands even sponsor sports leagues and teams to connect with their audiences.

73. Native Advertising

Native advertising is content that appears in a publication of some kind—blog posts, magazine articles—that a brand pays for. Sometimes, brands even write the content themselves instead of the publication’s own journalists. Native ads look just like normal content and may contain disclaimers to inform readers they’re looking at messaging a brand pays for.

74. Advertorials

Like native advertising, advertorials are content that appear in publications as ads. These are common in newspapers and magazines—more print types of content. These ads often include more text that is similar to an article, but is clearly not mixed in with traditional content.

75. Magazines

While they might be a rare sight these days, printed magazines can be a terrific format to reach audiences who don’t constantly stare at a screen (plus, they’re easy to repurpose as digital publications).

76. Reports

This is a perfect format for sharing your custom data. Reports often include graphs, charts, and text you can repurpose into other content formats, too.

77. Digital Brochures

A classic: The digital brochure offers specific information on your business or specific services or features you offer.

78. Fliers

Fliers are perfect for quick take-along content, usually well-suited for physical promotion for events. However, if you design them correctly, you can easily repurpose them for online posts and publishing.

79. Webinars

2020 has turned into the year of the webinar, but that’s because it’s a great format to deliver content. Training and demos are well-suited for webinars, and they’re also a terrific way to build your email list with subscribers.

80. Virtual Events

On second thought, maybe 2020 has actually turned into the year of the virtual event? A lot of traditionally in-person events have had to move online this year, but that doesn’t mean that the content has suffered at all. Just make sure to download our free 11 Ways to Win with Virtual Events guide first!

 

81. Event Replays

Record your webinars and virtual events to provide videos of the content after the events are over. This is a great way to repurpose the hard work you put into a form of content that exists only momentarily to get the most bang for your buck.

82. Conferences and Workshops

While online events may be easier to coordinate (since anyone from around the world has the opportunity to present and attend), physical conferences and workshops are an excellent avenue of training and networking. We have a feeling that 2021 and beyond will see a fierce and enthusiastic return to in-person events.

 

83. Meetups

Less formal than traditional conferences, Meetups provide an opportunity to connect with others in your industry, often localized to specific cities or communities. This is a perfect way to meet your local audience, and several have even moved online.

84. Live-Streaming Video

For any event, live streaming helps marketers bring in-person events to online audiences in real-time.

85. Presentations

SlideShare is still a good place to plant all those decks you create for your webinars and events, although it’s not the only place you should be posting them. Don’t forget you can also write a blog post and embed the presentation into the post as supporting content.

86. Podcasts

Podcasts have taken a slight dip, now that commute times are way down, but they’re still a great option and content format. They work well for interviews and, as Joe Pulizzi mentioned once in his “This Old Marketing” podcast, they are likely to attract an audience of near-customers when you post them regularly. (If you haven’t already, check out our own podcast, Social Pros social media podcast.)

87. Live Chats

Whether you invest in a chat bot or you have a real, live person proving real-time customer service to website visitors, live chat is a great opportunity for you to connect with your audience and answer their questions. It’s also a terrific way to gather content ideas directly from your audience.

88. Blog Posts

Well, this one was bound to come up sooner or later! Just make sure you’re not creating random acts of content, and your blog addresses both your audiences’ needs and your business objectives.

89. Vlog Posts

I always love a good portmanteau and some great videos. Vlogs check both of those boxes. Vlogs are also great ways to complement normal blog posts.

90. Audio Articles

We actually just recently started adding audio articles — audio versions of every post on the Convince & Convert website. Like podcasts, this is a terrific way to connect with an audience who is constantly on-the-go or would rather just listen to the audio version of an article.

91. Photo Galleries

Especially useful for showing portfolios and company culture, photo galleries are a hub designed to help you share visual content. Other uses could include infographics.

92. Content Libraries

CoSchedule includes a guide, template, e-book, infographic, or worksheet of some kind in all of their posts. So they decided to build a content resource hub to share all of the bonus materials they create in exchange for an email address. It’s another great list-building technique that their audience also find incredibly helpful.

93. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Like Q&As, FAQs are great for answering your audience’s questions. Those questions typically concern your product or service and may be technical in nature, though you could expand this to your industry in general to target highly searched terms and provide the answers.

Pro tip: Check out our formula for content marketing success, which uses your customers’ most frequently asked questions.

94. Content Hubs for Curated Content

You can complement your own content with the best content from other experts in your industry with curated content hubs. Tools like Uberflip are great ways to share awesome content with your audience that you may not have published yourself

95. Guest Posts, Podcasts, Webinars, and Videos

Publishing all of this content on your own platforms? Why not share your knowledge to introduce your brand to new audiences by writing or recording content for other awesome resources in your industry? Guesting for others with content types like blog posts, podcasts, webinars, and videos is a great way to expand your existing audience..

96. Content Syndication and Republishing

If you just published some awesome content on your blog, there’s a good chance other blogs in your industry will gladly accept and republish your content on their blogs, too. It’s called content syndication or republishing—a great way to maximize the work you’re currently doing to help you reach a larger audience.

97. Twitter Chats

Content Marketing Institute holds a weekly Twitter chat, to help connect with their followers. And it’s a simple social media event you can do, too. Just let your audience know you’ll be asking some questions at a specific time, and invite them to participate in the conversation. All they have to do is use the specific hashtag you define for your chat.

98. User-Generated Content

Why user-generated content? Well, for starters, Hootsuite notes that “Consumers are 2.4 times more likely to view user-generated content as authentic compared to content created by brands.” Also, creating strong content partnerships can open your brand up to an entirely new audience that otherwise would have taken a ton of time and a lot of resources to reach. Just remember that when asking for UGC, be specific with your content request, always ask for permission, and always give credit back to the creator.

99. Blog and Social Comments

Blog and social media comments are an awesome way to connect with others in your industry, provide your business’ insight, and even link back to your content (when done well). Just remember that no one likes a salesperson at a party, so make sure you’re jumping in on the right conversations, in the right ways

100. Influencer Programs

According to Tomoson, 51% of marketers believe they get better customers and build stronger audiences from influencer marketing. That’s because the relationship begins with trust in the influencer. But don’t make the mistake in thinking that the bigger the influencer, the better the results. Instead, look for micro-influencers who have a dedicated yet active and loyal following.

101. Ask Me Anything (AMAs)

This type of content combines forums, up-vote communities, and FAQs into a social event where you help your audience ask questions which you then answer. Popular marketing communities like Inbound.org are well-known for examples of this type of content.

When you’re ready to calendar all those great new ideas…

Ok. So now that you have all of these great, new, amazing content ideas, now what? Head on over to one of our other favorite blog posts, How to Build a Content Calendar, and take a deep dive into how you can easily build a more successful editorial calendar and score with completely free content calendar template while you’re there.

This post was originally written by Nathan Ellering in 2015, and extensively updated by Anna Hrach, Digital Strategist here at Convince & Convert, in 2020.

The post 101 Content Ideas to Add to Your Editorial Calendar appeared first on Content Marketing Consulting and Social Media Strategy.

Using the “Eavesdrop Effect” to Get Ideal Clients written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Marketing Podcast with Dov Gordon

Getting clients can seem like the hardest work an entrepreneur can do. Getting the right clients, well that can feel like scaling a mountain.

But, working with clients that appreciate the value you bring, expect to pay a premium and see you as a trusted advisor and collaborator is the best way to build a business that serves your life.

In my experience, the idea of working solely with ideal clients takes a bit of a mind shift. First you have to believe it’s possible – then you have to believe you deserve it.

My guest for this week’s episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is Dov Gordon. Dov helps consultants, coaches and other experts build a steady, consistent, predictable flow of ideal clients. We talk about ideal clients, how to identify them, and where to find them using an approach he calls the “eavesdrop effect.”

Questions I ask Dov:

• How did you become a business consultant?
• What is the “Eavesdrop Effect?”
• How do you finally convert a potential client you may already have as a lead?

What you’ll learn if you give a listen:

• Why ideal clients are so critical to find for every business
• How self-esteem can help you in attracting new clients
• How to reach a point in your business to where you can say no to a perspective client

You can download Dov’s guide How to Systematically and Consistently Attract First-Rate Clients here.

We’re onto the next step in Account Based Sales Development: selecting your accounts. Now that you have cleaned your data, you are ready to select your accounts.

This is an opportunity for sales development and marketing to come together to collectively decide the fate of your sales development effort. In most organizations, marketing is frothing at the mouth for someone in sales development to ask for help identifying the accounts that matter the most. Not only would this make their year, but it would also give you a partner with all sorts of resources to help you.

In fact, I am so confident that they would be willing to help you, that you can copy/paste this email to your marketing team and ask for their help. If you don’t get a 100% positive response, please let me know!

Subject: Account alignment?

Email Body:

We were looking at an Account-Based Sales Development strategy for 2016, and SalesLoft (who is producing awesome content to help inspire and guide us through this journey) is suggesting that we reach out to marketing to discuss our segmentation strategy, so that we can align on the top accounts.

Can we set up 15 minutes to discuss the Account Based Sales Development strategy, and see how we can work together to develop this list for our reps to target?

By the way, on January 13th, they are teaming up with DemandBase to discuss the topic of ABSD and marketing alignment. Maybe our groups should attend to get some fodder?

Alright, so some of the email is self-serving — but we LOVE this topic and believe it is going to rock your world and set you on a path of a higher-performing sales development team.

Now, let’s get down to business. Here are the 3 ways that you should go about developing your account segmentation strategy:

1. Industry
2. Role
3. Use Cases

Step 1: Selecting Your Industry

TOPO does some amazing work on ideal client profiles and buyer personas — I encourage you to check them out. And when it comes to account segmentation, I am a big believer in starting with industry. Why? Well, the goal of any industry segmentation is to identify industries that have similar needs and wants.

Keep in mind that this topic of industry segmentation is HUGE. There are organizations that specialize in segmentation, and many books written on the topic. I, however, am going to give you the poor man’s version of industry segmentation — I call it the Risk/Reward Model. It’s so simple, even I can do it! Here are some questions that you should consider answering when diving into the Risk/Reward Model:

1. What industries represent the LARGEST opportunity for your organization (in terms of both dollars and number of companies)? For example, the medical device market is huge dollar market, however, it is also led by a few large organizations.
2. What industries represent the HIGHEST opportunity for winning? This is a great opportunity to look into a few sub-questions:
   • Where is your revenue coming from?
   • Where is your current pipeline coming from?
   • What is your win-rate in each industry? (nice place to find “sleeper cells”)
   • What industries are visiting your website, engaging your brand, downloading content etc

After you answer these questions, you can map out those industries across 9 quadrants across Risk and Reward. Start with the industry that offers the highest reward and the least amount of risk.  To break it down, the green zone represents primary industries (yes), the yellow zone represents secondary industries (maybe), and the red zone represents tertiary industries (no).

Take the 1-2 of those industries and put them to side, then move on to identifying roles.

Step 2: Identify Roles

I’m a big fan of leveraging the ideal client profile to identify roles — but there is a catch. Depending on what you are selling, you might have a committee sell, so you don’t want to ignore your buyer persona. If you are not confident in who your ideal client profile is — no worries — just test by utilizing the following method.

Similar to the industry Risk/Reward model, start by compiling a list of your ideal client profiles and buyer personas, then get together as a group and discuss each one.

