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Author: Megan Lindsey

  • Best Apps for Mardi Gras in New Orleans

    Mardi Gras in New Orleans is one of the most exciting times of the year! But with all of that excitement comes a bit of preparation. Make sure you’ve got these top apps downloaded on your phone so that you optimize your Mardi Gras experience.

    Listen to our radio interview covering some of these tips on WWNO New Orleans Public Radio.

    WDSU Parade Tracker car riding in Mardi Gras Parade in New Orleans, LA

    Parade Tracking Apps

    WDSU Parade Tracker | WWL Eye on Carnival Mardi Gras Parade Tracker

    Parade tracking apps are ESSENTIAL for Mardi Gras in New Orleans! These local apps provide real-time tracking of the parades so you’ll know exactly where they are on the route.  So how does it work? There’s a GPS tracker located in a vehicle at the front of the parade, so you’re able to see exactly where the beginning of the parade is at any given time.  

    It’s especially helpful for finding out if there are any delays along the route. Also, if you’re out parading and don’t want to miss anything, you’ll want to know how much time you have between parades to use the restroom or grab some food. Other nifty features include:

    • Parade schedules: See how many parades roll each day and what time they start.
    • Parade route maps: Find your spot and see where you are on the route.
    • Parade float count: See how many floats are in each parade. This is an indicator of how long it’ll last.
    • Weather info: Plan out what you need to wear. Weather during Mardi Gras tends to be pretty volatile—it can go from hot during the day to freezing at night, to raining, so you gotta make sure you’ve got the right attire!
    • Notifications: Real-time notifications for weather, parade starts, and delays.

    WDSU iOS | Android  WWL iOS | Android

    Transportation Apps

    Uber | Lyft

    These are the most popular for helping you get to and from the parade route without the dreaded headache of parking. It’s especially good for ride-sharing with friends or others who are going to the parade. It makes it easy because you don’t have to worry about spending extra time driving out to the parade and searching for a place to park, or even paying to park; and if you’re planning on drinking, you definitely shouldn’t be driving!

    Uber  iOS | Android  Lyft iOS | Android

    Blue Bikes

    If you’re a local, biking is one of the easiest, and sometimes even the fastest way to get around the city during Mardi Gras. Even if you already have your own bike, Blue Bikes are especially helpful for when you’ve got friends or family visiting from out of town that don’t have their own bike.

    Getting set up for this bike-sharing program is quick and easy. Simply download the mobile app and register for an account through the app. There’s a $5 sign up fee and pricing is either pay-as-you-go (10 cents/minute), or pay a monthly fee ($15/month). Through the app, you can find Blue Bikes and Blue Bike stations across the city, reserve bikes, and even see your trip history and miles ridden.  Using the bikes are even easier! When you’re ready to ride, you’ll enter your six digit account number and four-digit PIN into the keypad on the back of the bike to unlock it. Then ride it to wherever you need to go and return it to the nearest Blue Bike station, or you can lock it at a public bike rack for an additional fee.

    Transit Tracker – New Orleans RTA

    One good way to get downtown during Mardi Gras is public transportation. The French Quarter is typically closed off to drivers from Friday evening until midnight Tuesday, so driving there is impossible. Even if you try, you likely won’t be able to find a place to park.

    With Transit Tracker, you put in your starting location and destination and it will show you which streetcar or bus to take and where you will need to walk. There’s also real-time GPS data on the streetcar/bus locations. It does rely on the RTA keeping the trackers in working conditions, so this could be hit-or-miss.

    iOS only

    Waze

    If you decide to drive out to the parade route, we highly recommend using Waze to help you navigate. This GPS app is typically the most reliable for getting driving directions because it uses user-submitted road and traffic data, such as accident reports, police traps, closed roads, and other hazards along the way. It’s especially helpful during Mardi Gras in order to know which routes to avoid due to traffic (within or coming into the city) or to indicate which roads are closed because of the parade routes.

    iOS | Android

    Mardi Gras parade float in New Orleans, LA

    Location Apps

    Google Maps

    Google Maps is one of the most used and trusted location apps. It comes in handy during Mardi Gras for travelers and locals alike! Cell service can be pretty spotty when you’ve got a concentrated crowd of people, so if you’re trying to get in touch with someone to meet up, you can easily share your location by dropping a pin. Also, if you decide to drive out to the parade route and park, there’s a good chance you’ll need help remembering where you parked. Simply drop a pin and save it.

