Digital Marketing Agency vs. Freelancers: Who to Hire?

It is not a secret that digital marketing can give anyone’s business an incredible exposure in and out of the social media world. A small business can be a recognizable and successful venture especially if it is equipped with reputable sites, blogs, and links on reputable blogs, plus excellent customer feedback.

But, the success of any venture will not be possible if the people who will be behind the marketing campaign are not good and credible on what they will do. There are the marketing agencies who are equipped with people with the right attitude and the best of abilities to make your campaign the best. Also, some freelancers are passionate about their crafts in boosting your brand. 

There are many ways to choose between a freelancer or a marketing agency, but in this article, we will discuss reasons to hire either a freelancer and an agency which can surely help you decide.

Reasons to Hire a Freelancer

  1. Greater Flexibility

Since freelancers work as a one manpower man, they are more flexible to work with few people to work with which means fewer and simpler adjustments as well. Also, their dedication to their work is guaranteed since they work on a particular project at a particular time.

  1. Lower Costing

Compared to the rates of an agency, freelancers have lower rates, so they are more practical for simpler projects. Also, some of them are working for a certain project, so there is no need for a longer-term of the contract. 

  1. Focus on your Campaign

Dedication on your brand’s campaign guarantees their focus and passion to accomplish it on the schedule, and with your desired results. Freelance management isn’t an easy task but through finding the right freelancers, you’ll be able to achieve your goals.

Reasons to Hire a Marketing Agency

  1. Guaranteed consistency

If you are looking for a long-term project for a more sustainable campaign, the agency is the answer. Moreover, agencies can surely handle almost every aspect of your marketing aspect, from the website to every content of your campaign.

  1. Better discussions

Digital agencies, especially those that we consider working for the long term, would have to know your company’s visions and objectives so that they can align their marketing projects on the company’s goals. With these, you can talk to them regularly, ensuring that they can cater to your expectations, and expect them to send you comprehensive reports telling them on their developments.

  1. Assured quality of the work

Freelancers can give the best quality of their work too, but especially with a bigger project, digital agencies can make the most for your product. A good digital agency has every person equipped for every aspect the best project can have. Also, agencies always have the strategic methods that will make your project the best one. 

Which One is for You?

Both of the freelancers and digital marketing agencies can both be a great help in bringing your business to a higher level upon invading the digital marketing world. However, being clear of your goals, equipping yourself with researches and determining your budget are some of the things you have to know before fully deciding which of these two best options you will choose. 

Top 5 Apps to Boost Productivity

No matter what type of industry you are in, productivity is a must. The more productive your workforce is the higher revenue you can expect from your business. In fact, productivity has become a survival tool otherwise no business can sustain for the long run due to the huge market pressure and the competition. But the question is how would you bring productivity in your business? Here are the 5 apps to boost your office productivity.

Visitor Track – Visitor Management Software

Visitor Track is the cutting-edge visitor management application. This robust application will ease your visitor management process. Unlike paper-based manual visitor management process, this is fast, efficient and takes less than a minute to check in and check out. In short, the Visitor Track will accelerate your visitor management process.

Asset Tracker – Asset Management Software

Think about how much time you have to waste for managing your asset. Using the manual process is never enough. You need something that works faster and can keep you updated all the time so that you can take prompt decisions. Asset Tracker is such an answer to such productivity. Using Asset Tracker you can track your asset location, detail of its owner and can get the report when any issue arises or any repair required. The whole thing can be done from a single platform.  Its mobile version makes it more easy to access information from a remote location, which means you can always be updated. Isn’t it great!

Simple CRM – Customer Relationship Management Software

We all know, the customer is the king, if you cant satisfy your business can’t satisfy you. But for positive customer experience, you need a seamless customer management software that makes the whole process efficient and easy. Simple CRM is the perfect application for customer management. Using this application you can create, manage and communicate customers so effectively and productively. This application makes the process smooth that brings productivity in the process and enable you to deal more customer than before.

CircleCare – Employee Wellness Application

Circlecare is the employee wellness application. Using this app you can motivate your employees, encourage them, take care of their good health along, connect with them and engage with them. No doubt all these activities will motivate your employees and thus boost their overall productivity.

Fleet Manager – Fleet Management Application

Fleet Manager is the Fleet management application. This mobile and PC based application will ease your fleet management process. Make it easy for you and your organization to manage the number of fleets without any hassle. Using Fleet Manager you can schedule a vehicle, manage driver profile, manage vehicle reservation, manage trips, perform remote inspection and many more all from the one place.

