Entrepreneurially Spirited College Gal

12 years a foreigner; 2016 grad; avid music listener; crazy drawer

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ERIK HASSLE • MONDAY, MAY 4 • 4:00PM ET / 1:00PM PT

Erik Hassle has been busy. His new music video, No Words, was recently released, he just wrapped up his tour with Broods and thetwinshadow, and now he’s stopping by Tumblr HQ to answer your best questions.

Submit  those best questions, then follow Erik Hassle’s Dashboard Confessions on Monday, May 4 at 4:00pm ET.

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Ted Talks Technology Presentation

 About

Ted Talks became a thing after Richard Wurman, an architect, came up with the concept of Technology, Entertainment, and Design. Currently, Sapling Foundation owns Ted Talks. The Sapling Foundation is a non-profit foundation organization. In 1996, publishing entrepreneur, Chris Anderson, established the Sapling Foundation. As of 2001, Chris Anderson—the Sapling Foundation founder—became the owner of Ted Talks.

 Mission Statement

“We believe passionately in the power of ideas to change attitudes, lives and ultimately, the world. So we’re building here a clearinghouse that offers free knowledge and inspiration from the world’s most inspired thinkers, and also a community of curious souls to engage with ideas and each other”

 How it makes Money

Ted Talks make money in the following ways:

§  Conference attendance fees

§  Sponsorships

§  The Sapling Foundation support

§  Licensing fees and book sales

 Conference Costs

As of 2006, attendance cost was $4,400 per person by invitation only. As of 2007, the annual membership fee was $6,000 and included attending the conference, club mailings, networking tools, and conference DVDs.

 Ted Talks in Greater Detail

Ted Talks are supported by partnerships with carefully selected organizations. The ads on the videos and website support from the carefully selected organization make Ted Talks available to the world for free in many languages (over 120) and on many platforms. Ted.com and the mobile apps allow great ideas to be easily accessible to the world for free thanks to the money that TED receives.

 Ted Talks

§  It spends the money that it makes immediately. The money being spend supports big projects such as making Ted Talks available for free and supporting the independent TEDx community around the world.

§  Every dime made goes right back into supporting the work that Ted Talks does

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Part_3 - GeorgianaKlem2593's library

Part 3 of my podcast

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Part_2__Digital_IQ__How_L.L._Bean - GeorgianaKlem2593's library

Part 2 of my podcast on L.L. Bean’s Social Media

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Part_1__Digital_IQ__How_L.L._Bean_Successfully_Interacts_wh_Consumers_Digitally - GeorgianaKlem2593's library

Check out Part 1 of my Jing video of my podcast on Digital IQ: How L.L. Bean Successfully Interacts wh Consumers Digitally 

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Target’s Marketing Strategies Hit the Ball Out of the Park

Target: Brief Overview

Target Corporate can simply be described as an upscale discount retailer that aims to provide customers with high-quality and trendy merchandise that is sold at attractive prices in stores that are clean, spacious, and guest-friendly. In the U.S. alone, Target owns 1,795 stores (Corporate). The company has 38 distribution centers throughout the country and global locations in India. Consumers can shop conveniently at target.com plus gain better insight on offered deals via the website and its applications (Target and Cartwheel by Target).

 The Target stores have attained a competitive advantage over its competitors (Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., Amazon.com, Inc., and Sears Holdings Corporation) because of its ability to provide a one-stop shopping experience for guests by “delivering differentiated merchandise and outstanding value“ with its Expected More. Pay Less brand promise (Corporate). Because of this competitive advantage, the company is the second largest general merchandise retailer in the U.S. and its website, Target.com, is ranked as one of the most-visited retail Websites—just behind Amazon.com (Corporate).

 Across the retail industry, Target is recognized as a leader in innovation. The company works diligently to pioneer the concept of designer partnerships plus consistently being the best when it comes to the store design. Target understands that it must exceed its guests’ needs and for this reasons, it continually reinvents its stores, the layout, and the presentation and merchandise assortment. An engaging shopping experience is established because of this constant reinvention (Corporate).  

 Social Media Overview:

Lets be clear and honest. Target knows how to do social media successfully. The company has a massive social media audience. Its social media audience is at 138, 441,927 as of May 2014. Its number of social media followers is measured through the various social media channels that the company implements successfully into doing business on a daily basis. Target has seven social media channels that it implements on a daily basis when it comes to establishing strong and memorable customer relationships. Its social media channels consist of a social media audience for Twitter followers, Facebook fans, Instagram followers, YouTube subscribers, Pinterest followers, Vine followers, and LinkedIn followers.

 Successfully Marketing to its Social Audience:

Target successfully markets to a social audience of 138 million by taking the following steps:

 First, the company has its eye on the prize: it divides to conquer. The fact of the matter is that Target maintains a competitive advantage by maintaining a different handle on Twitter for each customer need. The company has presence on Twitter by operating over five accounts. Its main account, @Target, provides users with new or exclusive offerings plus deals on its #cartwheel application. 

Second, the brand is all about the #cartwheel. Cartwheel is Target’s application that acts as a coupon-book for the company. It provides users with deals and allows them to scan barcodes directly from their phones while at a checkout. Loyal Target customers can also choose promotional deals at Target through its presence on Facebook. When a customer makes a buy, the Cartwheel application shares that activity with the customer’s friends on their Facebook feed. It has been calculated that 80% of the application’s users engage with the software on a weekly basis. The Cartwheel application, which is just a year old, is heavily Facebook focused but it also heavily relies on Twitter in order to drive users towards it. Target is heavily focused on establishing a strong presence on Twitter when it comes to implementing the #Cartwheel in order to offer users daily deals.

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Corporations being Socially Responsible: What it means for today’s businesses

a.     What are the characteristics of socially responsible companies?

Being socially responsible as a corporation was not a popular practice in the U.S. until the late 1960s. In the late 1960s, there was a need for businesses to address important factors such as the effect of the corporation’s pursuits on the environment and society plus it shareholders. Corporate social responsibility became in practice in order to attempt to “portray corporations as responsible citizens whoa re concerned with issues of social and environmental welfare” (Xaxx). As a result of corporations practicing being socially responsible, key characteristics were established in order to ensure best practice. According to Jagg Xaxx, there are 4 key characteristics of corporate social responsibility: the public, the environment, the clients, and the staff.

 The Public: Corporations bear responsibility for the effect they have on the various sectors of our society. The activities of corporations greatly impact our society and its individuals especially those individuals that are not employed by those specific corporations plus are not loyal to their products or services. According to Jagg Xaxx, the goal is to “strive for transparency in corporate pursuits so that the public knows what is going on”. The interaction between corporations and society should be positive and productive in order to ensure positivity amongst best business practices.  