    Depending on where you are, restaurants may have different hours during Carnival, so if you’re hungry and need a quick bite, it’s great for finding what restaurants are open in the area around you.

    iOS | Android

    Find My Friends

    It’s essential to stay in touch with your fellow parade buddies during Mardi Gras. This app allows you to easily locate friends and family using your iPhone. Just install the app and share your location with your friends by choosing from your contacts. When you share your location, your friends can start following your location immediately and easily share their locations back to you so that you’re both in the loop. It’s easy to get lost in a crowd during the festivities, so if you’ve got a large group of people that want to stay together or find one another, this app is key.  

    iOS | Android

    Food Delivery

    Instacart

    Make sure you’re stocked up on snacks and drinks for the parades! If you live near or on the parade route and you’re having people over, you definitely want to make sure you’ve got food for yourself and all those visitors. Shopping at grocery stores during Carnival time can get a little crazy, so you can save yourself the headache of fighting the crowds and use an online grocery shopping and delivery service.

    iOS | Android

    Uber Eats | Grubhub | Waitr

    If you forgot to pack food and want a meal delivered to you while you’re out on the parade route, all of these services can deliver food to you from your favorite restaurant. Additional fees vary. There’s usually a $4.99 flat fee + additional fees depending on the distance from the restaurant. Good news, there is a promo code for first-time users!

    Uber Eats iOS | Android GrubHub iOS | Android  Waitr iOS | Android

    Mardi Gras partiers hanging out on Frenchman Street in New Orleans, LA

    Mardi Gras Attire

    While we always encourage shopping local to find your unique Mardi Gras attire, the convenience of shopping online sometimes can’t be beat.

    Amazon

    Amazon is one of the top online shops for buying any and all of your Mardi Gras attire: wigs, makeup, costumes, glitter, fanny packs, YOU NAME IT! The best part? Quick two-day shipping with Amazon Prime for those of you who waited until the last minute.

    iOS | Android

    eBay

    It’s not just used items! It’s essentially a ton of virtual stores and sellers, and not everything is an auction. Many sellers offer the “Buy It Now” option, so you can easily filter that way if you’re in a time crunch to get your items. eBay is a great place for finding unique attire and pieces to build your costume.

    iOS | Android

    Etsy

    If you’re not the craftiest person, but you want something unique that you can’t just buy off the rack, this is the place to look. It’s a mecca for finding awesome, vintage, and handmade items like headpieces. There are also numerous thrift stores that have their shop online, so you can find some really unique and funky pieces for your costume. Not to mention, tons of vintage sequin tops! If you’re into personalized cups, koozies, t-shirts, etc., they’ve got tons of sellers that make these.

    iOS | Android

    Most importantly, don’t forget to bring a portable charger with you so that your battery doesn’t run out after using all these helpful apps during Mardi Gras. Our team at Search Influence is in full preparation mode for Mardi Gras! Learn more about our digital marketing experience throughout the Greater New Orleans area and around the country. Even if you’re not celebrating in the Big Easy this year, don’t let Mardi Gras be just any other Tuesday.

    Images:

    Blue Bikes

    Parade Float

    Frenchman

  • 5 For Friday – Bing Turns 5, Google+ Pages Merge, & MySpace Misses You!

    BirthdayFive

    1. At Five Years Old, Bing Has Come Far Yet Has More To Grow – Search Engine Land

    Can you believe the little guy is already 5 years old?! Microsoft’s search engine has made some solid strides over the last five years, gaining more of the search market share, and taking Yahoo’s 2nd place rank. While Google continues to dominate, Bing has been challenging users to make the switch, but it looks like the only share they’re gaining is from Yahoo.

    Although they will probably never match Google, Bing’s success as credible search platform has lead to partnerships outside of Microsoft, putting search into services and apps, including third-party apps. With the progress they’ve made so far, it’ll be interesting to see where they’ll be in 5 more years.

    2. Google Now Allows Brand Pages to Become Google+ Local Pages – Local U

    Google has released an update to Google+ that will finally make it possible to merge a Google+ Local page with a Brand page. After Google Places began integrating Google+, many businesses were confused and frustrated when realizing that they were unable to integrate their existing Google+ Brand pages with their verifiedLocal page.

    The problem has been solved with this recent update, and businesses are now able to merge all of their local data with their Brand page. This will allow for all of the local features to also be integrated, which include reviews, business information, and the map. This article give specifics about the changes to your pages when making the switch.