So, these are the 5 apps that will surely boost your office productivity. All these apps run on the cloud which means you can use them from the first day without hassle. Now, it is your choice to stick to the age-old conventional system or to embrace these 5 apps for high productivity.

Backlog Management: Making Sure  Your Backlog Is Lean 

A lot goes into running an online business. An online business can be classified as a variety of different things. You can run a website, build software, create an app or a wide range of other ventures. While more and more people are venturing online to start a business, it isn’t an easy task. There is not only a lot of competition but many new startups (whether online or not), will fail.

However, running a business today can also be easier than ever. There are many tools, software, and programs that can help with numerous aspects of your business. For example, with how important coding is to many businesses, there have been several different tools that can assist with your coding and monitoring your app. If you want to learn more about some of them, check out this link: JavaScript Error Logging Service Error Handling.

Unfortunately, trying to do too much or bloating your company with tools or other things can also often be problematic. Clutter or bloating in a company can cause many issues, and this is especially true when it comes to your backlog. A backlog is a collection or list of different new features, bug fixes, changes and more than your team wants to implement. If this backlog is too big or clogged up with stuff, it can hurt your business in many ways. It can slow down innovation, lead to confusion and can greatly reduce your time to market. With that in mind, this article is going to look at a couple of different tips to ensure your backlog is lean. 

Do Your Best to Prevent or Eliminate Waste

When you have a ton of unnecessary items in your backlog, it does nothing but wastes both time and resources. It can also make it quite tough to focus on the actual important items that could be buried in the backlog. As a result, you should get rid of any unnecessary entrants. Reducing the inventory to only things that are essential can go a long way. 

In addition to this, you should be sure to prevent any future waste or overproduction in your backlog. This means you should only look to provide what customers and users actually need, and not try to go above and beyond by overproducing. This will keep everything clean and concise and helps people focus on what is most important. 

Know When to Say No

As you are likely aware, it can be incredibly challenging to say no. This is especially true at the workplace and responding to colleague or coworker requests. However, when dealing with your backlog, it is incredibly important to be able to say no. Any ideas or potential entries that don’t contribute to the overall goal of the team should be declined.

This will ensure your product, software, company or program never becomes bloated. Sure, turning ideas down can be disheartening, it needs to be done. The less amount of items within the backlog, the leaner it will be. Even if something might be important later on, refrain from adding to the backlog to ensure it stays lean. Instead, you could add it to your roadmap or simply keep it on the back burner until it is time to make use of it.

Manage and Prioritize Your Backlog 

Of course, how your team actually manages the backlog can have a huge impact on how lean it is. You need to come up with a management plan and ensure everyone is on the same page regarding it. Everyone should be a part of ensuring the backlog is continuously updated and kept fresh. 

In addition to managing the backlog, it needs to be prioritized as well. You and your team need to work together to decide when and how each item should be implemented. Is it needed right now? Or can it wait for a future update? Addressing this early and often will make sure your team always knows how to move forward. 

In conclusion, hopefully, this blog post is able to help you make sure your backlog is lean. 

Missed Financial Literacy Month? That’s Okay – Here are 4 Money Tips to Help You Clean up Your Finances

April was financial literacy month. Each year, lenders, financial educators, and investment teams send out content during financial literacy month designed to help people learn more about their money and manage it more effectively. If you missed financial literacy month, though, don’t fear! You can still undo bad money habits and make your way through the rest of the year in a better financial place.

Here are four smart money tips from Dealing With Debt to help you do just that.

1. Stop Spending More Than You Make

Living beyond your means is one of the most devastating money habits. It’s also one of the most common. Right now, about 50% of Americans live beyond their means. These families and individuals don’t have anything left for retirement, savings, investments, or emergencies.

If you want to stop this toxic money habit, the first step is to cut your spending and start building an emergency savings fund. Check out a budgeting app like You Need a Budget to get you started.

2. Stop Accumulating Debt

Personal debt is an issue that faces many American households Today, the average U.S. household has about $16,000 in credit card debt. If debt loads get high enough, they can start to impede other financial goals – like savings or investments.

To battle this habit, start by paying off short-term debt like credit cards. If you can’t deal with the debt on your own, look into debt relief options that will help you consolidate the amount you owe. Crushing debt is one of the first steps to financial freedom.

3. Put Your Savings to Work for You

If you’re saving money in an emergency fund, that money should be working as hard as possible for you. To this end, consider transferring the balance of your emergency fund into a high-yield account.

