London SEO Services: November 2018

Friday, 30 November 2018

15 of the Best WordPress Newspaper Themes in 2019

Whether you’re a blogger, editorial writer, journalist, or any other type of writer, there are a number of different WordPress themes that allow you to share your content with your visitors on your website.

Newspaper WordPress themes — despite their name — work for all types of writing. No matter your content type, the layout you’re looking for, or the design you envision for your website, there are hundreds of newspaper themes to choose from. That’s why we’ve compiled this list of our 15 favorite newspaper themes for 2019 to help you find one that meets your needs.

15 of the Best WordPress Newspaper Themes for 2019

Each of the following themes contains a description and a few key takeaways to help you efficiently determine which option or options might work for your own website. If you don’t see a theme listed below of interest, you can always check out the WordPress theme library for more options.

1. News Pro Theme

Source

News Pro is a great newspaper theme for content-heavy websites. This theme formats your articles, photos, audio, and videos in a way that works for the story you are telling and for your website visitors. The simple navigation options also keep your content organized to ensure a great user experience. Additionally, if you’re already a WP Engine hosting plan user, you get free access to all other StudioPress themes.

Key Takeaways:

Ideal for content-heavy websites
Simple navigation
WP Engine hosting plan users get access to all StudioPress themes

2. Newspaper

Source

Newspaper is a WordPress theme created for writing articles and blogs in a newspaper template. The theme has several different layout options in their gallery suited for a wide range of blog types. There are also over 50 unique demos you can install in one-click to help get you started designing your website and adding your written content.

Key Takeaways:

Created for articles and blogs
Variety of layout options featured in their gallery
50 installable demos

3. Voice

Source

Voice is a clean and simple theme ideal for news and magazines. The theme has formatting features created for both news articles and editorial content. Voice has a wide variety of layout, color, and font options to customize your site. There are options to set multiple authors on a single post as well as add a “related posts” sections at the bottom of specific articles or pieces for visitors to continue reading on your site.

Key Takeaways:

Ideal for news and magazines
Can add multiple authors per post
Related posts sections

4. Noozbeat

Source

Noozebeat is a fully responsive theme, meaning visitors can move seamlessly from desktop to mobile to tablet while on your site. It’s designed for magazines and news articles and gives you the option to add advertising space, pages for your featured posts, and custom widgets to enhance your site’s user experience.

Key Takeaways:

Fully responsive
Created for news articles and magazines
Custom widgets

5. Hive

Source

Hive is a WordPress theme built for bloggers. There are a number of customizable typography options to make your written content look unique and fit your style. Adaptive layouts make your website interactive and exciting to look at — with these you can mix and match your written content with different fonts, styles, images, and more.

Key Takeaways:

Built for bloggers
Custom typography options
Adaptive layouts

6. Felt

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Felt is a WordPress theme ideal for publishing magazine-style content. The theme allows you to implement slideshows and carousels that automatically move visitors through a number of different images on your site. The theme also has built-in SEO features that will help you organically rank and reach more people.

Key Takeaways:

Ideal for digital magazines
Option to implement slideshows and carousels
Automatic SEO features included

7. Wonderwall

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Wonderwall is a great theme option if you’re a writer for a lifestyle blog and or digital magazine. There are formatting options to display banner ads on your site and add a built-in newsletter subscription widget to quickly grow your number of readers and email list. There are also a total of nine different customizable homepage layouts to choose from for your digital publication.

Key Takeaways:

Created for lifestyle blogs and digital magazines
Banner ads display options
Nine customizable homepage layouts

8. SmartMag

Source

SmartMag is a multi-purpose WordPress writing theme suited for online magazines, newspapers, blogs, and review sites. The theme has a drag-and-drop page builder that allows you to easily test your content in different areas of your site, try different formats, and create your website without the need for any coding. There is also the option to add multi-content slideshows to enhance the visual elements of your website and even help you generate more ad views.

Key Takeaways:

Multi-purpose writing theme
Drag-and-drop page builder
Multi-content slideshows

9. GoodLife

Source

GoodLife is a newspaper and magazine theme with five different types of article and post layouts to choose from based on your content type. There are also gallery pages for those of you looking to display your photo and video content in a unique way. The theme is SEO-focused so your website will be more likely to organically rank for certain key phrases and terms.

Key Takeaways:

Created for newspapers and magazines
Five different article and post layouts
SEO-focused

10. ColorMag

Source

ColorMag is a magazine and blogging Wordpress theme that comes with a layout for easily organizing and pairing your written content with your photos and videos. There are a number of ways to create specific pages and post types for featured and highlighted articles so they stand out to your readers and visitors. ColorMag also has a dedicated support team ready to help you if you stumble upon any issues while designing your site.

Key Takeaways:

Magazine and blogging theme
Featured and highlighted post types and pages
Dedicated support team

11. The Voux

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The Voux is ideal for digital magazines with layouts tailored to galleries, articles, and online shopping. You can set your images in a “lightbox” so they take up the entire width of your page and stand out with a black background for your website visitors. You can also set Image Hotspots and Shoppable Images so visitors and customers can click on certain items in your images to learn more about them, see their price, and purchase them.

Key Takeaways:

Built for magazines
Gallery image layout options with lightboxes
Image Hotspots and Shoppable Images

12. NewStar

Source

NewStar is a newspaper and magazine WordPress theme that features a one-click import tool so you can quickly select the features and layouts you want for your site and implement them immediately. The theme offers a customizable Article Teaser so you can get your readers excited about continuing to read your piece as well as neatly list multiple articles on one page. There is also plenty of ad space available in moveable banners throughout several different locations on your site.

