5 Ways to Strengthen Your Inner Drive

Marigold.

5 Ways to Strengthen Your Inner Drive

Need a boost to finish a project or push yourself forward? Try some of these tips.

Adam Toren

It’s normal to need a bit of a boost after you’ve been working on something for a while.

External motivators like money and praise can only go so far -- they’ll kick start you

at the beginning of your journey, but they won’t carry you to the finish line.

You’ll need a strong inner drive when the world throws obstacles your way.

These are my five favorite ways to strengthen my inner drive when I need some self-motivation.

Journal regularly.

You’ll have to work to create a habit of this one, but it’s worth it.

Journaling isn’t just a good way to document your journey; it’s also a way for you to mind dump 

all of your crazy thoughts and feelings on paper so you can focus on the stuff that really matters. You can write down your goals in your journal, list things you’re grateful for 

or record what you’ve done throughout the week. Had a bad work day? Vent about it –

- your journal won’t judge. Did something inspire you? Write it down to save for later!

Once you’ve journaled for a while, you’ll find you have a clearer head,

and you can flip back through the pages (or Word documents) to reminisce later on.

Be involved in your community.

Whether it’s personal or professional, being a part of a community is a great way to strengthen your inner drive. A group of like-minded people will have your back when your motivation

begins to slip. A supportive community will also pump you up and get you excited to work,

not just help you grudgingly push through your to-do lists. Networking events within your industry, co-working spaces and groups or even an online business forum can be a fantastic help

if you need some work-related motivation. When you want to work on the personal end

of your inner drive, local meetups, mentors and community centers are a great place to start. 

Educate others.

Taking the time to educate people has a handful of personal benefits.

Sometimes you don’t realize exactly how much you know until you have to teach it

to someone else, which is a huge confidence boost. When you educate others,

whether it’s a single person or a packed workshop, you’re acknowledging that

you’re successful enough to be considered a reliable source of wisdom in that area.

People will come to you when they have a question on your favorite subject,

and that’s motivation enough to brush up on your skills and keep working toward your goals.

It’s reassuring to know that you’ve gotten far enough to teach others to succeed as you have,

but it’s also a reminder to push yourself a little harder to maintain that pseudo-expert status.

Visualize success.

What will it look like to reach your goals? Will you be able to afford a membership

at a cool co-working space? Will you finally be able to take a vacation?

Look past the material rewards and focus on the personal and social. Will you have more family time each week? Will you be able to speak at next year’s biggest industry conference?

For some people, envisioning success is enough to motivate them to push toward their goals.

For others, it helps to make those conceptions concrete by creating a vision board.

You can do this using a corkboard, a few pages in your notebook, or a Pinterest board.

Just find pictures that capture your idea of success -- whether they’re Google images
of a beach, photos of your family, or a clip-art podium -- and pin them to your board.

If you keep your vision board in a place you’ll always see it, you’ll have a constant reminder of why you should keep pushing toward success, even when things get rocky.

Practice optimism.

“Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.”

You’ve probably seen this quote by Henry Ford over a hundred times, but it holds true:

Your attitude makes up most of your ability to reach a goal. I like to maintain a positive attitude

by practicing optimism throughout the day. Instead of thinking I’m bad at something,

I say it’s something I’m working on; rather than focusing on how much I dislike a particular task,

I look forward to something else that excites me.

Of course, optimism alone won’t lead to success -- you still have to gather resources

and put in the effort -- but it’ll help you immensely in getting there.

A strong inner drive will keep you moving when you feel yourself starting to lose steam.

How do you motivate yourself from within?

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/293036

Turbo Charged Reading: Read fast>>>Read fast>>>Remember more>>>Years later

Contact M’reen at: read@turbochargedreading.com

You can TCR software and engineering manuals for spontaneous recall – or pass that exam.