NOTE: This is a great exercise in gaining alignment on who you should be targeting with your sales emails and dialing efforts.

Now, when you create this list, put it together by DEPARTMENT and TITLE. Here is an example list of Operation:

1. Operations – VP
2. Operations – Director
3. Operations Quality – Manager
4. Operations Continuous Improvement – Manager
5. Operations – business analyst

Now that you have narrowed down your industry and roles to target, let’s discuss the use case. Again, this topic is large and will vary widely on your target account and role and what your specific value is but I am going to go ahead and offer you up a simple way to normalize your use case in order to align on which use cases that your team will be pitching when they target an account.

As a [TARGET ROLE] in the [INDUSTRY], I am  [STATED PROBLEM/VALUE THAT YOU SOLVE] so that [WHAT IS THE BENEFIT or STATED OUTCOME OF YOUR SOLUTION]

Once you build an exhaustive list of use cases — overlay the use cases with the selected industry and roles that offer the greatest reward with the least amount of risk. As you think about the reward and risk of the use cases here are a few questions to discuss with your team:

1. Which use cases can you absolutely crush your competitors on today! (Low risk/Should be high reward)
2. Which use cases would be killer to solve but you either don’t have the subject matter expertise or capability set to win? (High risk/High reward)
3. Which use cases are understandable by your ideal industry in 30 seconds or less? HINT: If you are not sure, go test!

Sound easy? It should be! But the important takeaway from this exercise is that you use it as a way to collaborate with your marketing partners on arriving at your account target list. And, when in doubt — test it out!

Good luck on your journey of Account Based Sales Development. Please share us your stories and lessons learned so we can all learn together!

The post Account Based Sales Development: Selecting Your Accounts appeared first on SalesLoft.

We could be hearing a lot more stories like this. Big stories.

On Tuesday night Moody's became the first ratings house to downgrade Asia's largest commodity trader, Noble Group, to junk.

In its decision, it cited the potential for a prolonged slump in commodities prices and concerns about Noble Group's liquidity.

Noble Group's stock fell 10% on the news, and has now fallen 61% in the last year.

Consider this a strong sign that the rout in the commodities market has entered a new phase. This is when the pressure starts to hit the biggest players in the corporate sector.

It is brutal in the commodities business right now, and some smaller companies have already defaulted.

But it is the impact of the commodity price collapse on bigger companies, such as Noble Group, Glencore and Anglo American, and commodity exporting countries like Brazil, which has the potential to be really destructive and grab the business world's attention. 

Kit Juckes, an analyst at Societe Generale, wrote that in this new phase survival "will be about how the corporate sector reacts to weaker income in the longer run (some will be more resilient than others and some will fail), while at the macro level commodity exporters’ governments will also react."

He continued; "It’s these second round effects of lower commodity prices that may dominate in 2016."

The Bloomberg commodities index is down 25% so far for 2015, and it's hard to see when demand for anything from oil to coal to copper will rise again. This is the end of the "commodities supercycle."

An unholy mess

Noble isn't the only commodities trader suffering in this environment, but it has internal problems that make it more vulnerable than its peers.

Short sellers like Muddy Waters have been accusing the company of playing accounting tricks for some time. Moody's, S&P and Fitch have all had a negative outlook on the company's credit since this summer.  

"We think the company is deeply loss making and that's reflected in their cash flow," said analyst Gillem Tulloch, founder of GMT Research, in an interview with Bloomberg TV back in August.

Tulloch said that a lot of the profit Noble books comes from fair value gains and projects that haven't been completed. Once the company's creditors start to doubt the company, he said, Noble's will face a liquidity squeeze.

Noble's CEO, Yusuf Alireza, has denied these allegations and says that Noble's pain is one that is being felt across the industry. To illustrate his point, he commissioned a report explaining Noble's cash position from PWC and held a public forum on the matter.

In response to the pain the industry is feeling at large, he's started selling off Noble assets for cash. 

"The stock has slumped not because our core investors are selling, the stock has slumped because we have a short seller attack on the stock," he told Bloomberg TV, also back in August. 

Alireza also said at the time that his company didn't need an investment grade to continue to do business. His peers don't have one, he pointed out. He also said at the time that a credit rating cut was "not something that even is on the cards."

It looks like there will be a more nasty surprises for as long as commodity prices stay low. 

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: JIM CRAMER: 'YOU SHOW UP AND THAT'S THE REVENGE'

Complete the sentence, “The purpose of selling is to…….”

When I ask sales people and managers that question, the responses vary but generally fit into one of the categories below:

…to make my/our numbers.

…to sell our company’s solutions and products.

…to achieve our revenue and growth goals.

…to grow our company.

Those are all outcomes of being successful in selling, but what’s absent in each of those perspectives?

It’s pretty easy to recognize, it’s the customer. All the responses are very self-centered, focused on what we want to achieve.

We take it for granted, but without a customer, we can’t sell. Until a customer buys, we can never achieve any of the outcomes outlined above.

Turn the question around, put yourself in a customer’s shoes, finish the sentence, “The purpose of buying is to ……”

…help us address and solve a problem.

…help us address opportunities we’ve not been able to address in the past.

…help us become more efficient and reduce operational expense.

…help us better serve our customers and address their needs/requirements.

…help us improve our quality.

Our customers are buying, not just to buy but to achieve something.

At this point, I’m probably eliciting a yawn, or a reaction something like, “What’s the point, Dave?”

The point is not earthshaking, but it’s really about the disconnect in perspectives, purpose, and objectives between sellers and buyers. Until we resolve this disconnect, we sales people will always struggle to achieve our goals. We need to be completing the sentence, The purpose of selling is to help our customers address and solve problems. The purpose of selling is to help our customers address opportunities they’ve not been able to address in the past. You can figure out the rest.

Selling requires buying (Duugghhhh). But if our focus is on what we achieve, then we have lost that vital partner that enables us to achieve our goals–so we can never reach them.

As simplistic as this seems, it transforms the relationship we have with customers, It transforms who we engage, how we engage, and what we achieve through them.

First, it forces us to focus on customers who have problems we can solve. Spending time with anyone else is a waste of both their and our time.

Second, it forces us to focus on customers who have a recognized need to change and do something. If they don’t have a compelling need to change, they have no reason to buy. Often our role is to create and get them to recognize that compelling need to change. We may do that through providing insight, talking about what others in the industry are doing, helping them understand and recognize they must address certain issues to achieve their goals.

We make selling far too difficult buy focusing only on selling. Frankly, I’m too lazy to do that—it’s too much work. It’s so much easier if we recognize the buyer, helping them achieve what they want to do.

Take a moment, reflect on your immediate response to the challenge to complete the sentence, “The purpose of selling is to…..”

If your response didn’t have the words, “help my customer….” then you will always struggle to achieve your goals.

Figure out what you need to do to embrace the customer and what they want to achieve. Things get much easier.

Although paid search is our primary focus here at WordStream, we (along with almost every other company these days) are also in the media business. Purely by virtue of having a blog, we’re constantly looking at ways to not only optimize our content’s performance, but improve the content itself.

Since content is such a big part of what we do here at WordStream, we wanted to look back at our content marketing advice and collect it all into one, invaluable post. However, we weren’t “content” (pun most definitely intended) to focus on our content marketing advice from 2015, but rather the very best content-related content from the entirety of the WordStream blog.

So here we are – the best content marketing advice we have to offer. Whether you’re a seasoned blogger with strong traffic or a fledgling newbie with a small (yet beautiful), brand-new blog, you’ll find plenty of actionable advice you can use immediately in these 13 tips and strategies.

13. Only Publish Your Very Best Material – and Be Consistent

With so much content being produced, competition in today’s so-called “attention economy” has never been more intense. As such, it’s vital that you only publish the very best content possible, or you can’t possibly hope to succeed. It’s better to publish one excellent post per week than five mediocre posts per week.

Not only do you have to set the quality bar incredibly high, but you also have to keep meeting (or exceeding) this standard. This can be a challenge for even the most experienced content production teams, but it’s essential in standing out from an increasingly large crowd and making your voice heard. Accept that producing exceptional content takes time, effort, and money – and that there are no shortcuts.

For more advice on how to stand out in an increasingly competitive crowd, check out this post on 11 of the biggest content marketing challenges and how to overcome them.

12. Evaluate the Success of Your Content with Data

One of the most common misconceptions about content marketing is that simply by publishing blog posts, your business will magically take off and you’ll be besieged by armies of eager prospective customers clamoring for whatever you sell. Unfortunately, this is rarely the case. Smart content marketers don’t just produce excellent content, but also know how to measure the results of their efforts.

Some bloggers are content to glance at the number of social shares their latest post has accrued and make a judgment call on its success based on that. However, even the most widely shared blog post may fall short of achieving your business goals. What do you want your content to actually accomplish, and how will you measure it?

Whatever you want your content to do, it’s crucial that you evaluate the performance of your content using analytics and other data-driven approaches – otherwise you could be wasting your time and money on content that isn’t doing anything for your business. For some, success might be measured in overall traffic using Google Analytics. For others, social shares or “attention metrics” such as scroll depth might be more important, a metric that can be measured by tools such as Chartbeat.

However – and whatever – you measure, be sure you’re actually assessing the performance of your content consistently to ensure your time and money are being used wisely and productively. For more advice on content marketing metrics and how to measure them, read this in-depth guide by WordStream Founder and CTO, Larry Kim.

11. Repurpose Your Content

The best content takes time, effort, and skill to produce. Even if you’re giving away your best content for free (which you should be), that doesn’t mean you can’t get a greater return on investment from your content. This is why so many businesses repurpose content from one format into several.

Think of the last blog post you published that performed strongly. Did it resonate with readers because it served as a valuable, evergreen resource? Did it offer your audience something they couldn’t find anywhere else? Then it would probably do well as a downloadable guide. Similarly, some blog posts might be well-suited to an email blast, or a live webinar. However you choose to repurpose your content, be sure you’re getting your money’s worth from your content production investment.

10. Reuse Your Best Headlines in PPC Ads

If you’re running a PPC campaign and producing content, you should also consider repurposing your most strongly performing headlines into your ad copy. If a headline resonated strongly with your readers, a variation of it will likely resonate strongly with prospective buyers.

If you think about it, PPC ad copy and content share a lot of the same “hooks,” such as an emotionally engaging angle, strong verbs, and easily understood benefits. They’re also similar (or should be) in length – AdWords and Bing Ads have mandatory character limits in their ads that advertisers have no choice but to follow, while shorter headlines of around six words tend to perform strongly from a content perspective.

If a recent blog post, webinar, or whitepaper exceeded your expectations, run an A/B test to see if it performs as strongly as an ad.

9. Accept That Not All Content HAS to Tell a Story

One of my biggest pet peeves about the content marketing industry is the focus on storytelling. Don’t get me wrong – I firmly believe that storytelling is a crucial skill for aspiring (and even experienced) content marketers to cultivate, and that brand storytelling is one of the most effective ways to reach prospective new customers with your message.

However, that doesn’t mean that all content is storytelling, or that all content marketers are storytellers.

You are not a storyteller – Stefan Sagmeister @ FITC from FITC on Vimeo.

Not all content has to tell a story. Sometimes, a straightforward blog post that serves a purpose and provides value for your readers is more than enough. Oftentimes, the people who talk the most (and loudest) about storytelling in content marketing are those who either don’t do it, or don’t understand it. Don’t listen to these people, and don’t worry if you’re not a natural-born storyteller – it’s far from a prerequisite for content marketing success.

