Social Media Marketing for Travel Brands and Services ...

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The recent increase in the volume of people going online to examine and plan their holidays has prompted vacation brands to develop an excellent digital presence. Although some are still testing the actual waters, many vacation brands have already manufactured social media an integral part of their own marketing strategy. Tech-savvy travel businesses are looking to make their websites a one-stop search for users who want almost all travel related info in one place. Whether it is last-minute travel tips, destination data or attractive delivers, everything is just a look away. According to the 2011 Digital camera Travel Content and User Experience Survey carried out by Frommer?s Unlimited:

72% in the 18-24 demographic said that they?d share their journey experiences online through Facebook; twitter and also travel blogs taken into account 27% and 26% of usage respectively.
93% of the answerers said that they would use the internet for information about their holiday destination ?before determining where to go.

The recent spurt in the number of travelers going online to plan trips and also research holiday destinations has made australia social media an attractive method for travel makes. Here are some more reasons why the travel customers are going social:

Tech-savvy take a trip agencies are using social media to communicate with potential customers and keep existing customers updated with the most recent offers and information.
Increasing brand visibility is also a substantial priority for many journey companies.
Using social media monitoring tools such as Model Monitor, brands really are a) keeping a tabs on travel suggestions by existing buyers to their friends t) studying the impact of their online marketing strategy and how nicely it has been received through customers c) being aware is important to vacationers and anticipating the requirements and d) overseeing their brand?s position within just all the online routes and networks.
Many vacation companies are using social media marketing for providing beneficial content, which will create their expertise after a while, subsequently boosting traffic and revenue.
Social press can function as a program for information trade and on-site referrals; companies can use this with regard to converting customers in order to brand advocates.

Position2?s investigation on social media strategies for travel brands ended in some interesting studies: as a travel sector professional, there are about three crucial points many of us recommend you keep planned:
1. Create that Perfect Webpage

No matter what your business objectives are, we believe a properly designed web-page is essential to have your audiences? attention whilst them coming back for far more. A webpage with too many marketing messages and too less details may keep away prospects or give them a reason to look elsewhere. Keep in mind, content plays an important role in the user?s encounter on websites, which has an effect on conversion rates and devotion. As a travel brand, your social media website should:
Focus on the Important information First

Focus on the Right information First: Finding the reduce to ?how much information? you can include in your homepage can sometimes be challenging. Visitors to your internet site or social media page naturally want to know travel-related info and tips; why not include these very first and provide links for other details. Any travel brand?s home page must ideally include: any) information on what hotels they should stay along with airlines they can employ b) basic specifics of the most popular holiday destinations they are able to visit at that time of the year c) places to look at and things to do upon arriving at a destination d) last minute special deals and e) beneficial tips for first time global travelers. Frommer?s study also shows that 88% of travelers looked for description with the destination and information about special offers on a take a trip site.
Be Visually Attractive: The right balance regarding content and images is essential to keep users captivated. Once you have their attention, then their fascination with that lovely holiday resort pictured will ensure your requests for concerns follow.
Feature Social Applications to Connect: Traveling is a social activity and individuals make travel selections largely based on recommendations of their family and friends. Social apps such as Tripadvisor?s take a trip map leverage this particular and show people the destinations where their Facebook pals have traveled.
Be User-Friendly: Frommer?s research on consumer experiences on travel websites specified bad navigation and complicated site layout to become among the biggest problems faced by individuals when looking for information. 58% from the users said that the data they were looking for ended up being hard to find, because a distinct site was not an easy task to navigate. Our idea? Keep it simple and user-friendly. Your prospective customers are generally regular people who will basically opt for your opponent?s website when faced with direction-finding issues.

