While an eye-catching resume alone probably won’t land you your dream gig, it doesn’t hurt to put a little extra effort into how you present yourself on paper.

The right resume design speaks to your individual skills and personality, and can propel your application to the top of the stack. But finding the perfect design can be a major hassle — and applying for jobs is already hard enough.

We’ve scoured the web for some of the coolest, most unique resume designs to help you stand out in a sea of Times New Roman and crowded copy.

You’ll want to steal each and every one of these creative resume designs — and the good news is: You can! These generous designers have made their work available for free download. Read on to check them out and find a great fit for your next job application.

15 Unique Resume Templates

1) Infographic Style Resume Template

Created by digital art director and freelance designer Fernando Báez, this unique, infographic-inspired resume template helps you organize your work experience and skills into a minimal visual layout. Báez has made the template available for free download here.

2) Bold Classic Resume Template

If you’re looking for a more traditional resume template that still makes a bold impression, check out this creation from Finish designer Mats-Peter Forss. The template includes space for a headshot, and is available for free download here.

3) Resume Template with a Simple Color Accent

Adding color to a resume might seem intimidating at first — especially if you’re applying to a more traditional workplace — but a few sophisticated pops of color can add some interest without compromising on professionalism. This template from designer Eduardo Ogawa uses bright accents to spice up the traditional layout. You can download it for free here.

4) Resume Template with a Photo Background

This template from Polish designer Patryk Korycki is perfect for photographers, graphic designers, and other creatives looking to showcase a sample of their best work. The template can be downloaded here for free.

5) Graphic and Adventurous Resume Template

This is not a resume template for wallflowers. The folks at Createer whipped up this daring design as part of a free resume template pack, which you can check out here.

6) Resume Template with Subtle Color Scheme

Beiruit-based designer Wassim Awadallah serves up a simple, two-page resume template for more advanced professionals. Displaying the headshot and contact information on the cover leaves plenty of room on the second page to document all your career highlights and accomplishments. Download the template for free here.

7) Resume Template with Pops of Primary Colors

Proof that color can be professional, this template boasts a compact, sophisticated layout and bright, colorful accents. Designer David Gómez actually uses this resume template himself, and he’s been generous enough to share it for free download here.

8) Black and White Resume Template

Running low on colored ink? Check out this minimal black and white template from editorial designer Bro Luthfi. The simple design is anything but boring, and includes a set of custom icons to add some visual interest. You can download the free template here.

9) Resume Template with an Organized Use of Space

When you’re trying to crunch years of work experience and a laundry list of skills onto a single sheet of paper, things tend to get crowded quickly. This template from designer Tina Von Helsinki invites you to simplify. The distinct sections highlight different aspects of your qualifications — eliminating anything extraneous and putting the focus on what matters to your potential employers the most. Download the template here.

10) Playful and Professional Resume Template

Italian designer Martina Cavalieri created this resume template with a set of 16 custom icons to highlight your interests and skills. The modern layout is anchored by a bold two-toned border: just enough color to help your resume stand out in the pile. Cavalieri offers this template for free download here.

11) Clean and Modern Resume Template

Your resume is really your first impression with a potential employer, and this template design from the team at GoaShape is modern without being too edgy. The template pack includes a two-page resume layout and cover letter design, and can be downloaded for free here.

12) Resume Template with an Unexpected Format

If you want to really stand out in a crowded applicant pool, then this resume is definitely for you. Graphic designer and freelance photographer Paolo Pettigiani created this bold template for his own professional use, but has made it available for free download here.

13) Monochromatic and Retro Resume Template

This design from freelancer Fay Zodiac is a whimsical take on traditional resumes. The retro typography adds a playful element, while the boxy layout keeps everything from looking too busy or crowded. You can download this resume design here for free.

14) Center-Aligned Resume Template

If you want to mix up your resume format without going too crazy, try a center-aligned layout, like this clean, modern design by Zohan Habib. The custom icons and colored border add a nice creative touch. This template is available for free download here.

15) Vibrant and Visual Resume Template

Alessia Curcio, a Copenhagen-based designer, gives us a perfect example of how to incorporate kaleidoscopic color without going over the top. Infographic-inspired elements help clearly display work experience and skills with minimal text. Download Curcio’s free template here.

Didn’t find the design you were looking for? We bet you’ll find an awesome template in this free resume template pack.

I moved five times in the last year. And every single time I moved, I forgot to sign up to have my mail forwarded to my new address.

Mail forwarding is an important step in any moving process, as it ensures you don’t lose any valuable information that’s sent to you. And the same can be said for your website: If you’re moving a website from one URL to another, you need to take the necessary steps to ensure your visitors get sent to the right place. In the world of tech, this is called a 301 redirect.

A 301 redirect is key to maintaining a website’s domain authority and search rankings when the site’s URL is changed for any reason. It easily sends visitors and search engines to a different URL than the one they originally requested — without having to actually type in a different URL.

