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Website content hooks that seduce readers

Posted on by in Blotter

If you could learn to write interesting website content hooks that bring 100+ likes for all your posts, would you be interested in learning more about it? Unless you are The Most Interesting Man In The World, your website content is getting ignored if you’re not using the hooks of the trade.

Santa Claus, the tooth fairy, an interesting blogger and an old drunk are walking down the street together when they all spot a fifty dollar bill at the same time. Who gets it? The old drunk, of course. The other three are mythological creatures.

Maybe it’s debatable whether Google has developed an algorithm to penalize boring website content. What’s not debatable is the vulnerability most readers have to content that employs information gaps, bait and switch, leadership and paradigm shifts.

Readers need to be challenged with website content hooks that seduce them and keep them reading more.

Information Gap Website Content – (Dubious)
Examples: Upworthy.com, BuzzFeed.com, (First line of this post)
This woman found a dog. What happens next will blow your mind! If that clickbait piques your curiosity, then you’re not alone. Roughly 100% of human beings can’t resist their curiosity and will do most anything to fill the gap of missing information. Information Gap Theory of Curiosity, developed by George Loewenstein in the early 1990s, is simple: Readers feel an emotional “itch” on the brain that requires them to scratch it by reading the more. There’s a “gap between what we know and what we want to know,” says Loewenstein. Here’s what they’re doing when writing Information Gap content:

Teasing readers by omitting conclusions to a question
Displaying images that are purposefully ambiguous
Challenging readers to test their assumptions
Testing readers’ sexual, social, moral or morbid curiosity

Bait and Switch Website Content (Shameless)
Examples: Slate.com, NewYorkTimes.com
Could a brain parasite found in cats help soccer teams win at the World Cup? If you didn’t click on that link, congratulations. There are any number of seemingly bizarre headlines and vulgar images that ultimately lead to nothing but an innocent place on the other side. These headlines and images are both intriguing and appalling, but they’re a sure-fire way to keep people’s interest – to keep them coming back to your website again and again. By varying the presentation and keeping the content unpredictable, Bait and Switch content deceives readers into clicking. It’s also quite possibly the very best way to alienate and to find yourself blacklisted by readers who won’t forget that your posts always end in disappointment. With that in mind, be sure to utilize the below website content hooks infrequently:

Promising an interesting innovation, but ending with disappointment
Adding mixtures of unpredictability and helpful facts
Showing a bang and ending with a shrug
Seducing with sexual innuendo without taking the reader to second base

Thought Leadership Website Content (Highly Professional)
Examples: LeanIn.org, MarthaStewart.com
These are posts that provide expertise while communicating the credentials, experience and reputation in order to validate the message. These website content hooks typically come from an organization or brand leader that is well established because of a reputation boon, either earned or endured. The hooks can keep hooking – for as long as we love the leader purveying his or her wisdom upon us:

Persuading through demonstration
Divulging trade secretes and successful project strategy
Presenting as a rainmaker who attract customers or attention
Reflecting on how they overcame challenges

Paradigm Shifting Website Content (Professional)
Examples: Ted.com, BitCoin.org, Apple.com
This revolutionary content provides a voice for innovative ideas. Paradigm shift content is an advocacy for fundamental change in the way your reader should approach and assume their lives and business, allowing the reader to feel he or she is on the verge of something big, Big, BIG! While the reality may be rather small (e.g., a demonstration on how to tie a shoelace over instead of under for a tighter knot), the content is seductive and irresistible:

Empowering readers through inspiration
Demonstrating change using props or analogies
Inspiring a feeling of metamorphosis
Providing guidelines for reinvention

Headlines, articles and images utilizing website content hooks funnel readers through a website. Whichever methodology used to attract readers, website content should always satisfy with a quality that is original and useful to readers. And as with all great recipes, if the reader sees the seams or feels manipulated the website content hooks are acutely ineffective.

Why Use Maid Service Software?

Posted on March 31, 2015 by Guest Blogger in Top Of Book

There’s a common misconception that providing maid services is not a high-tech business. After all, you’re providing labor services. A lot of these businesses have been doing things the same way for decades. Sure, it worked in the past, but now, they’re encountering a lot of issues and competition from other providers who have implemented efficiencies using technology. A professional maid service software, similar to the one offered by Thoughtful Systems, can help take your small business to the next level.

But don’t take our word for it. Oxford Martin School’s recent study – a collaboration between Dr. Carl Bendikt Frey and Dr. Michael A. Osborne – found nearly 50% of small businesses are at “high risk” if the right software is not adopted quickly quickly. They’re not alone. The nation’s largest network of small business accounting software consultants, The Sleeter Group, says it’s especially the accountants at small businesses who are at risk. The Sleeter Group recommends Chunkification (compartmentalizing business needs); Zero Entry (elimination of data entry); Collaborative Accounting (Internet connectivity with clients); and Mobile (making it available everywhere). Their book, Adding A Xero To Your Practice, offers “Practical advice for accountants looking to be successful in The Cloud.”

What is Maid Service Software?
Basically, this software makes your business more efficient. Because efficiency is key to productivity, you need to be efficient in order to make sure that your employees are scheduled well. You need efficiency in order to make sure that you’re able to provide services for multiple locations. You need a cloud service and you need to minimize data entry for all parties involved.

Maid service software provides a small business with a single interface where you can automate the tasks involved with managing your maid servicing business:

Multiple Job Scheduling Calendars
Customer Relationship Management Features
Integrated Email Modules
Mapping Features
Integrated Caller ID
Marketing Features
Integrated Text Messaging
QuickBooks Integration

By automating day-to-day tasks you can focus on the things that really matter – like getting more clients.

