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Monthly Archives: August 2019

How Microsoft Dynamics 365 Can Improve Your Business

August 31, 2019   CRM News and Info

Let’s take a look at how the automation, process flow, and centralized data that Dynamics 365 brings to your business can impact different departments. These examples are simplified and limited but will give you some perspective. The possibilities are endless when fueled by your creativity and a good partner to help you make them happen.

Download Full eBook: But Really…What is Microsoft Dynamics 365?

Sales

  • Notify sales teams when a customer enters a service ticket or inquiry.
  • Process Flow. Shorten ramp-up times and increase deal size with an event-driven sales process that guides your sales rep’s actions.
  • Centralized Data. Centralize customer interactions and transactions—both current and historic—to keep salespeople on task.

Customer Service

  • Dynamically guide agents to the right actions by surfacing relevant information exactly when they need it.
  • Process Flow. Create work orders and schedule and dispatch technicians with relevant customer information.
  • Centralized Data. Deliver value at every touchpoint with a 360-degree view of each customer’s journey.

Field Service

  • Automatically schedule the technician with the right job skills and best location to fit in more appointments per day.
  • Process Flow. Provide mobile access to back-office information so technicians can update work order details and initiate the billing process.
  • Centralized Data. Synchronize and track inventory down to the truck level with real-time visibility for higher first-time fix rates.

Project Service Automation

  • Enable intelligent and relevant skills-based assignments with real-time visibility to resources using a unified scheduling engine.
  • Process Flow. Prioritize project-based sales opportunities with built-in intelligence to plan for successful outcomes.
  • Centralized Data. Anticipate resource demand and ensure the right resources are on the right projects, keeping utilization high.

Marketing

  • Use configurable templates, reusable content blocks, design tools, and videos to deliver content based on customer engagement.
  • Process Flow. Prioritize leads, automate hand-off, and track progress with shared information and connected processes between sales and marketing.
  • Centralized Data. Improve marketing ROI with embedded intelligence and analytics that track marketing performance.

Finance and Operations

  • Optimize workforce productivity with role-based workspaces that provide intelligent automation, task prioritization, and integration with Office 365 applications.
  • Process Flow. Minimize operational costs across business geographies with financial process automation, encumbrance, budget planning, budget control, and three-way matching.
  • Centralized Data. Improve product quality by identifying and resolving issues through real-time insights and predictive intelligence.

Talent

  • Welcome new hires with personalized onboarding checklists and clearly defined processes that reduce administrative burden.
  • Process Flow. Collaborate during the hiring process, sharing candidate information through talent sourcing, recruiting, and selection.
  • Centralized Data. Support professional development by tracking employee accomplishments, certifications, and training.

Retail

  • Acquire inventory from the right vendor at the right price and allocate and replenish stores based on season, market demand, and competitive pressures.
  • Process Flow. Give customers the convenience and flexibility to buy in-store, pick up in other locations, or get home delivery through connected ordering and fulfillment.
  • Centralized Data. Support omnichannel buying with real-time product, customer, inventory, and order visibility.

To find out more download the full white paper: “But Really…What is Microsoft Dynamics 365?” The not-too-technical, not-too-salesy guide to Microsoft’s new cloud business management solution.

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By CRM Software Blog Writer, www.crmsoftwareblog.com

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Universal Health Care

August 31, 2019   Humor

Sometimes I think we fail to realize how absolutely insane our health care system truly is. This comic by Sarah Mirk imagines what it would be like if all public services in the US worked like our healthcare system.

I am perfectly happy to not insist on “Medicare for All” immediately, as long as we start to offer a “public option” where people have a choice between our current system and and a Medicare-like system. But our goal should be to move toward single-payer health insurance, the only question is how we get there.

The main objection I hear against going to a Medicare-like system with universal coverage is that it would raise our taxes. But as this article in the NY Times points out, we are looking at this the wrong way. We should think of the premiums that we (and our employers) pay for health insurance as taxes. After all, it is all just money out of our pocket.

