Happy Saturday! It’s time for a wrapup of some of the most interesting, useful or fun blogs I found this week.
It’s funny how you can always tell when something new is going on because this week there was a whole lot of talk about Facebook’s Graph Search. I’ll spare you those posts this time, because you can’t sneeze without finding one yourself! Instead I’ve got a few that will tickle your fancy and get you thinking about your business in new ways.
Warning: Using Pop Ups Will Grow Your Email List Fast
Written by Sarah Arrow
I hate popups. You hate popups. Everyone hates popups. So why the heck do they work? It would appear that what we say and how we behave are not always in sync! Sarah actually did a bit of testing to see which popup plugin got the best subscription rate on her blog. She has some pretty thorough info here, including the pros and cons, ease of use and cost. I won’t tell you which one won her tests. You’ll have to find out for yourself!
20 Conversion Factoids Worth Tweeting About
Written by Oli Gardner
I should totally not be sharing this with you. This post is literally a very cool list of tweetables about converting website visitors to customers. And now that you know about it, your tweets are going to look an awful lot like mine. This stuff is not just worth sharing but worth paying attention to. For example, Oli shares this tidbit: using video on landing pages can increase conversion by 80%. Makes you think, doesn’t it? Do yourself a favor and write some of these on index cards to tack by your desk!
Above And Below The Fold: Stop Talking About The Stinkin Fold
Written by Chris Lema
Waaaaaaaaaay back in the day, us web people used to design for a 600×800 resolution because that’s pretty much what everyone had. The internets were pretty new and monitors were pretty small. Scroll bars? Browsers? Whatthewhatnow? Ok, skip ahead to 2013 and we’ve established that you can scroll down a page… that monitors come in all sorts of sizes and shapes… and that when it comes to visible screen space, there’s no stinkin’ fold. Why this persists is a mystery but Chris does a great (and amusing) job poring over the problem and giving us “a better way”.
Darren Hardy: Goal-Setting Doesn’t Work
Written by Darren Hardy
For those of you who want something in the realm of inspiration, read this post about creating the life you want. Warning: it isn’t a happy-happy feel-good post. There’s talk of “work” and “responsibility” but the ultimate message is that the question you should be asking is not “how will I achieve my goals” but “who do I need to become in order to achieve my goals?” This is an interesting take and Darren gives you something to get you thinking past your basic goal-setting, milestone-writing-down self.
Turning Social Media Into Social Business
Written by Clare Price
Everyone and their pet chihuahua is “doing” social media, but that doesn’t mean you’re doing it as part of your business! Hanging out on Twitter isn’t doing business. Starting a Facebook fan page and posting a couple of photos of your best polka dotted tie isn’t doing business. If you want to use social media to grow your business, whether by making sales, generating leads, building loyalty… you’ve got to do it as part of your business and marketing plan. Clare is a woman of process and does a lot of question-asking in this post. It’s up to you to answer them! And if you need help, I strongly suggest you check out her 5 Easy Pages System.
That’s this week’s five. Did any speak to you?
Hi Carol Lynn,
Thank you – I particularly liked the article on “above the fold” and will be passing it to a few people.
Have a great weekend!
I still hear that one a lot! I’m glad you enjoyed it too 🙂
Ah, more great shares Carol that I’ll have to read. I haven’t read any of these so I have it on my “to do” list for this next week. Always love reading posts that my friends recommend.
Thank you so much and hope you’ve enjoyed your weekend.
~Adrienne
The factoids was the most fun. They’re definitely tweetable and I found some of them surprising!
What great reads Carol.
The one I like best is about pop-ups. That is the one thing that bothers me most but “they” say it is effective. Go figure…I’m going over to check it out now. Thanks so much for these great shares!
Donna
That’s what “they” do say! I finally caved and installed one on this site and my subscription rate has definitely gone up. I haven’t even offered a “bribe” but I’m really curious to see how that will affect things, too! In an effort to be less annoying, I set mine to pop up only once every 60 days so hopefully it will not bug my regular readers!
Hi Carol
I visit Sarah’s blog but have not heard of the others so they will be on my list of new blogs to visit this week 🙂
Thanks for sharing
Pauline
I hope you enjoy them, Pauline!