CES Recap Highlights 2015

International Consumer Electronics Show (CES 2015) showcased new innovations in electronics and technology in abundance. The uber-cool products, gadgets and gizmos defined lots of new and amazing trends that are going to go on this year. It was a big event and had more than 3000 exhibitions. Cool new gadgets, drones, Internet of things (IoT), wearables, cars, toys also including robots were big attractions among all the exhibits. Many new startups showcased their work and successfully launched their new products. Many concepts were successfully prototypes and launched at this main event. Technology is taking the right foot forward and it is a great leap from the last year as far as the International Consumer Electronics Show is concerned.

Below mentioned are the important highlights of CES 2015:

1) Internet of Things (IoT): Machines and technology are coming one step closer to your life as CES 2015 witnessed something revolutionary. Internet of Things is the most amazing innovation people are going to witness this year. It constitutes of connected devices and systems, which enhance our lives. Big companies like Google, Samsung, Apple, Qualcomm etc. are innovating on Internet of Things. Internet of things will give rise to smart homes, connected cities, connected automobiles, big cloud data so that you are always connected. Your gadgets will be controlling your appliances, doors and even thing like laundry. Internet of Things is also called Internet of Everything.

2) Smaller and Faster Drones: Drones were one of the major attractions of the electronics show. Drones are unmanned, remote-controlled vehicles that fly in the air. But this time drones were more sophisticated in looks as well as functionality. Attendees at CES enjoyed clicking selfies with camera attached flying drones. These extremely small aerial drones are the coolest innovation exhibited at CES 2015. Many new startups and crowd funded teams launched drones at the show and were appreciated a lot.

3) Highest Resolution 4K TV’s: It is the biggest electronics show of the year and TV’s are the biggest of all exhibits. Makers from around the globe were trying to woo consumers by launching high definition TV’s. The latest are the OLED, quantum dots, ultra-widescreen TV’s, which had great features and best picture quality. Many new things like bendable and curved screens along with more than 4K resolution TV’s were displayed.

4) Driverless Cars: Attention everybody, the cars of the future are here and it is none other than Mercedes-Benz that launched the very first driverless car at CES 2015. The F015 is an innovative, highly sophisticated and luxurious driverless car that was unveiled at the show. From the looks of the showcase, everybody loved it. It seems like the entire industry will undergo a phenomenal change in the coming years as Mercedes has set the bar very high.

5) Virtual Reality: The Las Vegas convention center also witness Oculus Rift, a startup acquired by Facebook, which launched Virtual Reality hardware at CES 2015. Oculus showcased a headset that could make virtual reality possible and appealing too. The excitement is already in the air after the showcase as everyone is waiting for the consumer version to hit the markets.

6) 3D Printers: 3D printing technology is not relatively new;but it still got a great fan following here at CES. 3D printing industry is getting better with time. Technology wise it is becoming for adaptable and affordable. 3D printing really left every consumer visiting spellbound. You can now print chocolates, candies and even hard materials like wood with these 3D printers.

7) Wearables: When you think of wearables all you think is a band that carries information. In 2015, wearables are going to be touching your life, more than you an ever imagine. From fitness, activity tracking to keeping you healthy thee smart bands are launched for multiple purposes. Big companies and so many startups have initiated this trend in 2014 and it will continue to grow this year too.

8) Startups Shine: This is a great achievement for the technology driven companies. Many new players were applauded for breaking the cliché and shining at this huge event. While technology impressed everyone, a big chunk of it came from really small teams at even smaller startups. 3D printing, Drones, Wearables etc. were launched by many startups and these products were extremely impressive.

Did we miss anything? If yes, share your favorite product announcements or CES 2015 news with us.

How to Keep Your Readers on Your Blog Longer

There are millions of bloggers out there who write meaningful blog posts every day. But only few rise up to be viral and get a large readership. What if you can follow some guidelines and increase traction and even bring back the readers? Yes, it is possible to keep your readers on your blog longer and even for minutes.

Follow these great tips and strategies to make your readers spend more time on your website, enjoying your valuable content:

1) Ask questions and respond to comments

While you are writing a post, make sure you end it on an intriguing note. End it with a question asking the readers about the things they plan to do. If the post was about some hack or tip, ask them in an encouraging way to contribute their experience with the same. People who are interested in the content will comment by answering that last question. This way you get to respond to them and get a way to reach them within few seconds. The tip here is to respond every comment you receive and spread your knowledge. This is effective in increasing reader loyalty and their trust in your blog content.

