6 Steps to Building an Audience That Builds a Business

By Rainmaker.FM

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It’s taken awhile, but the startup world is starting to recognize the power of building an audience before building a product. That’s music to our ears.

That’s the way Copyblogger Media grew out of a one-man blog. Back in 2012, while chronicling how that happened, Brian Clark coined the term minimum viable audience, effectively tying content marketing to the lean startup movement.

A case study on Copyblogger Media in The Lean Entrepreneur brought the message to a wider audience of entrepreneurial hopefuls. Now, Joe Pulizzi is dedicating an entire book to the subject, which may well provide the tipping point.

It’s called Content …read more      

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The Evolutionary Process of an Entrepreneur

By Rainmaker.FM

he-nathan-chan

Today’s guest on Hack the Entrepreneur is the creator, publisher, and editor of Foundr Magazine, which launched in 2013 and has become a six-figure business.

Foundr is a monthly digital magazine, which has had more than 100,000 downloads in its first 15 months.

He also hosts a weekly podcast for Foundr where he interviews the greatest minds in business today and has created a training platform that provides educational video courses for young entrepreneurs.

Now, let’s hack …

Nathan Chan.

In this 39-minute episode of Hack the Entrepreneur, host Jon Nastor and Nathan Chan discuss:

  • Connecting with people and leveraging their knowledge
  • How Instagram can build your …read more      
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How an Editor-in-Chief Creates Editorial Standards, Part Two

By Rainmaker.FM

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This week’s installment of the editorial standards series on Editor-in-Chief outlines three digital publishing best practices you can implement right now.

Get ready to start making details a priority …

In this 13-minute episode of Editor-in-Chief, host Stefanie Flaxman discusses:

  • How to make your content a trusted source for your audience
  • Why we become hooked on certain digital media and ignore other content
  • The audio equivalent of a wart (or why Stefanie lost her train of thought in the middle of this episode and why it’s okay when you make mistakes, as well)

Click Here to Listen to

Editor-in-Chief on iTunes

Click Here to …read more      

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How to Avoid Obscurity by Misusing Language

By Rainmaker.FM

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Language is software (your brain, the hardware). A form of coding. It communicates information, and ideas travel from one person to the next through language.

As babies, our first goal is to learn the language. Master the fundamentals. Learn your scales. And most of us are fully satisfied with this.

Great writers, however, aren’t.

They go on to experiment with language. Bend it to their will. Manhandle it. Even misuse it.

In this 7-minute episode of Rough Draft with Demian Farnworth, you’ll discover:

  • What great composers have always known about greatness
  • The quirks of three great writers
  • What you must do before you misuse the software
  • And more!

<a class="colorbox" …read more      

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Don’t Get Fooled: 17 Questions to Ask Before Hiring an SEO Company

By Neil Patel

seo

Pretty scary, right?

Hiring SEO help can make or break your company.

A good SEO will get you on the path to making tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars per month, but a bad SEO could cripple any existing search traffic you get.

It’s important to choose carefully, and that’s what I want to show you how to do today.

If you’re thinking about hiring an SEO company, I’ve put together 17 questions that can help you make the right choice.

You should ask these questions before hiring anyone so you know exactly what to expect.

Finally, you don’t need to ask all …read more      

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