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How to Create a Pinterest Graphic

Using Pinterest can help a business get a good amount of traffic. But, many struggle to get pinners ever to click on their pins, let alone click through to their websites. If pinners bypass your pins altogether, Using Pinterest will end up being a poor strategy for your business.

There are some ways to optimize your pins so that they gain more atten-tion with pinners. A major factor is the graphic or image that you use. The image is the primary means for which people will become interested in exploring more about you. You need to make it stand out.

The first aspect of a Pinterest graphic is its size. The key is to make it longer rather than wide. If you were to make a wide graphic, Pinterest would truncate it, and pinners won’t be able to see the graphic, espe-cially if there is any text on it.

Pinners scroll down by nature when using Pinterest. Therefore, the longer your pins, the longer they focus on them. This is especially true if you make each section of the pin something they want to see. Consider using color to make your graphics stand out. Experiment with different colors and even add some blends or gradients into the mix. You should try to split test based on colors. For instance, try a blue pin and a green pin at the same time to see if one is favored over the other.

Add a significant number of supplemental images to your Pinterest graphics, but don’t overdo it. The images should be relevant to the mes-sage you are trying to convey. Too much flash, however, will get pinners to bypass your graphics.

Make sure you have the rights to use the graphics you include in your pins. Don’t take this issue lightly as there are companies that are paid to monitor copyright infringement. It is a serious offense that is likely to cost you several thousands of dollars. If you find a website that claims royalty free access to images, make sure you know their claims policy. You want them to fight for you if it ever comes down to that. When using text, make sure you are consistent with your font selections. Each section can have a different font but try to keep to no more than two or three fonts.

You want to ensure that the website you link to is relevant to what the graphic portrays. If not, you can expect to have your pins reported to Pin-terest.

How to Get Better Results from Pinterest

Pinterest is shaping up to be one of the most important platforms for businesses to use. It’s easy to get your message across. It has millions of members who love the platform, and it funnels mass amounts of traffic to websites. If this isn’t a recipe for success, nothing else is.

Just like anything else, there are right ways and wrong ways to approach the platform. One obvious wrong way is constant boasting about your business. No one cares, for the most part. You need to focus on what members are searching for and why. Keep selling or promotions down to a minimum.

A much better approach is to convince people of how your products or services can help with their situations. Obviously, this is not an easy task by any stretch. If you take the time to reach out to people and find out what they want, your Pinterest strategy becomes more defined.

Most people ignore the newsletter that Pinterest sends. This is a mistake. They are the authority on their platform, after all. They give tips and re-port on trends. It’s like having your own mini-marketing department. Granted, they are trying to hook you into advertising with them. But, this doesn’t mean the information they provide is useless.

Another way to get better results is to pin frequently. You obviously have an audience. As long as you stay focused on your market or niche and you find that people are sharing what you post, you should continue to post. Set up a schedule for what and when you are going to post.

There are reports published that state the best times to post on each of the social media channels. This is mostly noise that should be ignored. The biggest problems with this are people who miss that window of op-portunity often wait until the next one. And if they miss it again, there goes yet another day of inactivity. If you decide to use these optimal times, make sure you set up a service that can post for you at those times. You also need to ensure that you trust the service you enlist. If not, it can be difficult to get your account unbanned.

Overall, don’t expect instant results. Like all social media platforms, time is going to be your greatest ally. Stay focused on your strategy and keep going until your results start heading in your desired direction.

How to Manage Pinterest Boards

Pinterest is a great platform for businesses. One of the key features is the ability to create boards. These are much like categories. When you pin, you will be asked which board to pin to. Here are some guidelines for the best uses of these boards.

Before dealing with your boards, make sure your profile is set up and that you have a decent picture along with a description of your business. You may believe people don’t read your profile but in fact, many will. Also, include your website address as you’ll get a good number of pinners that will use it. This is free traffic to your website.

It’s usually best to have Pinterest accounts with a specific theme or niche, and this is key when determining what to name your boards. As of this writing, Pinterest does not prohibit people from multiple accounts. So, keep the accounts separate from personal and business. The downside is you will need to manage these multiple accounts.

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Creating Quality Content – What Exactly Does That Mean?