Key Takeaways:

Ideal for newspapers and magazines
One-click feature import tool
Customizable article teaser

13. MagPlus

Source

If you’re writing for a blog or magazine, MagPlus could be a great WordPress theme option for you. The theme has a Live Customizer so you can edit your website’s page designs, update their content and appearance, and see what your changes look like in real time. MagPlus is a lightweight theme so it’s speedy and efficient for your visitors. There are also 25 different layout options to help you customize the look of your site.

Key Takeaways:

Created for blogs and magazines
Live Customizer
25 customizable page layout options

14. Soledad

Source

Soledad is a multi-purpose writing WordPress theme, meaning you can use it for your blog, newspaper, magazine, and other content. The theme has dozens of layouts that allow you to mix your magazine and blog content or completely separate your images, videos, and blogs. Soledad also has a White Label Tool that allows you to remove all of the Soledad logos throughout your site and replace them with your own so your theme is branded.

Key Takeaways:

Multi-purpose writing theme
Mix and match your written content with videos and images
White Label Tool

15. Gridlove

Source

Gridlove is a WordPress theme tailored to newspapers and magazines. With no coding knowledge required, anyone can easily get started building their website with one of the hundreds of customizable, pre-made layouts and templates as well as their drag-and-drop page builder. The theme offers a flexible homepage in which you can feature any number of articles and other types of content.

Key Takeaways:

Tailored to newspapers and magazines
No coding knowledge required
Hundreds of customizable layouts and templates

Back To You

These 15 WordPress newspaper themes are built to help you share all types of written content with your website visitors and customers. Whether you’re writing for a blog, magazine, review site, or newspaper, there is a writing theme tailored towards your needs. Get started and pick a theme listed above based on the type of writing you do, install it to your WordPress website, and start adding and sharing your content.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/newspaper-theme-wordpress

The Definition of Human Resources in 300 Words or Less

It's likely you already have an understanding of what Human Resources does -- at the very least, you probably know they have tasks that include recruiting and hiring employees, and dealing with an organization's culture.

However, it's a tricky term to define, particularly since HR deals with so many different aspects of a company.

Along with recruiting and hiring employees, Human Resources is responsible for compensation and benefits, on-boarding employees, training, organization development, and workplace culture -- this long list of tasks can make it difficult to cleanly define HR in the first place.

Here, we've defined HR in less than 300 words. Whether you're interested in pursuing a career in the Human Resources field, or simply need to know how your HR department can help your team, it's critical you understand the term. Fortunately, we've made it easy.

What is Human Resources?

Human Resources is in charge of dealing with all issues related to the people within your organization. This includes recruiting and hiring people, as well as onboarding employees, but it also involves tasks required to retain employees, long-term. For instance, HR might develop wellness initiatives, provide guidance regarding disciplinary actions, or promote career development or training programs to strengthen employee satisfaction. Additionally, HR handles compensation and benefits.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/what-is-human-resources

How to Convert Images From PNG to JPG and JPG to PNG

When I first started my marketing career and needed to include an image in one of my articles or post a picture on social media, the image’s format didn’t matter to me. In my eyes, JPG and PNG were exactly the same.

Once I actually dug into the difference between the two, though, I realized they’re quite different. But one format isn’t necessarily better than the other -- JPG is optimal for some situations while PNG is optimal for others.

In a nutshell, JPG images are best suited for social media and blog posts because they’re optimized for photography and have a smaller file size than PNG images.

PNG images are best suited for web graphics and professional photography because they maintain their quality no matter how many times you open and save them, whereas JPG images decline in quality every time you open and save them.

Fortunately, JPG and PNG images aren’t permanently stuck in their respective file format. You can convert images from PNG to JPG and vice versa in less than one minute with the help of some free online tools.

How to Batch Convert Files from PNG to JPG

1. Visit one of the free online PNG to JPG converters listed in the section below.

2. Upload your PNG images.

3. Press “Convert” to convert your PNG images to JPG images.

4. Click “Download” to download your new JPG images.

Best PNG to JPG Converter Tools

1. iLoveImg

With iLoveImg, you can convert up to 15 PNG files at a time without signing up for a free account. If you register for a free account, you can convert up to 30 PNG files at a time.

2. png2jpg.com

Png2jpg.com lets you convert up to 20 PNG files at a time. The free tool doesn’t ask for your email address.

3. online-convert.com

Online-convert.com offers a free tool that lets you convert up to 20 PNG files at a time without giving them your email address. If you buy their premium version, you can convert up to 200 PNG files at a time.

How to Batch Convert Files from JPG to PNG

1. Visit one of the free online JPG to PNG converters listed in the section below.

2. Upload your JPG images.

3. Press “Convert” to convert your JPG images to PNG images.

4. Click “Download” to download your new PNG images.

Best JPG to PNG Converter Tools

1. ILoveImg

With iLoveImg, you can convert up to 15 JPG files at a time without signing up for a free account. If you register for a free account, you can convert up to 30 JPG files at a time.

2. jpg2png.com

Jpg2png.com lets you convert up to 20 JPG files at a time. The free tool doesn’t ask for your email address.

3. online-convert.com

Online-convert.com offers a free tool that lets you convert up to 20 JPG files at a time without giving them your email address. If you buy their premium version, you can convert up to 200 JPG files at a time.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/png-jpg

Local Search Ranking Factors 2018: Local Today, Key Takeaways, and the Future

Posted by Whitespark

In the past year, local SEO has run at a startling and near-constant pace of change. From an explosion of new Google My Business features to an ever-increasing emphasis on the importance of reviews, it's almost too much to keep up with. In today's Whiteboard Friday, we welcome our friend Darren Shaw to explain what local is like today, dive into the key takeaways from his 2018 Local Search Ranking Factors survey, and offer us a glimpse into the future according to the local SEO experts.