2. Select the right Platform

According to the current L2 Think Tank, Electronic digital IQ Index regarding travel report, social media marketing is responsible for driving 78% of the traffic on take a trip websites. Travel organizations are exploring every one of the possibilities in the social media marketing space in order to bring customers and increase revenue. Twitter accounts, Myspace pages and weblogs are filled with travel tips, destination information and user reviews. Is a good idea? Yes, in case your brand is in the very same league as Unhappy Planet. The popular take a trip brand has a Myspace presence, a Twitter account and a weblog; this is in addition to it?s travel specific social media site. However, we suggest checking out the competition and researching online (find out where your customers devote their time in the social media space) before deciding what social websites channels work best in your case.

For more information about australia web design please visit the website.

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Gold fever sweeps South Sudan ahead of new mining law

NANAKANAK, South Sudan (Reuters) - Taking a break from the toil of digging, Leer Likuam sat on the edge of a shallow trench, puffed his pipe and boasted he once found a 200-gram gold nugget bigger than his thumb.

In Nanakanak, a village of stick huts in an area that has attracted hundreds of diggers since Sudan's civil war ended in 2005, Likuam's find would have been lucrative but unexceptional.

"Everything is luck," he said through a translator. On an average day he might dig up six grams, worth around 1,200 South Sudanese pounds ($270), he said. "Some days you're lucky."

Word of Nanakanak's riches has spread. In the capital Juba, international mining firms are lining up at South Sudan's ministry of petroleum and mining, aiming to get their hands on part of the vast, unexplored territory.

Officials say firms from China, Australia, the United States, South Africa and other African countries plan to apply for licenses when new mining laws are passed later this month. After many delays, parliament is set to begin debate on the bill on Monday.

The South voted to secede from Sudan, then Africa's sixth-largest exporter of oil, in a referendum last year.

The new nation inherited three-quarters of the united country's oil production, but in January a row with Khartoum led it to shut down the industry whose receipts gave South Sudan 98 percent of its income.

The sudden loss of funds prompted Juba to introduce severe austerity measures, centralize and expand tax collection and explore fresh sources of revenue to replace petrodollars.

Oil production is expected to restart in the next couple of weeks, reaching around 230,000 bpd by the end of the month, but in the meantime the government hopes to pass mining legislation that will formalize the industry, let them tax precious metal and mineral exports and sell concessions to large-scale investors.

"It will diversify the economy. The mining sector has great potential," Petroleum and Mining Minister Stephen Dhieu Dau told Reuters.

VIRGIN TERRITORY

On the international market, Likuam's prize lump would fetch $11,000, an enormous sum in a country where the average teacher earns just 360 South Sudanese pounds, about $90, per month.

Likuam isn't the only man with the golden touch.

Around him dozens of other Toposa tribesmen and women, festooned with plastic necklaces, brass piercings and beaded amulets, hack away at the red soil with metal poles and shovels, digging small craters in a boozy revelry.

Despite the morning hour, girls distribute crates of lager, "sarko" moonshine and pitchers of bitter-smelling beer brewed from sorghum.

Many of the miners claim to have found nuggets of a rival size, or even larger.

Nobody knows the extent of South Sudan's mineral reserves because the 22-year war prevented exploration.

The latest geological surveys date back to the 1970s and 80s, but mining officials say diamond and gold deposits in South Sudan's mineral-rich neighbors are encouraging. They describe the 16-month-old country as virgin territory.

"We are neighbors to the DR Congo and Central African Republic so we can't rule anything out. Geology doesn't know borders," said James Kundu, acting director general for geological surveying at the ministry.

As well as gold and diamonds, he lists potential deposits of chromite, copper, uranium, manganese and a belt of iron ore, which is often associated with aluminum. A lot of records were lost in the war. One report by a Belgian company was half-eaten by termites, Kundu said.

"There's a lot of stuff here but people don't know about it. They're too focused on oil," said one international gold trader who preferred not to be named in connection with the as-yet unregulated trade.

"It's the best stuff I've seen in central Africa," he said, explaining that the samples he's tested show a purity of over 22 carats (91.6 percent gold) compared to around 18 carats in the Central African Republic.

