Erik Qualman's Blog, page 518
September 17, 2015
Digital Marketing and Social Media Prove a Great Team
This is the time for social media and digital marketing.
If you’re not employing this for your business right now, well, you just better get started.
Have you ever thought about trying a new business, whether it’s a bakery, a dog groomer or a new restaurant … you go to check out their social media, and there isn’t any. It’s a turn-off. We all know it is.
So as a business owner, you should be teaming digital marketing and social media for the best and strongest presence you can have.
Changing the Picture of Social Media
Remember the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge?
It changed the way we look at social media and marketing and set a precedent for everyone.
To read more about its success, check out 18 Reasons the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge is Your New Standard in Digital Marketing.
And here are some of those reasons along with others on how social media and digital marketing can be your best friends:
• Make it fun – Everyone had fun doing the Ice Bucket Challenge. You waited to see if you were tagged and thought about who you’d tag. You also learned about a cause, a disease and what you could do to help. And, of course, pouring a bucket of cold water on you – fun!
• Make the sharing easy and worth it – With social media, it is so easy to tag and share. No letters to send, no phone calls to make. Make sure your campaign is worth the shares, and social media will make it easy for you.
• Have a great call to action – Not only was the Ice Bucket Challenge fun, it was a call to action. Sure, the cold water dump was something to do, so was sending in a check. People felt like they were really doing something good, and they were. You knew what were supposed to do. With your own digital marketing, make it clear what people should do with it.
• Let it be personal – The Ice Bucket Challenge worked because people waited to see if they were tagged. You could then make your video fun and your own, then send it out to the great big world of social media. By making things personal, people become more involved.
• Involve everyone. – Just like the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge let people star in their own videos, use social media and digital marketing together to get people involved. Have people Instagram their vacation pics incorporating your brand – writing the name in the sand, shouting it out in a video, wearing your jewelry. Give out a t-shirt at your orthodontist practice and have your teen customers take pics and post them wearing it. They just add a hashtag, and you’re in. There’s tons of ways to incorporate social media and digital marketing, no matter your business.
Digital marketing and social media is a fun combination to create great branding and marketing for you and your business.
Be creative, spontaneous, get in the trend and you’ll have fun doing some great marketing.
Photo credit: BigStockPhoto.com
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September 16, 2015
How to Incorporate Effective Social Media Strategy for Freelance Writing Career
To ordinary people who go to work every day, from 9 to 18 (at least), freelancing looks like heaven. And this is because they can only see the good part of it – staying at home, having your own working rhythm, typing from your cozy sofa, and so on. But the truth is that freelancing can be often frustrating – you don’t have a stable income and clients come and go. So an important part of this working regime is finding new and new customers.
Now here’s a tip: because this is an online job, the key for success is looking for online employers. And what better place to make new connections than social media? Let’s see how we can employ these platforms in business means.
Social media managing
There are tons of businesses that need to make their presence known on social media. Fortunately for us, most managers don’t have the time and the patience to learn how each website functions. And this is why they pay others to do it. Here are the steps to becoming a social media manager:
1. Start with a personal online strong presence – create accounts on all platforms, build a network of potential customers and make sure to have a professional appearance;
2. Learn more than the basics – it is not enough to know how to publish a simple post; you need in depth skills for creating pages, attracting the right audience, marketing the business;
3. Come up with custom action plans for every client – depending on the company, each social media campaign must have different features; pick up the best platforms for your customer and create personalized approaches;
4. Create great content – your job as a writer is not forgotten; every social media website functions on this principle – attracting audience with impressive texts.
How to get clients from social media platforms
So we have the working plan and we only need the customers. Let’s get them from different platforms!
Blogs
Number one method of gaining visibility as a writer is to contribute to famous blogs. Huge websites from different areas have openings for guest posts. You just have to respect their indications and submit the best text ever. This type of exposure can bring in serious customers, asking for regular content.