2) Help out readers

Comments as explained are a way for you to reach the reader and vice versa. If you have intrigued them or they have some doubt, they can quickly comment and ask you. Readers often ask for help when you publish some tutorials or any other tweak as a blog. Like this post for example, people might email or comment regarding some queries. Build great reputation by helping each and every email or comment that reaches you. There are people out there who read and share your content if you help them out. It is the easiest way to fuel your loyal reader base.

3) Showcase your top posts

All your star posts must be highlighted along with the content. These posts already enjoy a high readership and you have a chance to keep people longer on your site by this method. Just put top posts of your site on a sidebar and see the magic yourself. This is often helpful for many readers as they get to explore more things. Reading more content means they spend more time on your blog. You can easily do this by using a plugin for displaying top posts.

4) Create a conversation

Another important factor that attracts readers is your writing style. Do not be serious while writing, because you are passing on useful information to humans not to search engines. While everybody has their own style, but readers appreciate a conversational tone as they go along reading a blog. Many readers are looking for solutions or some hacks and you can save the day by being friendly and writing to the point in your post.

5) Collect emails

Email is useful in building traffic. It is even convenient in increasing the readers site spend on time. Offer them a free eBook or any trial version of your product in exchange of their email. Slowly and steadily you will receive more number of emails and people will spend more time on your blog posts filling the information.

6) Spread your content over multiple pages

If you write detailed posts, you might as well spread them over multiple pages. This way you give the readers all the information in small parts and get them to spend more time on your side. This way even if your readers just skim through your posts, the average time they will spend on your site will be higher.

7) Related Posts

You may never know what exactly your visitors are looking for, which is similar vice versa also. But a useful plugin can give you the edge you need. Increase the interaction by mentioning related posts along with the current topic that you want readers to read.

These are useful strategies and tips, which have successfully increased spend on time for many sites. Try out and tell us what kind of results you get for your site

Why Video Marketing is Important – 20 Powerful Statistics

Online Video Marketing is an essential part of any business online because online videos are being consumed a lot more than a web page content. For marketers it is important to understand this difference between content marketing  (text/images ) versus video marketing before they plan on engaging with their audience. Here are few statistics to ponder upon that will convince you to incline towards implementing video marketing strategies for your websites :

1) 1 Minute Online Video is Worth 1.8 Million Words

The emphasis of having a one minute video is clear from this statistic alone. A single 1 minute video is worth 1.8 million words when you calculate the value of impact it has on your users. Writing 1.8 million words is time consuming and costly when compared to a one minute video that can engage your users more quickly and with minimal cost.

2) 45.4% Watch One Video Per Month

The chances that you lose out with web content marketing are high because the average exposure is low for content. Reading on the web is mere scanning, which is not very popular medium to grasp information online. In comparison to this an online video is phenomenal medium to gain information. Also according to numbers, average users are exposed to 32.2 videos a month. Here you can tap in and successfully increase your online engagement as well.

3) 100 Million Users Watch a Video on Internet Everyday

Internet is filled with videos. YouTube is the #2 most popular sites in the U.S. as of today. Lots of viral videos are shared on social media channels. According to the latest survey, people watch at least one video every day. These videos include comic videos, viral and funny video clips to informative videos regarding the services and products. Consumers watch videos before to get more information about the things they are interested in buying.

4) 90% Shoppers Watch Videos:

Videos convince the users regarding the product and service they like to buy. A great deal of genuine information plus a first-hand review of the product encourages the shoppers to buy the products and services. Thus decision making is easier for them after watching online videos.

5) 75% Executives Watch Work Related Online Videos:

Online videos are also loved by working class executives who learn a lot by watching business videos online. 75% of Forbes executives claim to watch business videos online on a weekly basis. YouTube again dominates here as 50% of executives watch online videos there.

6) More Than 16 Minutes of Video Ads are Seen By Every User in a Month

Online video ads are also consumed by users every month. More than 16 minutes of video ads are seen by every user who watches online videos. This is the impact of online video marketing as it reaches most of the users.

7) 80% Recall Watching a Video

The powerful impact of videos is the best thing about them. Users find them useful because they can recall online videos better than the content they read on the Internet. 80% of the users can easily recall information that they saw in an online video. It is a great statistic for marketers to ponder upon. It will surely convince you to make a video marketing strategy for your brand.

8) 64% Inspire Them to Buy The Product

Watching videos increase the time users spend on the site. Also if they are looking for a product and your video explains it, users are likely to watch it before buying that product. Online videos thus inspire around 64% of the shoppers to buy the product.