Everyone has advice to offer regarding your online blog. It is an advice-du-jour type of environment. Each week, you can expect something new. The advice may work in the short-term, but in many cases, it eventually goes out of favor with either the search engines or with your readers.

One piece of advice that continues to circulate is to create quality con-tent. This keeps appearing for one great reason: it works. It’s the only tried-and-true piece of advice, and it’s one that was relevant ten years ago and will be relevant ten years from now. In short, Google wants rele-vant results for its searches and providing relevant results will get you re-warded.

But, what exactly does it mean to create quality content? That advice seems to be lacking, at least until now. To create quality content, you need to focus on who you are creating it for. Even quality content will be of little use if it is not presented to the right audience. For instance, you can write a great article on the benefits of organic gardening, but it won’t resonate well with someone who is searching for how to buy the right cement for your next DIY project.

The key here is to start out with relevancy. Your readers came to your blog because they were looking for some information. Give it to them. If you read in a forum that people were having an issue with some topic and you provide an answer to the issue, they will be happy with what you publish. Some will argue that if you give them everything they need, they no longer have a use for your blog. While some readers will do this, oth-ers will recognize that you presented yourself as an authority on this topic and will be curious about what else you can help them with. This is why it’s crucial to have a call-to-action on each of your blog posts. Give them a reason to come back.

Enlist others and collaborate on content creation. This has several bene-fits. First, you will get another view on the content. Second, you will have someone willing to promote what you have created in exchange for promoting what they have created. It only takes a couple of influential bloggers to send your content and blog into the stratosphere. The web is a collaborative machine. Use this fact to your advantage.

Don’t Forget to Use Social Media

It’s amazing how many bloggers do not include social media as part of their strategy. The popularity of social media continues to grow and is likely to do so well into the future. Therefore, not using it is keeping you from recognizing your true potential.

It’s also widely believed through testing that search engines are incorpo-rating social media signals into their algorithms. That means when some-one searches for something, the search engines will factor what kind of influence social media has on that search term. It’s important to become aligned with what you are targeting with these signals.

On the flip side, do not rely solely on the impact of social media. It should be a part of your strategy but should not be the entire focus. Share because you believe your followers will appreciate what you shared, not because you think it will sell. That’s an important distinction, and you need to keep that in mind whenever you share on social media.

People don’t like to be sold to, especially on your Facebook timeline. If you don’t believe me, think about the last time a friend started promot-ing his or her wares on Facebook. Chances are good, they received plenty of unfriend requests. You may have been one who takes that action your-self. Instead, create an environment of sharing useful information.

When you share, don’t be afraid to use other people’s content. Your friends will find it useful, and the people whose content you are sharing will appreciate you for it. They will be much more willing to share your content in exchange. It also gives you plenty of publishing power in case you run out of ideas on what to share. Find content that has a minimum of promotional information.

While sharing other peoples’ content is important, don’t forget to share your own. The point is, you want people to click on the links within your social shares. This will take them to your website and will garner the at-tention of search engines. This, in turn, should increase your ranking with those search engines.

Social media is a long-term strategy, and you need to keep with it to see any benefits. It will probably take much longer than anticipated which means it will seem like it’s not working early on. You have to believe that it will make a difference and keep with it. When it does take off, it can flood your website with high-quality traffic.

Find a Purpose in Repurposing Content

You’ve written a blog post. Great! However, it may not be enough. The problem is, the web is no longer just about text. You need to have other types of content in your mix. One great way to do that is to repurpose your content.

Do you have PowerPoint? If so, you now have the ability to not only cre-ate a slideshow but to turn that slideshow into a video. If you don't have PowerPoint, don't worry. There are plenty of alternatives that don't cost any money.

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These 52 Fitness Secrets will reveal simple advice on exactly what you need to do to transform your body and give you the ability to live life to its fullest. Ready? Let’s dive in…

52 Fitness Secrets You Need To Know

1. Find Your WHY (Burning Desire)

Do you know your reason why? It’s your reason why that spurs you to action and keeps you from quitting.

If your reason why isn’t big enough, you’ll stay on the couch, or at least go back to it after a few weeks. Find a big enough reason why and you’ll push through to success. Do you know your reason why? Well figure it out!