List of blogs where you can gain your reputation through contribution as a freelance writer:
1. AboutFreelanceWriting
2. Shoutmeloud
3. Writetodone
4. Novelpublicity
5. FreelanceWriting
LinkedIn
Use this platform’s features at maximum like this:
1. Add as many keywords as possible to your job title – just writer is not enough; come up with all the other related terms: content/copy writer, blogger, social media manager, etc. These will let interested people find you during their search for a freelancer;
2. Update your status regularly – any updates in your profile is sending notifications to contacts; this is a subtle way of reminding them of your specialty;
3. Send messages to those who viewed your profile – create a template and send it to everyone who visits your page; don’t ask for a job, just offer your help;
4. Check out the groups – join writers’ groups; in here, jobs are being posted regularly.
Twitter
This less formal platform is great for connecting with persons who may help you out – editors, magazine owners, bloggers, etc. Follow them and retweet every impressive post. In the end, sending a short message may do the trick.
List of freelance writing companies that recruit through Twitter:
1. FreelancerCareers
2. Textbroker
3. Hire Writers
4. FlexJobs
5. CrowdSource
6. EssayWriters
7. Funds for Writers
Facebook
Find customers in here by:
1. Analyzing companies’ pages and offering your services to those that lack an attractive platform;
2. Creating your own business page – make it as remarkable as possible, because this will be your business card; it works in two ways – getting clients who need writing services and attracting customers who want a page as good as yours.
Youtube
Videos have a high impact on resumes. As a consequence, you could also use them to present yourself in a professional way and to promote your services. Focus on emphasizing the benefits of collaborating with an experienced writer.
Google+
The great aspect about this platform is the following – as you make connections, it displays the friends of your friends. In this way, it would be easier and less strange to get in touch with influent people.
Local platform
Last, but not least, go local, too. Maybe you’re the only professional writer in your area and local businesses will really appreciate the help!
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Porsche Versus Tesla
THE STORY: PORSCHE VERSUS TESLA
The luxury electric car market currently consists of Tesla but this may change in a couple of years. At an auto show in Frankfurt, Porsche and Audi unveiled what they have been working on. A luxury electric car called Mission E (Source: CNN).
Battle of the electric cars…
Mission E will be faster and run longer on a shorter charge by being able to charge to 80% of capacity in just 15 minutes versus the 30 minutes it takes Tesla to reach that level (Source: CNN). So if saving 15 minutes is important to you, Mission E might be better.
DA SKIM
Elon Musk has a couple of years to improve Tesla to challenge Mission E. A Porsche spokesperson noted that it could be five years before this happens (Source: CNN). Tesla can spend the next few years enjoying its place in the market before they need to race against Porsche.
Quote of the Day: “I’m going to dislike all your Facebook posts!”
Facebook users have been asking for a dislike button for years now. It looks like that might happen in the future. At a question and answer session on Tuesday, Mark Zuckerberg said that they are working on it and hope to test it soon (Source: CNBC). Now you can show enemies how you really feel instead of liking posts passive aggressively
In case you missed it…
Snapchat added new filters and people are FREAKING out. Snapchat acquired Looksery to create animated selfie Lenses. Snapchat Lenses lets users puke rainbows, look scary or old, be in a heart avalanche or become a terminator (Source: TechCrunch). It’s incredibly weird but very entertaining.
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September 15, 2015
Mary Poppins Loves Social
Watch out for FOMO
The truth has arrived, and it’s knocking on your neighbor’s door. A recent study conducted by researchers at the University of Glasgow announced that teens on social media are actually suffering from FOMO, you know that anagram don’t you? Fear Of Missing Out. The researchers questioned 467 teens ages 11 through 17 about their online habits, and found that many of them are feeling pressure to respond to texts, posts, and media 24/7. Researchers found increased levels of anxiety, lower self-esteem, and worse sleep quality patterns from teens who spent more time on social media sites. The proposition? The scientists suggested a “digital sunset” that would automatically disable users phones, tablets, and other devices in the evening. Hhhmmm interesting idea. Have you ever tried a digital sunset or do you think it will work?. (Source: Digital Trends)
15-Year-Old Rockstar
Anneke Dipietro is changing the game of social media BIG time. The young 15-year-old convinced her dad to let her skip math class for six months in return for her coming up with a solid business plan. The results? One kick a$# social media platform named Xirkl. The premise of the site is all about the user — not the advertiser. The platform works as follows: any number of people can follow you, but you can only follow 21 people. Users can choose who populates their feed and the number one rule at Xirkl is the user is first. Anneke DiPietro already has her name tied on two patents, and has launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund her startup. Can’t wait to see how this one takes off. (Source: Huffington Post)
A spoonful of sugar…
In case you missed it, Disney has reported they are developing a new live-action musical rendition of Mary Poppins. The film uses existing Poppins tales and takes place in London 20 years after the classic. *Wipes away tears of happiness.* (Source Entertainment)
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Essential Role of Social Media Networking in Ecommerce
Social media serves a vital purpose in online marketing by helping companies establish stronger web presence, generate leads and increase traffic. A well-structured social media strategy is important for improving the development and growth of an ecommerce business. Social media continues to gain popularity owing to its commercial success around the world.