How Can Maid Service Software Features Benefit You?
You already know the general benefit is increased efficiency that leads to improved productivity. But let’s look at these efficiency plays in detail:

Easily set up a client database
Import an existing database or create customer profiles on the fly. Afterward, there’s no need to spend time looking for a client’s information. Professional Maid Service Software allows you to easily add, edit and delete a customer.
Fast access to client information
You can easily see their information with just a couple of clicks and you can even see all of the jobs that you’ve done for them. This software also has a powerful search function. You can easily find what you’re looking for in just a few seconds.

Print invoices, labels and flyers for snail mail
You can continue to send snail mails to prospective customers and bill them manually if you desire. This is where good label functionality can help. Print hundreds of labels and invoices in just a few minutes. Or market to new customers by handing out flyers. Professional maid service software has built-in templates for printing in no time, ready to be handed out to prospective customers.

See all jobs at a glance
What happens when a client calls asking for a job that you’ve done for them? Don’t lose time by searching for paper files; instead, using a professional maid service software solution can easily launch a jobs tab so you can see all their past jobs at a glance. You can even see the future jobs scheduled.

Set reminders
There’s no need to stick post-it notes everywhere. You can simply set up reminders that will remind you with a pop-up alarm so that you don’t have to miss an appointment or an important task.

Improve quality control
Unfortunately, quality control hasn’t historically been tracked very well in this industry. However, with a professional maid service software package includes custom notes and checkboxes for both employees to audit their own work as well as having customers feedback if they wish.
Custom Features
Feature requests in response to customer demand are an integral part of any professional solution. A tried and true solution has years of customer input.

Rita Gunther McGrath

Unfortunately, says Columbia Business School professor Rita Gunther McGrath, those days for small business owners to maintain a “sustainable competitive advantage” are gone forever. She advocates for a “transient competitive advantage” by updating our procedures, business strategy and office practices so that we can maintain our existing customer base by learning to master the new rules. The new rules in business is good technology – good software is what runs it.

Handyman Business Software

Posted on March 25, 2015 by Guest Blogger in Thoughtful Systems

Independent businesses are constantly trying to find the time to streamline what they’re doing and reduce their bottom line expenses. By using handyman business software, a handymen can offer their services with efficiency so that he can manage his jobs more quickly and effectively.

Who are today’s Handyman Businesses?
A person skilled at a wide range of repairs in office buildings, residences and retail spaces knows that odd jobs and fix-up tasks can include everything from light plumbing to electric jobs. What makes the handyman unique is their ability to get the job done fairly and effectively – without having to call in high-expense specialists. Their customers know that a skilled handyman might be called to remodel a room, help with installations, assemble projects or other work that is otherwise not something the customer wants to do him or herself. Available estimates put the market for home-maintenance and repair at more than $126 billion per year and increasing 4% annually. Because more than half of American homes are older than 25 years, the demand for efficient and effective handymen is growing hand over fist. The number of independent operators and franchise businesses are growing in the United States. That competition means it’s important to have effective technology for managing a handyman business.

What technology tools can help today’s growing Handyman Business?
Because quality of work, safety, liability, cost, efficiency and dependability are the major strengths of any good small business, handyman business software should cover 10 touchstones for this type of business:

Scheduling Functionality – Know when and where to dispatch services for customers. A good calendar solution should provide multiple options for viewing employee activity, weekly dispatch notes, availability and more. An ideal solution offers integrated mapping options for locating clients and tracking employees onsite.
Customer Relationship Functionality – Manage all information regarding customers and sales prospects, including contact information, print and email mail campaigns, pop-up alarms and reminders for sales prospects, and thorough account transactions for customers.
Estimation Functionality – Create customer quotes that are based on parameters defined by custom settings such as per square foot or percentages. These estimates should be easily emailed, printed or faxed to customers.
Employee/Team Information Management – Manage employees so that you know where they are, what jobs they are assigned, payroll data including hourly and overtime rates, and employee skills and certifications. Group employees into teams and manage them on the fly with the right software.
Cloud Solution for Mobile Devices – The most powerful and vital tool of any successful service business should be available on-the-go as well as at your desk. Key to a good scheduling management software is the ability to use the platform on a mobile phone or tablet – because readiness is key. One innovative solution to consider is Web Express, an online version of traditional Scheduling Manager software that allows employees to manage scheduling while in the field.
Service Categorization and Pricing Functionality – Track and manage the different jobs provided while running analytics and reports to ensure that optimal pricing reflects the trends.
Payroll Functionality – A good solution needs to make payroll easy and dependable. Payroll should be automatically recorded when jobs are completed, and hourly pay, overtime, per-job and commission settings are needed. By integrating with popular programs such as QuickBooks or other platforms, the software allows for dynamic integrations.
Inventory Functionality – Tracking items that are in or out of stock is often done manually, but a good manager knows this aspect of business must be highly automated using software that allows for flexibility and thorough tracking. Set automatic threshold warnings and receive alerts when stock runs low.
Payment Processing Functionality – Once the job is complete, now comes the task of ensuring customers are invoiced and make payment in a timely manner. Be sure the software offers solutions for credit card transactions, checks and money orders.

Handyman business software responds to the needs of this unique business. One day a handyman might be asked to hang pictures or a flat-screen television while the next day he might have a technical wiring project. No matter what the job – woodwork, painting and decorating, plumbing, electrical work, doors and locks – handymen can accelerate revenues by adopting efficiencies through available technologies. Finding a handyman business software solution supports the core business of getting it done.

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