9) 40.3% More Inquiry Calls in Real Estate

Videos inspire big real estate buyers too. Real estate listing with online videos receives 403% more inquiry calls from interested buyers. The video ads also add a lot of value by increasing the leads for the businesses.

10) Click Through Rate Increased By 96%

Add a video to your mailer when you run a campaign and see the magic yourself. According to survey, adding a video to the emails increase user click through rate by 96%. More reason to start video marketing – indeed!

Infographic Credits: www.videoflot.com 

11) Explainer Videos Increase Click Through Rate By 200%

People like things explained better and this is where marketers spotted an opportunity to increase the click through rate. Explainer videos embedded in emails increased click through rates by 200%. That is pretty amazing when you are targeting new users during early engagement phase.

12) Popular Among 59% Seniors

Senior executives also love watching online videos. They opt for video content over reading text and articles online. 59% senior executives in the U.S. prefer watching online videos before buying a product or learn about something to reading about it.

13) Benefits SEO and Decreases Bounce Rate

Online videos are great for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) of your website. The videos make the users stay longer on your site and engage them too. The bounce rate significantly decreases when you add an online video on your site about your product and services.

14) Adding Videos to Email Campaigns Reduces Subscription Cancellations By 75%

Companies also experimented with online videos to decrease the number of subscriber opt-outs. This experiment worked really well as adding one video to an email resulted in reducing subscription cancellations by 75%.

15) 51% Leads Increased By Videos:

Marketers were happy to find out that videos also led to increase the number of leads for them. More than 51% increase in conversions happened after adding a video to the campaign.

16) Video Has Only 10 Seconds to Charm:

The difference between a hit and a miss is just ten seconds in case of online videos. If you can keep the users engaged for first 10 seconds you have grabbed their attention.

17) 5 Minutes Viewing Time on Mobile

This is surprising and good at the same time. Online videos on desktop are much less popular than they are on tablets and smartphones. While users on desktops online videos stick to one video for just 2 minutes on iPads this viewing time increases p to 5 minutes. So you are more likely to penetrate and engage users through smaller devices using video marketing.

18) 16% of People Share YouTube Videos Tuesdays

People like and share videos on social channels. Most common platform they watch videos on is YouTube. 16% of people watching online videos like, share and embed YouTube videos on Tuesdays as per latest survey statistics.

19) 15 Seconds Favorable Duration of Viral And Shared Videos

If you look at viral videos on the Internet most of them are 15 seconds or shorter. Large videos are less viral because they have fewer tendencies to engage many users. Videos with duration less than 15 seconds are shared more.

20) Ecommerce Impact of Online Videos:

Consumer’s instincts are trigged by online videos. An online advertisement, review and trailer of the product and service impacts ecommerce a lot more than any discounted sale. Therefore users like to watch online videos before buying stuff online.

Sources and Importance of Stock Images for Your Website

A picture is worth a thousand words. Adding images to your content makes it more appealing for the readers. Stock images provide a visual experience that benefits your readers to engage more with your website. It also lets Google index your images and gives you additional website traffic. Infographics in particular are trending and can aid your reader in understanding your subject matter.

Learn how to select the right kind of stock images for your website. There are many stock images available online that give you unique and high quality images but choosing a suitable image should be your focus. Add expressions and communicate your idea with innovative stock images that help your brand connect better with your audience.

How to choose stock images?

Here are 5 proven strategies that you can put to use while choosing stock images for your website.

1) Avoid Clichéd Images

Your brand is unique and it should be spread that way only. Never use clichéd and old images on your website. Find images that are synonymous to your brands message and delivers your message more clearly. Audience love visuals as they can quickly get what the post is saying, without reading too much.

2) Add the Personal Touch

Add stock images that users can relate with. Outlandish images are a turn off. Find images that connect users personally with your brand. This personal touch will surely appeal to the users when they see it.

3) Relevant and Up to Date Images

All stock images you ever find must go along the context of your content. Do not find images that are not relevant or out of date. The style of your images must be up to date as this reflects your website and brand’s freshness. Be familiar with the latest trends and avoid anything outdated.

4) Look, Feel and Color Tone of Image

Your logo and brand image connects your user visually towards your business. When you are choosing stock images, you may as well choose them according to the look, feel and color tone of your brand image. This similarity helps the audience connect and relate to your brand more. Also this move will give you a more aesthetic and professional look.

5) Test your Image

Even if you select a proper stock image, do not buy it before testing it. Download images with watermarks and test them out. The portrait and landscape modes of images vary and are used differently for different layouts. Purchase images after testing few good one, so that your choice makes your brand look best.