2. Forgive Yourself

Life is about mistakes. We all make them. All the freaking time! It’s not whether or not you make a mistake, it’s how you react to it that counts.

Don’t let a mistake like missing a few workouts, or binging in front of the television one night completely throw you off your game and cause you to quit.

Acknowledge you slipped, and start fresh in the morning. Don’t let it fester and become a big thing so that before you know it, you’ve been eating Krispy Kreme for three months and haven’t worked out, either!
You can’t change yesterday. Focus on now!

3. Eliminate Negativity (Yeah, People, Too!)

Sadly, some of the biggest obstacles to overcome when trying to make positive changes in your life are your friends and family.

They have many reasons, I’m sure, from trying to “protect” you or your self-esteem to trying to sabotage you out of fear because if you make all these positive changes you might just leave them behind as they still go to happy hour (for hours), party late into the morning and sleep half the day, and while away the hours in front of the television.

Whew! That was a long sentence!

You need to make very clear what your goals are and that you need their support. If they can’t support you, they can’t be around you. Sure, that sounds harsh but sometimes necessary.

4. Turn Off The Freaking TV!

You heard me! Don’t look at me like that! Everybody is too freaking busy for this and that and the other thing, yet they spend 10 plus hours a week watching television.

Here’s a shocking news alert for you. 99.99% of what is on TV is complete crap! Turn it off!

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Environmentally Friendly

Excess use of paper exhausts the supply of trees. These resources take several years to grow, in most cases. The reduction in the demand of paper can bring the supply in line. This will allow us to replenish the supply at a faster pace from all the years when demand was higher.

Higher Productivity

People will be able to find their documents much quicker when it is in an electronic format. While they still must implement some document retrieval system, they will not have to rely on digging through several filing cabinets before finding the documents they need. Let’s face it; most people are not organized when it comes to this.

More Shareable

Digital documents can be sent via email, saved to the cloud or sent up to other locations via a file transfer program. All of this happens in seconds whereas sending via traditional means will take much longer.

Collaboration

Many document management systems, and to some extend to word processing programs, allow easy collaboration with documents. Some are sophisticated enough to reflect real-time changes. The features vary alongside the costs, but there is bound to be a solution available for any office needs.

Reduction of Loss

If a document in a traditional filing cabinet gets lost somehow, there is no way to retrieve it. Unless the owner created a duplicate of the document and remembers where he or she stored it, that document is gone. While digital documents can be lost without any backup, it is much easier to duplicate, store and retrieve.

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Can Your Smartphone Replace Your Desktop Computer for Work?

Many of us consider our desktop computers primarily as work devices. These are the machines we use when we're writing documents, updating spreadsheets, creating slideshows and presentations and pretty much whenever we have any kind of work to do.

But desktop computers are not portable and they are prone to going wrong occasionally. As such, it's very possible to imagine you might end up stuck without your computer and having to make do with your smartphone – which is always on and always on your person.

Could you make do?

Let's find out…

Software

The main challenges would be finding compatible software. If you only tend to use Microsoft Office for your work, then the good news is that both iOS and Android have fully functional office suits from Microsoft in the form of Office365. You'll need an Office subscription and some features are lacking but overall it will be sufficient for most people looking for a way to write their documents on the move.

If you don't have an office subscription then you can alternatively use free alternatives like Kingsoft Office or Documents to Go.

Unfortunately, some businesses will require their own specialist software and this is where things can get a little bit more difficult for those who need to work on the move. Unless you can find a way to stream your computer to your smartphone (which will be fiddly) you'll probably be stumped.

Input

The other challenge with working on a smartphone would be the input. Fortunately this is a matter that is considerably easier to solve. If you're someone who owns an Android, then setting up a compatible Bluetooth mouse and keyboard is actually very easy. If you then prop your phone up with a stand you can have a set-up that is reminiscent of a very tiny computer and this can be used to work anywhere. You can even get foldable keyboards allowing you to keep the whole set-up in your pockets! With an iPhone on the other hand, you won't be able to get mouse support but with a capacitive stylus you can achieve much the same thing.

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Evernote

Project management and note-taking go hand-in-hand. It’s all good and well organizing other members of your team, but when you’re at risk of forgetting what you need to do, or when you need to refer to that clipping that you found online, Evernote is always going to be incredibly helpful.