These accounts are offered by online banks like Marcus and Ally. Some of these accounts offer an APY as high as 2.25% – significantly greater than you’d find at a traditional bank or credit union.

4. Stop Ignoring Your Credit Score

Your credit score is a critical part of your financial life. If you want to keep it as healthy as possible, you’ve got to monitor it frequently. Today, credit cards issued by organizations like Discover and Chase offer built-in credit monitoring features. You should also know what you can do to improve your credit score – from lowering your debt load to making all your payments on time.

5. Start Educating Yourself

Money is a learned skill. While lots of people feel shame around money, you can only get better at it by seeking to actively learn about it. This means signing up for some financial literacy courses, reading some books on investing, or working with a service like The Financial Gym to improve your money management habits.

It’s never too late to celebrate financial literacy month. These five tips are an excellent place to start taking control of your money and growing your wealth!

7 Tips for Planning a Smooth Business Event

A company cannot afford to have a business event go wrong. The planning has to be done carefully for everything to fall in place. This is because companies mostly rely on business events to promote their products as well as foster the employee community.

Ideally, a business event has to be entertaining, informative and innovative. To achieve this package, the people in charge of planning have to understand exactly what is needed.

Check out some tips that will help you achieve a smooth business event plan:

  1. Develop a budget

When making a budget to work with, try not to underestimate or overestimate. Ensure your budget is reasonable. Negotiating will help you get good deals for the venue and hotels.

Have these big expenses as accurately as possible and do not hazard a guess as to how much you think it might cost. Get the quote in writing so there are no unexpected add-ons which can quickly blow a budget.

  1. Who is your target audience?

Before you start thinking about what you will need for the event, have your attendees in mind. List down all the potential guests that you are expecting. Once you identify your target market, it will be easy to plan the event.

Let everything from the venue, food, and drinks revolve around your guests’ preferences. Have some idea of numbers that will be attending as this will affect costs.

  1. What is the event’s purpose?

To have a successful business event, you should have the event’s purpose in mind throughout the planning. This will help you stay focused. Every decision you make will be to support the event’s main goal.

  1. Be right with the event date

You do not want your business event to collide with holidays or events organised by other companies.

Do thorough research before giving your event date. Ensure the date you assign is not too close to holidays or any other event that might tamper with your event’s turn out.

  1. Use an event planning template

While planning your business event, it is also important to prepare people for what is coming up.

Use an event planning template that allows you to add images, videos and maybe the seating arrangements of the proposed business event. Include videos and pictures of your previously planned events to have your clients know what to expect. Fill them with anticipation for the event to ensure maximum attendance.

  1. Emphasize on advertising and marketing

You might think that this tip is not important, but it is! Let the community know what you are planning. Let people know about the upcoming event through marketing and advertising.

Use the media to promote your event. This will keep your potential guests in the know. The guests continue their anticipation for the event.

  1. Go through your checklist

As an event planner, you need to confirm and re-confirm that everything is as expected in advance. You do not want to be a last minute person. Your boss will not appreciate you asking for extra money to cater for an extra budget that you never saw coming.

Cover all your bases and double check so any last minute issues can be dealt with before the event.

Make sure you make all payments are done within a reasonable time frame. Not meeting payment deadlines could have a negative influence on the event planning as well as the event itself. Make deposits when needed!

Go through your to-do list to make sure everything has been done as expected.

Image Pixabay License CCO

Sporting and social media – a match made in heaven

For centuries, sport has been part of our connection to one another. From participating to watching to reveling our shared glories, sport brings society together in a way that we could never have possibly imagined. More importantly, though, sport has managed to bring about massive societal change. In the modern world, though, the cult of celebrity means that for many athletes they are held up as examples, of symbols of a better tomorrow for all of us. It’s no wonder, then, that sport and social media are such a match made in heaven, right?

Sporting and social media - a match made in heaven

Sport has long been seen as one of the great unifies and dividers in society. Today, take a look at a sports club on social media. From small local community clubs to sporting titans like Real Madrid, Liverpool FC or the Los Angeles Lakers, social media plays a huge role in their growth. Millions of people follow major sporting clubs, especially on social media. And for years now, we’ve been noticing a happy correlation between sports teams and social media.