Resources to Find Great Stock Images:

Now that you know how to choose the right stock image for your brand, let us explore the resources that have tons of stock images, you can use.

Free Stock Images Resources:

There are many websites that have a great collection of free stock images. You just have to devote time to find the right image within these sites. Register and subscribe to these sites to get access to millions of free stock images.

1)      morgueFile http://www.morguefile.com/

2)      Creative Commons http://search.creativecommons.org/

3)      Pixabayhttp://pixabay.com/

4)      Little Visuals  http://littlevisuals.co/

5)      Wordlehttp://www.wordle.net/create

Tools to Create Stock Images:

Infographics are extremely useful for reaching the users and they are appreciated by users as well. There are many tools to create images using infographic tools:

1)      Canvahttps://www.canva.com/

2)      Visual.ly http://visual.ly/

3)      Easel.ly http://www.easel.ly/

4)      Infogr.am https://infogr.am/app/#/home

Mobile Technology Trends to Watch in 2015

742210

2015 is sure to witness a lot of new mobile technology trends as smartphones are being adopted all over the world at a great pace. These trends are going to set new standards through mobiles in the way we play, work and shop.

1)      Battle for Wearables

Mobile technologies are expanding with brand new wearables like Google Glass and Apple Watch. The developers will have to keep up with the pace as brands are trying to woo customers with innovative products. Apple is launching Apple Watch with great momentum and in this year wear mobile technology will be developed globally. The market is new and people want to see what these brands bring on the table.

2)      More Brand Engagement

Engagement through mobile will be another key trend you are going to see in 2015. Each and every brand you use will lift them up from age old subscription emails to innovative ways to engage you with their products and services. This different approach is somewhat like Fitbit, the fitness tracker, where these brands will keep you updated about the products and services many times a day.

3)      Mobile Payments Grow Both locally and Globally

We all know that mobile payments are more secure and private. Apple Pay came out as one of the most innovative mobile technology that was launched towards the end of 2014. Many retail chains across the U.S. are already accepting payments through mobile. This one touch payment through your smartphone saves you a lot of time. In 2015 it is hopeful that more merchants will accept mobile payments. Also not just locally, mobile payments are going global as per the trend reports. Travelers will be able to enjoy mobile payments in international currencies and will save a lot of time and hassle.

4)      Smart and Connected Home

Apple is leading here too. The newly launched HomeKit will be setting standards for the connected and smart homes. While Apple’s mobile technology will be in house and closed, Thread Group is also launching similar ecosystem which will be more open to developers.

Infographics Source: Kona Company

5)      Automobiles Integrated With Mobiles

Just like wearables, mobile technology also enhances automobiles. Augmented virtual overlays and more effective GPS tracking is sure to benefit everyone in 2015. More power to your windshield as you will feel more connected to the specs and environment while driving premium vehicles.

6)      Internet of Things (Internet of Everything) Expansion (IoT)

Marketer have preached internet of things as a cool concept for so long already. But in 2015 you will see it happening in front of you. A revolution is coming and in the form of really cool products that will surely catch your attention.

7)      Hackers Will also Target Mobile

More users on mobile, means it will be more prone to malware and hacks. Hacker groups have already targeted mobile apps in 2014 and this year it will be all about more and more mobile penetration. Data breach will be in every third mobile device around you. Hence more security measures will be adopted in 2015.

8)      Mobile Beacons Technology

For all the shoppers out there Beacon technology is the biggest trend for mobile in 2015. The store owners can send you messages or notifications on your mobiles and create a fun and profitable shopping experience.

9)      M-commerce Evolution

Holiday shopping season of 2014 recorded highest sales through mobile devices ever. This is increasing at a steady rate, because of the deals, offers and easy of shopping through these apps. Retailers will engage more through mobile and try to retain as many customers as possible. Driving sales and revenue through m-commerce will be a big trend of 2015.

10)  Travel and Bookings More Through Mobile

Applications on your mobile will be more powerful. For example travel booking websites will give you more sophisticated way to book flights and hotels from the app itself. You travel research will be part of your mobile, laptop and tablets all throughout 2015.

11)  Mobile connected with your health and nutrition

Mobile is going to make you live well by keeping your health and nutrition in check. Mobile tracking and keeping real-time data for your body will help you take good care of your health. Notifications regarding the content of your meals, heart rate and sleep quality are very useful. In 2015 you will also be notified about your stress levels.

12)  Businesses Goes Mobile First

Businesses will prefer mobile first to showcase new products and services. The companies will become more mobile-centric in 2015. Mobile-first behavior is something you have to watch out for in 2015.