I can Turbo Charge Read a novel 6-7 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

I can TCR an instructional/academic book around 20 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

Introduction to Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

A practical overview of Turbo Charged Reading YouTube  

How to choose a book. A Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Emotions when Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

How to prepare your body for Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Advanced Reading Skills Perhaps you’d like to join my FaceBook group ?

https://www.facebook.com/TurboChargedReading/

www.pinterest.com/mreenhunt

Perhaps you’d like to check out my sister blogs:

www.turbochargedreading.blogspot.com    

All aspects of regular, each-word reading and education.

Turbo Charged Reading uses these skills significantly faster

www.innermindworking.blogspot.com         gives many ways for you to work with the stresses of life

www.mreenhunthappyartaccidents.blogspot.com          just for fun.

To quote the Dr Seuss himself, “The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn; the more places you'll go.”

A Structured Day Can Keep Wasted Time at Bay

Poppy.

A Structured Day Can Keep Wasted Time at Bay

Adam Toren

Americans may as well start giving flowers to their computers,

buying their business phones diamond encrusted cases a

nd taking their briefcases on expensive vacations -- our nation is having a love affair with work.

For most entrepreneurs, this is not news. In fact, ABC News reports that Americans

work more than anyone in the industrialized world.

We work longer days, take less time off and retire later in life.

But, is love really the basis of this affair? The answer is usually no.

It's not love, but a drive for success that leaves us frequenting the office like drunk college kids frequent a Taco Bell. However, beyond the insatiable desire to win,

it's also structure -- or more accurately, lack of structure –

- that causes many to spend 20 hours on things they could actually get done in five.

Misuse of time is prolific and can envelope both personal and work-related activities.

Too frequent checking of email, an inability to delegate tasks, excessive meetings

and the failure to make a plan all add up to "work" being more aptly titled "waste."

It doesn't have to be this way.

Most of you are probably familiar with Tim Ferriss (of Four Hour Work Week fame)

and his approach to success.

Tired of working 14-hour days, Ferriss came up with a system to work less and live more.

The goal of Ferriss' book may be to communicate how people can work less,

but let's face it -- many people don't want to work less. I don't want to work less.

I like my work. However, I do want to be as effective as possible with my time.

Doing so will help me capitalize on opportunities and find greater fulfillment in those opportunities.

Scott Dinsmore, founder of Live Your Legend, follows a similar train of thought.

 His core message isn't about working less; it's about doing what you love. Sounds great, right?

And it is, but as Dinsmore clearly points out, it isn't easy.

In order to do what you love, you have to use your time to maximum effect,

and that starts with a process. It starts with structure and planning.

Dinsmore's approach involves eight steps (normally concentrated to five) that are executed weekly:

*Carve out some time to plan your week before it begins

*Mentally focus on your long-term goals

*Celebrate your successes from the week before

*Identify lessons learned in the previous week

*Take note of things that were planned that didn't occur and determine why

*Call out the most important goals for the current week

*Schedule everything -- yes, everything -- formally on a calendar

*Schedule everything else, including the planning itself

While Ferriss may reject the use of some technological tools,

and Dinsmore may evangelize the use of similar tools, the common denominator is

that they both promote a structured methodology to achieving goals.

No single approach is going to work for everyone, but the correlation between the adoption

of a structured approach to your workday and success can't be ignored. The key is to take the ideas that resonate best with you and adopt them. If you can't swallow an entire method immediately, then begin one step at a time. Start with a weekly planning session, then layer in maximizing

the use of virtual assistants. In a month's time, commit to spending 10 minutes a week

reflecting on the successes (and missed opportunities) of the past week.

Before you know it, you'll have an approach to addressing the work week.

Underpinning any methodology for addressing the opportunities in front of you are consistency and flexibility. Helmuth von Moltke, the chief of staff for the Prussian army in the latter half

of the 19th century, noted that "no battle plan survives contact with the enemy."

Events will inevitably conspire to foil the best of plans.

This doesn't obviate the need for structure, rather, it reinforces it.

As Dwight D. Eisenhower sagely noted, "Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable."