COW BANKING

Locally, artisanal miners like Likuam are making their fortune, investing much of the money in the traditional method of storing wealth - cattle. In the last year alone, Likuam has bought 10 cows, each worth around 1,000 pounds.

In another nearby artisanal mining spot called Napotpot, Julia Lakalay panned the red earth with water she had carried two km (one mile).

"The gold mining has completely changed my life," she said, swathed in colored beads and spattered with mud. "In my village I could not even earn 1 pound. Now I'm earning 200 pounds per day."

Merchants in Kapoeta, a local town of tin-shack pubs, dirt roads and scampering goats, say the price of gold is inflated by the scarcity of dollars, a problem across the country since the oil shutdown.

In the absence of banks or an official exchange rate between the pound and the Kenyan shilling, Kapoeta's economy relies on gold as a form of cross-border currency.

"The main purpose to buy gold is to change currency. We buy gold, take it to Kenya, sell it to dealers, and buy more stock to bring back," said Kenyan businessman Junius Njeru, weighing a pile of gold nuggets.

"It's in your pocket, nobody searches you," he said, describing the process of taking the gold across the border.

Miners sell the gold for around 200 pounds ($46) per gram, leaving traders a narrow profit margin for resale on the international market at $55.

"BIG POTENTIAL"

Officials hope the new mining law will bring this trade out of the black market and, by selling land to prospecting companies, eventually let the national and state governments benefit from the underground treasure.

The mining companies with 42 so-called "grandfather" exploration permits approved by the semi-autonomous southern government before independence will have two weeks to claim their licenses after the bill passes through parliament, which could take as little as one day.

Norway, the United States and Botswana helped draft the law that caps large-scale exploration licenses at 2,500 square km. To prevent exploration companies from sitting on the land, the law forces them to surrender 50 percent of their concession every time they renew their contracts, which will be variable.

Firms that find enough minerals to start digging can convert their license into a mining permit.

"If you put them in a queue, there's at least 20 meters of investors waiting to get a license ... Others must know that if they want something, they must come quickly," said Rainer Hengstmann, a ministry adviser working for consultant firm Adam Smith International.

However, in a landlocked country with just 300 km of paved road, Hengstmann cautioned it will take many years to get commercial mining off the ground.

"You need a railway if you want to go large-scale. It will take time. They really need roads and power," he told Reuters, echoing investors' complaints about the lack of infrastructure.

Ministry officials say two firms, New Kush and Consolidated Mineral and Energy Resources Investment Company (CMERIC), are exploring actively on their grandfather licenses.

But Equator Gold, a British company working on the CMERIC license, says it will still take several years to actually produce anything.

"I think there's going to be a big rush to get land but exploration takes a long time," said Emma Parker, the firm's chief operations officer. "The progress has been slow but the geology is interesting. There's big potential."

(Editing by Alexander Dziadosz and Sonya Hepinstall)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/gold-fever-sweeps-south-sudan-ahead-mining-law-134751998.html

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Lady Gaga donates $1 million for storm relief

By Rebecca Macatee, E! Online

Gareth Cattermole / Getty Images

Lady Gaga is famous around the world, but she'll never forget where she comes from. On Wednesday, the pop star pledged $1 million to the American Red Cross to help with Hurricane Sandy relief in New York.?

Gaga devastated by Sandy, her childhood is underwater

"If it wasn't for NYC: the Lower Eastside, Harlem, the Bronx and Brooklyn, I would not be the woman or artist that I am today," Gaga, 26, posted on her Little Monsters blog. "New York is relentless ambition, a drive to succeed, a place where there is a natural pursuit of diversity through compassion."

"Please accept this gift on behalf of myself, my parents Joe and Cynthia, and my sister Natali; with our deepest gratitude New York for raising us," she added. "Thank you for helping me build my spirit. I will now help you rebuild yours. Sincerely, Lady Gaga and The Germanottas"?