 The Environment: Being socially responsible towards the environment has pushed many corporations nowadays to increase the public’s knowledge about declining resources, toxic waste, and global warming. Corporations are working diligently to ensure that serious changes are being made to achieve sustainability and appearing green rather than just being green.

 The Clients: Corporations being socially responsible towards its clients means that the market itself will protect the needs and interests of the clients’. The protection of clients will have to be enforced by the government or “voluntarily pursued” by companies according to Jagg Xaxx. Installing practices into corporations in order to monitor the interaction that goes on between corporations and their clients is key. In order to ensure trust in corporations, clients must feel that they will not be exploited or cheated by those they trust the most (the major corporations).  

 The Staff: Any employees or staff members of a corporation have certain given rights such as the right to expect fair pay, safe working conditions and purposeful work. A corporation’s social responsibilities include being dutiful to its employees by ensuring that their rights are respected and changes are made in order to prevent the mistreatment of staff members and exploitation.  

Being socially responsible and the measures that are taken to ensure that this occurs vary amongst different corporations of various sizes. For example, the measures that the team in the Bureau of Economics and Business Affairs for the U.S. takes various in respects to a small mom and pop business. Different companies of different sizes call for different corporate social responsible measures to take place. The Bureau of Economics and Business Affairs is global and cares about promoting responsibility and ethical business practices. It coordinates a “cross-functional, intra-departmental, and interagency team” in order to make sure that support and guidance is provided to major areas of responsible corporate conduct (Corporate). The major areas of responsible corporate conduct include the following:

•    Good Corporate Citizenship

•    Contribution to the Growth and Development of the Local Economy

•    Innovation

•    Employment and Industrial Relations

•    Human Rights

•    Environmental Protection

•    Natural Resources Governance, including the Kimberley Process

•    Transparency

•    Anti-Corruption

•    Trade and Supply Chain Management

•    Intellectual Property

•    Women's Economic Empowerment

 Source: http://www.state.gov/e/eb/eppd/csr/

 Three specific companies of three different sizes best exemplify how being socially

responsible as a corporation can make a difference: GM, Market Basket, and Zappos. GM is committed to owning five behaviors: candor, trust, winning, accountability, and the tenacity to face challenges (O’Brien). In addition to these five behaviors that the company is committed to, it is also committed to increasing transparency and two-way communication plus taking responsibility when it comes to addressing congressional committees, regulators, and customers (O’Brien).

 Market Basket emphasizes the importance of the attention being always on the customer. The company went through corporate drama when protests broke out that demanded that the company’s CEO returned. Customers boycotted stores in order to support employees who had made them feel welcomed over the years (O’Brien). Those customers that boycotted paid higher prices elsewhere because they wanted Market Basket to remain the same. The employees demanded for their CEO, Arthur T. Demoulas, because he had made them feel seen, heard, respected, and cared about (O’Brien). A socially responsible company such as Market Basket succeeded because it understood the significance of pleasing and considering its staff members just like the successful company Zappos.

As Zappos continues to grow as a company, it also cares about remaining socially responsible plus defining their core values from which their culture, their brand, and their business strategies are developed. Their ten core values that they live by can be simply defined as the following: 

·      Deliver Wow Through Service

·      Embrace and Drive Change

·      Create Fun and A Little Weirdness

·      Be Adventurous, Creative, and Open-Minded

·      Pursue Growth and Learning

·      Build Open and Honest Relationships With Communication

·      Build a Positive Team and Family Spirit

·      Do More With Less

·      Be Passionate and Determined

·      Be Humble

Zappos believes that by restructuring their organization and eliminating manager roles in order to become a holacracy, they are becoming more socially responsible to their employees. Jagg Xaxx would agree with the brand, as their commitment to being socially responsible to their staff and employees is one of his key characteristics of a socially responsible company.

The following three key points are a few of the many things that I have learned when it comes to running a small business:

1.     First, I learned that the mission statement for a business is like the brand ambassador of the company. A good mission statement should be one sentence, clear and concise statement that explains who the business is. It should include the name, whether or not the business is non-profit, and what type of business it is. In addition, it should include what it does, and for whom and where. Those are the basic components of a powerful mission statement. Some experts consider the mission statement as the PR statement because it must be easy to remember and repeat to various members such as board members, staff and volunteers. These members must be able to effectively speak on behalf of the business and its efforts successfully.

2.     Critical success factors play a major role in the success of your business. The critical success factors represent the factors and the strengths of your business. If your business was too fail or struggle, these critical success factors should have the capacity to carry you throughout. Some experts suggest that the following are just of the few critical success factors to consider as a small business owner or even business owner that has an international presence. First, sell each unit at a profit. (Rayna) A business owner must be able to evaluate each product that they plan on selling and determine if they are selling them at a profit. Second, continue to reduce overhead costs. This should always be a continuous objective for all business owners. Third, develop new products while also maintaining the high quality of the existing products (Rayna). Your products should be created or chosen based on the demands of your customer. Customer feedback is always key too. Forth, find and retain the high-value customers. Implement the 80-20 rule, meaning that 80% of your business will come from 20% of your customers (Rayna). Fifth, create and maintain the highest level of customer satisfaction. Providing the best customer service is one of the most important success factors in order to sustain as a business.

3.     The What I must do well and What could go wrong sections of the assignment helped me learn a few things. First, a business owner should always due business with the future in mind. An intelligent business owner will achieve great customer satisfaction in the present and aim to improve it for the future but overall, that business owner understands that their customers can easily leave them if they do not retain a competitive advantage. What I must do well implies that a business owner must feel almost completely confident in their capability to successfully implement their critical success factors. What I must do well is the aspect of a business that a business owner does not have much room to miss. The business owner must be able to confidently run a business being aware of its strengths and opportunities. What could go wrong is like thinking about a business from the weaknesses and threats point of view. An educated business owner who is constantly seeking new opportunities and better techniques to implement in a business should be capable of being able to identify factors that could impact the success of a business. What could go wrong should cause a business owner to think about a possible exit strategy as a back-up option. A successful business owner should always have a plan B in mind when doing business because the truth of the matter is that businesses never run as intended. Every successful business has gone through many growing periods where it overcomes strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Doing business successfully requires a business owner to test his knowledge and challenge his capability to seek the What I do well and What could go wrong factors.  

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How L.L. Bean Successfully Implements Social Media in the 21st Century

Before going into details about how L.L. Bean, a privately held mail-order, online, and retail company, ended up executing social media successfully, it is important to understand how the company began doing business.

 Brief Background:

Leon Leonwood Bean founded L.L. Bean in 1912. L.L.Bean was an outdoorsman first and a businessman second. Due to his passion for nature, he began to design the Maine Hunting Shoe. L.L. Bean designed his famous boot in order to revolutionize outdoor boots.

