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We are entering the final quarter of the year. Nine months removed from the enthusiasm and focus of January. Between challenging clients and shifting deadlines, clarity can be evasive. Here are the five quotes that every entrepreneur and business owner should internalize to finish 2016 as strong as they started:

  1. “If you don’t pay the price for success, you’ll pay the price for failure.” – Zig Ziglar

Zig Zigler success quote

2. “Do not confuse having a good day with having good habits.” – Mikhail Bell

 

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3. “A business is just a context for doing interesting things.” – Tim O’Reilly

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4. “Legacy is greater than currency.” – Gary Vaynerchuk

Legacy vs Currency Gary Vaynerchuk quote ParkerMather

5. “One of the most supernatural things you can do is be consistent.” – Mikhail Bell

Motivation quote Mikhail Bell

You have just over 116 days between you and 2017. Make them count. Take action.

Onward,

Team ParkerMather

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The Hillary Clinton campaign is killing it on Snapchat. For several months, I have followed both Hillary Clinton and the Trump campaign on the app. I saw fewer than half a dozen snaps from the latter and dozens from the former.

What is the value to the campaign?

Perspective: The Clinton campaign uses Snapchat to show behind the scenes snaps, giving followers off-stage and pre-speech exclusives. This is much more interesting than watching the televised recaps on Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN each night.

Demographics: According to Comscore, Snapchat’s year-over-year growth among users over 35% increased 84%. Additionally, younger and older voting age millennials (b. 1980-2000) are spending more time on the app and its audience is growing faster than on Instagram. (More on Snapchat’s strategy and growth compared to Instagram)

Activation: It is important to show up where voters spend meaningful time and do not expect to see you because it suggests you care and understand them. By giving good content, voters can relate more to “millionaires and billionaires” which will increase voter turnout.

On August 10, 2015, Hillary Clinton joined Snapchat. Here are three snaps from the July campaign trail and this week’s Democratic National Convention.

  1. The story is bigger than Her
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Former president Bill Clinton addresses the DNC in Philadelphia, PA.

2. User Generated Humor

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This DNC delegate knows who he is with.

3. Capturing Key Moments

 

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Clinton and Kaine appear together for the first time.

Thanks, Gary Vaynerchuk, for continuing to beat the Snapchat drum and inspiring this post!

 

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Instead of focusing on creating content, start listening to the conversation. Used properly, social media monitoring, or listening, can be a boon for small businesses in particular and communicators in general.

My favorite social media luminary, Gary Vaynerchuk started off on Twitter by listening. He used these obtservations to grow his following through genuine connections with other users. Vaynerchuk now has over 1 million followers and shows no signs of slowing down.

How Do I Monitor Trending Hashtags?

That depends. Social media monitoring should connect with a strategic goal, such as research about millennials on healthcare exchanges or fan reactions to Game 5 of the NLDS.

Here are three tools for social media listening:

  • Twitter Search: This is the most powerful and underused part of Twitter. Search lets you follow hashtags almost instantaneously, identify influencers, and displays popular images associated with the term.

NFL, Twitter, Colts, ParkerMather, social media listening

  • Topsy: Topsy aggregates Twitter mentions, total tweets over 1 hour or 30 days. In addition, users can clearly see which voices are dominating the conversation.

Topsy, NFL, 49ers, ParkerMather, Social Media Monitoring

  • Social Mention: In response to one, Social Mention opens a galaxy of associated search terms from across the Web. This includes related keywords, trending topics, and sources. Tie this information back to Twitter search and add context to the online conversations.

Social Mention, ParkerMather, Twitter

There are a multitude of social media listening tools out there for communicators. Try these three and see what else complements the brand’s goals!

Do not forget to celebrate victory.

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Fact: Jason Bateman (@batemanjason) and Will Arnett (@arnettwill) are on Twitter.
Fact: Jason Bateman (@batemanjason) and Will Arnett (@arnettwill) are on Twitter.

Gary Vaynerchuk is one of my favorite marketing personalities. He is energetic, and more importantly, sees tech developments a few years ahead of time. Vaynerchuk rose to fame with Wine Library TV before publishing the bestselling personal branding primer Crush It. During his tenure, he more than quadrupled revenue at his family’s wine store.

Vaynerchuk is important to this blog post because he credits search.twitter.com, formerly semize.com, with making him wealthy. Twitter’s search mechanicism is probably its least used and most powerful feature. Using search effectively one can quickly access data, discern sentiment and effectively engage with users in their ecosystem.

After reading long reports each week, I am a big fan of quick reads in the morning. Here are a few articles to better understand advanced search:

Best,

Mikhail

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Dig in.

From a young age we are groomed to seek out the perfect life partner. First we find attraction. Then we learn about wooing the opposite sex. Eventually dating becomes a regular part of life. Finally, we commit to one person for the rest of our life. That is where the fun starts.

Gary Vaynerchuk spoke of our aspirations in the following way: “Brands mature over time, like a marriage. The bond you feel with your spouse is different than when you first met each other. Excitement and discovery are replaced by comfort and depth.”

We are groomed in a less structured way about commitment from our early days. Whether through sports, reading novels, or , we are implicitly taught that effort is fuel necessary to accomplish our goals.

Stop dating and put a ring on your goal. Divorce is not an option. Prenups, in this instance, are exits for the fainthearted. Instead find comfort and excitement in the journey.