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/230547

Turbo Charged Reading: Read fast>>>Read fast>>>Remember more>>>Years later

Contact M’reen at: read@turbochargedreading.com

You can TCR software and engineering manuals for spontaneous recall – or pass that exam.

I can Turbo Charge Read a novel 6-7 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

I can TCR an instructional/academic book around 20 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

Introduction to Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

A practical overview of Turbo Charged Reading YouTube  

How to choose a book. A Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Emotions when Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Advanced Reading Skills Perhaps you’d like to join my FaceBook group ?

www.facebook.com/mreenhunt

www.pinterest.com/mreenhunt

Perhaps you’d like to check out my sister blogs:

www.turbochargedreading.blogspot.com    

All aspects of regular, each-word reading and education.

Turbo Charged Reading uses these skills significantly faster

www.innermindworking.blogspot.com         gives many ways for you to work with the stresses of life

www.mreenhunthappyartaccidents.blogspot.com      just for fun.

To quote the Dr Seuss himself, “The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn; the more places you'll go.”

How to Trick Yourself into Becoming a Morning Person

Self Heal.

How to Trick Yourself into Becoming a Morning Person

Stephanie Vozza

The early bird apparently does get the worm. Christoph Randler,

a biology professor at the University of Education in Heidelberg, Germany,

found that morning people are often more successful than evening people because,

as a group, they tend to be proactive. A recent survey conducted by The Guardian 

confirms this idea, reporting that many CEOs of successful companies are up by 5 a.m.

But what if you’re more of a night owl than a morning lark – is it possible to change your ways?

Yes, but it will take work, says Dr. W. Christopher Winter,

Medical Director for the Martha Jefferson Hospital Sleep Medicine Center in Charlottesville, Va. and spokesperson for the American Academy of Sleep Medicine.

"Your genes determine what we call your 'chronotype,' which is if you are a morning

or evening person," says Winter. "It's often similar within families,

but it can be influenced to a certain degree."

Changing your chronotype takes about two weeks, but you have to stick with it.

If you slack off, you’ll drift back to your natural tendencies,

Winter cautions. He offers six simple tips for adjusting your internal clock:

1. Put yourself on a morning schedule, but don't sweat bed time. 
Wake up, exercise and eat at the same time every day, says Winter.

The body likes to anticipate what’s happening, and will settle into a routine.

But don’t worry about your bedtime: "People get hung up on setting a bedtime,

but that’s a mistake because it can cause stress," he says. "The bedtime will sort itself out

because you'll be tired. The most important piece is to not slack off on the wakeup time."

Winter says the problem occurs when you drift back to older patterns during weekends

and vacations. Sleeping in on weekends tells your body that your early morning routine

is just an arbitrary schedule and that it should stick to its chronotype. To become a morning person, it’s important to get up early on weekends, even if you are out late the night before.

2. Use a smart alarm. 
The snooze button was designed to allow people to go back to sleep for a few minutes without reentering a deep sleep cycle, but it can hinder your transformation into an early riser, says Winter.

“There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with it, but if you want to wake up at a certain time

you’re not in a cognitive state of mind to make a decision about whether or not

to add nine more minutes of sleep,” he says.

Instead, Winter likes to use a smartphone alarm app, such as Smart Alarm or Math Alarm,

that requires him to solve a math problem to turn it off or set it to snooze.

“Solving a problem makes your brain awake enough to make an informed decision,” he says.

He also likes to use his music library to play a random song as an alarm.

“You can become callous to the same song or sound on your alarm,” he says.

“Different songs will be a novel stimulus and that can be helpful.”

3. Let in the light. 
Whether it’s natural or artificial, light is significant because it tells the brain that the day has begun and sends signals to the body to stop making melatonin,

the hormone that helps regular sleep, says Winter.

“If it’s dark when you want to wake up – say 5 a.m., for example –

you can fool your brain into thinking the sun is up by using bright indoor lights,” he says.

