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What to pin on Pinterest

Pictures sell.

Posting pictures on social media is proven to be one of the most effective ways to get attention and send traffic to your site, which is why Pinterest is so powerful.

With Pinterest, showcasing your brand can drive your business more revenue than it can ever get from Facebook. 

But what pictures should you post on Pinterest?

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5 proven ways to promote on Instagram

Instagram has evolved from a playful platform for pictures into one of the most effective marketing tools online with 15% more engagement than Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

But just like any other social media platform, there are more effective ways to leverage Instagram than just posting random pictures.

We scoured the internet for examples and here’s what we learnt from some of the most successful Instagram brand campaigns.

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Non-Drupal Developers Will Love the New Drupal

Developers who haven’t used Drupal before should be the most excited about the upcoming Drupal 8 release.

Drupal has undergone major changes for this new version. At the moment it’s not ready for final release but the bulk of the changes are already in place and available for testing, and it may be just a few more months before it is ready.

If you have used a previous version of Drupal you’ll also be excited by the introductions in the system. Drupal is more flexible for Devs.

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Do you like the new Facebook updates?

According to the news circulating online, Facebook have marked memes a type of low quality content and will begin penalising business pages that exclusively post memes.

Brian Carter, author of the book The Like Economy, argues that this makes it harder for smaller businesses to compete against more established businesses online.

Unlike bigger companies, small businesses are “understaffed, under-trained and underfunded” to maintain social media on a daily basis.

We've listed all the updates here. 

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Drupal 8 and content administrators

The release of Drupal 8 is getting closer, causing excitement in the Drupal community - including us here at Choc Chip.

While many of the new features serve designers and developers, there are also changes that content administrators can look forward to in Drupal 8.

The team developing Drupal 8 have taken community feedback by including features for easier editing and customisation, as well as taking out features and functions that many users find daunting.

Here's a list of four awesome features for content administrators in Drupal 8. 

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Drupal and the non-programmer

Drupal CMS has a reputation for being powerful, flexible and popular but also, unfortunately, difficult for people who are not programmers.

But Drupal has evolved over the past few years.

(Image source: Shutterstock)

With the help of its devoted community of developers, the latest Drupal versions have become much easier to use even for non-programmers - and the future promises to be even brighter, with Drupal 8 containing and whole new swag of usable goodies.

Click this link to continue reading "Drupal and the non-programmer" 

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Google X future technology

Technology is meant to improve our lives. And while plenty of examples of practical inventions and advances exist, other ideas seem absurdly sci-fi.

But to Google, some absurd ideas are worth investing in.

In fact, the company is working on out-of-these-world projects at Google X, a semi-secret facility they built to house such projects in Mountain View, California.

Know 5 Google X projects here.

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5 Free Google Apps that will improve your business

Two weeks ago, we shared the benefits of Google Drive. In that article we mentioned the five free collaboration tools available in Google drive -- Documents, Spreadsheets, Presentations, Forms and Drawings. 

Google also provides access to various other apps through Google Apps for Business. Popular free choices include Google Mail, Google Calendar, Google Sites and Google Hangouts.

These, and many other apps (free and paid), can extend your Google Apps experience to include just about anything. Much like finding apps for your phone, you’ll find that the quality and experience varies but there are some gems there if you look around.

Want to learn more about the 5 Free Google Apps? Read this.

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9 good reasons why you should use Google Drive

One of the most amazing benefits internet technology offers businesses is the ability to collaborate across distances.

Google Drive is currently one of the most impressive online collaboration tools. It offers not only storage and mobility, but also simplifies the sharing and collaboration process. Google Drive is the renamed Google Docs, but with new and better features.

Since Google Drive is hosted in the cloud, various members of your team can access and edit the same document simultaneously. You can actually see the changes from your colleagues appear on screen as you’re typing, making collaboration instant and very simple. 

Click here for more on Google drive.

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Personalise with Google my business

Over the last two years Google has rolled out a range of services intended to help businesses improve their visibility and succeed online.

Services such as Google+, Google maps and Google places have become an integral part of marketing for many companies.

This month, the company launches Google my business which pulls all these exciting features together making it easier to update business information across all Google services from a single dashboard.

Find out how Google my business can boost your biz. 

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The importance of words

The words you use directly affect the amount of traffic generated from social media posts.  Let this infographic show you:

Interested to know more? Click here.

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Youth in Africa given a shot at employment

Studies show that in Africa, many young people facing socio-economic problems are driven to drug abuse, prostitution, theft and other criminal act. Lack of gainful employment is found to be one of the main causes of criminal activity.

Youth-based organizations, KampaBits, NairoBits and Butterfly Works are working together to solve this problem in Africa by offering less-privileged youth a chance to acquire programming and entrepreneurial skills in order to build a more financially stable life.

Know how programming solves unemployment in Africa here. 

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4 reasons why removing timestamps on your business blog is a bad idea

The internet is full of marketers trying to beat Google and make their content appear better in search results, but it is important to remember that not all tactics are beneficial for your company.

Take for example, removing timestamps from your business blog.

Many online marketers choose to take the timestamps off their blog posts to generate more comments and link backs over time. But this practice can have negative results.

Know why you shouldn't take out your timestamps here.

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5 things you can expect when you take your business online

Even if you’ve got a successful bricks-and-mortar business you must ensure your online presence is at the same level.

If, on the other hand, your real-life business is struggling you may dramatically improve your results by increasing what you do online. You should even consider if moving the majority of your business to an online model would be a rewarding step.

Here's what you should be doing...

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Giddyup, Geelong

Personally I think innovation and creativity often thrive in tough times, and I'd love to see business in Geelong growing stronger out of this experience.

Especially small business - small businesses as a collective are a massive employer force in the region. Imagine how much our economy would improve if all our small businesses were growing and improving year on year, even if only by 10% or 20% each year. It would be a massive win.

So I was thinking about how we here at Choc Chip could help. We're part of this community in Geelong and we speak with 100s of small businesses every year, hearing their struggles and helping them improve the benefits they're seeing from what they do online.

Learn more on how Choc Chip Digital can help here.

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How to solve a problem the Facebook way

Mark Zuckerberg has finally realised that arguing against critics on privacy issues is futile. Web users are simply not comfortable with having no control over who has access to their Facebook account information.

So Zuckerberg has announced Anonymous login.

But the Facebook Anonymous log in is still not really “anonymous”. Know the details here.

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Four top-notch reasons why switching to Universal Analytics is a good idea

Google announced recently that the new Universal Analytics is no longer in beta. The big question is, should you make the switch from the old analytics to the new?

We've listed four top reasons why you should:

1. It has a User ID feature

One of the most exciting features that Universal Analytics has is User ID which gives you a more accurate user count.

More on Universal Analytics when you click this.