A significant percentage of advertising campaigns take place through social media websites. Including social media in an effort to advance ecommerce can be highly beneficial. It provides an effective way to attract the interest of the large audiences that use social media.
Rapid Social Media Growth
The use of social media has witnessed rapid growth over a time with several people making purchases through it. Many businesses have opted to take advantage of the opportunities presented by social media networks to obtain more customers. Although some business owners may be skeptical about using social media, the reality is that it is a worthwhile inclusion in online marketing campaigns.
Use Social Media According to your Objectives
In order for you to be able to maximize on the potential of social media for your online business, you need to set clear objectives. Companies use social media with the aim of creating leads, boosting their sales and spreading brand awareness digitally.
Social media has the ability to increase sales because strong online presence on sites such as Facebook and Twitter provide a cost effective way to interact directly with prospective consumers. When you communicate with your consumers through social media networks, you are able to get feedback that gives you insight into what they want.
Impact of Sharing Information on Purchasing Decisions
• Social media sites cater for innovative features such as ‘like’ buttons and comment sections frequently used to facilitate conversations. Sharing information through social media is important because of the impact it has on the choices that people make when selecting products and services.
• Incorporating Share buttons for social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter on your website will allow you to advertise your business and promote interaction. You can consider carrying out promotional activities exclusively on social media platforms to increase traffic your site as well as the following that you have.
• Several social media users make their purchases online after they share items on Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter. This is a clear indication of how vital social media networking is in ecommerce. Consumers around the world will be spending billions of their hard earned money annually through the accessible platforms of social media.
Monitoring Social Media
Keeping track of social media as regularly as possible ensures that you communicate with your customers consistently. By neglecting social media or you being rarely available shows you are not quite interested in your customer base.
In 2013, almost 40% of social media users relied on the sites to carry out research regarding products or services they were interested in. Over 70% of customers based their purchasing decisions on the information they gathered from social media. The increase in traffic to ecommerce sites has resulted in significant sales for various outlets.
Popular Social Media Options
Facebook has been cited as the ideal social media platform for creating brand awareness and engaging with consumers. Twitter is suitable for encouraging interaction with customers and the hash tag feature makes it easier to share valuable content.
YouTube is an excellent choice for businesses that want to use videos to promote their brands and increase their visibility. Pinterest is a worthwhile option for you if you need to offer merchandise exclusively and showcase products in advance.
Value of Social Media
Social media needs to be a part of your company’s marketing budget because it gives you a powerful way to create a connection with your target audience. From Instagram to LinkedIn, there are virtually limitless ways for you to interact, give and share information as well as market your products. When you perform social marketing effectively, it adds instant value.
Social networks enable you to connect with new customers and stay in touch with the customers you already have. They also give you the opportunity to provide access to your brand in an enjoyable and convenient way. The content that you offer through social networks is just as significant as a sign at the entrance of a store or a displayed poster.
Commercial Platforms for Effective Online Marketing
Social networks have gone beyond being sites where people can find and share information. They have evolved into commercial platforms that more and more businesses are utilizing. Social media serves your marketing strategy by easing the process of acquiring customers, making sales and setting up new marketing campaigns.
An important aspect of social media is that it takes you directly to where your customers are. You can use social media networks to gain a better understanding of your audience. This makes it much easier for you to design campaigns that are suited to their needs.
Social media enhances customer service by making you accessible to your customers who have a tendency to seek immediate feedback. You will be able to respond in a timely manner to their concerns and inquiries.