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Howdy, Moz fans. I'm Darren Shaw from Whitespark, and today I want to talk to you about the local search ranking factors. So this is a survey that David Mihm has run for the past like 10 years. Last year, I took it over, and it's a survey of the top local search practitioners, about 40 of them. They all contribute their answers, and I aggregate the data and say what's driving local search. So this is what the opinion of the local search practitioners is, and I'll kind of break it down for you.

Local search today

So these are the results of this year's survey. We had Google My Business factors at about 25%. That was the biggest piece of the pie. We have review factors at 15%, links at 16%, on-page factors at 14%, behavioral at 10%, citations at 11%, personalization and social at 6% and 3%. So that's basically the makeup of the local search algorithm today, based on the opinions of the people that participated in the survey.

The big story this year is Google My Business. Google My Business factors are way up, compared to last year, a 32% increase in Google My Business signals. I'll talk about that a little bit more over in the takeaways. Review signals are also up, so more emphasis on reviews this year from the practitioners. Citation signals are down again, and that makes sense. They continue to decline I think for a number of reasons. They used to be the go-to factor for local search. You just built out as many citations as you could. Now the local search algorithm is so much more complicated and there's so much more to it that it's being diluted by all of the other factors. Plus it used to be a real competitive difference-maker. Now it's not, because everyone is pretty much getting citations. They're considered table stakes now. By seeing a drop here, it doesn't mean you should stop doing them. They're just not the competitive difference-maker they used to be. You still need to get listed on all of the important sites.

Key takeaways

All right, so let's talk about the key takeaways.

1. Google My Business

The real story this year was Google My Business, Google My Business, Google My Business. Everyone in the comments was talking about the benefits they're seeing from investing in a lot of these new features that Google has been adding.

Google has been adding a ton of new features lately — services, descriptions, Google Posts, Google Q&A. There's a ton of stuff going on in Google My Business now that allows you to populate Google My Business with a ton of extra data. So this was a big one.

✓ Take advantage of Google Posts

Everyone talked about Google Posts, how they're seeing Google Posts driving rankings. There are a couple of things there. One is the semantic content that you're providing Google in a Google post is definitely helping Google associate those keywords with your business. Engagement with Google Posts as well could be driving rankings up, and maybe just being an active business user continuing to post stuff and logging in to your account is also helping to lift your business entity and improve your rankings. So definitely, if you're not on Google Posts, get on it now.

If you search for your category, you'll see a ton of businesses are not doing it. So it's also a great competitive difference-maker right now.

✓ Seed your Google Q&A

Google Q&A, a lot of businesses are not even aware this exists. There's a Q&A section now. Your customers are often asking questions, and they're being answered by not you. So it's valuable for you to get in there and make sure you're answering your questions and also seed the Q&A with your own questions. So add all of your own content. If you have a frequently asked questions section on your website, take that content and put it into Google Q&A. So now you're giving lots more content to Google.

✓ Post photos and videos

Photos and videos, continually post photos and videos, maybe even encourage your customers to do that. All of that activity is helpful. A lot of people don't know that you can now post videos to Google My Business. So get on that if you have any videos for your business.

✓ Fill out every field

There are so many new fields in Google My Business. If you haven't edited your listing in a couple of years, there's a lot more stuff in there that you can now populate and give Google more data about your business. All of that really leads to engagement. All of these extra engagement signals that you're now feeding Google, from being a business owner that's engaged with your listing and adding stuff and from users, you're giving them more stuff to look at, click on, and dwell on your listing for a longer time, all that helps with your rankings.

2. Reviews

✓ Get more Google reviews

Reviews continue to increase in importance in local search, so, obviously, getting more Google reviews. It used to be a bit more of a competitive difference-maker. It's becoming more and more table stakes, because everybody seems to be having lots of reviews. So you definitely want to make sure that you are competing with your competition on review count and lots of high-quality reviews.

✓ Keywords in reviews

Getting keywords in reviews, so rather than just asking for a review, it's useful to ask your customers to mention what service they had provided or whatever so you can get those keywords in your reviews.

✓ Respond to reviews (users get notified now!)

Responding to reviews. Google recently started notifying users that if the owner has responded to you, you'll get an email. So all of that is really great, and those responses, it's another signal to Google that you're an engaged business.

✓ Diversify beyond Google My Business for reviews

Diversify. Don't just focus on Google My Business. Look at other sites in your industry that are prominent review sites. You can find them if you just look for your own business name plus reviews, if you search that in Google, you're going to see the sites that Google is saying are important for your particular business.

You can also find out like what are the sites that your competitors are getting reviews on. Then if you just do a search like keyword plus city, like "lawyers + Denver," you might find sites that are important for your industry as well that you should be listed on. So check out a couple of your keywords and make sure you're getting reviews on more sites than just Google.

3. Links

Then links, of course, links continue to drive local search. A lot of people in the comments talked about how a handful of local links have been really valuable. This is a great competitive difference-maker, because a lot of businesses don't have any links other than citations. So when you get a few of these, it can really have an impact.

✓ From local industry sites and sponsorships

They really talk about focusing on local-specific sites and industry-specific sites. So you can get a lot of those from sponsorships. They're kind of the go-to tactic. If you do a search for in title sponsors plus city name, you're going to find a lot of sites that are listing their sponsors, and those are opportunities for you, in your city, that you could sponsor that event as well or that organization and get a link.

The future!

All right. So I also asked in the survey: Where do you see Google going in the future? We got a lot of great responses, and I tried to summarize that into three main themes here for you.