Here, we’ll cover the details of a 301 redirect, why websites use them, and how they differ from other redirects. 

What Is a 301 Redirect?

A 301 redirect is a permanent redirect from one URL to another. 301 redirects send site visitors and search engines to a different URL than the one they originally typed into their browser or selected from a search engine results page. These redirects also link various URLs under one umbrella so search engines rank all of the addresses based on the domain authority from inbound links. 

Let’s put it into practice. Below are two different URLs that take you to the same site. That’s thanks to a 301 redirect. That way, when people link to HubSpot Blogs using either URL, the URL we direct blog traffic to (blog.hubspot.com) retains the search engine authority associated with inbound links to either URL.

1. blog.hubspot.com
2. http://blog.hubspot.com

Did you notice that even though the second link has “http://” at the beginning of the URL, by the time you arrived at the blog, the URL in your browser read “blog.hubspot.com“? That’s because of a 301 redirect. It’s essential to set this up so the domain authority from inbound links to the http:// address are linked to blog.hubspot.com to improve its search rankings.

Why Set Up a 301 Redirect?

The big reasons marketers might set up a 301 redirect are:

1. To associate common web conventions (http://, www., etc.) with one URL to maximize domain authority (hint: this is the same situation as the scenario we outlined above.)
2. To rebrand or rename a website with a different URL
3. To direct traffic to a website from other URLs owned by the same organization

In the second scenario, when a brand is changing its company or website name, a 301 redirect is integral to maintaining the power of inbound links to the original URL on the migrated new domain. Additionally, the 301 redirect is necessary in this case to do exactly what redirect means — to send website visitors to the right web address to get what they’re looking for.

In the third scenario, brands sometimes purchase domains that are similar in name or subject matter to their brand to generate more search traffic to their website. A 301 redirect is necessary to make certain that the brand’s original domain maintains its search authority in the process.  

What’s the Difference Between Permanent HTML Redirects and other Redirects?

Generally speaking, a 301 permanent redirect is better for search engine optimization than a temporary redirect because it transfers the inbound links from the redirected domain to the new one, which helps the website maintain its search rankings and prevent any dip in search traffic.

There are few situations where a 302 temporary redirect would be preferable over a 301 permanent redirect — except for when website content needs to be moved temporarily, such as when a site is undergoing maintenance and visitors need to be directed to a different domain to consume their content.

301 Redirect Mistakes to Avoid

Now that you understand the importance of the 301 redirect, we’ll review common steps in the process to review to make sure you don’t make a mistake that could adversely impact your site’s SEO.

1) Set up a 301 redirect between the http:// and http://www versions of your domains.

301 redirects point the power of inbound links from one URL to another, and although it might not look like it, http://blog.hubspot.com and blog.hubspot.com are two different URLs. Make sure you set up a 301 redirect from all of the different iterations of your brand’s domain to boost your search engine results.

2) Don’t move to a new domain without first setting up a 301 redirect.

Back in 2010, Toys ‘R Us purchased the toys.com domain without setting up a 301 redirect first, and their new site’s SEO results plummeted because it was re-crawled by Google as a brand-new domain without inbound links from the original Toys ‘R Us domain pointing to it. Be sure to set up the 301 redirect before migrating your website content so your site doesn’t lose traffic in the process.

3) In almost all cases, set up a 301 permanent redirect instead of a 302 temporary redirect, which may be the default setting of your website management software.

Unless you’re temporarily migrating your website’s content while updating or repairing your website, use a 301 redirect to maintain the inbound links and your search rankings while making changes to your domain.

4) Set up redirects to older internal links on your website.

If you don’t set up redirects from the older internal links on your website (such as a link to your company blog on your homepage), you’ll create a bad user experience for site visitors who click on these older, not-directed links. The old internal link will eventually kick over to the new domain, but it might take several seconds or show a white screen in the meantime.

The good news is that it’s easy to set up a 301 redirect correctly following the steps above and if you’re using HubSpot software to optimize your website. We wish you the best of luck with your next website redirect and moving process. (P.S. – We can help with one of those.)

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in December 2010 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.

 

The following is an excerpt from our free resource, How to Create Beautiful Infographics. If you’d like to download the full guide, click here.

Chances are, if you’re reading this, you’re creating an infographic to use on social media or a marketing campaign. If you’re creating the infographic for marketing purposes, you’ve got one more step, and that’s promoting it.

After all, there is no point creating content if no one sees it, is there?

Here are some methods on how to promote your infographics:

• Make it into a blog post and share on all your social channels.
• Send out an email newsletter. (Check out how to make emails more engaging with infographics here.)
• Ask your advocates to share explicitly.
• Post it on social discovery sites like Stumbled Upon, Reddit, Imgur..etc.
• Outreach – find bloggers who will benefit from sharing your infographic.