    Google+ still has a several other kinks that they need to address, but this is a step in the right direction and will bring some much needed relief to many business owners (and marketers!). Happy merging!

    Giant_Panda_Eating3. Press Release Rankings: Slammed by the Panda? – SEER Interactive

    Since the release of Panda 4.0, press release agencies have seen a severe drop in traffic, which has everyone questioning the value of using them for SEO marketing efforts.

    The algorithm update has primarily affected the press release sites’ rankings in search results, specifically when used to manipulate the search results with irrelevant content. This means that the press releases most affected are spammy and were being used as a way to game search results while not providing any useful information for the searcher.

    The good news is that press releases are still a very valuable marketing tool, when used for the right reasons (to announce timely and newsworthy information). This particular impact of the Panda update on press release sites is just another way that Google is cleaning up search results, proving just how important it is to always produce the most relevant and useful content for your business.

    4. How to Grow Your Google+ Fan Base to 1,000 Followers & Beyond – Search Engine Watch

    It’s pretty clear that Google loves their products and wants you to use them. All of them. And the more active you are, the better. For Google+, not only is it important to be active, it’s important that you engage and build up your fanbase—follow and be followed. This article shares some great tips and tricks to get started on building your fanbase and to create and maintain engaging content for your followers.

    MySpaceRuinedMyLife5. Myspace Is Embarrassing Users With Old Photos to Win Them Back – Mashable

    Remember that old Myspace page you had 10 years ago? Neither do we. If you’re one of the lucky people that has access to or even uses that old email account, Myspace wants to remind you by sending you old embarrassing photos. While these admirable marketing efforts probably won’t make you go back, it will, at the very least, drive more traffic to their site so that you can laugh at those photos…and then delete your account.

    Image sources:

    “5th Birthday Cake” by Andy Eick

    “Giant Panda” by Chen Wu from Shanghai, China

    “Myspace Ruined My Life” by Bill Alldredge

  • HAPPY FRIDAY, BOYS! (and girls)

    HAPPY FRIDAY, BOYS! (and girls)

    Here at Search Influence, we’re all about tradition.

    We’ve got loads of candy in the kitchen, an anonymous question of the day on the community whiteboard, king cakes all Mardi Gras season long, double booked conference rooms, and every single Friday afternoon ends the same way.

    No matter what you’re doing, or how busy and stressed out you are, you’ll know when it’s five o’clock.  You’ll hear it coming loud from the Development Department.  It’s time to listen to “This is How We Do It” by Montell Jordan.  It’s a tradition that began with a former Influencer that we refuse to break (Shout Outs, J-Luft!).  I mean, seriously, is there any better way to start off your weekend!? It’s 3 minutes and 59 seconds of head bobbing, hand waving, and lip syncing – or loud singing – bliss.  In that moment you forget everything that you’ve ever known and remember what’s important in life.  The weekend.

    While this doesn’t exactly mean it’s time to pack up and go, because let’s be real, we’ve still got stuff to do, it’s a signal of what’s to come.  You may think that we’ve grown tired of one another after spending over 50 hours a week sitting two feet apart, but that’s not the case.  For some odd reason, some of us just can’t seem to get enough.

    Carrollton Station New Orleans

    So after we convince ourselves that we’ve accomplished all that we can in a workweek, or slowly peer pressure one another to leave, one-by-one we head on down three blocks to the station. Carrollton Station.

    While I could go on for days about all of the fun things that have happened, conversations we’ve had, or the moments we can’t quite seem to forget (or remember) at the station, instead I’ll fill you in on the reasons why we keep going back.

     

    Activities

    Carrollton Station Activities

    After sitting at a computer for over 8 hours a day, it’s time for a little cardio.  On any given Friday, you can see Influencers doing any combination of the following:

    • Ping Pong Tournaments
    • Darts
    • Shot skis – For added team building
    • Buying drinks for co-workers – Because you owe them for helping you out that week
    • Starting/Building Fires in the back patio area – It’s cool, we have Boy Scouts on the team
    • Watching the Saints  – Vuvuzela horn every time they score and free shots after the game

    Conversations

    While we try to avoid talking shop, it’s inevitable.  The nights always seem to begin with those topics, because it tends to take a few drinks for us to forget about the work week. But those stories always lead to funnier stories, which turn into inside jokes we laugh about for years.  This is the time when you really get to know your co-workers and decide that you’re also friends.

    Food & Drinks

     I guess it’s more drink than food…but it’s alright! We worked hard this week and we’re sleeping in tomorrow.