1. Keeping users on Google

This is a really big one. Google does not want to send its users to your website to get the answer. Google wants to have the answer right on Google so that they don't have to click. It's this zero-click search result. So you see Rand Fishkin talking about this. This has been happening in local for a long time, and it's really amplified with all of these new features Google has been adding. They want to have all of your data so that they don't have to send users to find it somewhere else. Then that means in the future less traffic to your website.

So Mike Blumenthal and David Mihm also talk about Google as your new homepage, and this concept is like branded search.

What does your branded search look like?
So what sites are you getting reviews on?
What does your knowledge panel look like?

Make that all look really good, because Google doesn't want to send people to your new website.

2. More emphasis on behavioral signals

David Mihm is a strong voice in this. He talks about how Google is trying to diversify how they rank businesses based on what's happening in the real world. They're looking for real-world signals that actual humans care about this business and they're engaging with this business.

So there's a number of things that they can do to track that -- so branded search, how many people are searching for your brand name, how many people are clicking to call your business, driving directions. This stuff is all kind of hard to manipulate, whereas you can add more links, you can get more reviews. But this stuff, this is a great signal for Google to rely on.

Engagement with your listing, engagement with your website, and actual humans in your business. If you've seen on the knowledge panel sometimes for brick-and-mortar business, it will be like busy times. They know when people are actually at your business. They have counts of how many people are going into your business. So that's a great signal for them to use to understand the prominence of your business. Is this a busy business compared to all the other ones in the city?

3. Google will monetize everything

Then, of course, a trend to monetize as much as they can. Google is a publicly traded company. They want to make as much money as possible. They're on a constant growth path. So there are a few things that we see coming down the pipeline.

Local service ads are expanding across the country and globally and in different industries. So this is like a paid program. You have to apply to get into it, and then Google takes a cut of leads. So if you are a member of this, then Google will send leads to you. But you have to be verified to be in there, and you have to pay to be in there.

Then taking a cut from bookings, you can now book directly on Google for a lot of different businesses. If you think about Google Flights and Google Hotels, Google is looking for a way to monetize all of this local search opportunity. That's why they're investing heavily in local search so they can make money from it. So seeing more of these kinds of features rolling out in the future is definitely coming. Transactions from other things. So if I did book something, then Google will take a cut for it.

So that's the future. That's sort of the news of the local search ranking factors this year. I hope it's been helpful. If you have any questions, just leave some comments and I'll make sure to respond to them all. Thanks, everybody.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

If you missed our recent webinar on the Local Search Ranking Factors survey with Darren Shaw and Dr. Pete, don't worry! You can still catch the recording here:

Check out the webinar

You'll be in for a jam-packed hour of deeper insights and takeaways from the survey, as well as some great audience-contributed Q&A.

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

from The Moz Blog http://tracking.feedpress.it/link/9375/10857126

Thursday, 29 November 2018

14 PowerPoint Presentation Tips to Make More Creative Slideshows [+ Templates]

I like to think of Microsoft PowerPoint as a test of basic marketing skills. To create a passing presentation, I need to demonstrate design skills, technical literacy, and a sense of personal style.

If the presentation has a problem (like an unintended font, a broken link, or unreadable text), then I’ve probably failed the test. Even if my spoken presentation is well rehearsed, a bad visual experience can ruin it for the audience.

Expertise means nothing without a good presentation to back it up. For starters, grab your collection of free PowerPoint templates below, and use the tips that follow to perfect your next presentation.

No matter your topic, successful PowerPoints depend on three main factors: your command of PowerPoint's design tools, your attention to presentation processes, and your devotion to consistent style. Here are some simple tips to help you start mastering each of those factors, and don't forget to check out the additional resources at the bottom of this post.

Content Creation Templates

PowerPoint Presentation Tips

Don't let PowerPoint decide how you use PowerPoint.
Create custom slide sizes.
Edit your slide template design.
Make sure all of your objects are properly aligned.
Use "Format Menus" to better control your objects' designs.
Take advantage of PowerPoint's shapes.
Create custom shapes.
Crop images into custom shapes.
Present websites within PowerPoint.
Embed your font files.
Save your slides as JPEGs.
Embed multimedia.
Bring your own hardware.
Use "Presenter View."

PowerPoint Style

1. Don’t let PowerPoint decide how you use PowerPoint.

Microsoft wanted to provide PowerPoint users with a lot of tools. But this does not mean you should use them all. Here are some key things to look out for:

Make sure that preset PPT themes complement your needs before you adopt them.
Try to get away from using Microsoft Office’s default fonts, Calibri and Cambria. Using these two typefaces can make the presentation seem underwhelming.
Professionals should never use PPT’s action sounds. (Please consider your audience above personal preference).
PowerPoint makes bulleting automatic, but ask yourself: Are bullets actually appropriate for what you need to do? Sometimes they are, but not always.
Recent PPT defaults include a small shadow on all shapes. Remove this shadow if it's not actually needed. Also, don’t leave shapes in their default blue.

2. Create custom slide sizes.

While you usually can get away with the default slide size for most presentations, you may need to adjust it for larger presentations on weirdly sized displays. If you need to do that, here's how.

In the top-left corner, choose "File."
Select "Page Setup."
Type the height and width of the background you'd like, and click "OK."
A dialogue box will appear. Click "OK" again.
Your background is resized!

Tip: Resize your slides before you add any objects to them or the dimensions of your objects will become skewed.

Change-Size-of-Background-PPT-2

3. Edit your slide template design.

Often, it's much easier to edit your PowerPoint template before you start -- this way, you don't have design each slide by hand. Here's how you do that.