Don’t shy away from telling stories if that’s what makes the most sense for your content, but don’t buy into the hype that every single piece of content has to be an engaging, complex narrative – it simply isn’t true.

8. Be Bold and Speak Your Mind (Especially When Others Don’t Dare)

One of the biggest challenges facing content marketers is competing with and overcoming the sheer volume of content being produced. With literally millions of blog posts being published every single day, making your voice heard over the tsunami of (poorly written, useless) content can be an almost insurmountable task – unless you take a stand that nobody else is willing to take.

So much of the content being produced (especially in tight-knit industries such as digital marketing) merely parrots and regurgitates the opinions and viewpoints of a select few. This is why readers are rapidly becoming desensitized to content – if there are hundreds of blogs all saying the same things, why should readers waste their time consuming that content? This is what makes producing contrarian content so powerful.

Taking an unpopular stance, speaking your mind when others won’t, and flirting with controversy can be a powerfully effective strategy in your content. Of course, you should take care not to offend or be contrarian for its own sake, but dare to be bold and speak your mind. If nothing else, your readers will likely appreciate your candor. In addition, you’ll probably sound and appear much more authentic than you would by merely repeating what others have said.

7. Go After Specific Keywords with Your Content

In an ideal world, we wouldn’t have to worry about SEO. We’d publish insightful, thought-provoking blog posts about our chosen topics, and find enormous online audiences eager to learn from our experience and buy whatever we’re selling.

Obviously, we don’t live in that world, and we do have to think about SEO.

Some content experts advocate for a “keyword-less” approach to content; publishing content that serves reader interests first and foremost, and doesn’t concern itself with anything as “distasteful” as keyword targeting. Again, this is great in an ideal world, but it’s a jungle out there – if you’re not thinking about keyword targeting, you can bet your competitors are. That’s why it pays to target specific keywords with your content before you produce it.

A topic as broad and complex as keyword targeting for SEO is far beyond the scope of this post, so I won’t try to condense it here. Suffice to say that you should be thinking of keywords you want to rank for before you sit down to write a blog post or produce any other type of content.

6. Back Up Your Arguments with Data

In today’s digital media environment, trust can be hard to come by. With fact-checking and journalistic due diligence at all-time lows, it’s easy to see why so many readers have become reluctant to accept “facts” as the cold, hard truth. That’s why it’s so important to back up your assertions with data.

Using data in your content should be as natural and commonplace as spell-checking. If you make a point, include statistics and facts to back it up. Similarly, if you cite data to make a point, be sure to cite it appropriately and, if possible, include a link to the original source. After all, you wouldn’t want somebody else using your data in their content without tipping their hat to your research, right?

5. Ensure Your Content Reflects Your Brand’s Voice

Content marketing is one of the best ways to develop and refine the “voice” of your brand. However, even large, well-funded businesses with dedicated content teams can struggle to identify and define what their brand voice actually sounds like, especially when working with larger teams.

Ensuring continuity of brand voice, especially across larger teams, can be a challenge. It requires constant review of editorial standards to ensure that both quality and tone are consistent, as well as a higher-level overview of your blog and content in general. However, while developing brand voice through content can be challenging, it’s definitely worth considering.

For each and every post, ask questions about how the content advances and develops your brand’s voice. Does the writing reflect your company’s values? What does the tone say about what it’s like to do business with you? Is your brand voice sincere, or forced and artificial? These are all questions that can help you take control of your brand’s voice and refine your messaging through content. By answering these questions (and correcting course when necessary), you’ll also provide your audience with a more cohesive experience as a brand, something to which all blogs should aspire.

4. Don’t Copy Other Corporate Blogs – Look to the Indie Superstars Instead

In the past, I’ve worked with several clients who asked me to make their corporate blog “sexy” and more appealing. In such discussions, corporate content managers often point to the blogs of influential solo bloggers who have established vast, loyal readerships as an example of the direction they’d like their blog to take.

This is a more challenging task than it might appear.

Even large, well-established corporate blogs can learn a great deal from the influential blogging superstars who dominate web publishing. For one, these blogging rock stars simply ooze authenticity, because they’re writing as themselves and representing their own brand by being themselves – a challenge for many corporate blogs. They’re selling themselves by being themselves, a valuable lesson that any corporate blog could stand to learn (and practice).

Whether you’ve been tasked with revamping an ailing corporate blog or launching one from scratch, don’t look to other corporate blogs for inspiration. Study how the individuals behind the most popular and influential blogs on the web have established their audiences, and emulate those strategies instead. Your readers will thank you for it – and come back for more.

3. Constantly Hone Your Writing Skills

One of the questions I’m asked the most often is, “How can I become a better writer?” To many would-be content producers, their relative lack of experience or confidence is the biggest obstacle to their aspirations, and there’s nothing worse than telling people to just stick with it in the vague hopes that their writing skills will improve.

I’ve been blogging professionally for quite a while now, and although I’m confident in my abilities, I’m always trying to improve and seeking out advice and help from the experts. Writing, like many skills, is a craft that you can always improve. Read more widely and extensively by reading material you may not ordinarily read (and yes, I mean actual, honest-to-God books, not just blogs). Write every single day – yes, every day, even if it’s only a hundred words or so. Be relentless in your pursuit of excellence, and don’t settle for mediocrity.

Even if you know what you’re doing when it comes to content, adopt the mindset of the perpetual student, and never be satisfied. Strive to push your writing skills to their limit – then push even further. The more time and effort you invest in honing your writing skills, the more readers you’ll attract.

2. Answer Complex Questions with Your Content

Earlier, we discussed the value of targeting specific keywords with your content. If you’re already doing this, the chances are pretty good that you’re targeting (and hopefully ranking for) a solid number of simple keyword terms that are relevant to your business. While this is still a worthwhile strategy to pursue, going after rankings for complex search queries can have an even bigger payoff, namely ranking in the Google Featured Snippet – or, as Moz’s Dr. Pete Meyers calls it, position zero.

The Google Featured Snippet is some of the most coveted real estate on the search engine results page. If your content answers a complex question by appearing in the Featured Snippet, not only could you drive a ton of referral traffic to your site, but you could also give your brand a major lift in terms of subject matter expertise. User trust in the content promoted in the Featured Snippet is high, meaning that if Google chooses your content to answer a complex question, your brand wins big.

1. Start Content Remarketing

So much time and effort goes into content production, only for a blog post or whitepaper to underwhelm you. Along with the actual overheads of producing content, it’s this (sometimes inevitable) poor return on investment that dissuades newcomers of content’s value to their business – a fallacy that even larger companies and experienced marketers can buy into. However, there’s a surefire way to make sure that more people see, interact with, and respond to your content, and that’s content remarketing.

Just as you’re (hopefully) using remarketing in your PPC campaigns to maximize their impact, you can use remarketing to get more eyes on the content you’re producing. First, you define the audience to which you want to remarket your content, then you tag visitors who come to your site so that you can remarket to them using banner ads on the Google Display Network later. This results in greater brand awareness and – hopefully – greater engagement with the content you spent so much time and effort producing.

While incredibly powerful, content remarketing is still very much the exception, rather than the rule. Many companies simply don’t even think about leveraging remarketing to promote their content, so if you want to get ahead of the curve and broaden your content’s reach, check out this exhaustive guide to content remarketing.

Creating a solid list of blog subscribers is a crucial component of many businesses marketing strategy (including ours).

Provided you’re creating blog content relevant to your business, blog subscribers are, by definition, relevant to your business as well. They’re your target market.

But how do you keep them engaged? How do you reduce unsubscribe rates, increase open and click-throughs and develop a real relationship with them?

This article will give five of the best strategies you can use to engage (or re-engage) email subscribers.

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Engage Email Subscribers with Exclusive Content

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Your blog subscribers expect to receive all of the articles you publish, that’s why they subscribed in the first place.

What they don’t suspect, and will be excited by, is content created exclusively for them.

Why this works:

Exclusivity is a chief component of desire. It’s what drives the entire luxury goods market as well as high-end restaurants, nightclubs, and, really, every club since you built a tree fort with a “no girls allowed” sign on the front.

Exclusivity is also a balance: too much exclusivity and you’re investing without a reasonable expected return, too little exclusivity and you lose the “wow” factor.

Here’s how I recommend you engage email subscribers with exclusive content:

• To maintain a reasonable ROI, re-use existing content in a new way. Turn articles into an ebook, an ebook into a checklist, a Slideshare into a PDF resource, etc.
• Segment your email list into sectors (this is relatively straightforward if you do it in the lead-generation stage through a form) and deliver both subscriber-exclusive and sector-exclusive content. Re-purpose existing content into sector-based content by giving sector-based examples and images.
• Place a timeframe on the exclusivity of your content. Give subscribers a deadline, after which the content will be available to the public. Urgency is a great influencer on action.

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Engage Email Subscribers with Early Entrance or Access

Conference, webinar, ebook, update, feature.

No matter the offer, giving it early to subscribers is a great way to deliver value. Alongside exclusivity, early-access increases the subjective value of the offer.

Let’s say you’re a diehard Android user, but the new iPhone 8S is coming out next month. Even though you’re not a fan, would you be interested in seeing it a week before it’s released?

Of course you would.

Why this works:

Early-access is a marketing strategy utilized most prominently by the indie game platform Steam, which releases the beta versions of games to interested gamers prior to their actual release.

The model is a win-win: the company creates a buzz around their content, grows its user-base (and sales) and generates feedback from people who are most passionate about the content.

The model can work just as well for your business. Are you considering a major shift to your content strategy or blog content? Test it first with your email subscribers by giving them early-access to a blog article. WordPress actually has a password-protected publishing option, allowing you to give your subscribers a secret password for them to access a page or article early. I recommend doing this, as secret passwords are awesome.

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Engage Email Subscribers by Asking for Feedback

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Engagement Case Study:

Dean DeLisle’s agency, Forward Progress, sends out over a billion emails per month for clients and himself. This means a clean list is essential to success.

“Recently, we were working with a mortgage company on re-engaging their list. The bank side had a large database, but they didn’t have a relationship with that data.

The first thing you need to understand is where the relationship status stands If the answer is nowhere, you need to reinvigorate.

In this case, we did a survey to find out the relationship. In return, we gave a $5 Starbucks card. The investment paid off, because the relationships came back.

For this survey, 3268 total participants were invited, and 322 total participated. That is about 10%. We’re happy at a 3% level with some re-engagement campaigns, so this was a success.”

Why this works:

What the case study refers to as a “clean list” really is crucial to your marketing strategy. A “dirty list” means your analytics can be skewed (particularly open, click-through, unsubscribe and reply rates) – not to mention the fact that you’re likely wasting money paying to communicate with people unlikely to ever engage with your business.

So the incentivized feedback strategy (above) is a great idea for any business with more than 10,000 contacts for two reasons: A) You get a better idea of your list’s preferences, meaning you can deliver more effective email marketing and B) They feel heard, valued, and get something of value from you (even if it’s a 10% discount or $5 Starbucks card).

And here’s the email template I’d send to subscribers…”

Subject: $5 Starbucks gift card for 5 minutes of your time

Hi [first name merge tag],

Hope this finds you well.