4. Get some exercise. 
Winter says exercising first thing in the morning helps wake up the body. 

Researchers at Appalachian State University found that morning exercise

lowers your blood pressure, reduces stress and anxiety, and helps you sleep better at night. 

Winter says exercising in bright light is best.

He suggests going for a morning bike ride or jog, or taking the dog for a walk.

5. Have a protein-heavy meal. 
Skip the bagel and go for eggs or yogurt, says Winter.

Protein facilitates wakefulness, he says, while carbohydrates promote sleep.

"Protein increases your dopamine levels, which help make you ready for the day.”

6. Avoid the urge to nap. 
Winter says falling asleep earlier may be difficult in the first few days,

and you may have a strong urge to nap, but you should fight it.

"Capitalize on sleepiness as a way to go to bed earlier," he says.

"If you nap, you'll destroy your natural stimulus for sleep."
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/228591

Turbo Charged Reading: Read fast>>>Read fast>>>Remember all>>>Years later

Contact M’reen at: read@turbochargedreading.com

You can TCR software and engineering manuals for spontaneous recall – or pass that exam.

I can Turbo Charge Read a novel 6-7 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

I can TCR an instructional/academic book around 20 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

Introduction to Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

A practical overview of Turbo Charged Reading YouTube  

How to choose a book. A Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Emotions when Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Advanced Reading Skills Perhaps you’d like to join my FaceBook group ?

www.facebook.com/mreenhunt

www.pinterest.com/mreenhunt

Perhaps you’d like to check out my sister blogs:

www.turbochargedreading.blogspot.com    

All aspects of regular, each-word reading and education.

Turbo Charged Reading uses these skills significantly faster

www.innermindworking.blogspot.com         gives many ways for you to work with the stresses of life

www.mreenhunthappyartaccidents.blogspot.com      just for fun.

To quote the Dr Seuss himself, “The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn; the more places you'll go.”

How Alibaba's Jack Ma Became the Richest Man in China

(White) Hedge bindweed, purple loosestrife

How Alibaba's Jack Ma Became the Richest Man in China

Steve Tobak

English teacher and Internet entrepreneur Jack Ma founded Alibaba 15 years ago

in his tiny apartment in Hanzhou, China. On Friday, Ma became the richest man in China

on the heels of the biggest IPO in U.S. and possibly world history.

With a market cap of $231 billion, the online retailer is nearly as valuable as Wal-Mart

and bigger than Amazon and eBay combined.

And this is just the beginning. Alibaba plans to expand aggressively in America and Europe

and has already invested nearly $1 billion in a host of U.S.-based startups, including Uber,

Lyft, ShopRunner, Fanatics, Tango and Kabam.    

Every current and aspiring entrepreneur and business leader should learn from

how a Chinese English teacher turned a vision, a group of friends

and $60,000 into untold riches and the world's most valuable Internet commerce company.

It will no doubt be studied in business schools for generations.

Start here, go anywhere. Recognizing the importance of English, young Ma would ride his bike

to a nearby hotel and guide foreigners around the city just to learn and practice the language.

His passion for entrepreneurship in many ways parallels Masayoshi Son who grew up poor, followed his dream to Silicon Valley and graduated from U.C. Berkeley before founding Softbank. As chairman of Softbank and Sprint, Son is now the richest man in Japan.

He had vision … and he had help. Ma saw the Internet’s enormous potential to bridge businesses across China’s huge population early on. 

So he and his wife brought 17 friends together and pooled $60,000 to start the company. 

That formed the basis for the company’s dynamic partnership structure and unique culture 

designed to drive collaboration, diminish bureaucracy 

and promote accountability for long-term growth.   

Go big or go home. Even if crowdfunding existed when Alibaba was founded, I doubt if Ma

would have gone that route. He’s simply not a “dip your toe in the water” kind of guy.

Instead he and his friends went all in, raising a $5 million angel round, $20 million from Softbank

in 2000, $1 billion from Yahoo five years later, and $1.6 billion from Silver Lake Partners

and DST Global in 2011. That’s how you make it big.   