 Source: http://www.llbean.com/customerService/aboutLLBean/timeline/#year-1021

 As history shows, L.L. Bean’s reputation was not tarnished as it faced difficult times. In fact, the company continued to flourish throughout tough historical moments such as the sinking of the Titanic, the Great Depression, World War II, and the attack on Pearl Harbor. During the Great Depression, middle-class families who could afford vacations to the wilderness sought out L.L.Bean. L.L.Bean supplied the gear for their adventures. During World War II, L.L.Bean did business in Washington as the company began to outfit servicemen with boots and outerwear. Back in Maine, the company continued to build a sturdy business with a blossoming reputation that was winning most of America over.

 Over time, the company has adapted its services to cater to the needs of its customers. The company’s focus has always been on practical apparel but customers began to demand casual-wear so the company decided to implement both, practical apparel and casual-wear while staying true to its signature piece, the Maine Hunting Shoe too.

 For the next 100 years, we can anticipate that the Maine Hunting Shoe will remain as the staple piece in L.L. Bean’s catalog, which like the shoe has “vastly improved and yet fundamentally unchanged, much like the company itself” according to L.L.Bean.com.

 L.L.Bean’s Current Social Media and its Standing:

Currently, L.L. Bean has exposure on 7 different social media channels plus has a blog known as Trailmix. Its blog, Trailmix, is a place where customers can keep up with all of the latest news. The blog allows customers to check out great ideas and receive advice that can inspire great outdoor adventures—as well as updates on the brand’s products, sales, and events taking place in Freeport, Maine plus around the country. In addition to its major blog, Trailmix, the company has the following channels: Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, Google+, Foursquare, and Instagram. L.L. Bean’s 7 social media channels each offer their own benefits and aim to positively represent the brand and its products.

 L.L. Bean decided to implement social media and go digital because of a few reasons:

·      Increase brand awareness

·      Acquire new customers

·      Drive traffic to llbean.com

·      Drive buyer file growth

·      Drive incremental demand

·      Provide exceptional customer service

·      Offer a platform for friendly, two-way communication

Facebook:

It allows you to share your favorite L.L. Bean stories, check out the company’s Daily Markdown deals and also participate in exclusive contests, giveaways plus more

 Twitter:

This account allows you to receive first word on L.L. Bean’ news, exciting giveaways, promotions plus more

 Pinterest:

This account features pinboards on the brand’s favorite gear and clothing brought to users from everywhere. The pinboards are focused on inspiring users to get outdoors plus discover art, photos, and more from the brand’s rich heritage.

 YouTube:

Videos are available that showcase the brand’s products, Users can also check out the brand’s TV ads and access exclusive, behind-the-scenes footage

 Google+:

When a user adds L.L. Bean to their circle, they can receive great advice on gear and destinations for their next outdoor adventure.

 Foursquare:

This social media channel allows users to scout the current specials at the nearest L.L. Bean store, find the ideal spot to put a kayak, and even more all through their mobile device.

 Instagram:

Users can explore photos and videos inspired by their love of the outdoors and things found in the great state of Maine.

 Source: http://www.llbean.com/customerService/aboutLLBean/social_media.html

 For this presentation, I will focus solely on 4 of L.L. Bean’s social media channels. I will go into further discussion about their Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter accounts.

 Facebook:

Two accounts:

1.     Facebook.com/LLBean

2.     Facebook.com/LLBeanSignature

·      Account was created in November 2008

·      553,000 likes

·      71,000 people have been to the store

·      6,076 people are talking about the company on Facebook (source: http://brands.ignitesocialmedia.com/l-l-bean/)

·      Post on a daily basis

·      Provides its consumers with information they are interested in and the brand cares about its consumers’ input

 Ex: April 20, 2015: Good luck to all the runners in The Boston Marathon today! We’re lacing up for a summer of training, exercise and more races – what inspires you to get out and run?

Shop running apparel: http://bit.ly/LLBean_Running

 ·      Conveniently include the URL for customers to easily click on and access the company website in order to check out the deals they are offering  

 Save while you stock up for spring – receive a FREE $10 Gift Card with your purchase of $50 or more. Hurry, offer ends this Sunday, 4/19. Shop now:

 http://bit.ly/LLBean_Spring_Gift-Card

 ·      Interactive posts where customers and enthusiastic fans comment on their posts

·      The company has 2 employees who post online versions of the most recent catalogue and post customer photos.

·      All content posted will be relevant to the current month and upcoming events (ex: National Park Day April 20/ Boston Marathon April 20)

YouTube:

2 channels

*Youtube.com/LLBean

* Youtube.com/LLBeanPR

·      Created on November 2008

·      2 employees are in charge of creating videos for all products displayed

·      Videos created will have specifications and show details which otherwise would not be seen unless in person

·      All community and company events are filmed and posted on YouTube along with videos that specifically show L.L. Bean products in use

 Instagram:

2 accounts:

llbeansignature

·      574 posts

·      26.1k followers

·      384 following

·      It is an Instagram page dedicated to showcasing the spirit of New England through the display of authentic classics with a modern sense of style and fit

Llbean

·      388 posts

·      72.8k followers

·      442 following

·      showcases images of Maine, the great outdoors and the everyday moments that inspire the brand

  Twitter: (source: https://twitter.com/LLBean)

·      Was established as of January 2009

·      Tweets: 6,340

·      Following: 1,050

·      Followers: 36.5 k

·      873 photos and videos

·      features giveaways and promotions

·      posts about 5-6 tweets per day

·      aims to retweet its customers’ tweets

·      2 employees respond to customer tweets, tweet about current deals plus hold contests online

·      All content is relevant to that day

·      *Has 4 accounts: @LLBean; @LLBean_PR; @LLBeanHuntFish

·      @LLBean_Chicago

 Ethics/Philosophy about doing Social Media for L.L.Bean

 A Recommendation for L.L. Bean

·      Establish an app dedicated to the brand’s products or an app that is centrally focused on establishing one platform for all of its 7 social media channels

·      Create a brand specific Tumblr account rather than one created by L.L. Bean brand enthusiasts or lovers

 Closing Words:

1st Annual Social Media Outstanding Citizen Award (SMOC) from Blue Archer

Source: http://www.llbean.com/customerService/aboutLLBean/images/FactSheet_2014.pdf

 L.L. Bean has been successful due to its ability to create a cohesive image to represent the brand across all of its social channels.

 The one thing that draws people to L.L. Bean is that it’s a down to earth old fashioned company but keeping those old fashioned values doesn’t mean that you cannot modernize yourself with effective marketing strategies that target customers on all levels.