Select "Themes" in the top navigation.
In the far right, click "Edit Master," then "Slide Master."
Make any changes you like, then click "Close Master." All current and future slides in that presentation will use that template.

Change-Slide-Master-1

4. Make sure all of your objects are properly aligned.

Having properly aligned objects on your slide is the key to making it look polished and professional. You can manually try to line up your images ... but we all know how that typically works out. You're trying to make sure all of your objects hang out in the middle of your slide, but when you drag them there, it still doesn't look quite right. Get rid of your guessing game and let PowerPoint work its magic with this trick.

How to align multiple objects:

Select all objects by holding down "Shift" and clicking on all of them.
Select "Arrange" in the top options bar, then choose "Align or Distribute."
Choose the type of alignment you'd like.

How to align objects to the slide:

Select all objects by holding down "Shift" and clicking on all of them.
Select "Arrange" in the top options bar, then choose "Align or Distribute."
Select "Align to Slide."
Select "Arrange" in the top options bar again, then choose "Align or Distribute."
Choose the type of alignment you'd like.

PowerPoint Design

5. Use "Format Menus" to better control your objects' designs.

Format menus allow you to do fine adjustments that otherwise seem impossible. To do this, right click on an object and select the "Format" option. Here, you can fine-tune shadows, adjust shape measurements, create reflections, and much more. The menu that will pop up looks like this:

powerpoint_format_menus

Although the main options can be found on PowerPoint’s format toolbars, look for complete control in the format window menu. Other examples of options available include:

Adjusting text inside a shape.
Creating a natural perspective shadow behind an object.
Recoloring photos manually and with automatic options.

6. Take advantage of PowerPoint's shapes.

Many users don’t realize how flexible PowerPoint’s shape tools have become. In combination with the expanded format options released by Microsoft in 2010, the potential for good design with shapes is readily available. PowerPoint provides the user with a bunch of great shape options beyond the traditional rectangle, oval, and rounded rectangle patterns, unlike even professional design programs like Adobe Creative Suite or Quark.

Today’s shapes include a highly functional Smart Shapes function, which enables you to create diagrams and flow charts in no time. These tools are especially valuable when you consider that PowerPoint is a visual medium. Paragraphing and bullet lists are boring -- you can use shapes to help express your message more clearly.

7. Create custom shapes.

When you create a shape, right click and press "Edit Points." By editing points, you can create custom shapes that fit your specific need. For instance, you can reshape arrows to fit the dimensions you like.

edit_points

Another option is to combine two shapes together. When selecting two shapes, right-click and go to the "Grouping" sub-menu to see a variety of options.

Combine creates a custom shape that has overlapping portions of the two previous shapes cut out.
Union makes one completely merged shape.
Intersect builds a shape of only the overlapping sections of the two previous shapes.
Subtract cuts out the overlapping portion of one shape from the other.

By using these tools rather than trying to edit points precisely, you can create accurately measured custom shapes.

8. Crop images into custom shapes.

Besides creating custom shapes in your presentation, you can also use PowerPoint to crop existing images into new shapes. Here's how you do that:

Click on the image and select "Format" in the options bar.
Choose "Crop," then "Mask to Shape," and then choose your desired shape. Ta-da! Custom-shaped photos.

Crop-to-Shape

Learn more about creating images for your marketing channels in the video below.

9. Present websites within PowerPoint.

Tradition says that if you want to show a website in a PowerPoint, you should just create link to the page and prompt a browser to open. For PC users, there’s a better option.

Third party software that integrates fully into PowerPoint’s developer tab can be used to embed a website directly into your PowerPoint using a normal HTML iframe. One of the best tools is LiveWeb, a third-party software developed independently.

By using LiveWeb, you don’t have to interrupt your PowerPoint, and your presentation will remain fluid and natural. Whether you embed a whole webpage or just a YouTube video, this can be a high-quality third party improvement.

Unfortunately, Mac users don’t have a similar option. Agood second choice is to take screen shots of the website, link in through a browser, or embed media (such as a YouTube video) by downloading it directly to your computer.

PowerPoint Process

10. Embed your font files.

One constant problem presenters have with PowerPoint is that fonts seem to change when presenters move from one computer to another. In reality, the fonts are not changing -- the presentation computer just doesn’t have the same font files installed. If you’re using a PC and presenting on a PC, then there is a smooth work around for this issue. (When you involve Mac systems, the solution is a bit rougher. See Tip #11.)

Here’s the trick: When you save your PowerPoint file (only on a PC), you should click Save Options in the "Save As …" dialog window. Then, select the "Embed TrueType fonts" check box and press "OK." Now, your presentation will keep the font file and your fonts will not change when you move computers (unless you give your presentation on a Mac).

11. Save your slides as JPEGs.

In PowerPoint for Mac 2011, there is no option to embed fonts within the presentation. So unless you use ubiquitous typefaces like Arial or Tahoma, your PPT is likely going to encounter font changeson different computers.

The most certain way of avoiding this is by saving your final presentation as JPEGs, and then inserting these JPEGs onto your slides. On a Mac, users can easily drag and drop the JPEGs into PPT with fast load time. If you do not use actions in your presentation, then this option works especially well.

If you want your presentation to appear "animated," you'll need to do a little tinkering. All you need to do is save JPEGs of each "frame" of the animation. Then, in your final presentation, you'll just display those JPEGs in the order you'd like the animation to appear. While you'll technically have several new slides in place of one original one, your audience won't know the difference.

An important consideration: If your PPT includes a lot of JPEGs, then the file size will increase.