Big problems lead to big opportunities. China’s lack of brick and mortar infrastructure

has always been an insurmountable hurdle for the enormous nation’s small business merchants. Alibaba solved that and now accounts for 80% of the country’s ecommerce –

a whopping $248 billion last year and more than twice that of Amazon.

Innovation comes from unique individuals who think and act differently. 

Everyone talks about changing the world and making tons of money these days,

but those who actually do it are exceptional individuals with breakthrough ideas,

uncommon vision and a passion to do great work. Disruptive innovation comes from people

who break from the status quo and carve their own path.

Stand on the shoulders of giants ... but learn from their mistakes. Like Amazon and eBay,

Alibaba is an Internet commerce company, but that’s where the similarity ends.

Alibaba does not actually hold inventory or sell goods. It’s a middleman that collects annual fees and commissions from larger merchants and advertising fees from smaller ones.

The result is one of the most scalable and profitable business models on Earth.

What’s in a name? Less than you think. Apple. Facebook. Google. Microsoft. Uber.

One Kings Lane. Fanatics. Starbucks. Whole Foods. What do the names and brands of all these companies have in common? Absolutely nothing. Some are conjunctions or made-up words.

Others are common words or phrases. There’s even a fruit. It’s what your business

does for customers that counts … not your name or personal brand.

Jack Ma was sitting in a San Francisco coffee shop when he thought of how Ali Baba 

overheard the secret password of The 40 Thieves -- “open sesame” -- and unlocked untold riches.

It resonated with his vision of unlocking the potential of China’s small and midsized merchants. Now you know the secret of how he accomplished his dream.  

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/237692  September 23, 2014

Turbo Charged Reading: Read fast>>>Read fast>>>Remember all>>>Years later

Contact M’reen at: read@turbochargedreading.com

You can TCR software and engineering manuals for spontaneous recall – or pass that exam.

I can Turbo Charge Read a novel 6-7 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

I can TCR an instructional/academic book around 20 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

Introduction to Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

A practical overview of Turbo Charged Reading YouTube  

How to choose a book. A Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Emotions when Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Advanced Reading Skills Perhaps you’d like to join my FaceBook group ?

www.facebook.com/mreenhunt

www.pinterest.com/mreenhunt

Perhaps you’d like to check out my sister blogs:

www.turbochargedreading.blogspot.com    

All aspects of regular, each-word reading and education.

Turbo Charged Reading uses these skills significantly faster

www.innermindworking.blogspot.com         gives many ways for you to work with the stresses of life

www.mreenhunthappyartaccidents.blogspot.com      just for fun.

To quote the Dr Seuss himself, “The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn; the more places you'll go.”

How to Determine the Best App for Managing Social Media

Hawthorn berries.

How to Determine the Best App for Managing Social Media

Aaron Agius

Before you jump headfirst into the next trendy social media management tools, 

make sure you ask these questions.

Q: What are the best free apps for social media management?

I am a bit familiar with Hootsuite, Zoho social, Klout and Buffer

but want to see what is the best and how they compare.

A: You’ve hit on a few of the top social media management tools out there, but there are 

a few others I’d recommend taking a look at as well, including SocialOomph, Sprout Social, TweetDeck, CrowdBooster, MeetEdgar and IFTTT/Zapier.

At Louder, we use Buffer, specifically the Buffer for Business plan, that lets us bulk upload

social updates via Excel file. I can’t tell you if that’s the right option for you,

since I don’t know what kind of campaigns you’re running or what your marketing objectives are.

There are a lot of questions I’d suggest you answer before investing in a tool,

including the following:

What networks will I be posting to?

HootSuite is a popular, social media management tool, but it only posts to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google+, YouTube and LinkedIn but not Pinterest.

If you need Pinterest management, you’ll need to choose a suite that includes it (like Buffer)

or a standalone Pinterest tool (Tailwind).

What features are important to me?

This is where the tools I mentioned above differentiate themselves. MeetEdgar, for example,

focuses specifically on recycling old content from your social channels to increase their engagement and decrease the amount of time you have to spend curating new content.