Pinterest

For creative projects, Pinterest is an excellent way to share ideas and to create mood-boards. When a ‘Task Complete’ doesn’t quite cut it, this is a much more visual and expressive form of remote communication.

Splashtop Remote

For when you just can’t explain to your client how to open that file, Splashtop Remote lets you take charge of their computer and even see their screen.

What is Smartsheet?

Finding the right project management app can sometimes be a headache. In theory, a project management tool or app can make life considerably easier for any business by keeping all open tasks in one place and providing an easy way for team members to stay updated and to collaborate.

The problem is that it’s very hard to find a project management system that is perfectly suited to your workflow. Every business is different and finding one piece of software that can be equally suitable for a writing agency as it is for a bricklaying company is always going to present challenges.

If you’ve looked at the ‘big three’ apps (Trello, Asana, and Basecamp) and not had any luck, then you might be starting to pull your hair out. Before you go prematurely bald though, consider trying Smartsheet.

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Important Tools for List Building

List building is an incredibly powerful tool for marketing your business and can also be used in a range of other ways to build trust, to collect data and to crowdsource ideas. Thus e-mail collection has increasingly come to the fore lately as more and more bloggers see it as a critical part of their strategy.

And this is great news for you, because it means there are now more tools than ever before to help you grow and manage your list! Read on to learn some of the best out there…

LeadPages

Landing pages are a great way to gather e-mails because they are designed in a manner that ensures everything leads to your ultimate goal. LeadPages is the most popular tool among many bloggers for quickly developing professional looking and effective landing pages, so give it a go!

WP Tactical Popup/ Sumo Me List Builder

Alternatively, you might just want a subtle box to pop up on your page to nudge your users to giving you their e-mail addresses. If you offer a free ebook or something this can be a very effective tool. WP Tactical Popup is a WordPress plugin that makes this feature very easy to add and that has great reviews from users. Sumo Me is another option for a popup 'lightbox' that has more features compared with WP Tactical Popup.

Mail Chimp

Mail Chimp is a tool for sending bulk e-mails to your mailing list. Once you've got all your e-mails, you need to actually do something with them!

The great thing about Mail Chimp is that it doesn't just help you send your e-mails but also helps you to design them ensuring that they make the right impression and have the desired effect.

AWeber

AWeber doesn't have the fancy design features of Mail Chimp but it's another useful tool for sending out bulk e-mails that is packed with features. It also provides tools for managing your contacts and for creating attractive opt-in forms.

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An Introduction to Highly Productive Flow States

A big buzz word at the moment in the world of productivity is something called 'flow'. Flow essentially refers to a state of mind that many people believe to be the state of 'ultimate cognitive performance' and which is characterized by a complete focus and attention to the point where all background distractions seemingly disappear.

The term has been used for a long time but has recently be re-popularized by a book called 'The Rise of Superman' by Steven Kotler. Let's take a look at what precisely flow is and whether or not it really holds the key to your ultimate productivity.

What is Flow?

Most of us will have experienced flow at one time or other in our lives. Most people describe flow as being that point when you're surfing, skiing or playing sports when everything slows down and you are able to react with super-human reactions. It's that sense of calm that allows you to pull off the impossible and achieve amazing feats and it's thus highly sought after by athletes.

Flow is also that point in time when you're writing and you completely focus on what you're doing to the extent that you don't even get up to go to the toilet or eat. It's when you're having a conversation and you completely lose track of time.

On a neurological level, this essentially means that you're completely switched on to what you're doing and completely engaged with it so that everything else appears less important. As a result, the brain produces chemicals that are similar to stress hormones but with feel-good endorphins. Specifically, flow seems to be the result of dopamine, norepinephrine, anandamide, serotonin and adrenaline.

Is Flow Real?

The concept of flow is supported in numerous studies and almost all of us can attest to having experienced something like it at some point in our lives.

That said, the idea of flow also seems to be one that is prone to exaggeration and embellishment. Too often, flow is treated like the solution to everything and Kotler in particular makes a lot of sweeping statements like 'every work of art or world record ever is the result of flow'. There is no science to back this up.