9 Nodding Strategies for Your Next Meeting

How to appear thoughtful and engaged without saying a word. 

You've got a bunch of meetings coming up, but do you have your nodding strategy ready? 

A solid nodding strategy could mean the difference between seeming like you understand what's going on and losing a job. 

meeting strategy

More seasoned professionals may think they can just nod the same way they did in their last meeting, but that's not an option  – â€Špeople will notice. Consider this: when someone's nodding the wrong way don't you immediately lose trust in them? I know I do.

To help you keep your nodding game fresh, here are nine nodding strategies you can choose from for your next meeting.

1. The Slow Nod

The slow nod is great for when someone is explaining something that makes no sense. Hopefully they'll see you nodding slowly and realize how ridiculous they sound.

2. The Slow Nod Followed by a Fast Nod

The slow nod followed by a fast nod is great to let the person talking know that you didn't get it at first, but you totally get it now, even if you still don't agree.

3. Head Shake Followed by a Fast Nod

A head shake followed by a fast nod shows that you didn't remember that thing you were supposed to remember but now you totally remember it. This is a really convincing strategy when you're on the hook for something that you never intend to do.

4. Side to Side Nod

Use this nod when you want to pretend you're considering something. It says – that could work, – while also saying it's not the best idea, and you're still waiting to hear something that'll really blow you away.

5. Let Me Write That Down Nod

This is the nod you use when you're pretending to write that down.

6. Let Me Think About That Nod

This nod will buy you some time before you have to make a decision. Put your chin in one hand, then both hands, then rest your chin on your knuckles, then repeat.

7. Nod With a Sigh

A nod with a sigh lets your coworker know you don't want to say yes, but you will say yes, because you're a professional.

8. Nodding Off Nod

This is a great nod for when you're trying to keep it together after a late night or when your coworker keeps talking beyond the point of reason.

9. The Almost Nod

This nod says, – you almost convinced me, but not quite, keep trying.

Hope this helps you find the perfect nod to fit your particular meeting situation so that no one will ever suspect you aren't really listening. If you enjoyed this, hit the green – Recommend – heart button below!

If you believe that my message is worth spreading, please use the share buttons at the top of the page.

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member

Have Reports of the Death of RSS been Exaggerated?

A portrait of the American writer Mark Twain t...

A portrait of the American writer Mark Twain taken by A. F. Bradley in New York, 1907. http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/publications/siycfall_05.pdf http://www.twainquotes.com/Bradley/bradley.html See also other photographs of Mark Twain by A. F. Bradley taken in March 1907 in New York on Mark Twain Project Online. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It seems as though reports of the death of RSS, (just like the death of Mark Twain) have been greatly exaggerated.  Every since Google shut down Google Reader in 2013, the cries of the end of RSS have been repeated again and again.

Social Media apparently caused the death of RSS.  It seems that RSS just wasn't sexy enough for the age of Social Networking. The reality is that hundreds of millions of people still use RSS.

Feedly (the RSS reader I recommend) has a free version, but their paid version has gone from less than 500k users in 2013 to over 2 million in 2015.  Feedly is thriving and nowhere near death. It should be noted that an RSS reader is built into WordPress blogs by default,

So it appears that RSS is indeed alive.  There may be newer technologies that supplement or replace RSS down the technological road, but today it is still a valuable method to get information on whatever niche inspires you,  all in one convenient place.

I recommend you try Feedly.  Many RSS readers have installed advertising into their apps, but Feedly is ad-free.  I am not even sure what advantages the paid version offers, because I have been happy with the free version.  I guess I may have to check it out, now that I have written about it.

Take a look at the following links for additional information.

If you are interested in marketing for your online or brick and mortar business, see the following links.

Goldfinch Digital Marketing

Goldfinch Digital Publishing

 

Additional links:

Is RSS dead? Look at the numbers

Rand Fishkin (from Moz) – Is RSS dead?

 

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Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member

4 Ways to Spread a Tweet Beyond Your Audience

If you want to build your Twitter audience, spam isn't going to get you there. The key to connecting with potential followers is to offer something useful such as a tip, laugh, or link. If you aren't constantly talking about your product or service, you can establish a relationship based on respect rather than making a sale.

social media sharing

Twitter, like many social media networks, can be an excellent marketing tool. But reaching out to the right audience is a challenge. Businesses and professionals that are new to Twitter have few, if any, followers, and without followers your tweet doesn't have an audience—or does it?

Tweets can reach more than just the Twitter users following your account—if you do it right. And when your tweets reach more than just your own followers, your number of followers will grow, too. Here are four strategies suggested from readers at WAHM to spread a tweet beyond your audience.