IFTTT and Zapier, on the other hand, are strictly automation tools.

They’ll auto-load your new blog posts to your Facebook page, for example, but they won’t give you the analytics reporting tools of a platform like Zoho Social or Sprout Social.

Klout is best for individuals trying to build their personal brands through social content.

The company’s companion Lithium supports business brands and agencies

with a more fully-featured platform.

SocialOomph offers social mention monitoring tools,

as well as follower suggestions for building an audience.

Get the idea?

Before you choose a tool, you need to sit down and figure out what you want it to do.

From there, you can narrow down your possible options based on their features and functionality.

Will I be running paid campaigns alongside my organic social updates?

You didn’t mention whether you’d be doing organic social, paid social or both,

but if you will be running paid campaigns, you’re going to be looking at an entirely different set

of tools (with the exception of Sprout Social, which can handle both to some degree). 

Trackur, Social Report and Webfluenz might be worth looking into.

Will multiple team members be using the tool?

Think about the scope of your social media campaigns. If you’re a one-person shop,

pretty much any of the tools I’ve mentioned so far can be made to work for your needs.

There are, however, situations where having multiple user accounts makes sense.

In a larger organization where social media is used as much for customer service

as it is for marketing, it can be helpful to be able to assign required responses

to a customer service rep or escalate difficult questions to a manager.

In these cases, setting up multiple users means the appropriate people

receive individual notifications about the tasks they need to follow up on,

rather than a free-for-all system that risks missing messages.

What can I afford?

The last question you should ask, of course, is what you can afford.

The tools I’ve mentioned are all across the board in terms of price,

with everything from free options to tools that cost hundreds of dollars per month.

This is a great time to cut that features list I talked about earlier from

“would be nice” to “must have.”

As more features generally means more money, understanding your budget will also help you choose the right tool based on the features that are truly most important for your company.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/287081

Turbo Charged Reading: Read fast>>>Read fast>>>Remember all>>>Years later

Contact M’reen at: read@turbochargedreading.com

You can TCR software and engineering manuals for spontaneous recall – or pass that exam.

I can Turbo Charge Read a novel 6-7 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

I can TCR an instructional/academic book around 20 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

Introduction to Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

A practical overview of Turbo Charged Reading YouTube  

How to choose a book. A Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Emotions when Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Advanced Reading Skills Perhaps you’d like to join my FaceBook group ?

www.facebook.com/mreenhunt

www.pinterest.com/mreenhunt

Perhaps you’d like to check out my sister blogs:

www.turbochargedreading.blogspot.com    

All aspects of regular, each-word reading and education.

Turbo Charged Reading uses these skills significantly faster

www.innermindworking.blogspot.com         gives many ways for you to work with the stresses of life

www.mreenhunthappyartaccidents.blogspot.com      just for fun.

To quote the Dr Seuss himself, “The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn; the more places you'll go.”

4 Ways to Win at Local Content Marketing

4 Ways to Win at Local Content Marketing

Aaron Agius

When it comes to marketing content to local customers, you have to take a unique approach

- the tactics that work for big businesses aren’t going to resonate with the target audience

in your town. So what do you need to do differently?

Here, I’ll discuss a new approach for marketing content to local customers.

1. Feature local experts in your content.

Most local marketers focus nearly all their content on their business alone,

but there are a lot of benefits to also bringing in other local experts

related to your niche. Incorporate quotes and interviews with local experts,

or find other ways to feature them in your content through collaboration. 

As long as they’re not your direct competitors, you can work with them 

to create a mutually beneficial relationship to expand your audience base. 

Besides, keeping all your content focused on your business alone

sets you up for some limitations. For one, you miss out on the fact that 92 percent of consumers trust third-party recommendations more than brand content. At the same time, sharing content through influencers can increase conversions by three to ten times.

If you’ve taken the time to feature others in your content,

it won’t be very difficult to encourage them to share it with their audiences as well.  