If you’re not a big brand with a large following, you’ll get limited mileage on most of these methods without determined effort on outreach. Outreach is an unavoidable necessity. It’s like cold calling and door to door selling. It works, but usually not how you would expect it to. You have to start at the bottom of the influencer pyramid and work your way up.

With so much content on Pinterest, how do you make your infographic stand out? What are the characteristics of highly-pinned and liked Pinterest infographics?

To answer these questions, Venngage looked at over 200 popular Pinterest infographics and evaluated them based on a series of qualitative and quantitative characteristics. The results? A comprehensive guide to what types of infographics get more “likes” than others. Based on their research, six factors were identified for a great Pinterest infographic.

1) Topic

Does the topic or subject matter of your infographic matter? Yes, it does. On Pinterest, the top topics were travel, food and marketing. This is not really surprising if you use Pinterest regularly. Travel and food images do extremely well on Pinterest given the demographic of their users. These three topics performed a lot better than all the other topics.

2) Mood: Funny, Challenging, or Useful 

One of the most important aspects of any content is the reaction is garners from its audience. Did the content leave an impact on the person, whether it was a good laugh or something useful they could use in life? Venngage looked at our sample of Pinterest infographics and coded each one with what they thought would be the reaction the infographic produced.

The results are consistent with a lot of other literature and research on content. The winners are infographics that are funny, challenging or practical. These infographics have the highest pins.

3) Simplicity of Information

One of the biggest misconceptions out there is that you need to have a lot of data and a complex infographic for it to be shared and liked a lot. Venngage’s research shows that simple infographics, such as informational and text based infographics, perform the best. Simple = Win.

The other characteristic examined was the dominant style of the infographic. Venngage classified IG style into one of five styles — text based, image based, illustration based, or a combination. The results showed text based infographics performed the best.

4) Serif Fonts

While the majority of infographic fonts were sans serif types (the more modern looking font), serif fonts perform better. Why?

Here is one plausible reason: people believe text written in serif fonts more than those written in sans serif. There was a popular study highlighted by the New York Times about how people tend to find statements written in serif fonts more credible.

5) 2-3 Colors

Colors have an effect on people. Marketers know this and have been using it to increase sales and conversions for a long time. It turns out when we looked at the number of colors used in top infographics and which primary colors are dominant, we see a very distinct pattern.

Less is more. Infographics with only two colors performed the most. Infographics that have more than five were the worst. [Click to Tweet]

6) Longform vs. Shortform

If you group the infographics based on their length to width ratio — a ratio is used since infographics have varying dimensions — and chart the distribution, you’ll notice that while shorter infographics do well, the ones that performed really well had between 5-9 length to width ratio (the infographics’ length were 5-9 times longer that its width).

I guess that is consistent with other longform content such as blog articles. But too long is not necessarily a good thing — as you go beyond the 9X ratio, the performance drops. So don’t over do it.

Want to learn more? Download How to Create Beautiful Infographics here.

Successful content marketing is about creating a connection between your audience and your brand.

This doesn’t mean just throwing content at them. It means creating content that they truly value — content that serves their needs and addresses their biggest pain points. And this type of content is much easier to create when it’s informed and driven by empathy.

As Dr. Brené Brown notes, “Empathy is feeling with people.”

When you put yourself in your audience’s shoes, it becomes easier to acknowledge their struggles and think critically about the best solutions. That’s why empathetic content marketing is such a powerful strategy for businesses — both B2B and B2C.

Not sure what that looks like? Let’s walk through nine brands that nail empathetic content marketing in multiple mediums.

9 Genius Examples of Empathetic Content Marketing in Action

1) LUSH

Content Type: Video

With the tagline, “Fresh, handmade cosmetics,” LUSH is a beauty brand that is all about natural products. As such, we see their radical transparency showcased in their How It’s Made video series, wherein they go behind the scenes of some of their most popular products.

Each episode features actual Lush employees in the “kitchen,” narrating the step-by-step process of how the products are made. Lush (pun intended) visuals showcase just how natural the ingredients are. You see mounds of fresh lemons, tea infusions, and salt swirled together to become the product you know and love. It’s equal parts interesting and educational.

How it shows empathy:

Their customers want to buy beauty products that are truly natural. They care about using fresh, organic, and ethically sourced ingredients — hence why the videos feature colorful, close-up shots of those organic lemons and sea salt to drive that point home. Taking customers inside the factory and showing them every part of the process — with a human face — assures them that they can consume these products with peace of mind.

2) LinkedIn

Content Type: Ebook

LinkedIn Marketing Solutions is all about mobilizing marketers to grow their audience, create more effective content, and, ultimately, achieve their goals. Naturally, they want their audience to leverage LinkedIn to help them achieve those goals. While they produce plenty of content related to the benefits of LinkedIn, the team has made a significant push into content that educates all levels of marketer on a variety of topics (as you can see on their blog).

This 27-page ebook, Native Advertising: What It Is. How to Do It, provides a ton of information on all aspects of native advertising, which is one of LinkedIn’s enterprise marketing services.