The profile you use on social media can compare to the traditional signage at the front of a store. Consumers rely on social sites to find out about products and services. Optimized profiles and useful information will create a positive first impression for your online business.
Importance of Content
Aside from increasing sales and traffic, social media gives you the benefit of marketing cost effectively while proving to customers that your product or service will add value to their lives. The content that you provide within your social marketing strategy should ideally showcase the most authentic and positive aspects of your brand.
Conclusion
Social media platforms have made it easier to reach your audience. With the growth of popular sites such as Facebook and Twitter there is more content than ever. This is why it is important for you to be able to target your marketing strategy and stand out from the competition.
Try out different ways of communicating with consumers, advertising and sharing your content. Internet resources such as social analytics are available for you to track the performance of your social marketing techniques.
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September 14, 2015
How to Come Up With Great, Clickable Titles, 3 Ways
It is (rightfully) said that titles are the most important part of the internet article. You know the type of content I’m talking about. They’re short articles, usually 500-1000 words, found everywhere online, and on every subject. But, some perform well, others don’t. And it doesn’t always have to do with the traffic of the site that hosts the content.
Via pixabay.com
Good titles are like first impressions: you know a good one when you experience it. And as with bad impressions, bad post titles are hard to get past. The reader rarely clicks through to get to know the article beneath the lead. But once you’ve convinced a reader to click through the title, you’re much, much more likely to generate marketable behaviors from this point on. So, the question is, how do we write these things? The answers are a little more complex than you might think.
For one, a dazzling headline can shoot you in the foot if the material itself doesn’t deliver. Instead, choose an accurate headline. For instance “5 Fruits that Cure Cancer” might seem like the sort of information that a lot of people want to know, if you’re not able to actually provide this content, it’s best to scale down the claims generated by your headline. In the same way, the quality of your content should be constructed so that it yields dedicated readership over time. If you consistently provide good, valuable content, it’s going to lend credibility to your titles, making people much more likely to click and share them than if they encountered them for the first time. In this way, SEO is both an art and a science. Belfast SEO can provide you all the tips and tricks you need to optimize your content for maximum exposure, but it’s important to give each article a firm foundation of content quality to develop a following.
So pick a good headline, and make sure it contains phrases that people will actually search for. For instance, in this title I used the phrase “Clickable Titles” something that a simple search will show you people search for on Google quite a lot. Hopefully, with the combination of this website’s exposure and my writing efforts, this post will be seen by hundreds, thousands, or more people. Working with a specific site, blog, or client can help you figure out the kind of titles that work best for individual audiences.
Finally, you want to give your titles some indication of the sort of content that the audience is ultimately going to view. People like this, because it helps them know that by clicking your title, they’re not going to be wasting their time. In the article I’ve just written I put “3 Ways” in the title so that the readers know they will be finding three specific recommendations, enough to take in quickly and digest. If I had an infographic, [infographic] would be appropriate to put at the end.
In every case, accuracy, personality, and communication are the ideals of the perfect title. If your title doesn’t seem right in any of these ways, it’s probably not a good title. Also, it’s OK to underpromise and overdeliver. If you have a somewhat humble title that has banging content, it might just catch on. Play around with it. You’ll master excellent titling in no time.
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Mark Zuckerberg Wants You To Have A Virtual Reality
THE STORY: MARK ZUCKERBERG WANTS YOU TO HAVE A VIRTUAL REALITY
Facebook has been trying out tons of new things recently. The latest thing they are working on is bringing Facebook users a virtual reality from their smartphone (Source: The Wall Street Journal).
But how does that work…
Facebook is still in early development for the app but their hope is videos will be compiled from multiple cameras allowing users to tilt their phones and change their perspective (Source: TIME). Zuckerberg said Facebook would support spherical videos on their news feed and users would be able to interact with these videos by being able to “move around inside the video and view it from different angles” (Source: The Wall Street Journal).
DA SKIM
Facebook acquired Oculus VR last year for $2 billion. The purchase of the virtual reality platform created hype and rumors about what Facebook would do next. After the purchase Zuckerberg said, “One day, we believe this kind of immersive, augmented reality will become a part of daily life for billions of people” (Source: TIME). TBD if this will actually be a success but it sounds pretty cool.