 Sources:

http://www.slideshare.net/wenzelhe/ll-bean-marketing-strategy

 http://simplymeasured.com/blog/2014/06/24/how-l-l-bean-scored-a-437-1-instagram-engagement-rate-hint-puppies/

 https://www.pinterest.com/llbean/your-llbean-selfies/

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Technology’s Impact on the Social Organization

Technology is impacting the social organization and Sherry Turkle agrees. No matter where we go, where we are, we have the ability to stay interconnected thanks to the innovation of technology and its evolution over time. The fact of the matter is that technology is ruling our lives. Sherry Turkle stated, “We are moving to a space where we feel free to respond to the three promises that technology now makes us: We can always be heard, we can be wherever we want to be, and we never have to be alone”. She argues that the capacity for solitude is terribly important to develop: If our children aren’t taught to be alone, then they will only be lonely.

Overusing our technology can threaten things that we care about and Ms. Turkle argues this as well in her interview. Our generation has allowed technology to overrule its lives to the point that we become co-dependent on it. Technology allows us to become vulnerable because of the stimulation that comes from receiving a message from a phone. We as individuals lose interest in communicating with one another when there is a phone that captures our attention more. Ms. Turkle argues, “We are not as strong as technology’s pull”. As individuals, we cannot pull away from the desirable technology because a sense of attraction is established. An interaction that is had with a cellphone once we receive a text is so strong that we cannot pull away as individuals because we feel a sense of acceptance and as if the phone wants and needs us. We’ve allowed ourselves to establish a real life relationship with our phones. It has gotten to the point where receiving a text message is no longer seen as an interruption but rather as a connection we are having with one another virtually.

 Here is what is important to know regarding technology and its impact on the social organization:

·      We are always and will continue to be mobile

·      We want a sense of community but not online

·      The ease of access for technology is unbelievable because we can do anything from anywhere with anyone

·      Becoming disconnected can lead to becoming outdated if one does not stay in touch with technology

·      A sense of dependency on technology and belonging plus following the trends has been established by our current generation

·      People communicate differently online versus in person

·      People do in fact reveal more about themselves online than when interacting with them one on one

The fact of the matter is that technology is impacting the ways that a corporation, specifically a social organization, functions currently and will function in the future. Technology has paved the path for businesses. In order for businesses to stay up to trend, they must stay in touch with the all the evolving fashions and technological innovations. Technology has the ability to impact a few factors of the social organization.  It has the ability to impact scheduling and businesses practices, meaning that a corporation can choose to not email after 5p.m. or implement a free day of emailing. These established rules will have an impact on how employees do business with either B2B or B2C.

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What is a blog and how to do it successfully?

According to a 2008 survey by Universal McCann, there are 26 million blogs and approximately 60 million blog readers in the U.S. alone. Out of those 60 million blog readers, each read about 3 blogs per day. These statistics help us gain a better understanding as to why building and maintaining a blog can help you gain an upper-hand in the social media industry. Building and maintaining a successful blog takes time, dedication, research, content, and passion.

First off, let’s go into further detail and gain a better understanding of what a blog is. A blog is a website that is regularly updated through its offered content. What distinguishes a blog from other types of social media? There are 6 key characteristics of a blog according to the book, Social Media Marketing.

Publishable: It must be inexpensive and easy to set up a blog for users. Posting should be free and should be able to be seen worldwide Findable: Users should be able to find blogs with search engines. The more posts, the quicker it is to find a blog Social: A blog should be a conversation starter. Conversation starters can occur through mutual interests either through direct comments or by linking to others with related content Viral: Information can be spread at the speed of light. Interesting content will start a conversation much quicker, which will allow your blog to be seen more rapidly by other users Syndicatable: Time can be saved in searching and finding relevant content when users can subscribe to a blog using RSS (Really Simple Syndication) plus be notified about updates Linkable: Blogs can be linked to each other, which will help users gain access to a bigger audience Creating a blog is just as easy as learning your ABCs. It actually happens to be the easiest part of blogging. Starting a blog is not difficult thanks to sites such as WordPress, Blogger, or other free offered sites that allow you to create a blog in just a few easy steps. WordPress and Blogger are examples of hosted blogs, meaning that another company’s website and server runs the blog. Self-hosted blogs are great for a few reasons. They are taken more seriously because they required a larger time investment to create and maintain. Also, they are relatively low in cost.

In order to become a successful blogger, here are a few recommended tips.

Use catchy titles: Great titles attract the attention of other blog users. They give the users a reason to read the post and have the power to have other users re-blog your post. Power to the title! Update Frequently: Update at least twice a week minimally or daily if possible. Updated content is best in order to reach a wider audience and target your posts to more users Keep posts focused: Users of blogging sites enjoy finding posts while browsing and researching other topics along the way. Concise, focused posts are easy to read and keep your readers wanting more Invite comments: Encouraging interaction on a blog is based off of ending each post with a question that asks for help or is provocative. Interacting with your audience allows you to create an avid and involved relationship Promote the blog: Being recognized as a blogger does not happen overnight. It is important that a blogger takes the time to self-promote their work. Competition for bloggers is tight. Differentiate yourself from the competition. Give your audience content that keeps them wanting more on a daily basis. Suggestions for promoting your blog would include the following: Sign up with popular blog listing services such as Technorati Look around at other blogs, check to see what blog communities people are involved in in order to provide you with a competitive advantage, plus join blogs that look trustworthy and worthwhile. Engage with others: Make thoughtful comments on other blogs; Respond to comments made by others in a punctual manner; Punctuality is key! The most valuable engagement will come from unplanned interactions. Be open to endless possibilities. Avoid negativity: Negative and aggressive statements towards other people, brands, or companies will only decrease the number of users following your posts. Negative comments invite different audiences, which in turn can harm the reputations of both sides (a company’s and a user’s) Stand by the content: Avoid going back on what content was posted or said because it will make any mistake more apparent and memorable plus can lead to more negativity from other audience members Cross promote: Using other social media channels to promote your blog can be a tactful technique to implement. Blogs offer great opportunities for sharing opinions and information, therefore, using other blogs can be great for getting your content out there to more audience members. A few last words:

Monitor your content, update it frequently, self-promote, work on establishing worthwhile relationships and a tight community with followers, and continue to show your passion for your work on a daily basis. Enthusiastic and spirited individuals are able to display meaningful content that inspires other bloggers to do the same. Keep the passion rolling and the content bursting with informative information.