Most Americans who have health insurance get it through their employer. I have started several companies and served as a CEO, and I can assure you that if a company didn’t have to spend the time or money providing health insurance — something that is a huge distraction and money sink from the company’s core business — then that company could easily afford to pay their employees a significantly higher salary. In fact, typically enough to more than offset the extra taxes that people would have to pay to support universal single-payer health insurance.

And there are other benefits that most people don’t even realize. For example, I have lived in three countries that have single payer systems, and in those countries insurance for your car is a small fraction of what it is in the US. Why? Because the biggest cost of car insurance is liability insurance to cover health care costs for you, your passengers, and other parties when you are involved in an accident. But if everyone’s health costs are covered by a single payer system, then there is no need for that insurance.

In addition to saving companies time and money, and saving us the premiums that are automatically deducted from our paychecks, a universal single payer system would save all the time that individual employees spend dealing with their health insurance companies and filling out paperwork. Every time I have lived in a country with public health insurance, the paperwork I had to deal with to get health care was far far less than it is in the US.

Related

 If you liked this, you might also like these related posts:
  1. Universal Health Care Merry Go Round
  2. Want to really understand what the rest of the world thinks of the US health care system?
  3. Republicans are fearful of health care reform not because it will be bad, but because it will be good
  4. Romney Praises a Government Take-over of Health Care
  5. Health Care Lottery

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Political Irony

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Teradata Hires Bob Joyce for New Role of EVP, Teradata Business Systems

August 31, 2019   BI News and Info
teradata logo social Teradata Hires Bob Joyce for New Role of EVP, Teradata Business Systems

New executive brings extensive experience in operational excellence – joins newly hired CRO, Scott Brown, and CHRO, Kathy Cullen-Cote, to strengthen leadership team and boost Teradata’s transformation

Teradata (NYSE: TDC), the industry’s only Cloud First Pervasive Data Intelligence company, today announced that it has appointed Bob Joyce as Executive Vice President of Teradata Business Systems, reporting directly to CEO Oliver Ratzesberger, effective immediately. Joyce will lead the newly created Teradata Business Systems function, which is focused exclusively on driving operational excellence throughout the company. Teradata has been steadily advancing in its business transformation, and with the addition of Joyce, as well as Teradata’s CRO Scott Brown and CHRO Kathy Cullen-Cote, the Teradata executive team has the right talent to deliver on all aspects of the company’s cloud first strategy and delight customers.  
 
“In Bob, we are adding a leader for Teradata Business Systems with fundamental experience driving an organization to be lean, efficient and agile, with a mindset for continuous improvement and growth” said Oliver Ratzesberger, President and CEO at Teradata. “This hire, and the establishment of a world-class business system, is absolutely critical to our company strategy. Add in the recent hires of Scott and Kathy, Teradata is now extremely well positioned to continue our leadership in this market and help the world’s leading companies leverage cloud to get answers to their toughest challenges.”
 
Teradata Business Systems, a new business function within Teradata, will drive operational excellence by ensuring everything Teradata does is aligned to its strategy, data-driven and focused on key metrics that increase the value of the company. Improving operational excellence strengthens the company’s commitment to its customers, improves the ease of doing business and will enhance Teradata in the position of true trusted advisor.
 
“Teradata is in the midst of a truly bold transformation to a cloud first subscription model and I’m excited to contribute,” said Bob Joyce, EVP Teradata Business Systems. “The market landscape is changing everyday and I believe that the companies – like Teradata – who focus on and invest in continuous improvement will have a significant competitive advantage. Tomorrow’s leaders will cultivate a growth mindset using simplicity and lean principles. This is what I will contribute to Teradata in support of serving our customers with the agility and flexibility they require.”
 
About Bob Joyce
Joyce joins Teradata from Fortive Corporation, where he was Group President over five operating companies in the United States, Europe and China. Fortive was a spin out of Danaher, the pioneer in driving growth through a measured business system. Joyce was fundamental in developing the Danaher Business System, the world-leader in helping companies track execution and create options for doing better. As part of this effort, Joyce has run billion-dollar businesses, driving consistent double-digit growth, and has successfully led organizations through significant improvements in execution, delivery and quality. Joyce is reporting to CEO Oliver Ratzesberger and will be based in San Diego.
 