It’s packed with tips, stats, deep dives into the various types of native ads, strategy, as well as the benefits of LinkedIn’s various native ad services.

How it shows empathy:

One immensely effective empathy marketing tactic is education. LinkedIn wants to empower their audience to do their jobs better (and use their product to do so), and this ebook is the single tool they need to understand and confidently use native ads to their advantage.

Through offerings like this, customers learn that they can rely on LinkedIn as a trusted source to guide them in the right direction, and LinkedIn can continue to provide solutions through their product offerings. It’s a win-win all around.

3) Home Depot

Content Type: Infographic

Home Depot is a home and garden supply store that caters to all types of builders and DIY-ers — whether you’re a construction worker building a gazebo or a homemaker experimenting with gardening. In other words, their content must cater to various demographics.

As they are all about the DIY, their marketing focuses on what their supplies can help you do — not just what the supplies are. This “Grow a Living Salad Bowl” infographic teaches consumers to grow their own salad, offering information on how to do it, which vegetables grow best, and what supplies they need — all with minimal branding.

[Click here to see the full infographic]

How it shows empathy:

Their customers dream of being skilled DIYers, but need a bit of help working through the unknown, as well as some encouragement. This infographic delivers on these, and inspires customers to take action.

4) Dove

Content Type: Instagram Images

Dove is a beauty brand all about positive self image, and they’ve done a great job of creating a supportive and loving environment for their fans on social media. Almost all of Dove’s posts on Instagram are about active self-love, and their messages and engagement are tailored to inspire this.

 

By embracing the unique beauty in others, without comparing it to your own, you can actually help develop your own sense of confidence. Start now—tag a friend and leave them a compliment. We bet you’ll brighten their day AND yours!

A photo posted by Dove (@dove) on Dec 14, 2015 at 9:57am PST

 

Take some time each and every day to list out all of the things you love about yourself. When you learn to #SpeakBeautiful about your best qualities, you can learn to accept your whole self.

A photo posted by Dove (@dove) on Dec 2, 2015 at 8:39am PST

Through inspirational messages and captions that dictate little self-love “assignments,” they not only encourage but actually mobilize their followers to practice what they preach. Whether it’s tagging a friend or trying out a mini journaling exercise, Dove is using Instagram to inspire action.

 

Tell us: “I feel beautiful when __________.”

A photo posted by Dove (@dove) on Nov 30, 2015 at 8:55am PST

 

This week’s challenge: Look for a moment of happiness in each day—no matter how small. What’s one thing you’re looking forward to this week? #HappyMonday

A photo posted by Dove (@dove) on Nov 16, 2015 at 10:57am PST

How it shows empathy:

Dove’s posts offer customers regular reminders of their worth, as well as ways to actively recognize themselves and other women. This is not only a good relationship-building tactic employed by Dove, but it also provides a real benefit to their audience: A 2013 Carnegie Mellon University study found that positive self-affirmations help you perform better under stress. It’s both a sincere and scientific approach to bring self-love into customers’ everyday lives.

5) Extra

Content Type: Interactive Site

We’ve seen just about every twist on gum marketing possible: sexy encounters, romantic trysts, and more. Extra is pushing past that narrative. They realize that gum is an everyday part of life, a seemingly mundane product, but its omnipresence means it’s there for many of life’s little moments. Hence the #givextragetextra campaign is all about celebrating those moments — the awesome fishing trip, the road trip with friends, the engagement — by turning them into art.

The interactive site and social campaign encourages you to submit photos of those everyday moments to be turned into sketches, some of which appear on the inside flap of Extra packaging. At the site, you can see the images, watch video of the artist’s sketches, peruse the gallery, and search to see if your submission has been turned into art.

How it shows empathy:

In many ways, gum is a product meant to enhance intimacy, making your breath fresh for more closeness. In our techno-connected world, those everyday moments of intimacy are often overlooked. This campaign helps customers become more aware and celebratory of those moments. By encouraging them to capture and share those memories — and honoring them through the gum-wrapper art — Extra is helping customers live a more full and present life.

6) Microsoft

Content Type: Interactive infographic

Microsoft’s security solutions are all about keeping consumers’ data safe. Their goal, then, is to educate and explain why their products are important. That said, data security is not the sexiest topic — not to mention plenty has been said about it.

To give it a new twist, Microsoft created the Anatomy of a Data Breach interactive site, which explains the issue of data security through a new and exciting lens: the data heist.

The site puts consumers in a hacker’s shoes, guiding them through the stages of a data breach and showing, in detail, exactly how the data is stolen. Coupled with statistics about data security, the messaging is clear.

How it shows empathy:

Consumers know data breaches are a problem, but they don’t know exactly how they happen. By making an engaging story and using real consumer survey data, Microsoft brings the problem to life in a genuine and accessible way. Through the interactive, customers truly see their vulnerabilities and better understand how to protect themselves.