1. Be conversational, not spammy.

No one likes spam—so don't produce it. Some Twitter users send automatic, prewritten messages. While that may seem like a good way to build up your followers, don't give into the temptation. It's spam. Instead, take the time to follow users that are interested in similar topics to what your business offers—you can do this by doing a hashtag search. Follow the people that are talking about things relevant to your industry, and then join in on the conversation: follow them, retreat them, and favorite their tweets. When they see that you have something interesting to offer to the conversation (e.g., not spam), they'll follow you back.

2. Use hashtags.

Using hashtags (#workfromhome, #mom, #parent, etc.) is a good way to get your tweet to pop up in Twitter searches and acquire new followers interested in related topics. But using the right hashtag matters, too. Tools like RiteTag help you see what hashtags are being used and searched the most, so you can make the most impact with a single tweet.

3. Know your audience.

Who are you trying to reach out to on Twitter? Identify your audience—for most WAHMs, that's the person most likely to buy your product or use your service. Once you've narrowed down a group of people that's likely to use your business, target them specifically. Follow other businesses that have a similar audience. Search for hashtags that your audience might use and engage in those conversations. Instead of reaching out to a big audience with no impact, you'll reach out to a smaller audience, but actually have more useful reach.

4. Make your tweets useful.

Don't think of your tweets as a marketing tool, think of them as an outreach tool. Instead of posting boring tweets about your product, share tweets that offer value, like a tip, a laugh, or a useful link. Retweet other interesting posts relevant to your industry or audience. When people see you post things that are useful to them, they'll follow you. Once you've built up an audience, you can post tweets that are directly related to your product, but you should still try to make most of your tweets as useful or entertaining, or you'll lose followers.

Twitter can be a useful marketing tool. While the platform is free to use, you do need to invest time and effort into reaching out to your audience and growing your number of followers. By sharing conversational tweets, using hashtags, knowing your audience and sharing useful information, you can expand your reach beyond just your Twitter followers. And when you reach people who aren't your followers, many of them will start following you—creating a snowball effect that continually grows your audience.

If you believe that my message is worth spreading, please use the share buttons at the top of the page.

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


 

Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member

Let’s make MarketHive the best Entrepreneurial Network it can be!

I sent out this post today using Pulse on LinkedIn.

 

As an entrepreneur, we often feel like everything depends on us.  Just like the hard-working woman in the image above, we sometimes can feel like our bicycle has too much loaded on it.  The whole world seems like it is on our shoulders.  In a very real sense, it is true that everything does depend on us.  A wise man once told me to pray as though everything depends on God, and work as though everything depends on you.  Sage advice I think, and words to live by.

That it why we sometimes need a group of like-minded entrepreneurs to exchange information and ideas.  There are many groups on LinkedIn where you can find entrepreneurs and do exactly that.

Sometimes you may think that there should be a marketplace where ideas, as well as products and services for the entrepreneur can be found.  Wouldn't it be great to have an entire social network dedicated to the entrepreneur?  I have been looking for quite a while for such a social network.

I have found a new Social Network that may meet my requirements for just such a place.  It is called MarketHive.  It is a fledgling network, and only time will tell if it grows into a thriving marketplace, but it seems to have good leadership with a solid core of dedicated entrepreneurs.  To find out more, simply visit http://markethive.com/jonlomb.

Thank you and good luck in all your endeavors!

Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member

The Only One Skill That, If You Have, Will Completely Change Your Life

We all look for the key recipe for the success. The secret element which will make all the difference.
The only true answer doesn’t exist. There’re plenty of skills which once mastered would change your life completely (This article originally appeared on Growthzer).

lifestyle motivation self-control

However, a skill that I believe is incredibly important in today's world, and it's something the vast majority of people lacks, is self-control.

Deeply inside, nobody wants to be unhealthy and practice self-destructing habits. But if you look around, people kill themselves every single day. The death may not come immediately, but it's going to arrive way sooner than it supposed to. Diabetes and cancer are sold on every corner. Profit is what counts to most of the companies, your health doesn't. So it's you who's responsible for controlling yourself.

People waste their most precious resource, which is time, on a daily basis and they'll never get it back.
This is caused by the lack of self-control. As a result, the urges, and today's economy is based on your urges, become more powerful than you're, so you act accordingly, instead of acting the way a disciplined person would.

Now, I'm not trying to say that being extremely disciplined would be a good thing. It definitely wouldn't. The overabundance of self-control is probably as harmful as the dearth of it.

But imagine a life in which you learned how to control yourself so that the obstacles the world throws at you become irrelevant: you just proceed with your goals.