Quote of the Day: “Welcome to Nintendo.”
Nintendo has a new president two months after the death of Satoru Iwata (Source: ). The new president is Tatsumi Kimishima, former human resources executive at Nintendo (Source: ). While none of Kimishima’s visions or plans for the company were announced, Nintendo has a new platform called NX which is to be made public next year and talks of a partner with Universal for Nintendo Parks (Source: Entertainment Weekly). Exciting times for Nintendo!
In case you missed it…
Apple’s new iPhones went on preorder over the weekend. So how did it turn out? Well Apple said customer reactions had been “extremely positive”. Apple spokeswoman Trudy Miller said, “We are on pace to beat last year’s 10 million unit first-weekend record when the new iPhones go on sale September 25” (Source: USA Today). Way to go Apple!
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Social Media Can Help You Cash-in on Retiring
Whether you’re hoping to retire at the average age of 62, plan on working into your 70s or hope to retire early in your 40s, having a well-funded, diversified retirement plan in place is crucial to your future.
Ultimately you’ll need to start your accounts and fund them through your local bank or your favorite investment firm, but social media and blogs are actually a useful tool in determining which type of account will best suit your needs.
What’s your plan?
First, you need to make a plan.
How old do you want to be when you retire? Be realistic.
Sure, many people would probably retire tomorrow if they could, but that’s not a reality for most.
Next, determine how much money you need to live on each year after retirement. One way to retire earlier than expected is by keeping your living expenses low. An example would be cutting cable. Not only will this save you $100 per month, but it also lowers your monthly living expenses by $100 for the rest of your life.
The article “The 5 best retirement calculators” provides five retirement tools for helping you plan your retirement. They include NewRetirement, T. Rowe Price, American Funds, AARP and Bankrate.
Using social media for retirement
Social media provides a wealth of information on retirement. Between personal finance bloggers, wealth-planning experts and retirement planning websites, there is no shortage of information.
Here are a few tools you can use to help plan your retirement:
Blogs
Personal finance and retirement blogging is huge right now. You can find people sharing their stories on how they retired early, read about specific budgeting plans to help you meet your retirement goals and connect with financial professionals across the U.S. Not only is the information on blogs useful and informative, it’s also personal and specific.
You can use Twitter to follow your favorite investment firms, keep in touch with financial planners and stay up-to-date on retirement news and information. Currently, 14 percent of people ages 50 and older use Twitter
Facebook is the largest social media platform with more than one billion users worldwide. Of people aged 50 to 64, 60 percent use Facebook. 45 percent of people aged 65 and up use Facebook, too. Facebook can be used to connect with retirement professionals and financial planners, follow your favorite banks and investment companies and read news regarding specific retirement plans.
LinkedIn is a professional social media networking site. This is the site to use to locate financial planners in your area. You can read reviews of them, see how many people they’ve helped, see what company they work for and more.
By using a variety of social media platforms, you can stay connected to financial news and information, especially when it comes to your retirement.
The more platforms you use, the more exposure you’ll have to the world of personal finance blogging, retirement and investing news, and access to financial planners.
Photo credit: Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
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September 11, 2015
3 Audio-Visual Marketing Lessons from Real-Life Businesses
Every organization has a secret recipe for marketing success. These recipes can be traditional, light, fresh or innovative but the basic ingredients are almost always the same or something that someone has used before, in another form or manner. In this article, we will discuss three organizations and the secret audio-visual ingredients that led them to marketing success.
Virtual Workshops (Overeaters Anonymous)
Virtual workshops or webinars are a great way to connect with people spread over continents. They allow businesses to deliver their content in a powerful audio-visual message. Some of the benefits of virtual workshops are collaboration with dispersed teams, productivity boosts, on-hand training, visual motivation and great cost savings!
Overeaters Anonymous (OA) started as a humble group meeting initiated by three women who shared a common goal: fighting binge eating and losing weight. Today, it has 60,000 members and publishes books, a monthly periodical called Lifeline, and a host of other digital products like CDs, downloadable MP3 videos, podcasts and webinars. For an organization that supports itself through voluntary donations and sales of literature, OA seems to be doing pretty good.