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After 5,000 games, Microsoft’s Suphx AI can defeat top Mahjong players

August 31, 2019   Big Data
 After 5,000 games, Microsoft’s Suphx AI can defeat top Mahjong players

Bolstered by algorithmic breakthroughs and an abundance of cheap computing power, AI has become a veritable games champion, notching wins against the world’s top-ranked players of chess, the Chinese board game Go, Montezuma’s Revenge, and countless others. In yet another victory for the machines this week, Microsoft detailed an AI system — Super Phoenix, or Suphx for short — capable of besting champions at Mahjong.

“For as long as researchers have studied AI, they have worked to build agents capable of accomplishing game missions,” said corporate vice president of Microsoft Asia Pacific R&D Group and MSR Asia Dr. Hsiao-Wuen Hon. “Mahjong is more complex than other board games, [so] playing becomes an art as well as a science. Good Mahjong players rely on a combination of observation, intuition, strategy, calculation, and chance that presents unique challenges for an AI system.”

As Dr. Hon and colleagues explained further, Mahjong is what’s known as an imperfect information game, meaning a number of factors remain unknown to players throughout matches. For instance, they must account for opponents’ unseen tiles and decide whether to fold, leading to bluffs.

To overcome this, the team had Suphx play against thousands of people on Tenhou, a Japan-based global online Mahjong competition platform with more than 300,000 members, to self-learn common strategies. It soon developed its own play style and learned to balance attack and defense moves, strategically weighing short-term losses against long-term gains and making decisions with ambiguous data.

Suphx demonstrated expert-level play after 5,000 games over the course of four months, and it recently became the first AI system to compete at Tenhou’s 10th dan ranking, something only 180 humans have ever done.

Microsoft’s AI gains come after San Francisco-based OpenAI’s Dota 2 bot defeated 99.4% of players in public matches and a team of professional players twice, and after DeepMind’s AlphaStar AI swept StarCraft II pros in head-to-head match. Tencent’s Honor of Kings AI earlier this month beat a team of professional players. And beyond the video game arena, Facebook AI Research and Carnegie Mellon University in July detailed Pluribus, a poker-playing AI that Facebook claims is the first to best 15 human professionals in Texas Hold’em.

The advancements aren’t merely pushing forward game design. Rather, they’re informing the development of systems that might one day diagnose illnesses, predict complicated protein structures, and segment CT scans. “[Our game-playing AI] is a stepping stone for us all the way to general AI,” Alphabet’s DeepMind cofounder Demis Hassabis told VentureBeat in a previous interview. “The reason we test ourselves and all these games is … that [they’re] a very convenient proving ground for us to develop our algorithms. … Ultimately, [we’re developing algorithms that can be] translate[ed] into the real world to work on really challenging problems … and help experts in those areas.”

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URL parameters for Paginated Reports are now available

August 31, 2019   Self-Service BI

“New Feature Friday” returns as we’re thrilled to introduce support for URL parameters for paginated reports in the Power BI service.  This capability allows report authors to send commands to paginated reports in Power BI by adding a parameter to a URL. For example, you can pass report parameters to a report by including them in a paginated report URL, and even construct this URL dynamically in a Power BI report and drillthrough to a paginated report by using a DAX measure.

To use report parameters, you need to prefix the parameter name with rp: for Power BI to recognize it in the URL.  The parameter name is the one set by the author when creating the report parameter in Power BI Report Builder.