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The Snowden Effect in Relation to Entrepreneurship

Dropbox is a free service that  grants its users the permission to bring all their photos, docs, and videos anywhere. Small entrepreneurial businesses such as Dropbox believe that they play a role in regards to establishing surveillance for their data. It stated that it pledges to abide by its Government Request Principles when “receiving, scrutinizing and responding to government requests for our users’ data” (Kabin). Dropbox is beginning to take these actions because of its following strong belief: “Stewardship of your data is critical to us and a responsibility that we embrace. We believe that our users' data should receive the same legal protections regardless of whether it's stored on our services or on their home computer's hard drive” (Kabin). Dropbox believes so strongly in protecting its users and plans on taking the following actions:

“fight blanket data requests and protect its systems from intrusive measures like government-installed backdoors”

“report specific numbers in terms of the government data requests they receive and that such requests should be limited to specific people and investigations”

Dropbox’s new policy went into effect as of March 24.

The impact of the Snowden Effect on Entrepreneurs:

entrepreneurs want to cash in on privacy concerns

With new knowledge comes a strong demand for government actions

How the Snowden Effect impacts how the U.S. does business with China:

According to Kristine Kwok and Stephen Chen, the Chinese telecommunication companies such as China Unicom have begun to replace a number of critical routers made by Cisco with domestic products in order to “increase the security level of China's backbone internet infrastructure” (Kwok).

Source:

Kabin, Benjamin. Dropbox Addresses NSA Surveillance Fears in New Privacy Policy. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Apr. 2015. <http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/231722>.

Kwok, Kristine, and Stephen Chen. Snowden effect changes US-China dynamic on cybersecurity. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Apr. 2015. <http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1532984/snowden-effect-changes-us-china-dynamic-cybersecurity>.

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Non-Profit Digital Infrastructures

An example of a digital infrastructure is the non-profit organization Kiva. Kiva is a non-profit organization that allows people from around the world to lend money via the Internet to low-income/undeserved entrepreneurs and students in over 70 countries. According to Kiva.org, you can lend money to an entrepreneur across the globe for as little as $25.

According to kiva.org, This infrastructure has helped the people who use it by providing them with safe and affordable access to capital. It provides those in need with the capital necessary to flourish at that moment instantly. By providing people with safe and affordable access to capital, Kiva helps people create better lives for themselves and their families. The way that the non-profit organization works is as following. It works with microfinance institutions on five continents in order to provide loans to people who cannot access traditional banking systems. Kiva.org further states that 100% of the loans are sent to these microfinance institutions. These microfinance institutions are called Field Partners and they administer the loans in their field.

Kiva.org states that since it was founded in 2005, it has 1,264, 610 lenders. It has $682,627,350 in loans plus 98.75% repayment rate. In addition, the organization works with 293 Field Partners and has 450 volunteers around the world. It exists in around 86 countries. The most amazing aspect of Kiva is that 100% of every lent dollar goes directly towards funding loans. The organization does not take a cut and most importantly, it does not charge its Field Partners interest. Kiva.org states that the organization is funded thanks to the generosity of its lenders that make optional donations and by raising funds through grants, corporate sponsors, and foundations.

It is important to also understand how Kiva functions. According to kiva.org, first you choose a borrower. Then you make a loan. Thirdly, you get repaid when you get updates as the borrowers you support succeed and are able to repay their loans. Lastly, you repeat the process.

Two lessons that digital entrepreneurs can learn about digital infrastructure from Kiva are that establishing a platform that lends loans to those in dire need is more successful if the borrower is held accountable. As a result, the borrower is able to receive its necessary funds and then repay them back to those who loaned the funds to them initially. Secondly, digital entrepreneurs can also learn from the digital infrastructure of Kiva that asking for a donation as little as $25 can helpt attract more lenders plus increase the number of borrowers.

Sources:

https://plus.google.com/u/0/+Kiva/posts

http://www.kiva.org/about

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Funding the Digital Organization

Venture Capital:

Vinod Khosla founded Khosla Ventures in January 2004. Vinod Khosla is the co-founder of Sun Microsystems. It does Seed, Early Stage Venture, Later Stage Venture, Private Equity, Debt Financing, and Post IPO Equity Investments. Its sectors include clean technology, mobile, and software. Khosla Ventures emphasizes the significance of being a firm that offers environmentally friendly technologies, plus offering venture areas such as the Internet, computing, mobile and silicon technology arenas. The firm is regionally located in China and the U.S. As of 2014, its early stage investments were at $809 million.

 http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/242702

https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/khosla-ventures

 Angel Investor:

Dustin Moskovitz was Facebook’s third employee and helped his roommate, Mark Zuckelberg, start the social media network, Facebook, while the two were attending Harvard together. After being at Harvard for just two years, Moskovitz dropped out and followed Zuckelberg to Paolo Alto in order to develop Facebook. As of 2008, he started on a new venture: starting Asana, a software firm. Dustin has invested in  $1.2 million in Venmo, $10.5 million in Flipboard, $2.5 million in Path, and $6.3 million in NationBuilder.

 https://angel.co/moskov?utm_source=people

http://www.forbes.com/profile/dustin-moskovitz/

 Crowd Funding:

Ryan Feit and James Han found SeedInvest in 2011. It is headquartered in New York and it is an equity crowd-funding platform. It aims to connect startups with investors through an online channel. The way that SeedInvest works is the following: The platform focuses its attention on building liquidity by attracting high-net-worth individuals, family offices, and venture capital firms.  The company raised most of the $4.15 million on its own in total Series A funding online as of April 2014 thanks to the help of Scout Ventures plus other venture capital and angel investors. Series A round is the first round of a venture capital investment.

 https://www.seedinvest.com

 I would choose an angel investor so in this case, I would choose Dustin Moskovitz. I would choose Dustin for three specific reasons.

1.     He is trustworthy—Dustin likes to do business on a professional level and aims to promote doing business fairly in order to balance the playing field

2.    He is a humanitarian—His involvement and participation in the campaign, Giving Pledge, makes him a worthwhile person to work him. Bill Gates and Warren Buffet to encourage billionaires to donate most of their wealth started giving Pledge.

He has a good reputation—Dustin has invented in many up-and-coming new ventures such as Path and Flipboard. Those new ventures are going to have a better reputation due to his influential role and his involvement in the companies as an angel investor.