12. Embed multimedia.

PowerPoint allows you to either link to video/audio files externally or to embed the media directly in your presentation. You should embed these files if you can, but if you use a Mac, you cannot actually embed the video (see note below). For PCs, two great reasons for embedding are:

Embedding allows you to play media directly in your presentation. It will look much more professional than switching between windows.
Embedding also means that the file stays within the PowerPoint presentation, so it should play normally without extra work (except on a Mac).

Note: Mac OS users of PowerPoint should be extra careful about using multimedia files.

If you use PowerPoint for Mac, then you will always need to bring the video and/or audio file with you in the same folder as the PowerPoint presentation. It’s best to only insert video or audio files once the presentation and the containing folder have been saved on a portable drive in their permanent folder. Also, if the presentation will be played on a Windows computer, then Mac users need to make sure their multimedia files are in WMV format. This tip gets a bit complicated, so if you want to use PowerPoint effectively, consider using the same operating system for designing andpresenting, no matter what.

13. Bring your own hardware.

Between operating systems, PowerPoint is still a bit jumpy. Even between differing PPT versions, things can change. One way to fix these problems is to make sure that you have the right hardware -- so just bring along your own laptop when you're presenting.

14. Use "Presenter View."

In most presentation situations, there will be both a presenter’s screen and the main projected display for your presentation. PowerPoint has a great tool called Presenter View, which can be found in the "Slide Show" tab of PowerPoint 2010 (or 2011 for Mac). Included in the Presenter View is an area for notes, a timer/clock, and a presentation display.

Screen_Shot_2013-12-05_at_2.07.31_PM

For many presenters, this tool can help unify their spoken presentation and their visual aid. You never want to make the PowerPoint seem like a stack of notes that you use a crutch. Use the Presenter View option to help create a more natural presentation.

Pro Tip: At the start of the presentation, you should also hit CTRL + H to make the cursor disappear. Hitting the "A" key will bring it back if you need it!

With style, design, and presentation processes under your belt, you can do a lot more with PowerPoint than just presentations for your clients. PowerPoint and similar slide applications are flexible tools that should not be forgotten.

Want more? Read 20 Great Examples of PowerPoint Presentation Design.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/easy-powerpoint-design-tricks-ht

Franchise Marketing 101: How to stand out from online and local competition

One significant advantage that franchises have over other businesses is that the brand is already established.

However, this is partly a disadvantage as well since you already have a lot of competition regarding the products and services you provide. Don’t fret, though, because you can still stand out from online and local competitors with a little extra effort.

If you’re considering getting a franchise business, check out affordable franchiseknowhow.com for ideas and resources on how to start this type of company. If you already have rights to a franchise, here are some tips that can make customers notice you:

First, Focus on Your Customers

Every business owner knows that their company will only survive when they treat their customers well. You can do this for your franchise by:

Providing Superior Customer Service – Delivering extraordinary service is something that will endear customers to your brand. Consider how you can go the extra mile to make your clients feel that they’re valued in your store. If you’re handling a coffee shop, it could be by offering a little treat to go with their beverage on particular days.
Own Up to Mistakes – “The customer is always right” may not apply to all situations. But, appeasing your client with a discount when you or your staff accidentally gives incorrect change will lead them to trust your brand.
Solve Customer Pain Points – If you franchised an apparel business, one of the most common pain points for customers is a cramped, dimly-lit fitting room. You can address this problem by providing a larger space with full-body mirrors and beautiful lights that will complement your products and your customers’ skin tones.
Propose a Guarantee – These are a great technique to lessen the feeling of risk that is involved in buying your product or service. It assures the buyer when you stand behind your product or service. Offer your customers a specified time as to when they can return items that they purchased or provide free shipping.
Be Transparent about Your Products and Services – Be honest with your customers. If you promised to deliver at a specific date but found out that you can’t, call and inform the buyer. If the food you’re selling is still on the shelves but has expired, then apologize and let them know the situation. It’s better to face the consequences of the truth head on than cower behind false facades that will ultimately be your downfall.
Delight Your Customers – Surprise your customers with promos and discounts especially the loyal ones. Moreover, the gesture don’t have to be grandiose. Often, it’s the unexpected, little things that make a lasting impact on your customers like sending them a motivational note along with their order.

Next, Focus on Your Community

While your customers are crucial to the growth of your business, it’s also essential to expand your vision to how you can help your community. Some of the things you can do are to:

Embrace Your Social Responsibility – Give back to your community. It can be in the form of organizing events with proceeds going to your charity of choice or hiring people with disabilities to work for you. TOMS, a shoe company, became known for its “One for One” advocacy which helps a person in need with every purchase of their products.
Be An Educational Resource – Not everything about your brand should be about buying your products or services. If you franchise a coffee shop, you could educate your customers about the different types of beans, where they grow, and how they’re harvested. You can also live stream how your product is made. Live streaming has become one of the valuable tools for online marketing.
Promote Other People – Create a friendly community, whether online or in-store, where people can display their fantastic work; even if they have the same products and services as you. This will show people that you’re confident about what you’re selling.

Conclusion:

It’s critical that your customers trust you first so they would set you apart from your competitors.

It won’t be easy and will increasingly become more challenging as your business grows. Nonetheless, keep on persevering and doing your research with the aim of staying ahead of the game.

The post Franchise Marketing 101: How to stand out from online and local competition appeared first on TheMarketingblog.

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2018/11/franchise-marketing-101-how-to-stand-out-from-online-and-local-competition/

Looking Back on Facebook's Murky 2018: Here's Why Users Are Sticking Around [New Data]

It’s fair to say that Facebook has experienced some turbulence in 2018.