From hilarious gaffes to amazing tweets marking moments of celebration, social media brings us ever-closer to the sports we love. Indeed, the relationship between sport and the media has been changing for a long time. Popular studies have looked into the relationship between sport and media in the past. Interestingly, a lot of people tend to look at sports media as a rather hard place to get involved in. Why? Because, for a lot of people, they can connect with their team like never before.

How has social media changed sporting communication?

Go back a decade, and your only form of in-club communication would be their website, mailing list, matchday programme and, if they were a ‘big name’, TV station. This would often mean not getting anything like the same kind of coverage that you would want. Social media, then, has opened up a world where we can learn more about our clubs all the time. Now, we have a 24-hour rolling way to help know everything we want about every club that we like.

Have they got a match coming up? You can find out all about it. You can often even follow everything from their arrival at the match to their warm-ups and line-ups, all far in advance of when you would on the television. This incredible growth and spread of information is fuelled by demand. Instead of turning to news and media publications to get positive press, most sports now just produce their own news. In-house media, particularly social media, is an incredibly powerful tool.

Indeed, this has been a long-term viewpoint for a lot of sports fans. Go back to 2009, and it was already clear how sports and social networks could benefit one another – at least financially. Today, though, people use their spots social media pages as the perfect way to find out everything and anything that they can from their beloved teams.

How has social media changed sporting communication

Getting closer to the stars on the field

Part of the joy of using social media in the sporting environment, of course, is getting closer to the people who matter: the players. For years, the media management and PR side of sports has ruined the appeal of the player. Now, many professional athletes are seen as faceless, opinion-free people who just do the job on the field. In the past, though, athletes were seen as people as much as players. This is why social media is so important: it re-establishes the link between the fan and the player.

This was dead for a good few years. Many seen major sports stars as aloof, hard to connect with, or find any kind of love for. How could you love a multi-millionaire who would never even give you a second look in the street, the popular wisdom asked?

It’s easy: follow them on social media. As research from mobilesignalboosters shows, you can listen to their discussions, follow their days, and learn more about them as people. This is the age where we can find out directly from a sports star if they are being lied about in the press. In the past, we just had to take the word of the media as gospel. Now, sports stars are more than capable of taking command of their own personal messaging.

They can stand out from the crowd, and they can tell the world their own vision. No longer do they need to hide behind club public relationships officers or stick to the ‘happy’ version of a story. If a sportsman wishes to rally behind a cause or make a certain opinion known, it is arguably easier to do than ever.

The age of sports professionals having power of their own celebrity is here. Through social media, sports has found the perfect way to re-engage with a larger-than-ever audience.

Getting closer to the stars on the field

A second by second breakdown of the internet – source: mobilesignalboosters.uk.com

5 Reasons Why Your Small Business Needs a Virtual Address

With the digital age bringing in the rise of home-based jobs, work no longer refers to just a physical place that you go to. It’s broken the traditional notion of work as somewhere you go to, since work can now mean what you do rather than where you do your job.

For aspiring entrepreneurs and budding startups, building your business from the ground up can present you with a lot of things to consider. It won’t just take one big idea for your company to flourish; You’ll need many investments, but the great thing is that you don’t have to go broke with these!

One of the best ways to make sure you’re putting your money where it matters is by investing in a virtual business address, instead of shelling out money for a physical office.

The prices of commercial spaces are skyrocketing, making it almost impossible for startups to have their own office space. There is a hefty price tag on this, since you’ll have to worry about lease, maintenance, and bills for the upkeep of a physical office.

If you dedicate a portion of your capital budget to a commercial space, you may find yourself in a tight spot. Rather than being able to dedicate the money to technology or workers that can improve your business, you will have to dent your savings for an office space.

This is where virtual business addresses can help your business grow and develop with you.

The concept of a virtual office has been around for a few years, but if you’re only hearing about it now, we’ve got you covered.

A virtual business address provides business owners with an actual address in which they can receive mail and use on their calling cards and websites. This gives you all the perks of an actual workplace, without all the financial frills.

You may be thinking, why would your small business even need a virtual business address? Well, here are the top five reasons you need to invest in one right away:

Privacy

The common theme among startups or small businesses is that it’s usually run from home. The rookie mistake many make is that they cite their private home address as their office address. Doing this leaves one vulnerable to many security and privacy issues that can be easily avoided with a virtual business address.

While operating from home saves you a lot of money, it can also put you at risk to spam, or other privacy concerns. However, if you opt for a virtual address, you will be able to protect your privacy.

In case you need to receive mail from customers, it also provides you with a PO box number, or they can even send things to the virtual address. Your mail is forwarded to you, so you won’t have to worry about missing any important parcels or letters.