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Women as Leaders

Dr. Liz Boyd

Research Director/ Women’s Leadership Center at the Kennesaw State University in Atlanta

Assistant Professor of Management & Entrepreneurship

--in greater Atlanta

Women’s Leadership Center (it’s not an actual place)

member companies (pay the center money for it to actually exist)

ADP

2. Ernst & Young

3. KPMG

4. Nationwide Insurance

5. PriceWaterhouseCoopers

6. PNC Bank

Events/Education/Research

2 large events per year; 4 roundtables

executive education, undergraduate education

Research:

“Best of” List

2. Mainstream media stories (displayed in Forbes, FastCompany)

3. Projects with member companies;

4. assessments and tools

5. affiliated faculty group

Factors impacting women’s success

WOMEN IN BUSINESS

4.6% of women are CEOs (Fortune 1000 companies)

8.1% are top earners

16.9% hold Board Seats

14.6%=Executive Officers

51.4%=Management, Professional, and related occupations

46.8%=U.S. Labor Force

--a LIMITED amount of women do not hold power at the top tier level (Fortune 1000 companies)

1995: had 0.0% of Fortune 500 Women CEOs

2013: 4.0% percent=Fortune 500 Women CEOs

Glass ceiling: women moving up but then hitting an invisible barrier

Glass cliff: Women in occupational minorities are likely to be hired into powerful positions SOLELY when the company is performing badly...that way, if the company ends up performing poorly, there is someone to easily blame...and that is the WOMAN

Factors impacting underrepresentation of women:

Exposure to Stereotypes

2. lack of mentoring (Mentoring is highly linked to success in companies)

3. Goals/needs/values

4. Work-life conflict

Adverse treatment discrimination

1. Adverse impact

2. occurs during the selection or promotion process

3. occurs because of Test bias

4. not a result of intentional actions on the part of the selection committee

5. Adverse treatment (aka aversive prejudice)

1. people who are consciously committed to equality, and who work deliberately to behave without bias, still possess negative perceptions or stereotypes of non-dominant groups

**Even those they are a part of

*In the work force, we treat men and women so slightly different

Migro-aggressions:

1. talked to you as if you were a small child rather than a competent adult

2. treated you as if you were stupid or incompetent

3. publicly addressed you as if you were a child (dear, kid..)

Basic Stereotypes:

1. Women are more interested in people, men are more interested in things

2. men are more interested in engineering  

3. men are more interested in science

4. “gender differences are not hardwired or immutable”~Hyde, 2014

Q. Are women’s ERGs fair (Employee Resource Group)?

-->equal versus fair

***need women’s resources to equal the playing field

Looking Forward:

1. ERGs are becoming Business Resource Groups

PROBLEM: Women are gaining all these skills but entering an organization that has not changed

2. unconscious bias

3. subtle differential treatment

4. should women change or should workplace change?

5. should we support parents?

How much will Millennials/Gen Y change the workplace?

→ by 2030, they will make up 75% of it!!

→ once we get there, we will fix it??? Change this mindset.

The future: More relevant research NEEDS to be done that aims to showcase how organizational strategy relates to women leadership.

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Lawrence Lessig’s take on User Generated Content; 10 Great UGC Campaigns

Lawrence Lessig starts out his Ted Talk with discussing how we open user-generated content up for business. He begins to inform the audience about a man named John Philip Sousa. John Philip Sousa traveled to the United States Capitol to talk about technology known as “talking machines”. Lessig emphasizes that Sousa was not overly enthusiastic to discuss “talking machines” while at the United States Capitol as he did not favor them. Sousa believed the following:

These talking machines are going to ruin artistic development of music in this country. When I was a boy, in front of every house in the summer evenings, you would find young people together singing the songs of the day, or the old songs. Today, you hear these infernal machines going night and day. We will not have a vocal chord left. The vocal chords will be eliminated by a process of evolution as was the tail of man when he came from the ape (Lessig).

After explaining to the audience what Sousa philosophized about user generated content, Lessig switches the topic of conversation to this following. He posts a picture of culture that he wants the audience to visualize. He states, “We could describe it using modern computer terminology as a kind of read-write culture. It's a culture where people participate in the creation and the re-creation of their culture” (Lessig). Lessig argues that Sousa feared that we as a culture would lose that capacity because of these, quote, "infernal machines." Infernal machines would take away the read-write culture. As a result, we'd have the opposite of read-write culture, what we could call read-only culture. Our culture would then mainly consist of creativity being consumed but not by the consumer who would be the creator. As a result, he argues that Sousa would argue “A culture which is top-down, owned, where the vocal chords of the millions have been lost” (Lessig).

__________________________________________________________________

10 Great Examples of User Generated Content Campaigns

 1.     BELKIN – LEGO IPHONE CASE

In 2014, Belkin created one of the coolest, most customizable iPhone cases in a partnership with Lego that had Lego studs on the back of the case. Belkin asked their customers to showoff their creativity and how each one personalized their case by tagging their Instagram photos with #LEGOxBelkin. Integrating User Generated Content onto a product page as a way to help sell a product was a brilliant idea for Belkin in 2014. It allowed Belkin to let its customers do the selling for them, which showed potential customers how customizable the case could be in a very authentic and organic manner.

 2.     T-MOBILE – BREAKUP LETTER

T-Mobile offered to pay the contract cancellation fees of any person who “broke up” with their existing cell phone service and switched to T-Mobile. This was a strategy integrated in order to convince customers to switch from T-Mobile’s competitors. They launched an ‘Un-Valentines Day’ with a Facebook app that let people create a custom break up letter to their carrier and print it out or share it on their social networks.This type of user generated content was great because T-Mobile has made a very friction-less way to generate the content and still maintained some control of the messaging through the Facebook app.

 3.     ESTÉE LAUDER – BREAST CANCER ACTION, NOT AWARENESS

Estee Lauder took a proactive approach to their global breast cancer awareness campaign in 2013. The brand wanted not to just promote breast cancer awareness, but to get people to start prevention today. The theme of the campaign was “Stronger Together,” encouraging women to create a ‘Circle of Strength’ with their friends and make commitments to schedule mammograms, eat healthy food, go on daily walks, and support each other in their efforts.

4.     INDEPENDENT LENS – DON’T STOP BELIEVIN’

Independent Lens launched a User Generated Content campaign for the premiere of the film Don’t Stop Believin’: Everyman’s Journey, which follows the real life rock ‘n’ roll fairy tale of Filipino Arnel Pineda, who was plucked from YouTube to become the front man for iconic American rock band Journey. According to postano, “Independent Lens did a fantastic job with this contest, making it very fun, engaging, and something everyone could participate in. I bet we will see more and more of similar contests like this as musicians and artists take even more interest and control in their social media marketing”.

 5.     TEDXPORTLAND – WHAT IS PERFECT?

The Ted Talks organizers worked with digital agency Instrument to develop an app that overlaid the word ‘Perfect’ over user-generated photos that were shared to Instagram and Twitter. The “Perfect” photos were brilliant marketing for the conference that helped build social buzz as everyone wanted to know what the “Perfect” photos were about. The organizers for the Ted Talks didn’t let those photos go to waste either, projecting all the photos on an 80ft tall honeycomb stage design.

6.     WARBY PARKER – HOME TRY-ON

Warby Parker decided to take the clever approach of integrating user-generated content into the purchasing process when they introduced their Home Try-On service in 2012. The free service ships five pairs to a person’s home to try on for five days, where they are encouraged to take pictures of themselves with the different glasses on and share it to their social accounts with the hashtag #WarbyHomeTryOn.