As the year draws to a close, looking back at the bumps in the road for Facebook over the past 11 months makes it difficult to believe that, well, it's only been 11 months -- to the point where It's difficult to encapsulate the 2018 ups and downs experienced by Facebook in a single paragraph.

But here goes.

The year kicked off with a major News Feed algorithm change in January to prioritize posts from users' friends and family over those from Business Pages. By August, engagement with these Pages had dropped by up to 50%. In the spring, details emerged on the improper harvesting of private user data by a voter profiling firm -- leading Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg to appear before Congress in two high-profile hearings. In November, the New York Times published a report that the company's leadership had not only actively worked to hide these issues (instead of fixing them), but also hired a PR firm to portray Facebook's critics in a negative light.

And that's only a selection of some of the bigger stories about Facebook from 2018.

Think you’re having a bad year? It’s probably not as bad as Facebook’shttps://t.co/unNh2GldHl
— Barron's (@barronsonline) October 2, 2018

But with every new announcement and report, it seems that it isn't quite enough for people to part ways with the social network for good. After many of these events, we ran surveys to determine if it they were enough for users to delete or deactivate their accounts, and every time, there was a consensus: "No, I'll stay."

To find out why, we decided to go directly to users themselves and ask, "Look at the year this company has had. What's keeping you around?"

Here's what we found.

Friends and Family First

In our most recent survey to measure user sentiment toward Facebook, we provided a short summary of the company's alleged scandals over the past two years for 643 people across the U.S., UK, and Canada, followed by a key question. It read:

"Over the past two years, Facebook has been plagued by a number of scandals. These include foreign actors using the site to spread misinformation and influence major elections, voter profiling firms improperly obtaining private user data, and a major data breach. There have also been reports of company leaders actively trying to hide these issues instead of fixing them, as well as hiring a PR firm to help make critics of the company look bad. However, our research has shown that despite all these issues, very few people have deactivated or deleted their Facebook accounts. What are your reasons for continuing to use Facebook, despite these issues?"

What are your reasons for continuing to use Facebook, despite these issues_

Data collected with Lucid

In previous instances this year, we've speculated that, for most users, the cost of losing the connection to friends and family provided by Facebook is too high when compared to the cost of the company's issues.

That was confirmed by the responses we received to this survey.

My personal life, like staying in touch with friends and family, is too heavily integrated with Facebook to delete my account-1

Data collected with Lucid

The highest number of users -- about 45% -- indicated that they haven't left Facebook due to their personal lives being too intertwined with it.

When we ran one of our earlier sentiment surveys in October, Likeable Media CEO Carrie Kerpen pointed to Facebook growing as a source of connections to relatives, for instance, who may not have previously considered using social media at all.

"Your Grandma is likely not on Twitter, but she's on Facebook now," Kerpen said at the time. "It's easy to use Facebook, every one is on it, and it's widely adopted."

Some People Have Given up on Privacy

At the same time, some users say they have simply accepted that using social media comes with the cost of their privacy being protected.

I have accepted that my privacy and personal information may never be completely protected if I use social media

Data collected with Lucid

That was the second-highest response we received, with over a quarter of participants selecting the answer: "I have accepted that my privacy and personal information may never be completely protected if I use social media."

This response could indicate that many users have simply come to terms with a potential lack of privacy as a result of having a presence on any social apps. That was one thought that HubSpot VP of Marketing, Jon Dick, had about the seemingly lack of shock among respondents earlier this year when we surveyed them about a Facebook data breach.

"People just assume that their data is constantly breached," Dick told me a few days after news of the breach first broke. That's why it's possible that "the Facebook news didn't even alarm people."

Benefits Beyond Friends and Family

If that's true -- that social media users simply assume and acquiesce that their personal data will always be compromised as a result of using it -- that impression could lend itself to other reasons respondents indicated for maintaining a presence on Facebook.

For example, the third-highest number of responses we received were from users who said that the other benefits provided by Facebook -- such as getting news or discovering other new content -- outweighed any problems the company might have.

The overall value Facebook provides me -- like being able to discover news stories, watch videos, or follow brands -- is greater than any concerns I have about the company itself

Data collected with Lucid

Just over a fifth of respondents answered, "The overall value Facebook provides me -- like being able to discover news stories, watch videos, or follow brands -- is greater than any concerns I have about the company itself."

That aligns with a point made by HubSpot VP of Marketing Meghan Keaney Anderson regarding user alliance to Facebook, when we discovered that many still didn't plan to delete their accounts upon learning of the aforementioned data breach.

And as per Kerpen's point, Facebook in particular serves as "a primary connection point to family members, to news, to society at large," Keaney Anderson said at the time. "And for now, there is no viable replacement to that."

But Facebook's seemingly irreplaceable nature wasn't one of the more popular responses we received, with only 9% of people answering, "I don't think there are suitable alternatives to Facebook that could do a better job at protecting my privacy and personal information."

I don't think there are suitable alternatives to Facebook that could do a better job at protecting my privacy and personal information

Data collected with Lucid

Looking Ahead

As 2018 draws to a close and the roller-coaster it's provided for the tech industry at large (Facebook hasn't been isolated in its controversy), we find ourselves looking ahead at its potential ripple effect.

Although users mostly say they're not leaving Facebook, the company's growth has all but come to a screeching halt in some regions -- namely, in the U.S. and Canada, which are its largest markets for (advertising) revenue.

Q3-2018-Earnings-Presentation

Source: Facebook

With new users plateauing in its most lucrative markets, some speculate that Facebook is on something of a warpath to find new revenue streams, such as introducing ads to WhatsApp: the encrypted messaging app it acquired in 2014. Instagram, too -- which Facebook acquired in 2012 -- is viewed by many as a social plethora of ads, and has been identified by some as something the company will heavily rely on for revenue in the near future.

