Pratik Dholakiya says, “For as long as we can remember, newsrooms have used data to support their stories. Whether it’s elections, global warming, or Oscar predictions, writers and reporters dig deep for facts and statistics that’ll add credibility to their claims. However, in recent years, data journalism has become the norm in almost every industry. And as a result, the need for data journalists continues to rise — companies like Priceonomics, Pandora, and many more digital agencies are all looking for people that aren’t afraid to get their hands dirty with numbers... [...]

Aja Frost says, “If you think about it, asking a random professional for advice or help should never work. After all, you want them to give up precious time in their day to share their hard-earned wisdom and experience with a stranger — and a salesperson, no less. So, why do people ever say yes to coffee dates or phone calls with reps? It’s possible the person asking got lucky and stumbled upon someone who’s incredibly altruistic. But more often than not, they reached out in the right way. Want to make your own chances of success with snagging time on an important person’s calendar... [...]

Lindsay Kolowich says, “Practicing good inbound marketing means sending emails to people who actually want to hear from you. But oftentimes, your emails still end up getting lost in the inbox clutter — or worse, in the spam folder. And then, when someone actually opens your email, they don’t actually click through. You may often think to yourself, “Ugh. I just can’t win.” I’ve got your back, though. Here are eight little things you can start doing immediately to improve the open rates, clickthrough rates, and lead generation for your emails. 19 Tips for... [...]

Joanna Alter says, “When done right, user-generated content (UGC) boosts a company’s visibility, traffic and sales. There are some great examples of user-generated content that impressed us all. We can learn from their beautiful displays, creative engagement strategies, and scalable results. But to really reap the ecommerce branding benefits of user-generated content, there are some key mistakes you need to avoid. Here are the five biggest mistakes to steer clear of to maximize the positive impact of your UGC strategy. 1) Publishing Without Permission Make rights management a priority to... [...]

Emma Brudner says, “Which of the following two emails would you respond to? Here’s the first: —————- Hi [first-name], I was really hoping we could just get on the phone or maybe have a meeting about my product, BestThingEver and how it could do great stuff at [company-name] because goals are met every day thanks to BestThingEver, for instance BestThingEver does a lot of really super cool stuff like separate loaves of bread into individual portions and deliver your offspring from their place of learning to your residence. Just a very few minutes of your... [...]

Jessica Cody says, “Think back to when you visited a website for the first time. Were you immediately ready to make a purchase? It’s likely that you were not. In fact, 99% of first time website visitors are not ready to buy. Yet, we as marketers often only focus on the 1% who are ready to buy. To nurture that 99% of people into a sale, you need to create conversions before the checkout (or pre-transactional conversion opportunities). Here are a couple of examples of conversions before the checkout: 1) Newsletter Providing your visitors with the opportunity to sign up for your email newsletter... [...]

Jacqueline Zenn says, “Most of us joke about being addicted to things like Snapchat or Instagram, and we’re all probably guilty of compulsively checking our phones for updates. However, social media is changing more than just our immediate behavior. Think about it: We’ve all seen the infamous commercials illustrating the effects of various illegal substances on your brain, but most of us haven’t considered how seemingly innocuous things like social media can have a strikingly similar effect on both our minds and behaviors. And as marketers, this is something we should be thinking more... [...]

Lindsay Kolowich says, “When it comes to growing and scaling your blog, there are three critical things you need to think about: how you’re going to get new visitors to discover your blog, how you’re going to convert those visitors into quality subscribers, and how you’re going to leverage your most dedicated subscribers to share your content and attract new audiences. Subscribers are a very, very important part of this whole process — especially if you’re in the early stages of blogging. You’re already pouring time and resources into creating awesome blog... [...]

Jacqueline Zenn says, “Most of us joke about being addicted to things like Snapchat or Instagram, and we’re all probably guilty of compulsively checking our phones for updates. However, social media is changing more than just our immediate behavior. Think about it: We’ve all seen the infamous commercials illustrating the effects of various illegal substances on your brain, but most of us haven’t considered how seemingly innocuous things like social media can have a strikingly similar effect on both our minds and behaviors. And as marketers, this is something we should be thinking more... [...]

Lindsay Kolowich says, “In the summer of 2015, we saw two major developments in mobile marketing: First, Google announced a major algorithm update that rewards mobile-friendly websites, and penalizes those that aren’t fully optimized for mobile in mobile search results. A few weeks later, we saw the number of Google search queries on smartphones surpass the number of queries on desktop computers and tablets. Since then, the number of consumers researching and buying on their mobile devices has only increased. Global mobile commerce now makes up 34% of all ecommerce transactions around... [...]