2. Look for opportunities to boost your local prowess.

One of the most basic marketing tactics to find local customers is by hosting

or participating in local events, which I definitely recommend as well. Some options include:

Becoming an event sponsor

Attending trade shows

Donating goods or services to a good cause

These are not only good networking opportunities to build brand awareness,

they’re also great fodder for content creation. Take and share pictures from an event

and create blog posts about the experience. Another important way to boost your local prowess through content is by taking advantage of trending news opportunities. Use Google Trends 

to research what people are talking about in your local area. If there’s a relevant topic

related to your niche, you can write about it on your blog. Google favors prominent news 

in SERPs, so you’re likely to get a boost there for relevance. 

If you can be considered an expert on a topic,

then you can also build local prowess by offering quotes to journalists for news stories. 

Just sign up for Help A Reporter Out (HARO). Journalists post queries on this platform

that you can respond to; getting you and your brand in the news.

3. Focus heavily on encouraging reviews.

This is an important strategy for businesses of any size, but positive reviews are even more crucial for local business success. If you’re working on building your local SEO, the first step is

getting set up on Google My Business. This makes it possible for you to show up in Google’s specialized local search results. Your reviews appear prominently within those results.

This user-generated content is going to have a major impact on whether people decide to visit

your business’s website from searches. Considering that 74 percent of people primarily use portals like Google to find local businesses, this is an area you can’t ignore.

Additionally, Google reviews aren’t the only areas that you on which you should target your focus. Just as endorsements from influencers boost your credibility, reviews from happy customers on review sites -  your website and search engines

 - will help draw in more customers.

4. Take advantage of paid social media

When many small businesses plan their marketing budgets, they write off paid social media

as a content distribution option that’s out of their means. However, there are a few points

that demonstrate how the strategy is actually completely essential for your business. 

For one - organic engagement on social media is falling.

It has been on Facebook for a while, and not coincidentally,

this began around the time the platform started offering paid content distribution options.

It’s no mystery why Facebook, Twitter, and others want to encourage brands to use

their paid options; they favor those over organic posts. Effective social media marketing

is no longer free. Another important point is that paid social media is really quite affordable,

even for small businesses. All the platforms have small minimum advertising investments

and give you complete control over how much you’re willing to spend for impressions, engagement, clicks, etc. 

These platforms have a plethora of super-specific demographic information.

They put the most relevant promoted posts in front of the right audience. 

Just take a look at what Facebook Audience Insights can tell you about your target audience 

based on location, age, interests, Facebook behavior, purchasing behavior, and more. 

A lot of what makes content great doesn’t have to do with business type. 

But if you want to be optimally effective at content marketing to local customers,

there are some strategies you should follow that apply to your unique situation. Take advantage

of the advice in this post to jumpstart your efforts to engage with local customers effectively.

 https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/275838?utm_source=Latest&utm_medium=site&utm_campaign=iScroll

Turbo Charged Reading: Read fast>>>Read fast>>>Remember all>>>Years later

Contact M’reen at: read@turbochargedreading.com

You can TCR software and engineering manuals for spontaneous recall – or pass that exam.

I can Turbo Charge Read a novel 6-7 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

I can TCR an instructional/academic book around 20 times faster and remember what I’ve read.

Introduction to Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

A practical overview of Turbo Charged Reading YouTube  

How to choose a book. A Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Emotions when Turbo Charged Reading YouTube

Advanced Reading Skills Perhaps you’d like to join my FaceBook group ?

www.facebook.com/mreenhunt

www.pinterest.com/mreenhunt

Perhaps you’d like to check out my sister blogs:

www.turbochargedreading.blogspot.com    

All aspects of regular, each-word reading and education.

Turbo Charged Reading uses these skills significantly faster

www.innermindworking.blogspot.com         gives many ways for you to work with the stresses of life

www.happyartaccidents.blogspot.com        just for fun.

To quote the Dr Seuss himself, “The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn; the more places you'll go.”