So, what does all of this mean for marketers and small-to-midsize businesses?

While active user growth in certain regions may have slowed, the fact that most of Facebook's core users have yet to leave the network likely means that it's still one of the best places for marketers to reach audiences.

That hasn't stopped other companies from building out tools and resources for businesses that are similar to those provided by Facebook. For example, Google recently introduced new features to its Google My Business app that emulates some of those provided on Facebook Business Pages, such as the ability communicate with customers via in-app messaging.

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Image source: Apple

But when all is said and done, Kerpen says, it could be quite some time -- if ever -- that business tools provided by other platforms begin to rival Facebook's.

"Google My Business seems interesting, but even in a best-case scenario, it’s years away from even being a blip on Facebook’s radar," Kerpen explains. "If advertisers ever flee Facebook -- which won’t actually happen until results decline -- it’s going to be for ad platforms like Instagram [which is owned by Facebook], Twitter, Pinterest, and YouTube."

And as we look ahead to 2019, it seems that Facebook continues to serve as a resource valued by users and businesses alike -- one that, despite its issues, upholds a high barrier to being replicated or replaced.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/facebook-2018-user-motivation

New research from Initials reveals significant numbers of consumers are switching to challenger brands across the board

Challenging the challengers

Launching today, new research conducted by independent creative agency Initials has found consumers are switching to challenger brands in their droves, with over two thirds of respondents saying being exposed to a multitude of marketing messages was making them less loyal to established brands. The findings expose five harsh truths established brands must tackle in the face of the challenger brand phenomenon.

Aiming to delve deeper into the dizzying climb of the challengers, the research surveyed over 1000 UK consumers, exploring how and why they are switching. Focusing on eight FMCG categories; food, soft drinks, alcohol, household products, healthcare, toiletries, beauty and grooming products, the research looked at everything from drivers at a category level to attitudes post purchase.

The first harsh truth is that challengers are impacting all categories. After food (57%), some two fifths (39%) of consumers say they have switched to a challenger brand in toiletries, followed by alcohol (35%) and beauty (34%). Household products (32%), healthcare (31%), soft drinks (29%) and grooming products (28%) complete the category list.

The second harsh truth is that across the board the switch to challengers is likely to be permanent, with 44% saying they intend to stick with the brand they’ve switched too. Of those that don’t intend to stick, almost a third (30%) plan to try another challenger rather than revert to their original established brand. TV is viewed as the most effective channel for driving consideration of challenger brands, cited by 42% of respondents.

Thirdly, value for money still matters. Despite the premium often associated with challenger brands they are delivering against their promise, with exactly half of respondents saying challenger brands are seen to provide good value for money.

The research also found the more shoppers are invested in their purchase, the more probable it is that they’ll find a reason to try a challenger – this is the fourth harsh truth and a concern for brands with higher consideration products. It’s most significant for food purchases with well over a half (60%) of shoppers saying this.

The fifth, and perhaps most significant truth, is the emotional connection consumers feel towards challenger brands – people recognise and respond positively to the purpose and personality presented by challengers. This is particularly significant amongst younger consumers, those aged 16-34.

Jamie Matthews, CEO of Initials, comments: “These findings should act as a wakeup call to brands. The rules of the game have changed, with challengers disrupting every one of the FMCG categories we examined. To compete effectively established brands need to adopt more of a challenger mindset. Doing that requires bravery, and a much greater appetite for risk, but in order to succeed they need to match challenger’s sense of ambition and conviction. Regardless of category there is a lot to be learned from how the challengers are doing things.”

The findings feature in Initials whitepaper; Challenging the Challengers, designed to find out whether established brands need to start behaving differently.

The post New research from Initials reveals significant numbers of consumers are switching to challenger brands across the board appeared first on TheMarketingblog.

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2018/11/new-research-from-initials-reveals-significant-numbers-of-consumers-are-switching-to-challenger-brands-across-the-board/

What are the benefits of using short domain names? – exclusive

The post What are the benefits of using short domain names? – exclusive appeared first on TheMarketingblog.

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2018/11/what-are-the-benefits-of-using-short-domain-names-exclusive/

15 of the Best Simple WordPress Themes

When it comes to determining what you want your WordPress website to look like, you’ll first need to consider the theme that you plan on installing — that’s because WordPress themes are how you actually design and customize the look of your entire website.

No matter what industry you’re in or which style you’re envisioning for your website, a simple theme — meaning minimalist, clean, and well-organized — is often ideal for businesses, visitors, and customers.

However, with the hundreds of simple WordPress themes available, finding one that fits your needs may seem like a daunting task. That’s why we’ve done the work for you and compiled this list of our 15 favorite simple WordPress themes for you to explore.

15 of the Best Simple WordPress Themes

We have categorized 15 of our favorite simple WordPress themes by need and industry to help you determine which option is best suited for your website. Whether you need a theme to display your photography, manage your online store, complete a variety of different tasks, showcase your writing, or share your creative work, there is a simple WordPress theme option that could work for you.

Simple Photography Themes

If you are a photographer or want to display your artwork, these simple photography themes will allow you to share your content in a way that looks nice, organized, and doesn’t detract from your work.

1. Fargo

Source

Fargo is a minimalist WordPress theme built for artists who want to share their photography. The theme offers unique transitions between photographs as well as Smart Galleries that seamlessly move visitors between types of content, such as text to photos to videos. If there are certain aspects of a photo that you want to make sure your viewers see, this theme offers zoom-in and zoom-out features that add a “cinematic experience” to your still photography.