Instead of putting junk into your body, you eat healthy foods, allowing yourself a reward in a form of eating what you want from time to time. This will have a tremendous impact on your health. You no longer have to try out fancy diets. If you eat real food instead of food-like products and you control the amounts, then you won't become overweight no matter how much you want it.

You also begin leading an active lifestyle. Instead of giving up on your New Year's fitness resolutions after two weeks, you hit the gym 3 times a week and walk a few miles on a daily basis.

After a year of controlling just these two areas: which is your plate and your lazy ass, you would already hugely transform your life, not just your body.

Now, let's take it further. We're bombarded with entertainment: Television, video games (which you can now play everywhere and every time because of smartphones), the Internet and so on. All these things can become really harmful once you lack self-control, and as you know, most people do not possess this invaluable skill. So instead of playing video games, watching Television or mindlessly browsing the Internet, which all translates to wasting your time, you read.

You commit to reading two hours a day, which may sound like a lot, but ask yourself how many hours you waste daily on the above three time-suckers. Books are life-changing. We learn through experience, but you can only experience so much in a lifetime. Owing to books, you can learn from other people's lives and apply the lessons during your personal journey. You will not find a highly successful person on this planet who would advise against books. Most of them would highly recommend you to consume them like you'd fast food or sweets.

So now a year goes by and you've been reading two hours a day for twelve months. I won't try to estimate the number of books you'd read, but there's one thing you can be sure of. It would be more than what the vast majority of people will ever read in their lifetime. They won't even read the half of it.

But reading great books without applying what you learn won't lead you to completely changing your life. You need to take action. For every single problem you'll experience in your life there's at least one decent book that offers the solution. To most of your issues, there're dozens of great reads. So now, as you start utilizing your knowledge, because due to self-control you proceed instead of procrastinating, imagine how many obstacles you'd overcome.

I'd like to take it further, so let's continue. As you read for two hours on a daily basis, you eventually become inspired to put your own thoughts on the paper. You realize that you'd love to write a book. The fact is, more than 80% of people wish to, but only 1% of them will ever write a book. And you know why 99% will fail? Because they lack the self-control to do the right thing instead of letting their urges dictate the flow of the day.

Fortunately, that's no longer your problem, so you commit to writing 500 words a day and stick to that for another twelve months. At the end of the year, you end up with more than 180 000 words of content. It may not necessarily be the piece of art comparing to the great writers, but it's definitely a miracle in comparison to what you used to be before you learned the skill of self-control.

Let's assume the positive, because why wouldn't we? Your book turns out to be pretty decent, which you've heard from a few people that you shared your work with. So you hire an editor and graphic designer to prepare it for publishing. Because of the self-publishing movement growing in power, you no longer need to cooperate with the publishing house. You can publish it on Amazon and let the readers judge your words.

More and more positive reviews appear under your name, money starts coming in. Over time, you become a recognized author and you like it so much that you continue polishing your craft. Maybe you'd even quit your job? Every year, you add a new book to your writer's portfolio.

Taking this story further in your imagination will either overwhelm you or inspire you to begin working on your self-control today. There're tons of invaluable skills to learn which has the potential to transform your life, but self-control is the key required to keep working on whatever skill you'd like to develop.

Some people would say that this sounds nice when you read it, but doing is a whole different story. It absolutely is. But why would you expect a miracle, a complete life-transformation caused by ordinary actions.

The society is mostly made of the third type. They just wonder why the heck they're in debt, overweight and miserable. Then there's the second type of people, who start to observe their surroundings more carefully as they become sick of being in the third category. They watch the high-achievers, the men of action. Some of them will eventually take a full responsibility for their lives and join the first type, also know as the happiest and fulfilled people, those who make things happen.

They know that the above scenario is absolutely possible, and the only barrier which separates you from achieving it, is you who need to finally find enough self-control to make it happen.

If you believe that my message is worth spreading, please use the share buttons.

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


 

Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member

Residual Income: What Is It and How Does It Work?

A residual income stream will earn you money even when you're not on the clock. Owning rental units, collecting royalties or investing in a savings and investment program are examples of such passive incomes.
 

residual income

Residual Income: What Is it and How Does It Work?

Wouldn’t it be nice to earn money while not working? That money is called residual, or recurring, income. It's what can happen after you put a lot of time, effort and sometimes money into a job to continue to get paid for the work months or years after it's done. (Salary jobs are part of linear income. This income is directly related to the number of hours you work. If you work 40 hours, you get paid for 40 hours of work.) Once you set up your business to earn residual income, you continue to make money while doing other things – maybe even starting a new business to generate more residual income!