The URL patterns for paginated reports closely follow those of SQL Server Reporting Services today.  For example, to set a report parameter within a URL, use the following syntax:

rp:parameter=value

So if I want to specify a value for the “Salesperson” parameter for my report in an app, I’d use the following URL:

https://app.powerbi.com/groups/me/apps/xxxxxxx-c4c4-4217-afd9-3920a0d1e2b0/rdlreports/b1d5e659-639e-41d0-b733-05d2bca9853c?rp:Salesperson=Tiggee

If “Salesperson” was instead a multi-value parameter that accepted multiple values, I can use an & to add an additional parameter value to my URL like so –

https://app.powerbi.com/groups/me/rdlreports/xxxxxxx-abc7-40f0-b456-febzf9cdda4d?rp:Salesperson=Tie+Bear&rp:Salesperson=Mickey

We’re also rolling out a new feature next week to simplify the discovery of the parameter names by adding an item in the File menu called “Generate Link”.  This will generate a link of the current report view with the parameter values appended to the URL.

In addition to report parameters, you may also set the export format of your paginated report directly on the URL.  So when you click the report url, it will render and download the report in the selected format without any user interaction required.  You just need to use the rdl: prefix when setting the output format.

For example, if I wanted to export my report to PDF when I clicked the URL, it would look like this:

https://app.powerbi.com/groups/me/apps/xxxxxxx-c4c4-4217-afd9-3920a0d1e2b0/rdlreports/b1d5e659-639e-41d0-b733-05d2bca9853c?rp:Salesperson=Tiggee&rdl:format=PDF

Please be sure to review the documentation to see several additional examples of URL parameters.

We’re really excited to see what you do with this feature, so be sure to leave us your feedback in the comments below and let us know what you think.

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How Supply Chains Bridge The Gap Between Sustainability Desires And Reality

August 30, 2019   BI News and Info
 How Supply Chains Bridge The Gap Between Sustainability Desires And Reality

I first learned about global warming while still in college in the early 1990s. I had enrolled in “Our Home, the Solar System,” a class taught by the famous astronomer Carl Sagan. Enrollment was limited to just 15 students, and to get in I had to write an essay. My rationale was that as a chemical engineer, the class would give me a different perspective from my core engineering curriculum.

For example, chemical engineers learn how to size the height of a smokestack to spread pollutants and lower concentration levels before they reach the earth. Or, as some students put it, “dilution is the solution to pollution.” I suspected that there might be more clever ways to think about mitigating the effects of industrial pollution. Professor Sagan let me into the class and it was indeed eye-opening.

Top-down vs bottom-up

I learned a lot about the problem of global warming in that class. Since then, my career has taken me in the direction of technology, manufacturing, and supply chain management. While the class with Professor Sagan taught me about the problem, my career experience has taught me about ways to address it.

Some environmental topics can be successfully addressed by top-down government policies. The hole in the ozone layer serves as a good example. By banning chlorofluorocarbons, governments have been able to reduce the size of the hole.

The success of this top-down approach can be attributed to the fact that consumers were largely insulated from the ban. Science delivered alternative propellants and refrigerants minus the chlorofluorocarbons. These worked fine, and few people resisted the change.

Other top-down mandates do not fare as well – even though they may emanate from noble aspirations. Why? Because often enough, they directly harm individual consumers and businesses by increasing costs or reducing convenience. The policies may serve the collective good – but because they conflict with many individual desires, compliance is low and, thus, the policies fail.

Desires delivered

The simple fact is that Armageddon-like stories about climate change from scientists and government officials do not seem to be turning the tide. From their pulpits, officials proclaim that each and every one of us needs to make sacrifices to save the planet. They want us to forego the conveniences that we have attained through years of scientific and social progress.

While they blame, point fingers, and spread guilt, they ignore the underlying cause – the rise in population over the past 50 years – which is a second-order effect of the successful avoidance of global pandemics and major atrocities from world wars.

A better approach, I think, can be summed up in a simple phrase: “desire delivered.” Sustainable policies and solutions, in other words, need to capitalize on human nature and consumer desires to channel behavior in the right direction.

For example, in Stockholm (where I’m from), public transportation is structured so that it is faster, more comfortable, more reliable, and less expensive than driving. This has resulted in fewer people driving cars into Stockholm city for work. Congestion is reduced and, more importantly, pollution has decreased. Public transportation is now the preferred transportation choice as it meets the desires of individuals.