7) Michael’s

Content Type: Blog

In a world where Pinterest dominates, Michael’s craft stores is making a play to capture its own audience on its own properties. They have long provided the standard craft tutorials and product features on their site, but with The Glue String blog they are inserting themselves into their readers’ lifestyles with a variety of content.

Posts like “12 Ways to Store Washi Tape” may sound a little silly, but for the avid crafter, these are the exact types of posts that are relevant to their lives. The beautiful layout and high-impact visuals only help to bring these stories to life.

How it shows empathy:

Crafting is an exciting hobby, but not without its own frustrations. Providing useful tips and hacks on how to do things better via a free publication helps readers do more of what they love with fewer headaches. Additionally, fans get to share their enthusiasm through social, helping Michael’s extend its reach while helping their audience show their interests off.  

8) JetBlue

Content Type: Video

JetBlue is a brand known for superb customer service and humor. At this point, we know where they fly, we know their hook, so their marketing needs to extend beyond the services they provide. As such, their content is focusing more on the world of flying and the experiences we all have.

Their Flight Etiquette videos are funny PSAs that spotlight some of the most pervasive problems we encounter while traveling: overzealous flight boarding, chatty seat mates, etc. By giving it the sarcastic “How NOT to” twist, they showcase their humor and brand voice.

How it shows empathy:

There are specific instances that make the flying experience suck for all of us. These videos attempt to remedy these troubles by commiserating with and educating the public.

9) J.Crew

Content Type: Visual How-Tos

J.Crew is a sophisticated clothing brand that has always marketed toward lifestyle, framing their clothes within that context. While they have a devoted following, they are always searching for ways to deeper connect with their audience. 

Their blog is a fantastic outlet for that. Naturally, as design is a core part of their business, it is a major component of publishing. Its clean design superbly showcases their products, tips, and tricks. And they consistently use on-brand visuals to enhance their content. For example, The Bandana, 4-ways tutorial includes directions, illustrations, clever captions, and actual product visuals to tie it all together.

How it shows empathy:

Their customers want their fashion to reflect their personalities. Giving them more options to express themselves through clothing, via different bandana styles, helps them achieve that.

Ready to Try It?

Approaching the content that you seek to create as a brand from a perspective that puts others and their wants, needs, and dreams before your own is the smartest way to grow an audience. This is because, in doing so, you’re showing people that you care about them as humans, first and foremost. And people want to work with (B2B) or support (B2C) people that they like, and companies that they believe, “get them”

You can always talk about your brand and what you’re peddling once there’s a connection, and then a relationship established, but, if you doing things right, people will be drawn to you and you won’t ever have to toot your own horn.

What’s the best example of empathetic marketing you’ve ever seen? Share it in the comments.

In marketing, it seems like the word “brand” is used a lot — the leading brand, off-brand, personal brand … you get the picture. 

But there’s often confusion around its meaning in business. What does it entail? Do I need to hire an expert? Branding is expensive, right?

To that very last point, it doesn’t have to be. As it turns out, there are some pretty creative ways to brand your business without a ton of cash. And while it can require an investment of time, the ROI won’t go unnoticed — in some cases, it can actually help you save money.

So read on, and see how you can start building a brand today.

How to Brand Your Business on a Budget: A 6-Step Guide

1) Know your personas.

It’s no coincidence that 82% of companies with better value propositions also use buyer personas — the semi-fictional “characters” that encompass the qualities of who you’re trying to reach.

The needs, goals, and behavior of your potential customers dictate how you convey your product or service. Understanding those things helps you determine what kind of media your personas are consuming, what motivates them, and where they “live” online. You can see why having that information helps develop a compelling, effective brand — it helps you reach the right people.

Figuring that out doesn’t have to come at a price. A great way to get started is with our free MakeMyPersona tool, which guides you through a series of questions about the ideal person you want to reach. Take your time with it. The questions are meant to get you thinking about how you want to be perceived and by whom — and that shouldn’t be a quick process.

2) Develop an identity and a voice.

Once you’ve identified your buyer personas, your brand can start to take shape. That involves creating a brand identity — the things that make people aware of what your brand is — and its voice, which is the tone you use in any copy or public communication.

As a writer, I’m particularly interested in the voice aspect — but what does that like for you? Figuring that out follows a process not unlike the one that’s used to determine your personas. But instead of answering questions about your target audience, you’re answering questions that are a bit more introspective to your brand. What are its values? What does it represent? How do you want people to talk about you? (Check out our guide to answering these questions and more on brand voice here.)

Even if you’re not starting from scratch, establishing a strong(er) brand voice can be valuable. Just take the instance of the Zoological Wildlife Foundation — during its recent rebrand, finding its voice was a top priority. The results? Its overall online presence increased by 343%, with website traffic alone seeing a 63% boost.

3) Have a consistent social media presence.

So, we know who your personas are. And now, we know what to say to them — and how to say it. But where are they?