    • $1 Tacos  –  Pretty self explanatory
    • “Blue Moonshine Death Berries” –  Everclear soaked berries in some concoction of a drink
    • Jello shots  – Randomly passed around for free
    • Fireball, Fireball, Fireball, SHOTS

    Music

    Most nights involve some sort of live music.  If there’s not some crazy Russian band or local New Orleans brass group lined up, the ‘skinny thigh guitar guy’ will start his acoustic jams.  If for some reason there’s nothing on the schedule, there’s always the jukebox. It’s important to mention that the Dev boys always end up singing “There is A Light That Never Goes Out” by The Smiths.

    The Usuals

    Since it’s a neighborhood bar, you typically end up seeing the same faces or hearing familiar sounds.  Outside of the SI group and the usual three bartenders (shout out Lillian), you’ll probably spot the bar cat, named Powder Cat, roaming around the backyard and patio.  “Wait, did I just hear a dolphin?” Nope. That’s just the sound of a frequent patron’s laugh that we all know and love.  And don’t forget about our friend, Harvey.  He keeps talking about rounding people up and having some pajama party at the Station? (Not sure what that’s all about.)

    After Party

    There’s no telling what mood will strike, who will stay out, or where you’ll end up, but it’s possible that you’ll find yourself at one of these places:

    At Search Influence we work hard and we play hard.  We’re all about teamwork and team building, and if you make friends along the way, well that’s even better!  As the company continues to grow, so do our weekly gatherings at Carrollton Station.  If you’re in the neighborhood on a Friday, stop on by. The more the merrier!

    What’s your favorite memory from a Friday night out with co-workers?

  • Influencer Spotlight: Gabrielle Benedetto

    gab

    Native New Orleanian, Gabrielle Benedetto has been working on the Search Influence account management team for over a year and a half. When she isn’t at the office, you can probably catch her running around New Orleans training for her next big race or enjoying time with friends and family.

    As an Account Manager what do you find yourself doing on an average day?  

    As all members of the account management team, my goal everyday is to make sure my clients are happy! Regardless of how simple a client’s question may be, my job is to make sure they feel confident about their SEO campaign and they understand what our team is doing to improve their online presence.

    Many of the accounts I work on have very niche markets. I make it a point to spend quality time with each client so I can get a better understanding of their marketing goals to insure we are running a great campaign.

    What would you say is your specialty and what do you enjoy most about it?

    I’m one of the few members of the account management team who works on site audits. This is basically a report run on an entire site that analyzes everything from internal links, HTML coding, optimized content, site navigation, and even off-site marketing. I really enjoy working on these as it provides me with a pretty deep understanding of how the site is currently optimized and shines light on opportunities to improve.

    Many client come to me saying “I have a user friendly site and provide visitors with unique content about my business, but I just can’t seem to increase my rankings.” In presenting a site audit, this allows me to spend time with the client and not only show them what areas of their site need improvement but how my team can address each issue.

    You’ve had a great deal of experience working with a wide range of clients, from local business to some national companies.  After working with and analyzing their websites, you’ve discovered some funky stuff along the way.  Any easy tips out there for an average Joe looking to improve their site?

    Ah great question! I have three rules: make it natural, make it pretty, make it search engine friendly. This may be a little easier said than done, but that’s where Search Influence comes into play.

    When optimizing or looking for ways to improve your site, you can’t go wrong if you follow these three rules.  

    1) Make it natural: Although sites with all the bells and whistles can be really nice to look at, they don’t always work properly. When optimizing a site, do what comes natural. This applies to something simple like making sure the content on your site reads naturally and is well optimized for your keywords. You could even take a more technical approach with this in making sure that you’re setting up an easy-to-use navigation and structure for your site.

    2) Make it pretty: I think we have all visited a site that wasn’t organized well and looked unattractive. Having a site that isn’t organized properly or comes across as ugly or outdated is immediately going to make you think of the “s” word… spammy. Having an updated, attractive, and welcoming site allows for a better user experience and also allows for your site to be seen as a little more trustworthy when compared to some of your competitors.

    3) Make it search-engine friendly: So you now have a site that just looks stunning! Your site is organized properly, attractive to visitors, and reads and functions naturally to the human eye. Regardless of how good it looks, if the search engine spiders can’t access your site’s information, no one will be able to visit your site. Make sure all content, pictures, pages, and URLs (just to name a few) are accessible to the search engines.

    If you could give advice to a new client starting up their first SEO campaign, what would you say?