In the interest of science, I’d like to take five minutes out of your busy schedule to find out a bit more about you: what you do, what your marketing challenges are, how often you’d like to receive email, etc.

In the interest of coffee, I’d like to give you a $5 Starbucks giftcard for your time. Complete the 15-question questionnaire and I’ll email you a coupon code.

Deal?

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Engage Email Subscribers by Running a Subscriber-only Webinar

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Webinars are a fantastic way to develop a relationship between your leads and your business. They put leads face-to-face with your representative and (if done professionally) increase your reputation as a business who knows its stuff.

And here’s the email template I’d send to subscribers to let them know…

Subject: Exclusive to subscribers: New webinar on creating optimized sales funnels

Hey there,

Twice a month, [your business] runs subscriber-only webinars, devoted to giving you information you need about a subject you care about.

The next subscriber-exclusive webinar is on [date] and will be focused on [subject related to your content].

Our special guest will be [industry expert] from [recognizable industry business]. Webinars are run twice, once at 11am EST and then again at 11am PST.

To register for the webinar which works best for you, click . And remember to stick around for the Q&A afterward to talk to our guest and ask any questions you might have!

Why this works:

• Subscriber-exclusive webinars are an awesome way to connect with leads who need that extra little push to put them on the road to a paid conversion. It’s very easy to work your own sales points into an educational webinar (ideally at the end), and the Q&A allows you to answer sales-specific questions in front of a group of people.

Top, ballsy tip: Consider planting a colleague into your webinar to anonymously ask a simple sales-based question in the Q&A session. Something like “So what makes you guys better than [competitor]?” or “That’s all cool, but I want to be able to [unique selling point your service can do, but that hasn’t been mentioned].”

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Engage Email Subscribers by Asking Them to Update Their Information

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The preferences and bios of your email subscribers are an important element of your marketing campaign:

• The subject they want to receive information about is going to be very closely related to what element of your service or tool you want to promote.
• Knowing the time they want to receive information allows you to increase open and click-through rates – increasing the chance they’ll read your lead-nurturing content and convert to a paid conversion down the line.
• Knowing their job title allows you to change their lead-nurturing path or upsell.
• Knowing their sector informs your content-creating strategy.
• Etc, etc

And here’s the email template I’d send to subscribers…

We want to deliver content you want, when you want it. We want to be a resource for education and marketing enlightenment, not that annoying daily email you delete without looking at it.

Because of this, we’re asking all our email subscribers to update their mailing preferences and information. Are you interested in only one specific subject of what we send out? Let us know? Are you comfortable with receiving daily updates or would you rather a weekly breakdown?

Let us know, and we’ll try our best to meet your needs!

And, as always, don’t hesitate to email us with any questions, concerns or requests for info!

Why this works:

This kind of email isn’t just about getting crucial information about the preferences of your subscribers, in fact, that’s only half of it.

This email shows your subscribers you care about them. It says “If you’re unhappy about what we’ve been sending, let’s work on it together.”

Of course, it does increase the efficacy of your email marketing strategy pretty fantastically…

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Wrapping it Up

Hopefully these five email strategies will improve your relationship and engagement with your email subscribers, as well as put them on the track to conversion.

Remember the tone of your emails is entirely dependent on your business’ tests and common sense. In a couple of the templates above I’ve recommended a very casual, personal tone, and that may not work for you. It’s simply what I prefer and what’s worked for our (very young, very startup) business.

Since the past couple of years, content marketing has gained tremendous heights. Without a doubt, it is an immensely powerful tool in a marketer’s arsenal to attract and entice the prospects. However, despite the popularity of content marketing, marketers seem to find it difficult to get the executive support for their ideas and strategies which is critical to ensure its effectiveness. Thus, marketers find themselves handcuffed and bound because of the lack of executive support, and consequently, lack of budget and resources to give their ideas a tangible form.

Failure to find backing from executives and other stakeholders is a common challenge faced by marketers. Here are some tips that can guarantee executive support for your content marketing strategies:

Address the Importance of Content Marketing

While you (marketers) are very much aware of the importance of content marketing in today’s world, the executive staff and stakeholders are fairly oblivious of its potential and benefits. You need to address its importance and support the claim with statistics and research. Talk in the light of facts and quote some successful examples (our blogs contain many!) for your point to be considered valid.

Relate Content Marketing to Your Brand

It is not enough to address the importance of content marketing. In order to sell your idea to those sitting on the higher end, you need to tell them how content marketing is in not only in harmony with wider business objectives, but has the ability to further them. You need to show them how content can strategically be used to tie various departments of the business, be it sales, marketing, customer service or finance together – and how it can benefit each department.

Show How the Said Idea Can Help

Next, you should show how content marketing can have a positive impact on your organization. You can demonstrate this by addressing the following points.
● It will generate web traffic. Also tell them clear about ROI. Since these may be difficult for you to handle, we can get in touch with us to plan a ‘plan’ for you.
● It will also develop leads to be successfully converted
● It will most likely reduce the marketing cost considerably

Explain How You Plan to Execute the Idea

Finally, you need to explain in detail how you plan on to execute the idea. This will cover all the following questions.
● Who is the target audience?
● On what basis did you identify the target audience?
● How do you plan to generate web traffic and leads?
● How will you convert those leads into customers and nurture them?

Basically, you need to create a thorough strategy and give a detailed explanation on how you plan to carry out. To make your strategy more convincing, you need to support it with numbers. Just make sure that they are relatable and not meaningless statistics.

Some sales reps are great at closing, others might boast strong activity metrics, and a few dominate product demonstrations, but all have one thing in common: They spend a lot of their time prospecting.

Prospecting is at the core of every successful sales team. Having highly qualified leads can make the difference between a month where teams exceed quota and one where they just skate by. And although it might seem like a relatively self-explanatory task, there are some mistakes that reps can make prospecting.

Check out this infographic that lists six mistakes to avoid when you’re filling your pipeline. Don’t fall into the trap of bad prospecting. Keep your pipeline strong en route to knocking your quota out of the park. 

Some days it’s really draining to be a senior executive. You sit in meetings for hours on end, and every decision you need to make is difficult — all of the easy decisions have already been made at levels below you. On those days, you know you could be a much more effective leader if you could approach each meeting with a fresh perspective. But in order to do that, you first need to put down the baggage you carried in from all your previous meetings. You can do it. And you can do it in just six seconds.

I led the creation of a Google training program called ”Search Inside Yourself,” which was designed to help people put down that mental baggage and approach each new situation with a present, focused mind. It quickly became the most highly rated course in all of Google, with huge waiting lists. Search Inside Yourself works in three steps. It begins with attention training to create a quality of mind that is calm and clear. We then focus on developing a depth of self-knowledge that leads to self-mastery, because when you can clearly and objectively see when and how you are triggered, you can begin to effectively deploy mental and emotional strategies to skillfully navigate those situations. Finally, we cultivate mental skills such as empathy and compassion, which are conducive to better social skills.

Many participants have told us that they became better leaders and gained subsequent promotions thanks to the skills they learned from Search Inside Yourself. For example, one engineering executive learned to manage his temper and gain increased clarity by, in his words, “learning to discern stories from reality.” He became so effective that he was promoted, even after transitioning to a part-time role. Another participant learned to handle stress so much better that her physical health visibly improved. A sales executive, already a good communicator due to the nature of his job, learned that when he listened with empathy, spoke with moral courage, and held a caring attitude for the person he was interacting with, he became an even more effective communicator and executive. Over and over again, our participants tell us the training changed their lives.

You and Your Team

These skills did not take long to learn. In every example above, the benefits were realized with fewer than 50 hours of training. But getting the training’s earliest benefits doesn’t even require 50 hours.

My colleague Karen May, vice president at Google, developed the ability to mentally recharge by taking one “mindful breath” before walking into every meeting. It takes her roughly six seconds, and in that time she brings her full attention to one breath, resetting her body and mind.

There are two reasons why taking just one mindful breath is so effective at calming the body and the mind. The physiological reason is that breaths taken mindfully tend to be slow and deep, which stimulates the vagus nerve, activating the parasympathetic nervous system. It lowers stress, reduces heart rate and blood pressure, and calms you down. The psychological reason is that when you put your attention intensely on the breath, you are fully in the present for the duration of the breath. To feel regretful, you need to be in the past; to worry, you need to be in the future. Hence, when you are fully in the present, you are temporarily free from regret and worry. That’s like releasing a heavy burden for the duration of one breath, allowing the body and mind a precious opportunity for rest and recovery.

This skill is used by some of the world’s best athletes. For example, I once asked tennis superstar Novak Djokovic about it, and he confirmed that the mental technique has game-changing consequences (literally, for him). The ability to reset and calm the body and mind in mere seconds is how athletes like Djokovic sustain high performance for extended periods.

The ability to calm the body and mind on demand has profound implications for leadership. Imagine that you’re responding to a severe crisis with your peers and everybody but you is frazzled, because you alone can calm down and think clearly. The ability to think calmly under fire is a hallmark of great leadership. The training and deployment of this skill involves paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgmentally. The more you bring this quality of attention to your breath, the more you strengthen the parts of your brain involved with attention and executive control, principally the prefrontal cortex.

This ability is one in a collection of mental and emotional skills that form the foundation of highly effective leadership. Another such skill is the ability to assess yourself accurately, beginning with your moment-to-moment experience of emotions, and culminating in you clearly knowing your strengths, weaknesses, and purpose in life. Studies show that accurate self-assessment is a necessary condition for outstanding leadership because it enables people to build effective teams around them that add to their strengths, complement their weaknesses, and contribute to a clear, common purpose.

Learning to calm the mind starts with being more mindful of the body. By bringing mindful attention to the body, you strengthen the part of your brain called the insula, which is highly correlated with strong emotional awareness and empathy. When combined with practices such as journaling, this improves self-assessment, and when combined with practices such as mindful listening, it strengthens empathy, all of which lead to higher emotional intelligence.

Even if your company doesn’t have a mindfulness training course like Search Inside Yourself, you can begin to benefit with your first mindful breath, in the first six seconds. Try it today, and see how much more present, effective, and productive you can be.

Ten years ago, less than 10% of US citizens had any kind of social media presence. Now? Over 75% of Americans have social media accounts and use Internet frequently. This explosion of social media has led to our approach on marketing a new twist.

With the rapid growth of the Internet, there comes the eventual adaptation and migration of businesses going online. One of the ways they do this is by utilizing social media, a concept that has expanded and become so complicated that it is considered its own industry of employment. It is unlikely that a business dealing with customers could approach social media from a secondary viewpoint; employing someone for the express purpose of handling the company’s social media profiles is the go-to and the recommended path to take.

Check out these 9 ways to use social media to improve customer experience. Try them out and see what happens, you might be surprised with the results!

1. Use your social media page to interact with your customers.

Many businesses, seeing the usefulness of having an online presence, create a social media pages and groups on sites like Facebook or Twitter…but only use these pages to distribute promotional material or service announcements. It’s rare for a page to interact with its customers, and it is one of the biggest “features” you can add to your company. Customers love being able to rely on having reasonable contact with a business they purchase from and social media is one of the best ways to go about that today.

2. Check up on your social media page regularly.

It’s absolutely necessary to maintain your page once it’s been made. Nobody is going to follow a social media page if there is no activity and especially no sign of presence by the business. Simply put, if you go through the effort of having a social media presence, you need to check on it regularly. Daily if possible. This allows you to answer customer inquiries promptly, deal with negative feedback, and quell spam/troll posts before they blow up and alienate your customer base.