Solutions that improve people’s lives

To really address important global issues, we need solutions that improve people’s lives on all dimensions, including the environment. The science is often there. Now, supply chains must be built and scaled to take that science to individual consumers so that they choose to use those new products and services, while the providers of those products and services simultaneously thrive and prosper financially.

There are many examples of companies innovating not only more sustainable products but also more sustainable supply chains. For example, many consumer products consist of a basic ingredient, water. Why not establish business models where concentrated products (without water added) are delivered to consumers who add the water at the point of consumption?

Soda Stream is a great example of this. It reduces the dependence on difficult-to-recycle packaging and lowers the tonnage of product that must be shipped. Leading consumer products companies such as Procter & Gamble have introduced a similar concept for basic household products such as soap and shampoo.

Supply chains are transforming to capitalize on this change and deliver scalable, desirable products to consumers. As a chemical engineer, I learned that what is possible in a beaker many not be directly replicated at scale due to, for example, differences in heat and mass transfer properties. So, to address the challenge in front of us, supply chain innovation is required, as supply chains are the mechanisms to take new ideas to the consumer and to businesses.

Supply chains that drive sustainability

Although I received my lowest grade in college from Professor Sagan, I have to say that his course is the one that I reflect upon the most to this day. Statistically speaking, if I’m lucky, I have approximately 1,700 weeks left in my life, based on my current age and life expectancy. I aspire to enjoy those weeks to my fullest, knowing that the daily choices I make result in an even better future for generations to come.

This is why I choose to invest my working hours helping digital supply chains deliver what people, including me, desire most – all in a way that helps drive sustainability and address the challenge of global warming.

To learn more on how to drive sustainable supply chain processes, download the IDC report “Leveraging your intelligent digital supply chain.”

This article originally appeared on Forbes SAP Brand Voice.

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Friday Dance Party!

August 30, 2019   Humor

Posted by Krisgo

 Friday Dance Party!

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About Krisgo

I’m a mom, that has worn many different hats in this life; from scout leader, camp craft teacher, parents group president, colorguard coach, member of the community band, stay-at-home-mom to full time worker, I’ve done it all– almost! I still love learning new things, especially creating and cooking. Most of all I love to laugh! Thanks for visiting – come back soon icon smile Friday Dance Party!


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Deep Fried Bits

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What’s new for SQL Server 2019 Reporting Services RC1

August 30, 2019   Self-Service BI
social default image What’s new for SQL Server 2019 Reporting Services RC1

We are pleased to announce the first release candidate of SQL Server 2019 Reporting Services is now available in the download center.  While the team has previously released several updates for SQL Server customers via Power BI Report Server, this is the first feature update to the core SQL Server Reporting Services product for the 2019 release wave.

Download SQL Server 2019 Reporting Services

With this release, we’ve added new features to help customers meet their changing business needs around cloud-readiness and accessibility.  These include –

  • Support for hosting your database catalog with Azure SQL Managed Instance
  • Support for Power BI datasets hosted in Power BI Premium
  • Using Azure AD Application Proxy with Reporting Services
  • A new version of Microsoft Report Builder updated for use with SSRS 2019
  • AltText (alternative text) in support of WCAG and 508 compliance for your report elements
  • PDF/UA support for PDF documents (coming soon)
  • Rollup of several security updates and bug fixes previously released in Power BI Report Server

Azure SQL Managed Instance support

Managed instance is a new deployment option of Azure SQL Database, providing near 100% compatibility with the latest SQL Server release.  Now, for the first time, you may use a Managed Instance to host your database catalog used for SQL Server Reporting Services that is hosted either in a VM or in your data center.  Please note that support is limited to using database credentials for the connection to SQL MI.

Power BI Premium dataset support

In March, the Power BI team announced support for connectivity via the XMLA endpoint to Analysis Services models hosted in Premium workspaces.  For the first time, customers can connect to those models using either Microsoft Report Builder or SQL Server Data Tools and publish those reports to SSRS 2019 using the SQL Server Analysis Services connectivity option.  Users will need to use a stored Windows Username/Password to enable the scenario.