Saves money

This may be the most important perk to small businesses on a tight budget. Since a virtual address for business is only a small fraction of what getting an actual office will cost, you’ll be able to save a lot of money.

By carefully cutting corners, you’ll be able to focus on what matters to your company. This means that you can put more financial support on business features that will make your company grow. Since you’ll be redirecting funds that were to be used on an office space to something more important, you’ll be helping your company grow and develop.

A diverse work pool

As a business owner, your choice in employees will be remarkably limited if you have an actual location for work. Your work pool is composed of those in the vicinity, and you won’t have the luxury of sourcing talent outside of it.

A virtual address allows your small business to operate from home, empowering you and your workers to do jobs wherever they feel comfortable. Doing this also allows you to look for the best fit for the task without worrying about your employee’s location.

Professionalism

Your customers are less likely to have confidence in your company if they see that you’re working out of your basement in some suburban home. This is why your location matters when it comes to building trust, and boosting your company’s value.

A professional-looking address situated in a commercial area will make your brand seem more attractive and legitimate to potential clients. Virtual business addresses give you this perk without breaking the bank.

Ease of expansion

The only thing constant is change and, as your business grow, you’ll find yourself having to move spaces if you opt for a physical office.

Expanding offices means that you’ll have to pay a heftier lease and shell out money for construction, decoration, etc. All of these new costs may dampen your expansion, which can hinder your business from thriving.

However, a virtual office gives you all the freedom to improve and develop your business all you want. You’ll have the freedom to strengthen your company through added technology, employees, and anything that can help you succeed.

Massive Instagram Followers; Why You Must Have Them

A figure is a significant factor for social media users. They love to check the number of friends, followers, likes, comments among others. Well, as a savvy entrepreneur, these statistics should be vital to you as they are essential to developing an accomplished social media profile.

Instagram is one of the social media platforms where the number matters a lot. A high number of followers on Instagram is very useful for both official and individual accounts. And the reasons are as follows:

  1. Generating high followers for official pages

Professional pages are designed to gain more  insta followers to sell products or services. And consequently, the higher the number of followers, the more exposed your brand will be to the public. Nevertheless, there are some benefits of high followers which people know little about. Check them out!

With a significant amount of followers, Instagram becomes a fun place to be. And once your page becomes an exciting place to visit, you will get more comments, more likes, and interact with a lot of people.

The higher your number of followers, the higher your revenue. Once your followers begin to rise, your customer base will also improve significantly. While the manner in which you market your product plays a significant role in your sales, the number of prospects is also as crucial. When you get both marketing strategies and many prospects on the high side, then, you can only expect your business to flourish.

  1. Generating high followers for personal pages

People need a significant number of followers for different reasons best known to them. However, generally, more followers on personal accounts will offer the following benefits to anyone:

It helps to create a long-lasting relationship with people around the world. Instagram is one of the most comfortable platforms to connect with people. Hence, you can make a lot of friends with similar interest or hobbies to yours – if you don’t aim to make money or sell your product.

A personal Instagram account will help you to promote your hobbies. For instance, you can share the images of you painting your landscape as a hobby even though you don’t sell paints on Instagram. People with a similar hobby will gather to your page to share an interest in your fun activity. Sometimes, genuine interest and exposure can be more valuable than money.

Having more followers can make your page quite interesting. Most personal accounts on Instagram contain only friends, families and work colleagues as followers without no fun. If you have more followers on your page, people that get to see your page will believe that your page must be interesting. And consequently, people will follow you more than ever for some quality fun time.

Regardless of the type of account you run, having a higher number of followers matters and quite beneficial. While Instagram activities such as like, comment, and followers are essential factors for effective marketing, they are just as crucial for connecting with people that have similar interest as you do. Make the most out of your Insta followers!

 

A Dipstick On Present and Future Status Of HR Tech

From the time when individuals were reluctant to use the technology to now, when the influx of automation, AI, and machine learning, have shaken the technology for all the good reasons; we have indeed come a long way! These multifarious technological advancements have impacted the HR technology too. The methodology used for employing individuals and managing their stay at the organisation has got a whole new definition.

In this blog, I walk you through the current scenario of HR Tech. Apparently, the status of HR tech is great but technology can never settle the way it is. There is always scope for enhancements and proliferation. So, the statistics, evolution and trends, let’s glance at all of them.