    SEO is a marathon, not a sprint.  I have many clients who come to me with larger-than-life goals for their campaign. While the competitive streak in me is eager to accept a challenge, I always want to make sure realistic goals and expectations are set properly. If you want to rank on page one tomorrow, launch a paid search campaign. If you want to build strength, trust, and authority to your site, run a properly optimized SEO campaign. Results traditionally aren’t immediate, but SEO is a great way to naturally increase your search presence.  Once we lay the foundation and the campaign starts to pick up speed, we can see the rankings “increase to infinity and beyond” as one of my clients put it.

    What’s your favorite thing about working at Search Influence?  Anything in particular you could live without?

    Something that makes Search Influence different than other companies is our staff and work space. Our office is full of monitors, MacBooks Airs, and extremely talented young professionals plugged in and focused on their work. Our staff is not only talented, but energetic and brings so much personality to this company. The team is constantly looking for ways to improve day-to-day internal processes, deliverables to increase the success of our clients’ campaigns, as well as our overall brand.

    SI has a finite amount of candy at the office. There is a love/hate relationship between the team members and the candy supply. I’m trying to quit, but candy is always in the office taunting me.  There are brief periods when the candy supply is low. I secretly enjoy this time without candy, but everyone else in the office starts shaking and needs their candy fix. I think I could live without the candy in the office, but I might miss the constant battle to cut down the candy.  Strange enough, this bonds us a little. But let’s quickly move on to the next question before someone yells at me for speaking out against our candy supply.

    Tell us a little more about your life growing up around The Big Easy.  In your free time, what do you do for fun?

    I am New Orleans through and through. Although we may be called the “Big Easy” there are always events going on in this town. Between races, social events, restaurant openings, or fundraisers there’s always something to do down here.

    gab2

    In a perfect world, left to your own devices, what would you be doing all day?

    When I’m not at the office I’m probably at one of the events mentioned above.  Yet, subconsciously I’m still working, networking, and meeting new people.  Since a lot of people aren’t extremely familiar with SEO or Internet marketing for that matter, I’m always explaining how Search Influence helps companies all over the country promote their business and increase their search presence. I never leave the house without a stack of business cards.

    One last hard hitting question —- If you could identify yourself with one designer brand what would it be and why?

    That’s easy, DVF (Dianne Von Furstenburg)! Her line is classic, professional, and fashion forward. She’s been rocking it for decades and still vogue — just one of my own aspirations!

  • Where Do We Get Our News — the Source of Social Media or Social Media as Source?

    It’s always up for debate on what’s “newsworthy.” In the time before computers, newspaper and newscasts were the ones that dictated what was important in the world.  What they considered “news” and a “must-know” became what was published and what we did know.

    But now things are different — very different.  With social media sites like Facebook, and Twitter, we are seeing more and more that the applications of social media as news source are quickly growing. 

    Let’s take the recent death of singer Whitney Houston, for example. Within the first hour of her death, over two and a half million people tweeted about the tragic story, averaging about 1,000 tweets per second.  The traditional news outlet will not go live about such a story without proper verification, which takes precious time. By the time those outlets did go public, the story was “old news” to these two and a half million viewers: an entire 42 minutes late, in fact. Twitter was indisputably the first one to the finish line.

    This is a prime example of the growing collective consciousness caused by these sites. Think about how many followers each person may have, then think about how rapidly a story as gripping as a long-beloved singer’s tragic death can spread from person to person. While this system has its advantages in quickly disseminating stories, though, its speed can be a double-edged sword; Twitter rumor-mongering can spread like wildfire, with false reports of celebrity deaths and other incidents gaining legs where traditional journalism’s insistence fact-checking would have prevented the publication of such a story.

    Other “newsworthy” incidents that spread like fire at a gas station include the death of Michael Jackson, which averaged at about 493 tweets per second in 2009.  The announcement of Grammy-winning chanteuse Beyoncé’s pregnancy had one of the highest ever with 8,868 tweets per second. Now let’s take something like the death of Osama Bin Laden, who is obviously not in the entertainment industry. This incident let to an average of about 5,000 tweets per second. The list can go on.

    Can you imagine if another war would to start?  How quickly the world would know.  If Twitter was around in the 60’s, how fast would people Tweet about the death of JFK?  The landing on the moon?  The fall of the Berlin Wall? Single-source outlets and the “gatekeeping” of which stories are publicized are obsolete: all people need is a computer or a cell phone to have the entire web, with its intricacies and viewpoints and thousands upon thousands of stories at their fingertips.