Microsoft Report Builder update

Later this week, we’ll have an update to the SQL Server 2016 Report Builder release.  This release updates all existing installs of that product.  It is fully compatible with the 2016, 2017, and 2019 versions of Reporting Services, along with all released and supported versions of Power BI Report Server.  New features include the ability to connect to a Power BI Premium dataset and enter data directly in a report.

AltText (alternative text) support for report elements

Meeting customers accessibility needs is an important part of the software development process here at Microsoft.  We’ve enhanced several accessibility items for report authors and viewers in this release, including official support for Alternative Text for report elements.  Using tooltips, authors may specify text for each element on the report and have this properly identified by screen reader technology as such.

Beyond what we’ve called out here, some additional features will be available prior to our GA release, including PDF/UA support for PDF documents.  We will announce those as soon as they are available.

As many of you know, we recently released paginated reports in Power BI, and are continuing to add more features there.  We continue to see Reporting Services as a key part of the SQL Server value proposition, and much like the Analysis Services team has done in this 2019 release, we’ll look to bring new RDL capabilities introduced in the cloud to the on-premises product in future releases.

Thanks for reading, and don’t forget to leave us your feedback in the comments below.

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What Is a Featured Snippet on Google and How Do You Get One?

August 30, 2019   CRM News and Info

Every content marketer and SEO expert wants to get noticed by Google and obtain that coveted #1 spot in the search rankings. Doing that, however, is no easy feat, especially considering that your competitors are constantly generating new content and optimizing their websites in an effort to do the same. 

Thankfully, appearing first in search rankings isn’t the only way to get your content noticed by your target customers. An even better way to get your content in front of your audience is by earning a featured snippet spot in Google search. Unlike the list of search results that usually appear below this highlighted content, featured snippets provide a more thorough answer to a user’s search query. When you achieve a featured snippet, Google will literally feature a snippet of the body of your content that it deems valuable enough to highlight as a quick overview that addresses the problem at hand — as you can see below.

Achieving a featured snippet is actually better than attaining that coveted #1 spot because it emphasizes your content in a unique way and puts it right where your audience will see it. Unlike a simple meta-description, this improves your chances of catching your audience’s attention and getting them to click through. 

Now that you’ve learned what a featured snippet is, you might be wondering what you can do to increase your chances of getting your content featured front and center. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered! 

Today we’re sharing a few tips that will help you on your way toward improving your SEO, as well as your odds of getting a featured snippet on Google. 

Aim to Answer Questions That Are Relevant to Your Audience

Featured snippets provide a quick and easy answer to a user’s question. Therefore, you should aim to structure pages on your blog and website in a way that provides brief and concise answers to the key phrases/questions your target audience is looking for. 

There are a variety of ways that you can accomplish this. To begin, you can look for opportunities to revise your existing website content to answer commonly asked questions related to your product or service. Start this process by looking at your analytics, using Google Keyword planner, or typing in various industry-related searches into Google to see what keyphrases appear. Based on the insights you gather, create a list of key phrases and keywords that your target audience constantly searches for. Then, using this list, look for product and solution pages that you can revise to address and answer related questions. 

Another way to answer your audience’s most pressing questions is by creating unique explainer pages or blog posts. These types of pages go into detail about a specific topic by covering a variety of related questions — and can drastically improve your chances of landing your website content in that featured snippet spot. By going into a lot of depth on a specific topic, you can increase your keyword usage, which helps with SEO. And you can also show both Google and your audience that you’re an expert in your field and know what you’re talking about. 

Provide Information in a Useful Way

How you answer questions is just as important as answering them in the first place. Thought leadership can be invaluable in helping you secure press coverage and stand out on social media platforms such as LinkedIn. Unfortunately, this type of content doesn’t deliver the type of straightforward information your audience is looking for during a quick Google search.

If your goal is to get your content highlighted in the featured snippet box, you should aim to create detailed and informative content pieces that provide clear and concise answers to commonly asked questions. Unless you’re referring to a term that is unique to your organization, try your best to stick to definitions that exist within your field or industry and receive a lot of traffic. For instance, when we developed our Marketing as a Service solution, we wrote a blog focusing heavily on answering the most common questions around the topic.  