Since you might have a clear picture of the different pieces of your audience, it’s important to figure out where they’re spending the most time, especially on social media. We’ve talked before how effective it is to reach people where they’re already present — that includes their online behavior, too.

We recommend checking out Pew Research Center’s Demographics of Social Media Users, which profiles the users of five major social media platforms — Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

Pay attention close attention to the data. Maybe the majority of your personas spend most of their time on one network. While that doesn’t mean you should ignore the others, it does give you an idea of where to dedicate the most resources.

And once you do establish that presence, maintain it. How many times have you gone to a brand’s Facebook Page only to find that nothing has been posted in the past three months? Chances are, it didn’t have a positive impact on your perception.

That can be avoided by diligently planning and scheduling social media posts like you would with any other marketing calendar. Something like our free Social Media Content Calendar can help, and get you thinking about things like the seasonality of what you post. That’s a huge part of staying relevant to your audience — by sharing content that pertains to what they’re likely thinking about at a given time of year.

4) Blog. 

We’ve covered the importance of blogging before, and we really can’t emphasize it enough. It’s a core part of our Inbound Methodology, especially the “attract” stage — the one that turns strangers into visitors to your website.

In fact, blogging might be the most fundamental step of inbound marketing. It helps you reach qualified customers, like your personas, by creating the informative content that matches the information they’re searching for. That’s why it’s so important to make it relevant to this audience — when you’re writing, make sure the content is optimized for those searches. (Here’s a handy list of places where you can learn search engine optimization).

Believe us — your personas are definitely looking for the information that you’re able to provide — if you write about it. After friends and family, blogs are the third most trusted source of information. Plus, that content will also serve as material to populate your social media networks, and we’ve already covered what a crucial part that plays in branding on a budget.

While blogging is fiscally inexpensive, one of the biggest struggles we hear about is the cost of spending time on it. For that, we reference the joke about a doctor asking his patient, “Would you rather work out one hour per day, or be dead 24 hours per day?” The inbound marketing version of that question would ask, “Would you rather blog for one hour each day, or always have insufficient content to draw in visitors?”

Like planning your social media presence, having an editorial calendar for your blog can be helpful in maintaining consistent timing and fresh content. That’s why we put together a free blog editorial calendar template, complete with instructions and content management tips.

5) Make customer service a priority.

When we hear the name “Zappos,” most of us immediately think, “unparalleled customer service.” The online apparel retailer built this level of service into its core approach to doing business — and into its core values.

Why is that so important? For Zappos, making excellent customer service the cornerstone of its brand actually saved money on marketing and advertising. That’s because it created word-of-mouth among existing and potential customers, which is what we call earned media — the recognition that your brand has earned, not paid for, from people talking about something remarkable you did. (Psst — U.S. businesses, as a whole, lose about $41 billion dollars each year because of bad customer service.)

Whether you’re serving customers or clients, the goal is to create a delightful, sharable experience. And when the client or customer experience is a priority, it shouldn’t cost you much for them to talk about it — remember, your work earned it.

But that revisits the importance of your identity and voice. As you go through these brand-building steps, think about the values that you want to be resonated in those things. Is excellent service one of them? Those values are what shape the brand’s culture, and that influences the voice you project to an audience.

6) Take advantage of co-branding.

I’ll never forget what my colleague Lisa Toner told me when I asked her about negotiating co-branding agreements.

“Larger companies may have a large reach,” she said, “but what do they not have?”

When you’re just starting to build a brand, you might not have the reach that Toner’s talking about. You can take the steps to build it, like we’ve described so far, but that takes time. Until then, one way to get your name in front of a broader audience is to partner with a brand that has one.

But don’t just pick any old brand to work with. Make sure it’s one that’s aligned with yours — the partnership has to make sense in the minds of your audience. Here’s what we recommend in seeking a co-brand:

• Consider your partner’s audience. Would it be interested in your brand? Is it that difficult for you to reach without this partnership? How well does it trust your co-brand? That’s crucial to getting them to listen to you, too — people don’t trust traditional advertisements anymore. So make sure your partner reaches the audience in a way that instills confidence, not doubt.
• Have something to offer your co-brand. Just like Toner asked, “what do they not have?” The experience should be a win-win-win: for you, your co-brand, and the consumer.
• Consider selecting a well-known and respected nonprofit as a co-brand. More and more people’s purchasing decisions are based on a brand’s social responsibility — in fact, 85% of millennials say that makes them more willing to recommend a brand.

Get Branding

Building a brand might seem like a huge undertaking, especially when resources are limited. But as we’ve seen, there are plenty of economical ways to not only get started, but to continue the momentum you start with these efforts.

And please, have fun with the process. Of course, there has to be a degree of strategy and logic involved — that’s why we’ve built the tools to help you determine what the different pieces of your brand will be. But it’s a creative exercise, so keep that in mind if you get bogged down in technicalities.

What were some of the first ways you started branding your business on a budget? Let us know in the comments.