    These sites are not only used for the quick spread of breaking news, but for event gathering as well. For instance, the Occupy Wall Street movement seems to have popped up overnight across America.  How did they do it?  It wasn’t thousands of dollars of advertising: Occupy Wall Street was a completely Internet-based movement.

    Using a great tagline, “We are the 99%,” Occupy Wall Street used tweets, Facebook events, and Youtube videos to get its message across.  The effect of such a movement will definitely go down in future generation’s history books.

    So let’s look at this from a business point of view: with the way that social media is evolving, how can marketers get themselves into the mix?  The answer is that they must find a way to get people to tweet, Facebook share and interact with their product, service, or brand the same way the social media consciousness does for events and topics it finds important.

    This is the future of getting your news heard and many successful businesses are already on top of this.  They’re using these social media networks to get themselves talked about.  Letting the consumer be the advertiser.  The more a business’s product or service is shared and spoken about via these networks, the more brand targeting and awareness they get.

    For example, on October 4th, 2011, millions tweeted and posted about the iPhone 4S.  Over seven thousand people alone posted something about Siri, the new voice assistant application.  Yes, Apple spent millions on advertising its obvious success — but a good chunk of the advertising work was being done for them by the social network community.

    So where can this go?  A stronger bond between companies and customers or celebrities and fans?  A greater union between the citizens of Planet Earth?  Time will tell, but the most important thing is to keep sharing, keep tweeting, keep posting, keep your place in social media — and the social web will evolve on its own.

    Right now, we are in a crucial time in human communications, when the entire world is more connected than ever before and information spreads at the blink of an eye.  Click like, share this post, or leave a comment — you’ll never know who you’ll connect with!

  • Why We Share: It’s Going Viral!

    Everyone out there is sharing and talking about the latest crazy thing they saw online.  “Did you see that video?” “Have you heard about that picture of [so and so]?”  We’ve all heard it.  We’ve all said it.  Viral sharing is so ingrained in our cultural subconscious that one may not even realize that this is just the beginning of 21st century marketing.

    Through websites such as YouTube, StumbleUpon, Digg, Pinterest, and Facebook, we are seeing that average people, not just celebrities, are providing worldwide commercial and “niche” entertainment. Independent artists are getting their visions seen.  Video bloggers are getting their voices heard.  Little moments in life that would normally be forgotten are now being shared with the world.

    But this is not just for entertainment value anymore. It can be a new jumping off point for small to big businesses that provides the opportunity to create value and ROI through the means of social sharing.

    Just another Awkward Family Photo

    So let’s start with the simplest question: “why?”  Why is viral marketing spreading the way it is?  Why is it that some things explode with popularity while other things are left in the world of the blind?  Instead of going through a sociological breakdown of it all, let’s just keep it simple.

    1.   It’s Hilarious

    • Embarrassing Content – the worst human condition possible.  However it is always funnier when it happens to someone else.
    • Cute Content – Whether it be furry animals dancing, silly babies yapping, or an owl being petted.
    • Outrageous or Satire – Comedy skits such as Derrick Comedy and Shit Girls Say that delve into the absurdly funny.

    2.  It Can Connect

    • Political Content – Videos, blogs, or pictures that represent what side of the political line we fall under
    • Personal Content – What it’s like to go through a breakup, the struggles of quitting smoking, or being insecure about one’s image are quite universal and people can relate to it.
    • Religious Content – A sharing of spiritual beliefs in a world of a thousand religions. Why I Hate Religion But Love Jesus received almost 12 million views in just 5 days.
    PostSecret allows people to share their secrets anonymously.

    3.  It’s Shocking and or Interesting

    • Shocking – Cars flipping on the interstate, old ladies hitting police officers, or rioters being maced.  Things that we don’t normally see that prove that this is no ordinary world.
    • Interesting – Whether it be scientific research like the marshmallow test, or the broadening of a subject matter, interesting topics can keep us deep into research for hours on end.

    So what does this mean for SEO?  Not only can a viral marketing piece entertain and have a mass audience buzzing,  it can be a great way to promote brand awareness and link sharing through authoritative sites.  By creating a share-worthy piece of content, companies can expect that more and more views can be achieved, thus placing their product or services deeper into the human awareness.

    “Did you see that video?” “Have you heard about that picture of [so and so]?”  So the next time you hear it, the next time you say it, ask yourself why.  What’s the last thing you shared?