Format Your Content in a Way That Is Easy to Consume

You can’t expect to get noticed by Google or have your target audience read what you have to say if your content isn’t formatted in a way that is easy to follow and consume. This is crucial for any type of content but particularly important if you want to rank high in Google search and have your content appear in a featured snippet box. 

To start, a good rule of thumb is to include your question as an H1 or H2 tag within the body copy of your content. This will help Google easily know which keywords and topics are covered on each page of your website. Furthermore, it will help your audience easily find what they are looking for, which is particularly helpful if their question only relates to a specific part of a much broader topic. 

How you format your answer is equally important. While strategizing the best way to present your content, consider whether it’s easier for your audience to consume as a paragraph, list, or table. In many cases, the type of question being asked will probably provide you enough guidance to decide the best way to format your answer. For example, if your question is “What is content marketing?”, you’ll probably want to provide at least one paragraph answer that defines the term. Whereas a chart might be more appropriate if you’re answering the question “What type of content do I need to nurture my leads?”

Make Sure to Include Relevant Keywords

Whether you’re trying to appear on the first page in the search rankings or land in that featured snippet spot, you have to make sure your content is relevant to your audience. Writing copy that includes high-ranking keywords is good practice for SEO and will ultimately motivate your target audience to click through. 

Aside from helping you rank higher in search and getting your content in the featured snippet box, including relevant keywords enables you to create content that is valuable to your audience. Using everyday language will help you relate to your audience, increase their confidence in you, and help them see value in what you have to offer. Ultimately, the goal is not only to get your audience to visit your website but to motivate them to keep clicking through and provide you with the contact information you need to begin the lead nurturing process.

Review Your Content Marketing Strategy to Achieve Featured Snippet Positioning in Google Search

It’s important to remember that good content marketing (and marketing in general) involves so much more than driving visitors to your website. Effective content goes beyond good SEO practices. Whatever content you create should provide value to your customers, engage them in a way that makes them want to learn more about what you do, and effectively guide them from one stage of the sales funnel to the next. 

If you’d like more tips on how to create a content marketing strategy that helps you attract, nurture, and convert your target customers, please check out our eBook, “Creating a Content Marketing Strategy: 6 Best Practices (linked below).”

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Act-On Blog

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Hunt Oil Strikes It Rich with Smart IoT Drilling

August 30, 2019   TIBCO Spotfire
TIBCOHuntOil e1567093328237 696x365 Hunt Oil Strikes It Rich with Smart IoT Drilling

In the oil and gas industry, the role of data cannot be underestimated. It is crucial to make data-driven decisions and aid in predictive maintenance of well machinery. But for Hunt Oil, a private oil and gas exploration and production company headquartered in Dallas, Texas, getting insights from the deluge of data was a challenge. The company suffered from out-of-date data insights; inflexible, vendor-supplied applications; and lack of agility. It needed a faster solution to extract information from applications to gain applicable insights. 

The company turned to the TIBCO Drilling Accelerator to enable its Smart IoT Drilling System. The system implements TIBCO Spotfire® X software, TIBCO Spotfire® Data Streams software, TIBCO® Streaming software, and TIBCO® Messaging software. This combination provided Hunt Oil with a single, real-time view of analyses.

With its Smart IoT Drilling System in place, Hunt Oil reduced the time needed to spot patterns in new data, taking only seconds to discover insights. Its development time also decreased, taking only weeks as opposed to months. 

Hunt Oil saw a number of benefits from the new system smart drilling system, including:

  • Analyzing downhole, bit assembly, hydraulic, and pump data with Spotfire Data Streams software to “query the future” for conditions that could lead to failure
  • Enabling the engineering team to go from idea to testing its smart IoT drilling system in less than six weeks
  • Developing easy-to-understand models and push them to Spotfire® X software for visualization and analysis, evolving as conditions change

To learn more about how Hunt Oil uses the TIBCO Drilling Accelerator to power its Smart IoT Drilling System, read the full case study. 

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