 

Earlier this year, I wrote about a little thing called “imposter syndrome.” It refers to the feeling we get when, no matter how much we’ve achieved, we feel like we don’t belong or don’t deserve to be in a position of leadership.

About 70% of us will experience it at some point, especially the bosses among us. No wonder why so many of us constantly ask if we stack up. And how do you measure that, anyway?

It turns out, we’re probably overthinking it. Sometimes, a simple question-and-answer flowchart can help us with that introspection, and answer the question, “Am I a good boss?”

You’re in luck. The folks over at Headway Capital have created such a flowchart, chock full of important questions to ask about your leadership style, priorities, and more. Check out the infographic below to see how you measure up as a boss — and where there might be room for improvement. (P.S. Love infographics but struggle with design? Download our free infographic templates here).

For schools, having a great website is no longer an added bonus. Parents and students alike make decisions online, and your website has a great deal to do with that process. 

The good news, is that it no longer takes an entire IT department to turn a mediocre website into a great one. In our new ebook for education marketers, 15 Website Must-Haves for Driving More Inquiries and Applications, we offer quick wins to help you optimize your school’s sites to both attract more traffic, and drive more leads.

You’ll learn all about: 

1. Inbound links
2. On-page SEO
3. Meta Tags
4. 301 Redirects
5. First impressions
6. Consistent layout and structure 
7. Compelling images
8. Clear navigation
9. Accessibility and mobile responsiveness
10. Perceivable value
11. Quality content 
12. Blog
13. Social sharing 
14. Student or Parent Testimonials
15. Landing Pages and Forms

Ready to dive in? Snag your copy of our free ebook here >>

Back when Sean Ellis first coined the term “growth hacking” in 2010, many marketers were skeptical about whether or not it was just a passing fad. A few years down the line, growth hacking tools, tactics, and strategies have proven hugely successful for both big name brands and unknown startups.

But what exactly is growth hacking, and how is it different from regular marketing?

In short, growth hacking combines technology, creativity, analytics, and innovative marketing strategies all with one singular goal in mind: growth.

To help you navigate the constantly changing word of growth hacking, HubSpot and Brandwatch teamed up to create The Smart Marketer’s Guide to Growth Hacking. This playbook for growth will help you identify what the right growth strategy is for your business, and how to execute on it.

More specifically, this guide will cover:

• Using the PIE framework to prioritise and conduct tests
• Five core metrics to tangibly measure growth against
• How to build an experimental funnel to test your hypotheses
• Tactics and tools used by GrubHub, Airbnb, HubSpot, and more to drive accelerated results in a short period of time
• Hacks to grow your database, boost your brand awareness, and launch new products.

Access your copy of The Smart Marketer’s Guide to Growth Hacking today.

Human beings consistently struggle with perfectionism — the idea that everything we do has to be right on the first try, or else we have failed.

Consciously, we know better. We realize that perfectionism causes more problems than it solves. Even so, creative professionals still have trouble putting “good enough” into practice.

Web design projects, in particular, seem to be a magnet for delays, unexpected hiccups, and ever-expanding launch dates, all of which make life more difficult for clients and agencies alike.

We are no longer living in an era where delays on projects are excused as acceptable or even inevitable. Deadlines are no longer suggestions — they’re set in stone. Speed is now the most valuable currency of business, and the rapid pace of technological innovation means your competitors are pushing new products and new ideas into the market faster than ever.

In this landscape, we all have to learn to let go of old habits — especially (my fellow) web designers. We hate having our wondrous visions restricted by pesky things like time, budget, and reality — yet many of us struggle for a way to make new and better habits.

Growth-Driven Design (GDD) is a new way to approach web design that can help your agency launch better sites, faster, and with better end results for your clients. The methodology provides a step-by-step guide to run web projects that create what end users actually want, all while minimizing the many risks associated with traditional web design. Visiting this page will help get you started.

As you learn more about how GDD can change your life as a web designer, keep in mind these important lessons.

Why the Best Designers Don’t Care About Being Perfect

Let Go of the Idea of “One Big Launch.”

Understand that there is no longer one single, ceremonious launch for website projects. “Launch Day” used to be a very proud and emotional moment for us: releasing that flawlessly polished work of art, that took many long months to create, out in to the world. Letting that moment go can actually be quite difficult for us; We feel like we’ve lost out on a way to take pride and satisfaction in our work.

We may forget in our nostalgia that there is also often a darker side to “Launch Day.” It often only comes after numerous delays and expansions of the budget, each one lowering our clients’ satisfaction and patience.

We might have rationalized this to ourselves as a necessary concession — after putting so much extra time and money into crafting everything just right, it would all be worth it when you pull back the white sheet and the client’s eyes light up with delight at the dazzlingly perfect end result! That’s the best sign of success… right?

With GDD, site launches are much smaller affairs. They aren’t as sexy, they aren’t as wow-inducing, they aren’t always emotionally satisfying. But they are always improvements over the previous version, however incremental.