Types of Residual Income

Some examples of residual income sources include:

  • Royalties from intellectual property, such as books and patents
  • Subscriptions, advertisements, donations or affiliate links from your blog or website
  • Transferring the rights to a song you recorded, a book you wrote, a software program you created or a gadget you invented to a company agreeing to pay you a percentage of each copy of your work sold
  • Purchasing an office or apartment building and leasing or renting out the properties
  • A savings and investment program that earns interest
  • E-book sales
  • Stock photography royalties

Does the Money Just Keep Rolling In?

The ideal residual income stream will produce money 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and you don’t have to personally market or interact with the business in any way. All you have to do is watch your bank account grow.

But that’s more like a fairytale. You’ll have to put in some effort to continue receiving residual income on the business you started. Talking to your managers and representatives will help them be more productive and run your business better. Marketing your online sales through social media and your network will help earn you more money. But you just won’t have to work at it as your full time job. Think of it as a part time job that can potentially bring in full time pay.

Advantages to Residual Income

  • You do have the potential to be financially independent if your residual income produces enough money.
  • Having residual income allows you to do more important things with your time. Whether that’s a hobby or another job, making money from your residual income stream won’t be the primary focus of your life.
  • No matter what, you will have a constant flow of income (however large or small it may be). This is critical if you get injured or sick, can’t work because of another emergency, or if you just want to take an extended vacation.
  • You will make money no matter where you live, unlike a linear income which ties you down to your position.

Of course, before the money starts rolling in you will probably have to put a lot of time, effort and money into the business or project. You’ll need a lot of patience and determination to see the residual income in the future. Instant gratification is not possible when it comes to residual income.

If you enjoyed this article, please use the share buttons at the top of the page.

 

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member

Walter Anderson, born October 10, 1885, passed away August 23, 1962

Two years ago I started following Zig Ziglar’s advice about learning one new positive quote each day. I was also a fan of Veretekk’s Daily Messages Online and thought I could do something similar.

What I would do is look up famous people with birthdays today and find a positive or humorous quote.

Walter Anderson, born October 10, 1885, passed away August 23, 1962.


All the best,

Alan
Alan Zibluk
http://alanzibluk.com

Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member

10 Reasons to Use Video in Your Local Marketing

 

If you haven't yet considered adding video to your marketing strategy, it might be time to start.  Video rental may no longer be a viable business, but video is having a huge impact on Internet advertising. From all the benefits of video accorsing to small business research, it seems the number one reason video is not considered as a small business promotion tactic is cost.

Well, you may find video producers that charge thousands of dollars for a full-blown five minute custom on-site video, but is all that production really necessary?  If you could get high-quality videos at a small fraction of that cost, it might be something you should consider, for the following reasons;

1) Everyone likes video.  Chances are visitors to your site may not read your posts from start to finish, but it is likely they will watch an entire one-minute video.

2) Video builds trust.  Instead of producing a feature-based video on how great all of the benefits of your products or services are, consider a review-type video that displays one of the 5-star reviews your company has received.  This type of video will definitely rank on Google in a search for your company name.  It may also rank on a more general local search, depending on the competitiveness of your local niche.

3) Video is universal.  Video can be used in ways you may not have considered.  You can not only add video to your website and your YouTube channel, you can add it as a link in your email, on your Facebook page, on LinkedIn, as well as on various other social media sites.

4)  Video is highly searchable. Look at all the Google searchers that return video results on desktop as well as mobile searches. The numbers are staggering!

5) Video is highly sharable.  Video views on Facebook alone number over 4 billion per day.  That is more than half of the world population viewing videos on a daily basis!  Source: PCWorld

6) Video gives you the "wow" factor.  When prospects see your videos, they automatically assume your business is a successful and substantial one.  No one would spend the time and effort to produce a video for a company that was barely getting by. It is not just a status factor, video is something that earns customer respect.

7) Video can be used to inspire and educate, not only to entertain.  If you feel strongly about your small business, you can let people know about it.  It can be a simple belief in small, or family owned business, or something motivational.  Your video doesn't have to go viral, it just has to have a clear message that resonates with your customers.

8) Videos set you apart from your competition.  If video marketing is not that popular in your niche, it will allow you to rise above your competition.  If no one in your local market is doing video, you will have a big advantage over your competitors.

9)  Video allows for greater interaction. People love to comment on videos. You can get multiple reviews from a single video, and multiply the benefit of a single citation.

10) Video stimulates the "buy" trigger.  Everyone loves to save time.  If you get your message across in one minute, you have done an effective job of stimulating the "buy" trigger in the mind of your prospect.

Visit Goldfinch Digital Marketing  for your free in-depth consultation on how video and social media can help your local business.  

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Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member