Louis C.K. took on Sandy with the help of 'Saturday Night Live'

Gaga, of course, isn't the only celeb wanting to help those suffering after Sandy. Chelsea Handler donated $100,000 to the Red Cross in John C. Reilly's name, Adam Levine made himself a poster boy for the organization and Christina Aguilera, Bruce Springsteen and countless other stars helped raise $23 million in NBCUniversal's "Hurricane Sandy: Coming Together" telethon.?

See more celeb do-gooders?

If you'd like to help, text REDCROSS to 90999 ($10 donation) or visit redcross.org?

Related content:

More in Entertainment:

Source: http://todayentertainment.today.com/_news/2012/11/07/14997398-lady-gaga-donates-1-million-to-red-cross-for-hurricane-relief?lite

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UK scientists developing lower-cost 20Gbps broadband, 40Gbps on the cards

Imagine a world where you can download 20 full-length movies in a second. Well, that's a reality a team of scientists based in Bangor, Wales are fighting for. They are researching ways of cramming more data down fiber-optic cables and negating "dispersion" (the deterioration of data when carried over longer distances at increased rates). Previous attempts to solve the issue have focused on more fibers, more lasers and other signal-boosting techniques. The team in Bangor are focusing their attention on existing Optical Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing technology. By developing a method to convert data into electrical waves, and then into optical data, which can be decoded at the either end with their proprietary system. While the 20Gbps speeds they are working with are far from unheard of, the key is making them practical and accessible to consumers, without expensive new infrastructure. The next steps are to look at ways of commercializing the technique, but the scientists think there's still potential for improvement, believing speeds of up to 40Gbps being possible, meaning fast connections that can multitask.

Filed under: Science, Internet, Alt

UK scientists developing lower-cost 20Gbps broadband, 40Gbps on the cards originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 06 Nov 2012 11:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/1A6aVvJ0f4o/

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How many ways can you use rhetorical questions in your speech?

A rhetorical question is a common rhetorical device where a question is asked by a speaker, but no answer is expected from the audience. This distinguishes it from explicit verbal audience interaction where a speaker asks a question, and then waits for a response or calls on someone to answer it.

You are certainly aware of this technique, but are you aware that you can use a rhetorical question in at least nine different ways? No? Read on!

This article identifies nine ways to use rhetorical questions, and provides examples throughout.

Strategies when asking rhetorical questions

Like other speech techniques, rhetorical questions can be used in a variety of ways, depending on the needs of the speaker and the speech.

It is rarely necessary to ask a rhetorical question; there is nearly always another way to convey the same idea without using a question. But rhetorical questions, like other rhetorical devices, add variety and interest to a speech.

Here are nine strategies that can be fulfilled (often in combination) with a carefully crafted rhetorical question:

1. Engage the audience to think with a rhetorical question.

The most popular use of a rhetorical question is to engage your audience to think. If your entire speech is a series of statements, your audience may passively listen?and absorb little. On the other hand, you can make them active participants in your speech by inviting them to think about your arguments. This is most effective if they are asked to think about an issue from a fresh perspective.

For example, suppose you are delivering a goal achievement seminar. While many people feel that external forces prevent them from realizing their goals, you might engage your audience to think about their self-defeating behaviors:

Setting goals is easy, but achieving them isn?t so simple. How are you sabotaging yourself?

2. Invite your audience to agree with you by asking a rhetorical question.

To persuade your audience, they must see you as credible. One way to build credibility is to convince your audience that you are similar to them and share their beliefs. One way to do this is by asking a rhetorical question where the answer has the audience agreeing with you, perhaps even nodding their head in agreement.

For example, suppose you are speaking at a networking event for working mothers, and you represent a local health spa:

Given how hard you work ? both at the office and at home ? don?t you deserve a day at the spa?

[When your audience silently answers "Yes, I do deserve that", the effect is that they see themselves as more similar to you.]