7.     TARGET – ACCEPTANCE LETTER

Target asked for videos of high school seniors opening and reading letters from colleges and then packaging up the best ones into a compelling commercial. Postano.com stated:

Target coupled the commercial with a commitment to education, announcing huge increases in educational funding and donations to K-12 education. Target, having already pledged to donate $500 million by the summer of 2010, promised to double it in upcoming years, culminating in a cool billion by the end of 2015 (Postano).

8.     NISSAN – #VERSAVID VINES

Nissan took advantage of the popularity of stop-motion photography on Vine with their VersaVid campaign, asking Nissan fans to print out a 3D picture of the car, cut, fold and assemble it, and then create a short video of an adventure in a Versa. According to postano.com, “Nissan incentivized participation in the contest by offering $1,000 Amazon gift cards to six contestants and a chance for their Vine to be featured in a Nissan commercial. They promoted the contest through their microsite YourDoortoMore.com as well as partnerships with Mashable”.

9.     CHOBANI – REAL LOVE STORIES

Chobani asked its fans to show support for the brand by creating videos. Real fans made original videos like the ones above, creative photos, and left praise on social media channels about their favorite Greek yogurt, supplying Chobani with an impressive amount of UGC to use for marketing purposes. Tweets were put on billboards, videos were featured on their website, and others were sent out to their social media followers.

10.  PEPSI MAX – MAX IT NOW COMPETITION

Pepsi MAX put out a challenge in honor of their partnership with NASCAR’s Jeff Gordon: 24 of of them in fact. Pictures, posts, videos and drawings came in droves to Pepsi MAX on Facebook and Twitter, hoping to win Pepsi Max and Jeff Gordon fan items. The campaign was a success, with more than 7,300 entrants and over 700 images of Pepsi MAX cans posted to social sites. a grand prize winner was selected to attend a race during the Chase for the Cup, where the winner managed Pepsi Max social media, blogged, and got to meet and interview Gordon himself.

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The 2015 New Venture Competition

On Friday, March 27, 2015 from 8am-8pm, the New Venture Competition took place at the EHS Building and McGuirk Arena at Central Michigan University. The daytime events took place at the EHS Building whereas the Awards Ceremony took place at the McGuirk Arena. The competition is in its fifth year. According to cmich.edu, CMU's New Venture Competition has provided education and opportunity for hundreds of aspiring entrepreneurs, many of whom have gone on to run successful businesses in Michigan. The New Venture Competition is a forum for learning, identifying, nurturing and showcasing emerging entrepreneurs and their businesses. This is done while supporting students in the process of creating and evaluating new business and social impact ventures. According to the Central Michigan University website, the New Venture Competition has resulted in over 30 businesses operating successfully now. The competition is led by the College of Business Administration’s Isabella Bank Institute for Entrepreneurship. The Keynote Speaker for the competition was featured at the Awards Ceremony and it was Enrico Digirolamo, who is the CEO of Covisint. Before further describing the competition, it is important to understand how the competition was divided. The NVC for 2015 was divided in three sections. Round One took place from 9:30-11am in the EHS Building. Round Two took place from 1:15-2pm. The final round took place from 3:45-5pm. In between those three sections was the panel discussion where current and successful entrepreneurs shared their struggles and successes. The panel discussion features successful venture capitalist and entrepreneurs such as the following: Steve Arwood, Lindsay Aspegren, John Bartos, Ron Beebe, Cindy Fitzgerald, Travis Johnson, Ken Kousky, Mike O’Donnell, and Ken Rogers. This took place from 11:15am-1:15pm. Before the final round took place, a Two-Minute Competition took place from 2:30-3:30pm. 

More than $75,000 was awarded in start-up capital and entrepreneurship services to the winning teams through a number of categories: the Best Overall, $30,000, was awarded to Episcura. The Best Social Venture for $10,000 was awarded to Humble Abode Tiny Homes, the best technology venture for $10,000 was awarded to HydroGuide, the highest growth potential venture for $10,000 to Beergo, the most impact in Michigan venture for $10,000 to Revolve Replication, best lifestyle for $5,000 to 3T, spirit of entrepreneurship venture to Mwage, best pitch venture for $1,000 to Mwage, first runner-up pitch for $500 to OddJobs, second runner-up pitch for $500 to Black Friday and Audience choice of $250 to Mwage (Twiddy). According to Executive Director for the Isabella bank institute for entrepreneurship, Debra Zellinger, the judges look for “A combination of winning factors based on experience. They check to see if the students made an investable business idea and look for a prototype of customer validation. They also look to see if the students have done more work than just thinking of the idea” (Twiddy). According to the Dean of College of Business Administration, Charles Cresp, “Many of the judges judge on two or three criteria, protecting intellectual property, if the preposition is unique, and often they will judge not so much on the business technique but the personal as well. Competitors have to demonstrate enthusiasm and a passion and fire for their business idea. Often you bet as much on the person as you do the business idea” (Twiddy). 

Although only the three following teams made it to the final round, Beergo, Episcura, and HydroGuide, Chairperson for the Department of Entrepreneurship, Kenneth Sanney, had the following advice for all that competed: “I think the competition has gone excellently. We’ve had some teams that didn’t make it to the finals that have connected with the entrepreneurs from across the state that will help their businesses grow. This isn’t about one team winning, but the opportunity for a lot of teams to network” (Twiddy). 

The fact of the matter is that no competition walked out the competition as a loser. Every competitor walked out the competition with more insight on how to out-perform fellow competitors in the upcoming years, better networking skills, and the confidence to perform and present in front of many successful entrepreneurs. The Dean of College of Business Administration, Charles Crespy, further stated, “The competition was an improvement from previous years as it gets a little better every year. The quality of competitors is only expected to increase in the years ahead” (Twiddy). 

Competing teams should always remember the following and take this given advice to heart. "Making a mistake now is better then making the right decision three months from now," said Co-founder and Chief Executive Chief of foodjunky Travis Johnson (Twiddy). 

On a personal level, I enjoyed attending the New Venture Competition immensely because I was given the privilege to interact with the competitors and work on my networking capabilities. I enjoyed volunteering for my fraternity, Epsilon Nu Tau, and being a timer in two out of the many competing rooms in the EHS Building. The two-minute pitch was especially enjoyable because since most of the competing teams were divided into designated rooms between the three rounds, I did not get the opportunity to see and hear all the various teams. The two-minute pitch was perfect as it allowed me to hear the rest of the 24 teams (the other 3 competing teams were the ones selected to progress to the Final Round--that was Beergo, HydroGuide, and Episcura) and their entrepreneurial ideas in the EHS Auditorium. I was given the privilege to be in charge of the social media promotion  for the CBA Twitter account thanks to my friend, Kevin Keeley (who ended being a participant in the New Venture Competition), and I really enjoyed doing that. 