3. Link your customer service department with your social media team.

If you’re a big enough business to have a dedicated customer service representative as well as a social media manager, it might be a good idea to link these two together. Many small businesses make this happen by ensuring that there’s a single person doing both jobs, but you can also make this come about by having both the customer service team and the social media team work together with customer inquiries. They have very similar jobs, only different platforms in which they work. It’s important that the problems or solutions one team grapples with can be easily accessed by the other team.

4. Ensure that your social media team knows what your normal employees know.

There’s nothing worse than being a customer, talking to a business’ employee in their brick-and-mortar store, going online, and then receiving completely different information from the business’ social media manager. Which person is right? You won’t know…until you do some digging. This should never be the responsibility of the customer; indeed, it should be expected that the customer receives the right information on the first try. If your social media team is authorized to comment on your business policies, make sure they actually know what they are in order to avoid confusing and frustrating your customers.

5. Respond to feedback, even if it’s simplistic or without complaint.

Just like how you should actually interact with your customers when they field complaints or ask questions, it’s still important to interact with them even if there’s nothing wrong. A simple “thank you” goes a long way in encouraging customer involvement with your business online. Likewise, if you have a specialized business (such as in the arts and crafts industry), providing suggestions to customers who are venting or otherwise just chatting on your business page can encourage customer loyalty. This leads to our next point…

6. Your social media team should be acquainted with your product.

Have you ever contacted a business’ customer service department or posted a message on their social media profile, and then realize after they respond that the employee doesn’t actually know what they’re talking about? It’s frustrating and it discourages you from ever contacting the business again. Why bother since you know more than them anyways? Make sure that anybody you assign to dealing with your social media pages knows a thing or two about what your business offers. Providing training documentation is an excellent way of ensuring they get brought up to speed quickly.

7. Run social media exclusive contests.

Many businesses post coupons, flyers, and promotional material on their social media pages. Most often, these posts are simply rehashes of what can be found in their actual physical store. One way of encouraging your customers to follow and appreciate your social media presence is to offer an incentive. Online-only coupons, contests, and more can all generate customer involvement that may not ordinarily be present. It’s a quick and easy way of getting a few extra likes and even getting a few more sales.

8. Keep personal opinions quiet.

This is seen far too often. Businesses with an online presence slip up, make a personal statement on their page, and then need to deal with public backlash. This can work out in some cases, but in most it’s seen as distasteful. This can be due to simple unprofessionalism or because the business is picking the wrong time and the wrong place for their owner or employee to get up on their soap box. Generally speaking, it is safe to assume that your customer only want to read material related to your business when they visit your business’ social media pages.

9. Keep an eye on what your customers want…and give it to them

Monitoring what your customers are saying on your social media pages is a no-brainer. You have to do it. What you also have to do, however, is take what they say into consideration when you decide what to change with your social media strategy. If a large portion of your customers are commenting that they want a certain feature or element to be added to their viewing or buying experience, it may be a good idea to implement it. It breeds goodwill with your customers and lets them know that you care about what they think.

Parting Thoughts

If you’re doubting the validity of adopting some better social media practices, just remember the story of Mark Zuckerberg. He wasn’t the first person to create a social media platform. In fact, when his creation of Facebook first entered the scene, the likes of MySpace were still on top. What made his creation so much more successful? There are different answers, but one of the big components is that he listened to his users, changed the site to consistently make it more accessible to others, and ensured that it was built on a model of sustainability. As a result, Facebook saw an exponential success rate, which made Mark Zuckerberg one of the richest I.T. billionaire in world, his current net worth is $42.7 billion dollars.

Those were just 9 ways you could enhance your customers’ social media experience when it comes to interacting with your business. Do you have any more that you feel are worth sharing? Did we get something wrong? Let us know what worked for you, especially if what worked for you happens to be something shared on the list above.

I’ve worked with a lot of organizations that have been sending email marketing campaigns for a long time (10+ years), but often, no one has ever stepped back and asked why they are sending certain types of emails, nor have they revisited their overall strategy.

It’s easy to get caught up in the details of email marketing, such as creating targeted segments, engaging designs, and effective deliverability tactics.

While these things are all important, there should be a strategy which guides the type of emails you send, how often you send them and who you send them to. All too often, brands haven’t thought about the complete lifecycle of their subscribers and simply treat everyone the same.

If this sounds familiar, you can own your email strategy like a boss by following the 4 steps in this post.

1. Create a mission statement for your email program

Your first step in owning your email strategy should be to create a mission statement which outlines the core purpose of email marketing for your organization.

Whether it’s to generate revenue, nurture leads, educate, or retain customers, it should be very clear in your head — and everyone else’s — what the purpose of your email marketing is and isn’t. With the purpose defined you can use your mission statement to help carry out the next three steps.

2. Set SMART objectives and track them

You’ve probably heard of SMART goals, which are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Timely, but have set SMART objectives for your email marketing?

Because you have already created your mission statement, you can now align your objectives with it and what you want your subscribers to do. Then you can ensure you’ve set up ways to track performance against these objectives.

All too often I meet email marketers who are too focused on tracking and improving basic email-related metrics, such as opens and clicks, that they forget about the other metrics that drive the business like conversions, average order value (AOV), total sales and leads generated. These metrics are easy to track and measure with our Google Analytics integration.

3. Develop a comprehensive contact plan

A contact plan is a useful way of mapping out the sequential order of the emails that you want to send, your segmentation and frequency.

Think of it as the who, what and where of your email strategy. It’s important to ask yourself and your marketing team why you send certain types of emails and to think critically about what provides the most value for your subscribers during this process.

I find it easiest to map out this type of plan on a whiteboard first. Start at the very beginning of your funnel and keep in mind that you may have several different funnels for different types of customers or products, so make sure that you clearly define who you’re creating each contact plan for.

Depending on your business model you might begin with lead nurture emails or a welcome program. The idea is to map out the sequential order of emails in your current program and then expand and improve from there.

4. Present your strategy and get buy-In

To get internal buy-in from management and other people within your organization, it’s imperative to include them in your strategy and planning process.

It may be most effective to start with the basics, and hold an educational training session on email marketing best practices and concepts for any internal stakeholders or people who aren’t familiar. These are oftentimes the people that request irrelevant, untimely campaigns to be sent at short notice. Providing them some basic knowledge can be important for getting them onboard with your new strategy.

You should now be ready to present your contact plan to the entire business. Be sure to clearly outline your new mission statement, your objectives, how it will be tracked and how the new contact plan is going to help you achieve results.

Completing these 4 steps is important to chart a new course in owning your email strategy like a boss.

Wrap up

It’s easy to sit back and go with the status quo, but it’s much more rewarding to go back to the drawing board and own your email strategy so you can reap the rewards of increased ROI and results.

Just like the saying goes to keep your friends close and your enemies closer, it’s important to keep tabs on what your peers are doing as a good benchmark of your own results. While your email campaigns may be hitting all of your marks, you may want to set your goals higher for 2016 based on how other companies in your space are doing.

After posting my earlier blog around email performance, in which I revealed which types of email perform the best, I received a ton of requests to break it down by industry so marketers can compare the performance of their email campaigns to those of their peers. The numbers are in and the wait is over!

Refresher on Email Types

In case you’ve forgotten the three types of email campaigns, here’s a recap from the original blog post:

• Batch Emails: Also known as “batch and blast”. These types of emails don’t have any “intelligence” built in. Instead they just gather a list of contacts and send them the same email. A great example of this is your company newsletter—it goes to everyone, no matter what.
• Nurture Emails: This is a series of targeted emails based on personas (e.g. by industry, role, or use case). Nurture emails are primarily used to lead prospects through the sales funnel and warm up leads for a sales handoff. A nurture email offers something different to a person based on where they are in their buying journey. If they are just learning about you, your nurture email might offer a fun, light infographic versus a buyer who has engaged with you many times and consumed your content might get a webinar invitation to a live demo.
• Trigger Emails: These are personalized emails that are delivered based on prospect actions. Some range of email “intelligence” is built in based on behavior (think of it as a two-way conversation of listening and speaking). An example of a trigger email would be this: a prospect visits your events webpage and then, based on that activity, receives an email invitation to an event in their area.

Email Performance by Industry

Here’s the email performance for the three types of campaigns across all industries. As you can see below, batch campaigns performed significantly better in Healthcare and Life Sciences and Travel, Recreation, and Leisure. Nurture campaigns, on the other hand, performed the best in Energy, Healthcare and Life Sciences, and Transportation and Storage. Trigger campaigns prospered across several different industries, with the highest average click rate across all types of campaigns.

This data represents average click rate for the 3 email types across all industries. Per the legend on the right, the green shades indicate the relative click rate performance (0.2% – 23.5%). Only industries with statistically significant averages are shown above.

What We Learned

This chart speaks for itself, but there are definitely some cool data points that stand out. Here’s my take on why certain email types do better or worse for certain industries. But I’d love to hear from readers of that specific industry (I’m looking at you…) to give their opinion.

1. In General–High Performance Trigger Emails

I know I sound like a broken record, but despite its proven success at Marketo and beyond, there are still plenty of email marketers that don’t realize the potential of trigger emails. So I’m going to say this one last time (no promises)…personalized messages based on behavior are much better than batch and blast. In fact, they’re 3x better on average. They are an important customer touchpoint so spend that extra time and effort to create those triggers campaigns!

2. Energy–The Power of Nurtures

The Energy vertical has the highest nurture email performance of any industry, at a whopping 12.4%! That’s as high as some trigger email metrics. It makes sense if you think about how an energy utility company communicates with their customers. Do you get regular emails around your energy usage, ways to save energy, and updates to policies? Those highly relevant targeted emails are nurture programs at work. Below you’ll see a similar example from a water department.

3. Travel–Brochures for Everybody!

This one is really interesting. The Travel, Recreation, and Leisure industry has the highest batch rates, but the lowest nurture rates. Their batch programs perform almost 40x better than nurtures! This is most likely due to the nature of the travel industry. Interest in travel traditionally happens by time of year and less dependent on the individual. Nurturing a customer every month probably isn’t as effective as blasting your entire database with beach excursions right before summer or a trip to the mountains right before ski season.

4. Healthcare–You’re in Great Shape

The most well rounded email performance award goes to Healthcare and Life Sciences. They excel in every type of email campaign. I think this is due to two main factors. First is how technologically advanced healthcare has become in the past few years. The overnight shift to the digital era definitely shows in their marketing efforts. Second is the wide range of use cases that each email type solves for this specific industry. Patient doctor office visits? Triggered emails! Ongoing preventative care tips and tricks? Nurture emails! Hospital announcements and newsletters? Batch emails!

You can see that different types of emails serve different purposes, but I hope that digging into this data gave you some ideas on how you can use email more effectively for your organization.

Notice something in the data that stood out to you? Have suggestions on what data to dive into next? Got follow up questions for me? Leave your comments below.

Thank you everyone for reading and sharing my most recent blogs on women in sales! It’s a topic that I am very passionate about and I love being able to share the insights of my colleagues as well!

Previously on…

Just kidding.