3. Stir emotions by asking a rhetorical question.

Effective speakers know how to stir audience emotions. Rhetorical questions do this by making the audience a partner in your emotional statements. Instead of delivering one-way emotional statements, you can involve your audience more emotionally by hooking them with a rhetorical question.

For example, suppose you are at a political rally. Instead of saying:

They?ve never done anything to help us.

Try:

What have they ever done to help us?

The latter version is stronger, because it triggers an emotional response by having the audience thinking ?Nothing! They?ve done nothing!?

4. Emphasize a previous statement with a rhetorical question.

Rhetorical questions can be used as an exclamation point on a preceding statement. While the preceding statement may be a factual statement, a rhetorical question forces your audience to think hard about it.

For example, suppose you are speaking out against gang violence in your community:

17 of our sons and daughters have already died in gang-related crime. How many will it take before we act?

5. Invoke misdirection with a rhetorical question.

Careful use of misdirection in a speech is an effective way of generating audience surprise, and this results in them being active participants. One form of misdirection is when you make a statement which leads in one direction, and then follow it up with a statement that pulls in the opposite direction.

For example, suppose you are trying to motivate your sales department:

Financial analysts in our industry predict that sales are going to be down next year. But does that prediction apply to us? [... and then you go on to show why it does not...]

In the above example, the rhetorical question followed a contrasting statement. But this pattern can be reversed with the rhetorical question preceding a contrasting statement. For example:

Why would anyone care about the polling data, when it has proven to be inaccurate in the past? The primary reason is that polling firms have been using entirely different methods this time?

6. Ask and answer a rhetorical question your audience may be thinking.

Thorough audience analysis will reveal many questions that members of your audience may have. Rather than waiting to address these questions following your speech (e.g. in a Q&A session), you can address them in the body of your speech by asking the question and immediately answering it.

For example, imagine that you are speaking to a new parents? support group:

As a new parent, you often wonder: What can I do to give my child an intellectual jump start? The answer is reading aloud to them every day.

Or, consider another example:

Why is it important to exercise our right to vote? Voting is a duty of active citizenship!

7. Answer a question with another rhetorical question.

A common technique to answer a question (either one you have raised, or one coming from your audience) is to respond with a rhetorical question. This is done when the two questions (the one you were asked, and the one you responded with) have the same answer (typically, either ?yes? or ?no?).

For example:

Will we win the contract? Is the sky blue?

The obvious answer to the second question is ?yes?, and this implies the answer to the first is also ?yes?.

Or, consider another example:

Do you think we should give up on our school and close it? Do pigs fly?

This time, the obvious answer to the second question is ?no?, and this implies the answer to the first is also ?no?.

Beware when using this technique as it can sound cliche to your audience. If you can, make the second question fresh and unique to your audience.

8. Ask a series of rhetorical questions to highlight divergent thoughts.

When speaking about a particularly complex issue, one technique that reinforces this complexity is to ask a series of questions which, if answered, would all point in different directions.

For example:

How can we stop bullying in school? Is the answer to educate the bullies? Or educate those being bullied? Do we need more supervision on playgrounds? How about stricter penalties for offenders? [...]

A series of questions like this might be used in the opening of a speech, while the body of the speech might follow up on the individual questions one by one.

9. Ask a series of rhetorical questions to highlight convergent thoughts.

A series of rhetorical questions can also be used in situations where, if the questions were answered, all of the answers would point in the same direction. This technique is a variation on repetition and could be used to emphasize a point repeatedly.

For example:

Who has turned around our club and made it prosperous? Who is tireless in her devotion to this club? Who is our undisputed leader? Of course I am speaking of our club president Laurelle who we honor here today.

What do you think?

That?s not a rhetorical question. I really do want to hear what you think. Please add a comment to share your ideas about how to use rhetorical questions.