Statistics-

The numbers are on a hike and hence supporting the current HR tech landscape. The future of HR tech seems to be quite promising as the experts have claimed that the current valuation of the HR market is somewhere around 10 to 30 billion dollars. The same is a result of the constant disruption in the HR technology for the better. This is why more and more SMEs have started investing in the HR software to keep up with the pace. In the coming years, it is believed that by the year 2021, the market will see a boom of at least $34 billion dollars.

Furthermore, the HCM in the coming future is going to see the investment of around 20 billion dollars. On the other hand, the estimated value of payroll software is $8 billion.

Evolution-

The past few decades have focused only on improving attendance and payroll software. However, now, the arena has spread to all the facets of HR including performance and engagement management. The focus has now shifted more to improving the employee experience and using data & analytics to fetch actionable insights. Moreover, predictive analysis is increasingly helping HR in reducing the attrition rate and increasing engagement. Furthermore, the advancements have also improved accessibility thereby promoting better tab on activities. Also, by measuring the performance frequently, the employees stay motivated and the productivity keeps surging.

Upcoming Trends-

In the near future, HR’s will witness a powerful uplift in data and analytics. Besides, artificial intelligence, machine learning and automation will continue to flourish. Apart from aiming to end more and more manual and redundant tasks, the HR tech will aim towards formulating ways to increase productivity and reduce the time taken to complete various tasks.

The Final Word-

The HR and payroll software have had their own share of pitfalls but the level of ease that the HR software has brought into the lives of not just HR but also the employer and employees has surpassed all of that.

There is no denial to the fact that HR tech is growing rapidly. It has emerged as a powerful combination of automation and AI. With the trends that are booming right now, the HR veterans are eagerly waiting to see how the trends will unfold over months and years to come.

Getting the Most Out of Your Company’s Work Portal

Corporate portals can serve as useful tools for aggregating links and information for employees. It makes perfect sense to gather relevant news, content and external links in one convenient location. This way, users only have to make one stop to get whatever they need—and are empowered to answer their own questions rather than having to go through HR or leadership teams for intel.

But all too often, web portals go underutilized by employees after their orientation period. Sure, users may check out the portal during their first few days of onboarding—and perhaps occasionally thereafter for specific queries. In general, however, engagement tends to diminish over time.

The end result? When corporate portals fall by the wayside, they fall short of providing value to users and companies as a whole. Here’s a guide to getting the most out of your company’s work portal.

Define Goals for Your Web Portal

Think about what you want your corporate portal to accomplish. What does the optimal user experience (UX) look and feel like? What features and controls must employees be able to access within this hub? What are the potential benefits to both end users and the organization as a whole?

According to Techopedia, web portals often contain features like “data access, personal content, transactions, security, published content and search.” Of course, no two hubs are exactly the same—appearance and UX depend on the organization and its goals. Companies are increasingly giving employees the opportunity to customize their portal to fit their preferences. The final product will also depend on which applications you make available for integration.

Start by defining goals. First, broadly. Then drill down and get more specific. What do you want your portal to accomplish? How often do you want users to visit it? What degree of personalization must your portal offer to users? Which devices will support access? Only once you have these guiding ideas in mind can you put together a genuinely useful product.

Avoid treating it as a catch-all and instead design it with intentionality.

Embed Data Analytics for Easy Access

Work portals are increasingly becoming a site for embedded analytics like ThoughtSpot as companies aim to monetize their stored data by making insights more accessible to all. The goal here is giving employees—even those without a background in data—direct access to the business intelligence tools and interactive charts they need to make informed decisions.

Monetizing stored data has become a major priority for businesses looking to gain the competitive edge. One way to monetize data is to allow users to ask questions and get answers instantly without having to wait for static reports. Speedy and informed decisions across the board drive better business outcomes. So, embedding search-driven analytics, custom charts and entire dashboards directly into portals is a solid first step toward data monetization.

Create a Personalized, Engaging Experience

It’s worth considering whether your company is giving people a genuine reason to visit your portal. As Society for Human Resource Management points out, users inevitably tend to compare corporate portals to their favorite websites—like Amazon and social media platforms.

What lessons can we glean from these popular sites? People today value personalized experiences, advanced search options and engaging features. If your portal misses the mark in any of these areas, employees will want to use it less. Offer opportunities for customization so users can create an environment and workflow that suits their preferences. This will go a long way in incentivizing employees to continually engage with your portal.

Getting the most out of your company’s work portal depends on allowing employees to customize it to their liking, and using it to provide useful tools like data analytics.