If you’re new to Sales Wars this is my third post in a series of blogs I am writing for QuotaFactory on women in sales. You can find the first two posts here and here. This weekend I was discussing my blogs with friends at a holiday party – some work in tech, others in engineering – and it ended up spurring a really open conversation about gender roles. As I began explaining the topics I’ve covered, the men presented theories as to why women might avoid a sales job. They made comments about sales careers that included phrases like “hyper-masculine environment” and offered suggestions such as “the unpredictable and varying payment structure would probably turn off women who seek stability.” They’re not wrong. Almost every article I’ve read echoes their theories. Admittedly it does take a particular personality type to be a great salesperson, but that should not be restricted to male personality traits.

To start a similar dialogue I posed this question to the team of ladies here at QuotaFactory:

What are the factors that you think hold women back in a sales role? What keeps women from wanting a sales role to begin with?

I am proud every day to work with women who have their eyes on breaking barriers and helping to dispel any stigmas or stereotypes when it comes to sales roles. I’ve included some of their responses below and I hope they are enlightening to our readers:

Meghan Jennings

“I think that a big factor that holds women back in sales is the stigma associated with this particular career path. This goes both ways. Women recognize that they don’t always get treated or spoken to with the same integrity as a man, over the phone and in the office. However, with that being said, women may choose to go into sales for this very reason in order to challenge the stereotype. I have been surprised in my last 3 years in sales that it doesn’t matter so much if you’re a woman, but rather how you take control of the sale and the amount of confidence that you display in your pitch and in your ability and talent. I think that all women have the “gift of gab” and that this gift can provide an advantage to someone who must identify their company’s pain in a more compelling, understanding and less sales-y way. However, there are still some times when I wonder, due to being a women, if I am not being taken seriously. And if not, how can I change that?”

Gillian Sontz

“I think that the two major factors holding women back in sales are that 1.) it is a male dominated field, and 2.) that women are afraid they will not be treated equally. However, I think this will change as women continue to join and conquer the sales landscape.”

Michaela Cheevers

“Although I don’t care for the stereotype that all sales people are overly aggressive, it still exists and it is its existence that I believe is what keeps women from wanting to pursue a career in sales. There is a fine line between aggression and confidence and I think that this gray area can hold a lot of women back within a sales role. Not being pushy when there is room to be or being “too nice” can cause women to rob themselves of opportunities that were there and they failed to close. I think that what keeps women from wanting a sales role the most is the stigma that they must be super pushy in order to make a sale. I know that I personally don’t like to feel as though I am forcing someone to make decisions that they aren’t ready to make or do something that they do not want to do. So, the concept that using aggression as the only way to close the next step in a sales cycle was always something I did not feel comfortable with.”

Melanie Salloum

“In general, women in sales are not taken as seriously as men. However, confidence is the key to overcoming this generality. Do your homework, know your stuff, get comfortable, and once you show that you know what you are doing you WILL be taken seriously. There is some added pressure because we as women do need to make an even greater first impression (and we need to do it quickly), but as long as you are focused and motivated, you can easily turn the “challenge” of being a woman in sales to a huge advantage. To be in sales, it’s important to have thick skin because dealing with rejection is a very real part of the job. You also need to be competitive, and you always need to be extremely motivated and goal-driven, even when things get rough. Men are hunters by nature, so I think that this is why there are more men in sales. That being said, when a saleswomen is intelligent, confident, and driven, she can be extremely successful in this field.”

What about our other women in sales? What are your thoughts on the matter? We’d love to get this conversation going! Please comment below with your thoughts on why women may be hesitant to begin a career in sales and some potential factors that could hold women back. We’d love to hear from you!

How a PRM Keeps Sales Development Reps Accountable

Utilize our Prospect Relationship Management platform to manage and track the performance of your sales development team. Combine the creation of daily schedules and workflows with automated dialing and data management best practices to produce qualified leads for closing reps and create a stronger and more reliable sales forecast and pipeline for your business.

Like Miley Cyrus’ chastity, the year 2015 has come and gone. And while I could prattle on about what a year it has been and how we’re now entering a new era, I won’t. Because the reality is that every year zips by faster than the previous one, and one of the best things about the New Year is that we all get to hit the reset button and have another go at success.

As marketers, though, there are a few realities to face if we want to generate more B2B leads. A key one is that millennial B2B buyers are becoming the target market. These new B2B buyers know exactly what they want from vendors and it isn’t old school marketing.

How to Get More B2B Leads in 2016

1. More Storytelling and Less Selling

The lines between work and play for today’s average B2B lead have blurred considerably. According to the Pew Research Center, more than 30% of the existing workforce have never worked in a world without email. Therefore, a pretty large chunk of the population is used to carrying their work with them around the clock.

Because of that, today’s B2B buyer wants to be entertained, not fed a sales pitch.

What you need to do: Create content that not only informs, but engages. Whether you’re creating a video, a blog post, an infographic, or another type of content, tell a story. And don’t be afraid to show some of the personality of your company.

2. Authenticity on Social Media

“Recognize social media as a channel, not a strategy.” ~ Daniel Newman, CEO of Broadsuite Media Group

While you should absolutely load up your Buffer for the week with industry news, content promotions, retweets, and mentions, you shouldn’t forget the ever-important personal touch.

Organic postings about your office dog have a place in your online company culture as well. There’s nothing wrong with posting a picture of Scruffy pawing at your keyboard right after a Tweet about sales statistics. In fact, please do. It makes the day much more enjoyable.

What you need to do: Abandon the idea that social media is a sales pitch. Encourage employees to post updates that promote your company culture in a personal way. It’s time to get real here.

3. Hands-on Time

Millennials may have nudged the whole concept of the “Experience Economy” into an explosive notion. However, it’s really something everyone has craved all along. Experiences are better than products. Now, if you can turn a product into an experience, well… you’ve got something special.

Why is it that Apple resurfaced several years ago as a megabrand? Because Steve Jobs wanted to create an experience, a culture. It’s the reason why Apple Stores don’t simply show you a video about their products, but have them lined up, ready for you to get your hands on.  You get to feel what it’s like to be in the Apple club.

What you need to do: If you have a store front, make sure that your products are ready for buyers to try out. If you sell a digital product, include a demo on your home page. Consider a try before you buy option. That will help turn lurkers into B2B leads.

4. Quicker Response Times

A while back, I was creating an image using the free software tool, Canva. I coudn’t think of the name of the type of graphic I was looking for, so I gave a quick shout out to the Canva team on Twitter. Minutes later I had my response. And I didn’t have to endure any hold music.

B2B buyers want a quick turnaround time when it comes to contacting your business.

What you need to do: Be present enough on social media to respond quickly to queries. None of this open a ticket nonsense.

The truth is, 2016 should be a year of fun. And if you’re stressing about how to make it fun, well… don’t. The process leading from browser to buyer is interactive, it’s relaxed, and you need to be yourself.

That being said, I know it can be all too easy to get stuck in a rut, content-wise. You want to pump out content that’s useful and entertaining, but it’s just not happening. If that’s you (and let’s face it, it’s all of us at some point), then check out our latest animated video, 7 Ways to Rock at B2B Content Creation. Consider it your free shovel to dig out of your content rut and charge into 2016.

So sit, watch, and enjoy!

I recently had a conversation with a client named Claire, who shared that her company had been touting the benefits of mindfulness, and she was giving mindfulness a try with a meditation app. But she was frustrated that it wasn’t helping her feel more relaxed — instead, she was actually a bit more agitated of late. While the situation was clearly a source of consternation for Claire, it didn’t mean the meditation app wasn’t working.

Now that mindfulness has hit the mainstream, it’s been defined in a variety of ways: moment-to-moment awareness, being in the here and now, relaxing fully into the present. And somewhere along the way we’ve come to equate mindfulness with “good feeling” emotions such as joy, relaxation, and happiness.

While mindfulness can lead us to experience the good things in life more fully, this only tells half of the mindfulness story. In fact, becoming truly mindful and aware means that we are also able to see, name, and more fully experience things when we are angry, sad, jealous, anxious, vulnerable, or lonely — this, too, is mindfulness.

Therefore, we have to redefine mindfulness as more than feeling good, and instead see it as having an increased capacity to sit with the full spectrum of being human, experiencing it all — the good, the bad, and the ugly — and learning to be less reactive so that we can make better choices each day.

I told Claire two stories about leaders as a better way of understanding mindfulness and leadership choices.

The first is about a leader named Randy, who is working on elevating himself as a leader. Over the course of the last year, he hired good people and helped them get up to speed. Now he wants to take time to be more strategic in his role and build more visibility for himself and his team, but he admits that he hasn’t made much progress. Sometimes, he says, it just feels like he “can’t help himself,” and he dives into the details instead of delegating or empowering his team.

Further Reading

Then there’s Natalie, who is working on becoming a more patient leader. Over the course of the past year, she received feedback that her hard-changing style rubs others the wrong way. The tone of the feedback suggested that if she didn’t make some measurable changes, she could derail her career. Sometimes, she says, it feels like she “just can’t help herself,” and she lashes out with a negative tone and body language.

For both Randy and Natalie, cultivating mindfulness means being able to see the patterns at play, become less reactive, and make clearer leadership choices. Each took the following steps:

1. “Witness” and track the pattern. Over a period of time, Randy and Natalie observed themselves in action, like a witness without judgment, and logged their observations in more concrete terms.

• What was the trigger when you had an “I just can’t help myself” moment?
• What body sensations did you experience?
• What was the “voice-track” in your mind?
• What was the underlying emotion you experienced?
• What did you do?

For Randy, he began to notice that he felt a pit in his stomach when he wasn’t in his comfort zone of “doing.” He found the corresponding voice-track really tempting: “Randy, wouldn’t it feel good to take care of email or head into the detail here?” Randy discovered that underneath it all was an underlying feeling of vulnerability and a fear of letting go of things he was really good at.

Natalie began to notice that she felt her jaw tighten and her blood pressure rise most acutely when someone on her team didn’t perform. The voice-track was a harsh critic that screamed, “This person is so incompetent! How dare she risk how others perceive me?” As Natalie shared, “What I came to realize was how much I dislike the feeling of being embarrassed. It’s been a big turning point for me to understand why I react the way I do in these situations.”

2. Notice, name, and pause. As Randy and Natalie became more skilled at noticing and naming their body sensations, voice-track, and emotions, they were able to hit the pause button more often. My fellow Paravis managing partner, Pam Krulitz, describes this step in these terms: “In cultivating mindfulness, we learn to not scratch the itch right away.” One of my clients described it as “noticing the initial feeling of discomfort, becoming aware of it, and taking a deep breath to bring things back to the frontal lobe.” And Chade-Meng Tan, author of the book Search Inside Yourself, calls this the moment of “sacred pause.”

When we experience the “sacred pause,” we become less compelled by what simply makes us feel better (e.g., diving into the details, e-mail, that afternoon candy bar), and we feel less compelled to attack, run away, or give in to what makes us feel bad.