Being in charge of the social media promotion for the CBA Twitter account was great because it allowed me to stay up to date with the tweets coming in from the two shifts for BIS 315. I believe that the two shifts did a great job at tweeting about the whole competition and throughout the many breaks at the competition. The stayed engaged with what was going throughout the day and it was obvious through the content that they posted on Twitter. I also tried to use my own professional business Twitter account, and my Facebook and Instagram accounts in order to better publicize the New Venture Competition. I wanted to publicize the event to the best of my capabilities so that the competition got all the recognition that it deserved. Many people put a lot of time and effort into making sure that the events of the competition ran as smoothly as possible so the least that the two shifts from our class and myself could have done is promote the competition in a professional manner. 

Source:

Twiddy, Brianne. New Venture Competition awards more than $75k to student businesses. CM Life, 27 Mar. 2015. Web. 28 Mar. 2015. <http://www.cm-life.com/article/2015/03/new-venture-final>.

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How Podcasts and Webinars are published

Podcasts & Webinars Defined:

According to the book Social Media Marketing: A strategic approach, a podcast can be simply defined as a media file that is distributed through subscription on the Internet. A podcast may contain only audio or audio and video recording together. A webinar on the other hand is a seminar that is conducted live over the web and to be interactive.  In this blog, I will be aiming to go into further detail about how to create and publish a podcast and webinar successfully.

 Podcasts can be consumed in three ways. They can be played directly off the website on a computer, downloaded to a computer and listed to offline, and downloaded to portable MP3 players for listening offline.

Creating a Podcast:

For those that haven’t created a podcast yet but are hoping to, there is one thing that you should know and that’s that creating a podcast is inexpensive. Because of the low cost, podcasts are popular especially amongst start-up companies and marketing departments that might be limited on money. In fact, podcasts are being utilized more in social media marketing because of their low cost of entry and the opportunity to reach thousands of viewers or listeners. The easiest aspect of a podcast is actually taking the time to make it. Using a cell-phone can create a podcast. When using a cell-phone, a podcast creator just calls a number, enters a personal identification number and records. While creating a podcast is the least daunting aspect of the process, the ability to choose a podcast’s format and its content plus persuading listeners to subscribe is the most difficult aspect.

 When choosing a format for a podcast, one would have the choice of selecting between three lengths: ten minutes, thirty minutes, or sixty minutes. It does not matter if the goal of the podcast is to create an audio or video podcast because there are three primary formats that one should choose from. Those three formats include presentation, Q&A, and Co-hosted.  If one chooses to do a Presentation based podcast, then it is important to keep in mind that audio editing will be necessary to avoid having dead time or static in the final podcast. A Q&A format should include one or more individuals in order to give the listener or viewer more information.  The co-hosted format should include an organic conversation that is unscripted as possible. It is suggested that the speakers choreograph their format and approach so that when they record the podcast, they do not step on each other’s word or create awkward pauses.

 Certain formats will require different lengths therefore, it is important to create a mental estimate of which format will be the most common because then the podcast can be ideally kept at a consistent length of time for each segment.

The necessary content for a podcast:

When deciding the content focus for a podcast, there are three possibilities. There is instructional, informative, or entertainment. It is highly recommended that when creating a podcast, stay with a common theme that will be able to connect the entire series of podcasts. Choosing to rotate between the different themes might seem like a good idea but it is not suggested because such a rotation may lose listeners if done incorrectly. Regularity in content can help draw more subscribers. Do not attempt to create a one-size-fits-all content but rather focus on the interests of a specific target audience.

Producing a Podcast:

Creating a podcast requires thinking and listening to the needs of your audience. When creating podcasts, it is important to keep the following in mind: choosing an articulate moderator, creating talking points rather than scripts, brevity, avoiding over-editing, and including music. Choosing an articulate moderator is important because it is necessary to find a moderator who has minimal verbal static and who has strong vocal presence. Creating talking points rather than a script is important because the podcast should be presented in a relaxed and conversational manner. Brevity is important because content should be determined prior to length. Do not try to stretch out content to make people listen. Listeners value their time just as much as you value yours so do not waste theirs. Avoiding over-editing is key because a choppy and forced podcast will not appear as professional or will attract a viewer’s attention as easily. The less audio editing, the better. Including music helps lend a professional air to the production and keeps the audience engaged. Although keeping all of these tips in mind can be useful, it does not guarantee you that your podcast will be successful. These tips do not guarantee that you will attract a large audience. Gaining subscribers will depend on a few things: combining engaging content, having a charismatic presentation, and constantly updating your podcast.

Delivering Podcasts to the Audience:

What do the people want and how can podcasts be the solution to their wants? People want information and entertainment that is available on demand, commercial free, and anywhere. Creating and delivering podcasts to listeners are two of the easiest parts whereas distributing podcast content and ensuring that the target audience finds it is challenging. In order to make it easier to find podcasts, it is important to fill in the ID3 tag. The ID3 tag is a file data tagging format that most media-playing software recognize.

How Webinars are established:

In order to access a webinar, the audience member must attend the webinar. To attend the webinar, the audience member/listener can call a phone number or listen live on a computer’s speakers by accessing the webinar through the Internet. A lot of the specifics are based off of how the webinar host has the webinar set up. The way that webinars are set up is as following. They contain a visual aspect such as a slide show presentation or live-stream video. The difference between a podcast and a webinar is that a webinar requires scheduling in advance so that people can set time aside in order to participate.  According to the book, Social Media Marketing, a webinar is a live experience, therefore it is highly suggestible that the webinar host posts and promotes the date and time that the webinar will be held.

Setting up a webinar:

Webinars are not very difficult to set up and run. When selecting a webinar, the first step is to select the right webinar service. There are many existing webinar services out there that are either free or low-cost. When selecting where to host the webinar, one should consider the following factors: the number of attendees, the visual content, and the frequency with which the webinar is held. Some webinar hosting sites have a limit on the number of attendees, therefore it is highly suggested that one gets an estimate beforehand. After selecting where to host the webinar, one should create the webinar outline. The webinar outline should contain a list of the main points that will be covered in the webinar. The points should be quick and direct because the audience will lose their attention much more easily if you just read directly off the outline. Make sure to also have a clear schedule for the webinar so that way you will avoid going off on unnecessary tangents and the relevant content will be covered. After the webinar outline is created, the event must be scheduled. Once the webinar is scheduled and listed online, start promoting the webinar on other social media channels. Promoting the webinar to ensure a sufficient number of attendees is detrimental to the success of the presentation.