Communication

Words Are Actually Too Hard! Can You Picture This?

/ Jeff Hora / 1 Comment
This image was selected as a picture of the we...

This image was selected as a picture of the week on the Farsi Wikipedia for the 13th week, 2011. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

You have a different way of learning than I do. There are a lot of terms like “Cognitive Styles” and “Learning Strategies” that describe this, but it’s really pretty basic. Still, there are some commonalities across the various Styles. Read a piece of information and 3 days later you’ll remember 10% of it. Simply add a picture and you’ll remember 65%! I also benefit from the inclusion of samples, stories and examples or templates that help me to fill in the mental construct. You probably have other things that help you, too.

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Want the Ultimate Quickie List for Social Media?

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I’ve been writing a lot about the cognitive research around sharing, content shock and emotions. You’re ready for that to be done. You want the “5 Things You Can Do Today to Rock Facebook!” post.

Sorry….it’s just not that simple.

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How To Be More Contagious

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Consuming and sharing content normally creates an emotional benefit, not a financial one. Hence the obstacle: companies try to use content to create financial benefits for themselves instead of emotional benefits for their readers. This completely overturns the traditional business view of what content should accomplish.

Studies show we’re hard-wired to talk about ourselves. Around 50% of what people talk about on social is ‘me‘ focused, and it’s not just vanity (although there are an ENORMOUS number of selfies and/or pictures of the food in front of you out there, but I digress…). Harvard neuroscientists Jason Mitchell and Diana Tamir discovered that disclosing information about ourselves is intrinsically rewarding. They found that sharing personal opinions activates the same brain circuits that respond to rewards like food and money. So how do you climb aboard those conversations?

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Why Does No One Share Your Sensational Content?

/ Jeff Hora / 2 Comments

So, let me share an uncomfortable truth: generally, no one wants to share your content.

Research by Cornell University, HP Labs and EPFL shows that people typically don’t share content they read on the web, even “great” content. The vast majority are passive information consumers. For example, the average Twitter user retweets only 1 in 318 content links they receive. Facebook reports that just 0.5% of those who see a Facebook post share it.

Does this mean all your hard work to create terrific content is wasted? No…but it does suggest that actively finding and nurturing that minuscule number of the most active users is critical to spreading your information online. Popularity, the nature of the content, and audience size alone don’t predict that this passivity will be overcome and they will “click to share.” You must employ strategies to overcome this passivity and systematically find those predisposed to love and share the content you create.

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Content Shock and the Search for Impact

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So now you’ve done a bit of research and found that not only is your market saturated with content, but you’re up against some “heavy hitters”. Competition seems hopeless and you don’t see how you can make any real headway. Well, there are three tactics you can use that can provide you some leverage and opportunity. Continue reading →

2 Things to Make You Reconsider Your Mobile Strategy

/ Jeff Hora / 1 Comment

A couple of things came up this week that have made me reevaluate my web site design and start reconsidering how I present my business. One was a cover article from The Economist “Planet of the phones” and the other was some news about how Google is tweaking its algorithm.

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Blogging – Speak If You Have Something to Say

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A question I received this week was, “How often should a business post to their blog?” This is a very common question and usually driven by a small business owner’s fear of having to spend a lot of time creating the post and the frequency of posting for the effectiveness of the effort. In new bloggers’ nightmares, it takes hours to write a 400 word post and she has to do this every day. Neither of those is true.

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The Challenge of “Always On”

/ Jeff Hora / 1 Comment

Embed from Getty Images

A question I received this week was, “How do you balance the 24/7 of social media with an 8-to-5 work day?”

“Always on”, 24-by-7 is kind of scary. I live an area that, this winter, has lost power about 7 or 8 times in the past 2 months, so “always on” is kind of relative, but I digress…

The availability of the Internet is terrific when you need to do that search, find that restaurant, message your friend, research that project or notify the world of some truly significant event. However, if you’re a business owner, it can be intimidating. Since the Internet is always there, you may feel you need to be, too.

Well, maybe not….

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Open the Box – A Fish?!

/ Jeff Hora / 2 Comments

Awhile back I was working through a visualization exercise mentioned in Steven Pressfield’s book “Do the Work”. My first post regarding this can be found here and if you search my blog you’ll a number of other visualizations that I’ve found useful using this. Let me summarize what this entails:

  • Imagine a box with a lid. Hold the box in your hand. Now open it.
  • What’s inside?
  • It might be a frog, a silk scarf, a gold coin of Persia.
  • But here’s the trick: no matter how many times you open the box, there is always something in it.

Over time I’ve found a golden table, a pressure washer, wood floors and a few others.

I hadn’t exercised my imagination in this way for a while, so I decided to give it a go and opened the box afresh. Today I found……a fish.
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Want to Be Heard? Listen…and Hear…

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Detail

Detail (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Do you remember the little plastic animals, usually dogs, that people used to place in the back windows of their cars?  These plastic pooches would nod their heads as the car moved, giving the impression that they were looking around. Sadly, I see this plastic behavior sometimes taking place in meetings I attend. Someone is presenting an idea, a report, training or just carrying on conversation, and some of the people around are making appropriate nods and noises, but their follow-up conversation and engagement belies their inattentiveness.  Even if they ARE listening, they don’t hear what is being said.
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