This is the “so what” behind having a more regular mindfulness practice. Whether we are deep breathing, sitting in meditation, or just moving mindfully through our day, we are in effect building our capacity to witness our body sensations, voice-tracks, and emotions without reacting. There’s a range of practices — from the informal to the formal — that can help us strengthen this ability:

Less formal things you can do on your own:

• Take one deep breath in between meetings
• Check in with your body
• Commit to doing one activity per day more mindfully
• Meditate for two minutes

More formal practices to try:

• Body-scan meditation (bringing your attention and awareness to different regions of your body, where you experience the sensations in the body without trying to change or react to anything)
• Sitting meditation
• Walking meditation
• Regular body work (e.g., massage, rolfing, etc.)
• Yoga
• Martial arts

For Randy, whenever he noticed the body sensation of having a pit in his stomach, he was less reactive to the corresponding voice-track trying to tempt him. Instead, he used it as a cue to step away from the keyboard and ask himself, “Should I really be doing this task?” For Natalie, whenever she noticed her jaw clenching, she was less reactive to the screaming inner critic voice. She would take a deep breath and say the mantra “peace” to bring herself out of a heated reaction.

3. See more clearly, choose more clearly. It’s when we can see and experience the situation or moment with less reaction — even if we are experiencing anxiety, fear, anger, or sadness — that a more constructive set of choices emerges: Can I reframe this situation? Is there someone I can reach out to for support? Is there a request I need to make here? What is the right thing to do here that preserves my overall integrity, vision, or values, even if it’s the harder choice to make?

For Randy, he realized that he needed to be less hard on himself and build a sound plan of transitioning items to his team while ramping into a more elevated role. Natalie realized that a lot of her interactions were driven by a pattern of needing to prove herself, even though she had the respect and confidence of others in her expertise.

And Claire, who was not feeling relaxed after using her meditation app, discovered that her meditation was bringing forth a set of emotions that she was repressing, thus leaving her feeling agitated. The irony, said Claire, was that she had started using the meditation app in the hope of escaping those feelings.

As Claire became more of an objective witness, she began to see more clearly that she had outgrown her role at work, even though that realization was uncomfortable. She was avoiding dealing with this, and her mindfulness practice was now bringing her closer to the truth.

Instead of running, Claire saw that she now sat at a much more honest, authentic juncture in the road, where choice became more possible: Was it time to have a difficult conversation about her next career steps with the organization? Was it time to create and articulate a vision and game plan for what would come next? What did she want to do, and would she have the courage to lean into it?

Mindfulness is not all gloom and doom, nor is it all sunshine and flowers. With mindfulness, we are just a little less tossed around by running away from or crushing what feels bad. We’re less compelled to indulge in our desires and excesses for what gives us a temporary high. Instead, we see with greater clarity just how blue the sky is on a beautiful day and we see and feel the depths of our hearts being pierced when we’ve experienced a meaningful loss. And somewhere in that fuller human experience, we connect and tap into a deeper source of motivation and choice that is more aligned with our integrity, our values and ethics, and our authentic essence.

“Nothing ever goes wrong inside the Sprint for an Agile Marketing Team, you are just doing it wrong!” – Voices in Your Head

This is the internal monologue most Agile Teams have rolling in their heads when things just don’t fit together.  I have had to force myself to stop this criticism inside and take a new look at the process.

So far, everything is so prescriptive and you get the feeling that if you just follow the rules and check all the boxes, that your problems will be solved and your team will be effective.  However, we are developing new ideas and creating brand new assets that we have not produced before.  Everyday holds a new ball of clay and a request to make it into something new.

Finding Answers in Ratatouille

My go to movie for sales and marketing is Tommy Boy.  So many breakthrough points that many who are new to the craft can relate to.  However, for this example, I will go to the Disney/Pixar movie, Ratatouille.

The head waiter comes rushing in the kitchen shaking and says, “Someone has asked what is new?”  Questioning the word, a chef replies, “New?”  The waiter returns with, “Yes! What do I tell them?”  “Well what did you tell them?”, says the chef.  Panicked, the waiter responds, “I told them I would ask!”

This is how a lot of us feel in marketing when we are asked to get out of our comfort zone.  That comfort zone could be the type of work we are creating or it could be the amount of content we are producing.  Maybe the depth and quality of the content we make, or just a request that we feel we have to defer.

Whatever causes us to question our ability, here lies many of the root problems when we feel our Sprint is off the rails and out of control. Do we say no, yes, or a combination of both?

The head chef burst into the room, looking for the reason for all the commotion, and repeats the dialogue with the waiter.  This time at the end the head waiter shouts, “I TOLD THEM I WOULD ASK!”  Relaxed, the head chef responds with pulling an old recipe and labeling it new.  However, the waiter reinforces that everyone knows the old stuff and adds, “They like Linguini’s soup.”

With modern marketing tactics changing because of the ineffectiveness to the old recipes of marketing, at some point we will be forced to try something new.  This “new” could be a response to innovation and the ability to do something that has never been done before, or we could just be playing catch up with the competition.

Whatever is the cause for the “new”, we typically underestimate the impact it will have on our team and our output.  Right here is another area that trouble is knocking at our door.

So what are we going to do about these problems? Should we give up on productive planning and the execution of our plan?  I hope your answer at this point is a collective NO!

To say no, you must look at the problems that you face and come up with solutions that allow you to continue to meet your goals of the Agile Process.  As a refresher, here is a list of characteristics a true Agile process has:

• Strive for customer satisfaction
• Embrace change
• Simple processes
• Adaptation to environment
• and, Sustain a comfortable pace

Let’s take a look at a few problems that frequently occur during the execution of a Sprint and some possible solutions.

Oh Not Now! Can’t You See I Am Busy?

The most prominent problem when it comes to content planning I have heard over the past year of teaching Agile Marketing Courses is inter-departmental requests.  I need a brochure, I need a presentation, I need, I need, I need…

These requests come in like an order at a dinner. Give me the usual and make it snappy.

The major problem with prioritizing these requests are the people making these requests. They either have a higher seniority than we do or they feel we are there only to help their department.  This is the situation you get into when your department is viewed as the group who is cutting through the grass to make a pathway for the company.

We need a Content Owner that can go to bat for our group and a ScrumMaster to protect the team from these distractions and place them on the backlog for further review.

Now that we have a reactive measure in place, let’s determine how we can be proactive.  Since we want to help our departments to drive amazing customer experiences as well, our Content Owner should sit down with each department quarterly and determine what is coming up and how the marketing team can play a role.

You should also sit down with the heads of each department and show them the agile approach to marketing and how the factory works.  Imagine a bunch of kids playing Double Dutch.  If you leave the outside departments out of the loop, they will not know how to effectively jump in.  Once they have seen how it works and a had a few practice rounds, they will know when to jump in and how they can participate.

Finally, there are requests that come in with top priority.  We will handle them in the next section.

The Executive Order

Imagine an early 1980s movie.  A few guys are sitting in a bunker with radar screens all around, when all of a sudden a phone with no buttons on it rings.  A red light starts flashing and the crew looks at each other.  Everyone is thinking, “I hope someone else will answer that.”  Finally, from another room, the most senior officer in the bunker rushes in, grabs the phone and says “Mr. President.”

If you work in a medium-sized company or larger, you have individuals who work in your company that you can get kind of nervous about.  They may over use their authority and make demands that cause unplanned stress.  Maybe the title includes the words Chief and Officer and their car cost more than you make in a year.  Something about them causes your team and your Content Owner to stand a little straighter and take action right away.  However, with a running Sprint, we have a little work to do to make it right.

Here is a list of possible ways you can handle these types of request that have to happen immediately:

• End the sprint – You can decide to end the Sprint depending on the amount of work being requested.  To do so, document all completed tasks and create new Content Items to represent the remaining work.  Then add the Content Items that represent the new work and reprioritize the backlog.  Plan a Sprint duration based on how long it will take you to complete the requested Content and keep the team effective.  If you know you will have blocking tasks that will cause the team to sit on their hands waiting, put some additional lower priority items on the backlog to cover those days.  The big thing to remember is the VIP items on the board have to ship as soon as possible, so don’t go overboard.  If the request was important enough to end a Sprint over, then someone should be willing to eat some time to make sure it gets done as soon as possible.  Consider multiple Standup Meetings if the tasks are smaller than one day in size.
• Hit the pause button – Most of the modern Agile software tools will allow for multiple Sprints to be ran at the same time.  Plan a new Sprint with the item and assign the appropriate members of the team to the Sprint.  Calculate the additional time you will need to add to complete the original Sprint and add it to the end.  If you only need a few members to work on the pressing item, then leave the others to keep working on the original Sprint.  Once the additional Sprint has been demoed and published, the members of that team can roll back on to the original Sprint and complete it as originally planned.
• Hold back time in planning for outside use – Like the efficiency factor, you can create another factor of time that is held aside from each Sprint for the entire team or just a few members.  This time is pulled out of planning and will be used to handle incoming high priority requests.  Until you get that number dialed in, you might end most of your Sprints early.  There is a cost to the extra planning required to plan so make sure you adapt as needed.
• Take one for the team – Finally, these requests can be so frequent that it makes sense to keep one or more team members out of the planning and “on call” for these requests.  Give them a separate board, but remove the time constraints that come along with Sprint.  Agile solutions like Kanban use buckets to manage workload rather than time boxes, so they work great for ad hoc environments.  Make sure you give them a cool name like firefighter or SWAT team and rotate other members into this role to ensure everyone gets as much time at a sustainable pace as possible.

It’s Not You, It’s Me

Employees leave, get promoted, or need to be allowed to excel elsewhere.  Whatever the case, make sure you have a plan.

If notice is given, make sure you don’t plan to use the resource during any new planned Sprints within the last two weeks of their time on your team.  Whatever the cause is, most employees are not nearly as effective during this time.  A sort of short-timer syndrome comes over even the most amazing team members.

Also, depending on their skillset, you may require a large amount of their time to teach other members of the team how to handle the responsibilities they were covering.

Now, if no notice is given, or there was a layoff, I suggest ending any recently started Sprints or removing the time constraint on ones that are near the end.  No one on the team should be held with the bag for a disruption that none of them could control.

In either one of these scenarios, you should plan on some additional time between the Sprints to have the team do a skill set audit and re-estimate any items on the Content Backlog that need to be updated.

The Bottleneck

Sometimes you have to make a hard decision and remove a member from the team. No matter if they are let go, reassigned to another project, or moved to another department, it will cause some pain for some members and relief for others.

The typical cause for this is a lack of performance.  The performance of an individual, group, or the entire team.  Something has caused a kink in the line and you need to get the content flowing again.

If there is a performance issue with an individual, it can cause the whole team to suffer.  You can spot these performance delays in several places, but the most common are frequently missed estimates, low quality, or hidden debt in items moved to done that did not meet the Definition of Done.

Before you do anything, make sure you address the problem square in the eyes of the person causing it.  These conversations should be held in private as enough public shame has occurred over time.  If this is unfamiliar territory for you, set a meeting with a person in HR or do some research about how your company handles corrective meetings.  Sometimes a verbal warning is offered, then written notice, then letting the person go.  If you jump the gun, you may find yourself in the hot seat.

One last bottleneck to an effective team that is harder to notice in the numbers are those certain members you would label as “a ______”, just fill in the blank with your favorite explicative.  With these folks around, you are not looking for their lack of performance, usually they can tolerate themselves just fine which is the root of the problem.  Instead you are looking for the performance of others to be hit.  These people might take the form of a bully, a gossip, a chatterbox, or a hot mess.  Take some time to appropriately address this feedback with the responsible party.  You can usually hear about these problems during the Retrospective Meeting when teams are allowed to freely speak.

What Should I Do When I Can’t Do What I Need to Do?