Source: http://sixminutes.dlugan.com/rhetorical-questions/

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Best Android apps this week

Zombie Driver THD

$6.74?Google Play
Zombie Driver was first released as a PC game on Steam back in 2009, and now it's available to Tegra-packing Android phones for the first time. Mixing cars, speed, explosions and zombies, it's a high-octane thriller packed with 31 different missions and unrelenting packs of the undead. With a whole host of crazy vehicles and upgradeable weapons at your disposal, zombie killing has never been so fun. Don't fancy the campaign mode? There's also the Blood Race Tournament and Slaughter mode to try out as well, giving you plenty of zombie-packed gameplay.

Photo Punch

Free Google Play
If you like the idea of bringing a little bit more creativity to your smartphone snaps, Photo Punch allows you to mash a number of images together into one. First, pick the part of your image you'd like to "punch" out using the outline tool, then superimpose it onto your background image, or choose one from the Photo Punch library instead. No doubt hilarious consequences will ensue ? putting a cat's head onto a squirrel's body is certainly what we'll be doing first.

Movember Mobile

Free Google Play
It's that time of year once again, where men across the country ditch their razors for a whole month and leave their moustaches to grow freely. No, it's not a hipster invasion, but Movember? ? an annual event to raise cash and awareness for men's health charities. This accompanying app allows Movember participants to request and track donations, update people on their Mo progress with statuses and photos, and even recruit people to join their Mo team. Step away from the razor and get involved.

Fontly

Free Google Play
Typographic geeks will have a field day with Fontly ? a place to collect, share and explore the wealth of vintage typography found all over the world. To get involved, you simply take a picture of the lettering you've found, title and tag it using the provided categories and then it will automatically be geo-tagged and added to Fontly's feed, map and website. You can then browse other people's photos by time, location or best rated to get your font fix.

This article originally appeared at Stuff.tv

Source: http://www.pcauthority.com.au/News/272811,best-android-apps-this-week.aspx?utm_source=feed&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=PC+&+Tech+Authority+Reviews+feed+-+Latest+Articles

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Warming temperatures cause aquatic animals to shrink the most

ScienceDaily (Nov. 5, 2012) ? Warmer temperatures cause greater reduction in the adult sizes of aquatic animals than in land-dwellers in a new study by scientists from Queen Mary, University of London and the University of Liverpool.

The research published Nov 5 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) shows that the body size of marine and freshwater species are affected disproportionately by warmer temperatures. This could have implications for aquatic food webs and the production of food by aquaculture.

The researchers compared the extent to which the adult size of 169 terrestrial, freshwater, and marine species responded to different non-harmful temperatures, in the largest study of its kind.

Summarising the results, co-author Dr Andrew Hirst from Queen Mary's School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, said:

"Aquatic animals shrink 10 times more than land-dwellers in species the size of large insects or small fish. While animals in water decrease in size by 5 percent for every degree Celsius of warming, similarly sized species on land shrink, on average, by just half a percent."

The research also demonstrates that the most likely cause of this difference in size is due to the much lower availability of oxygen in water than in air. Warming increases the need for oxygen by organisms on land and in water, however aquatic species have a much harder job meeting this increased demand.

Co-author Dr David Atkinson of the University of Liverpool explains:

"To satisfy increased demands for oxygen at higher temperatures, aquatic species have fewer options. Reducing the size at which they mature is their way of balancing oxygen supply and demand."

Lead author Dr Jack Forster also from Queen Mary's School of Biological and Chemical Sciences adds: "Given that fish and other aquatic organisms provide 3 billion people with at least 15 percent of their animal protein intake, our work highlights the importance of understanding how warming in the future will affect ocean, lake and river dwelling species."

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Queen Mary, University of London, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

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Journal Reference:

1. Jack Forster, Andrew G. Hirst, and David Atkinson. Warming-induced reductions in body size are greater in aquatic than terrestrial species. PNAS, November 5, 2012 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1210460109

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_environment/~3/wGMlrDORUuE/121105151334.htm

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