Organizing meetings that stretch across so many countries can be a challenge for even seasoned pros, so how does this organization keep in touch with its members spread extensively over 80 countries? The answer is simple – OA has always remained a step ahead in using collaboration tools. From using Yahoo chatrooms back in 2009 to harnessing the power of podcasts in 2015, this organization has come a long way, making good use of technology and latest communication methods.
OA hosts week-long annual World Service Convention and Conferences, where members connect with each other, attend workshops, hear from noted speakers from the world over, run marathons, and take part in a lot of other fun events. These workshops are later recorded and made available for sale.
However, it is not just non-profit organizations that can benefit from virtual workshops. For any business that is cleverly using content marketing, recorded meetings or virtual workshops can be a great medium in getting the message across. If you don’t prefer third-party platform like Google’s Hangouts on Air and would like to maintain proprietary access to recorded meetings, ClickMeeting is a great tool to help you get started.
Knowledge Podcasts (Tenable)
Podcasts are one of the least expensive and most effective ways of one-way communication with your target audience. Companies have taken the big leap with streaming podcasts across industries such as healthcare, finance, security, software and manufacturing. Some valuable ways for businesses to take advantage of this channel are to invite keynote speakers to shed light on latest trends applicable to their business, hold interviews with industry thought leaders, and get clients/users to share their stories.
Tenable has been freely using this platform and have over 200 podcasts on various topics. From eBay hacking to malware detection, their podcasts answer all your questions about networking security and threats.
Audacity is a simple, open source audio software that lets you make podcasts in a jiffy, regardless of whether you use Windows, Mac, or Linux. Spreaker lets you do the same on your Android phone. You can then incorporate your podcast in a WordPress blog or upload it to a hosting platform like SoundCloud.
Video Customer Service (Milford Regional Medical Center)
Kate Burke, M.D. and emergency physician at Milford Regional Medical Center, Massachusetts, felt a big disconnect between what she explained to her patients and what they understood. She also felt that she didn’t remember all the details at the time of consultation and needed to reach out to patients post-consultation. When she met with an accident, she underwent physiotherapy, but found she couldn’t remember the exercises later at home. So the next time, she carried a camera and shot videos of the exercises. This helped her do the exercises correctly even years after the accident.
Dr. Burke then thought why not do the same for her own patients? This Eureka moment led to MRMC’s new initiative – video customer service. Dr. Burke found that patients can’t remember even 50% of their doctors’ instructions. Further, one can’t expect patients to understand medical terms that doctors use freely, albeit out of habit.
So Dr. Burke films herself, the patient or the patient’s family member, depending on the situation. This video can then be replayed and shared easily. She spoke about cancer patients and how they have so many questions and want to get different opinions, “But how, as a patient, can you keep track of this? How can you remember those nuanced suggestions by these incredible experts that are trying to fit all this information into the visit?”
Image: How much of this would the lady remember?
According to Dr. Burke, clinicians can help by adding to the video content by directing patients to relevant sources that can answer all their queries and make them better informed about the disease. For instance, Postwire is a patient engagement tool that allows sharing of videos and helpful articles among health providers, caregivers, patients. Years ago, doctors and healthcare providers dreaded video or any form of electronic medical records, but Dr. Burke and her ilk have changed the way healthcare is imparted, making it more transparent and open.
While there is little point preaching the benefits of video content in general to your business, I’d suggest you waste no time in making videos an integral part of your branding and marketing strategy. Outside of YouTube, Wistia is THE professional video hosting and delivery tool to use, with an excellent blog to help you master the nuances.
Parting Thoughts
All three of these organizations are from different industries but it takes little to realize that all of them are big on communication. Their business objectives are different: OA focuses on helping distant members, Tenable wants to establish itself as thought leader on all things security, and MRMC wants to give great post-consultation care to patients. Thus, OA’s application of communication is customer-centric, Tenable’s is knowledge-centric and MRMC’s is support-centric.
Almost all businesses differ in their marketing plans and strategies, but they share a common objective – to reach out to as many people as possible. With the world leaning closer to hear more from you, you’d do better to use more tools and methods of collaboration and communication, no matter what your goals are or what channels you choose to pursue them.
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