One of our goals in the Agile process is break the role of the assembly line worker assigned to a particular task.  We do this through cross-functional teams and what Jason Miller from LinkedIn calls the Hybrid Marketer.  A Hybrid Marketer is someone who is assigned the title of marketer rather than “pick your content type” marketer.  The reason they are given the title is because they can handle the writing, graphics, email, video, and analytics.  To follow Agile Teams, I call this role the Content Developer.

One of the main reasons we want Content Developers on our team is to remove the blocking events that happen during our work.  If I have several tools on my tool belt, if a task requires a hammer and I have one, I can work on it while I wait for those that call for a screwdriver.  We move around the blocking events by working on different tasks that require our new skills.

However, the content still has to be assembled in a particular order.  You have to hold the interview before you can write the copy about the interview.  You have to capture the B-roll before you can mix the final video or it will be harder to tell a story.  You need to write the blog before you can review and create the social posts.

One mind blowing occurrence frequently happens with teams that do not properly plan for these blocking events and the development of their cross-functional skillset can be found during the Stand Up Meeting.

During this meeting, you will have one of your marketers walk up to the Scrum board, look around, and throw up their hands and say, “I can’t work on anything!”  In their voice, you can hear a not-so subtle confirmation that they broke the system, and see, Agile just doesn’t work for us.  From where you are, you just heard a team member say, “I can’t handle this task and I am not going to do anything about it!”

This is when the eye twitch starts and the head tilt comes in.  Puzzled, you start to question yourself rather than the marketer with the problem.

Did you make the wrong choice?  Is this just for software development and is this Jeff guy crazy?  Can the production of content be so complicated that to capture it in a process that allows for measurement would just break the laws of physics?

To go back to the tool belt analogy, a person on the job site said this requires a hammer and I only have a screwdriver, so I am going to stand here and wait until I can work on a task with a hammer.  That is probably the most shortsighted solution to the problem.  Does the person plan to stay in your crew?  Could they learn how to use a hammer relatively quickly with some offsite and on-the-job training?  Can you get a hammer pretty quickly for this crew member?  If the answer is yes, then you need to start executing a strategy to accomplish these tasks.

While you are getting the hammer, have the team member watch others use the hammer.  Then give them the hammer and some tutorial or practice boards and nails to use it on.  Once they are done bending the majority of their nails, assign them some work that happens alongside someone else who is using the hammer to give them the deeper knowledge you find in practice.  After a short period of time, they can handle these tasks.

Prioritize the work required to complete the Sprint with the work required to bring this member up to speed and plan accordingly when you task out your items.

If it seems like I made light of the skillset required to hammer a nail versus write a compelling blog post, you might be right.  However, growing up with a father who worked on a lot of job sites as a mason, I have seen some of the most skilled workers with their tool belts full of items they have learned how to use over their careers.  I have not once seen a tradesman allowed to stand around waiting for someone to finish their work on a productive crew.

There is always something you can do or learn to do that will help your team as a whole over time.  Make sure you are committed to the process, know where they pain points are, and have a plan to address them to give yourself the ability to succeed.

Everything Else…

For all the events that can happen, I haven’t mentioned a few options to consider:

• Fail the Sprint – If you have to stop immediately or if it doesn’t make sense to continue, stop and take inventory.  Plan a new Sprint and make notes of any lessons you need to learn from.  If failing continues to happen over time, consider other options discussed in this chapter.
• Finish well – Do what you originally planned to do by either having the team hold up their commitments with a little extra effort or say “not yet” to incoming requests.
• Add time to the end – As a last resort, if the time to plan and take inventory is just too long or the team was not in control of the delay, just put some extra time on the end and plan to discuss how we can better prepare for the event next time.  You will not look back at your year and be haunted by the Sprint that got away from you.  Instead you will remember the amazing work you did and the delight of your customers and team.

When was the last time you calculated the return on investment (ROI) of one of your lead generation campaigns? If you can’t remember when, you’re not alone. Too many marketers put off calculating this metric – not because they see it as unimportant, but because they find the process rather challenging.

At the end of the day, ROI is one of the best ways to measure the impact of your lead generation campaigns. It’s simple: if your campaign generates a positive ROI (e.g., if you spend $1000 on a campaign and generate $5000 in revenue), then that campaign is a success.

While calculating the ROI of your marketing campaign can be complex, it’s doable once you get a grasp of the key formula that determines the ROI of all your marketing efforts: your Customer Lifetime Value, or CLV as it’s more commonly known.

Understanding Customer Lifetime Value

At its most fundamental, the CLV is the amount of revenue you would generate from an average customer during the time he or she remains a customer with you.

Knowing your CLV is key to your lead generation campaigns because: a) It helps you understand how much revenue you’ll generate each time you acquire a customer, and b) It helps you understand how much money you should invest to acquire this customer.

Now that you understand why it’s important you know your CLV, let’s look at a simple method to calculate it.

Say you’re a cable company and you generate $100 from each customer each month and, on average, customers stay with you for four years. You’ll calculate the CLV of your customers by taking the monthly revenue per customer then multiplying it by 48 months (4 years).

Here’s what that math looks like: $100/month x 48 months = a CLV of $4,800.

The formula above is just a basic way of calculating the CLV. That said, it’s good enough to serve as the starting point to calculate the ROI of your marketing efforts. More sophisticated CLV formulas factor in things such as the labor cost associated with serving the customer and the time value of money during the four year time period.

Digging a Little Deeper into Your Return on Investment

Now that you understand the math behind calculating your CLV, let’s dig in deeper into how to use that number to calculate the cost of customer acquisition, or COCA.

The COCA is basically the amount of money you’re willing to spend to capture a new customer. You’ll use your COCA to first determine your marketing budget, and later to figure out the ROI for your lead generation campaign.

Most B2B marketers usually allocate about 10% of the CLV as the allowable cost of customer acquisition. Your mileage may vary, but 10% is a good starting point.

Let’s put this into action. Going back to the cable provider example, we established that the CLV is $4,800 ($100 per month x 48 months). 10% of $4800 is $480, which is the amount of money the cable company can reasonably spend to acquire each new customer.

The 10% number is an average, and it’s common for many companies to go up to 15% to 20% (or more) when calculating their COCA. In fact, new companies will often “investment spend” at a much higher COCA to acquire new customers before eventually dropping down to around 10%.

Now that you know your CLV and the allowable cost of customer acquisition, let’s look at how you can use these numbers to calculate the ROI of your lead generation campaign.

Let’s go back to the cable provider example. Say the company typically spends $480,000 a year on their marketing efforts, with 10% of that allocated toward lead generation efforts. This means, they would have to acquire 100 or more new customers from their lead generation efforts in order to generate a positive ROI.

A little confused? Let’s break the math down:

• Since the total marketing budget is $480,000, 10% – the portion of it allotted to lead gen – is $48,000.
• We know our allowable cost of acquisition per customer is $480.
• So, in order to break even, the campaign should generate at least $48,000 divided by $480, which gives us 100 new customers.

If the cable company is currently acquiring more than a 100 customers through their lead generation campaign, it is producing a positive ROI (and vice versa).

We’ve covered a number of concepts above, so here’s a quick recap and a step-by-guide for you to calculate the ROI of your next lead generation campaign. (Be sure to keep this list handy the next time you meet with your boss.):

Step 1: Calculate your CLV. Do this by multiplying the average revenue a customer brings in each year by the average number of years they’re engaged with your business. (Ex. $25 per customer for 10 = $250 CLV.)

Step 2: Calculate your allowable COCA. Unless you’re investment spending, this should be 10% of the CLV. (For the number from Step 1, this would be $25.)

Step 3: Calculate lead generation budget. Calculate what percentage of your total marketing budget is allocated toward lead generation campaigns (as opposed to branding campaigns). Be sure to include the costs associated with all marketing channels used (distribution) and content created (production) for lead generation activities.

Step 4: Calculate the estimated number of customers needed to generate a positive ROI. Do this by dividing the lead generation budget by the allowable COCA. For example, if the business mentioned in Step 1 has a lead generation budget of $1,000, you would need 40 new customers in order to have a successful campaign ($1,000 divided by $25, which is 40).

Step 5: Compare results. Look at the results from your current lead generation campaign to determine whether you’re hitting the goals to generate a positive ROI. (For example, if the campaign mentioned in Step 4 generated more than 40 customers, it would be generating a rock-solid ROI.)

A Few Final Thoughts.

ROI-based marketing can take some time to perfect, so don’t expect miracles. Odds are, you won’t generate a stellar ROI on your first try. However, by applying the formulas above, you’re creating the foundation for measuring results and using them to optimize spending on an ongoing basis. This, in the end, will help get you closer to success.

Now that you know how to relate your campaigns to revenue, explore Act-On’s eBook – Demand Gen 101, to learn the tools and tactics needed to create a winning demand generation strategy. You’ll learn 7 key activities every demand generation strategy should incorporate, and how marketing automation sets the stage for demand gen success.

Had a rough year? Well, the world's richest people might make you feel just a little better about it.

Bloomberg's billionaire index found that the world's 400 wealthiest people lost a total of $19,000,000,000 this year. We typed out the zeros just cause damn it feels good

It was a tough year for the global economy, as ongoing crisis in Europe (thanks, Greece) and worries about slowing growth in China (which immediately hammers many of the emerging economies in the world) meant little growth in the value of a variety of assets typically held by the rich. In a year where the tide didn't rise, even the biggest boats ended up taking a little bit of a dip. Read more...

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Los Angeles (AFP) - An artist has filed a $150 million lawsuit against Spotify, alleging that the leader of the streaming sector has knowingly reproduced copyrighted songs.

David Lowery, best known for leading alternative rock bands Cracker and Camper Van Beethoven, asked a US judge to allow a class action suit on behalf of "hundreds of thousands" of potential plaintiffs he believes were affected.

The lawsuit, filed Monday in a federal court in Los Angeles, accuses the streaming giant of disregard on so-called mechanical rights -- which, unlike performance rights that cover the playing of a recording, pertain to permission to reproduce copyrighted material.

Lowery, who holds a degree in mathematics and is a lecturer at the University of Georgia, accused Spotify of copying and distributing compositions for its online service without permission or informing the copyright holders.

Lowery himself listed four tracks from Camper Van Beethoven or Cracker that he said were taken without his permission for Spotify's more than 75 million users.

The lawsuit also alleged unfair business practices by the Swedish-founded company, saying that its payment structure was arbitrary and "depresses the value of royalties" overall.

"Unless the court enjoins and restrains Spotify's conduct, plaintiff and the class members will continue to endure great and irreparable harm that cannot be fully compensated or measured in monetary value alone," the lawsuit said.

While not specific about the request for compensation, the lawsuit charged that Spotify has been "unjustly enriched" by at least $150 million.

Spotify did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit.

But the company has frequently defended itself against charges from artists -- notably Taylor Swift -- that it pays back too little.

Spotify's founder Daniel Ek said in June that the site has paid out more than $3 billion in royalties as the company argued that streaming was a rare point of growth in a long stagnant music industry.

The company has long argued that, despite the criticism, it plays by the rules on licensing as it has worked out deals with record companies and songwriters' rights groups.

But the lawsuit took aim at what it said was a fund by Spotify of millions of dollars to settle royalty claims.

"The existence of this fund reflects Spotify's practice and pattern of copyright infringement, wherein Spotify reproduces and/or distributes the works without first obtaining appropriate authorization or license," it said.

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