Client satisfaction remains a constant and relevant factor in design work, but equally or perhaps more important is to impress the client’s customers, or better yet, to drive them to action. Strangely enough, the two groups often have very different opinions. If that’s the case, it’s up to the customer to have the final say on what works. GDD gets your work closer to the customers, and faster.

Learn to take as much pride in the process as a whole as you used to take on just one single Launch Day. Be proud of your team’s ability to release quality work quickly. Take to heart how much value the client is getting from your speed to market. Remember how each iteration is also helping to improve the lives of customers as well as clients, and now those customers are receiving value faster than ever.

Solve Problems by Doing, Not by Thinking.

GDD’s Strategy phase provides a framework for doing plenty of qualitative research — diving deep into the client’s current situation, exploring what we think are the customers’ needs and wants, setting goals for the short and long term, and making certain fundamental assumptions based on the team’s experience and expertise.

Without real world feedback, however, the power of research has its limits. That’s why the process aims to put a limit on how much time is spent on strategic planning. Eventually, we do need to get out into the real world via our initial release “Launch Pad” site, and start to collect quantitative data as well.

You’re the expert in your field. You’ve got a ton of ideas on how to improve metrics and satisfy customers. When you combine your expertise with the GDD process, you have a way to best optimize that expertise towards generating results. Do things that will conduct experiments to help answer those questions. After the Strategy and Launch Pad phases comes Continuous Improvement — and that means that improving and learning never stops.

Set a realistic, yet hard-stop, deadline for when the strategy phase — the “thinking” part of the project — ends, and when the doing — building the Launch Pad site — begins.

Let Go of the Need to Get It Perfect.

Perfect is the enemy of “done” as well as the enemy of “good.” Growth-Driven Design (notice how it’s not called Perfection-Driven Design) wholly accepts — even assumes — that our first hypotheses about the website will be slightly incorrect. So don’t be afraid of not getting it right the first time. Nobody’s life will be ruined if your first iteration doesn’t hit ideal metrics goals.

Perfectionism is one of the largest causes of design project delays. Designers get bogged down in the search for that “just right” solution. If we don’t find it, we’ll keep on trying ad infinitum, generating more ideas, on and on and on, without limit, because nothing we’ve come up with so far satisfied us one hundred percent. All the while, we’re losing track of time, missing deadlines and milestones.

The perfect solution to a design problem isn’t in the designer’s head, or even anywhere inside your office. It’s out in the market. Your office is a nice comfortable bubble, and the outside world is gritty and scary — but that’s where your customers are. That’s where your answers are. Use your Launch Pad site to collect real user data to make informed decisions.

Remind yourself, and counsel your team, that perfectionism is not expected of anyone. Nothing that your team can come up with will be one hundred percent right the first time. This is not only okay, but is the expected norm. Do not extend deadlines in order to gain more time to chase after perfectionism.

Don’t Start What You Can’t Finish.

Here’s one for the project managers. Though there’s no hard and fast rule, a typical Launch Pad site goes live 30-60 days after the project begins. That’s not a lot of time, and it’s certainly not enough time to do everything both you and the client want to do for the site.

Nor is it supposed to be. What a Launch Pad site is supposed to be is a notable improvement over the old website, as well as a tool for learning, experimentation, feedback, and improvement.

When planning a project timeline, be pessimistic, especially if you are new to the GDD process. For your Launch Pad site, you may streamline the process by simplifying features, or postponing the release of certain features or pages until the second launch.

Remember the “80/20 Rule” — around 80% of the value customers get from the website likely comes from around 20% of the pages and features. When your team is successfully able to identify those high-impact areas, you can be confident that you’re allocating time and resources optimally.

GDD workflows take very tight team communication. When a single day constitutes a much larger percentage of your work time than ever before, a single unproductive day where someone was blocked, or wasn’t prioritizing or focusing, is a huge hit to productivity. For my team, I mandate a minimum of two check-ins per day.

To help the team maintain focus on what they can finish, keep a wish list of tasks to be done in the future. This helps calm the anxiety associated with not being able to get everything done at once, and goes a long way in managing expectations with the rest of your team.

No one’s ideas need be rejected, merely saved into a trusted system and postponed for a later time. It’s this wish list that you and the client often refer to when deciding what to work on for your next release.

Nothing looks professional when it’s half-baked. “Done” is the key word here! If you can’t finish a page or feature in time, it’s better to leave it out entirely, put it back on your wish list, and plan to finish it for a later release.

The Key Takeaways for Agencies and Designers.

Once you learn to embrace the “done” rather than the “perfect” in your work, it’s quite a liberating feeling. Launch dates aren’t nearly as stressful when there are many small ones instead of one big monster launch.

You aren’t fearful over making a mistake. The thought of not finishing everything on your wish list in one go doesn’t cause crippling anxiety for your team. You take pride in the fact that every new launch is a chance to improve your work, learn truths that are actually backed up by real data, and improve customers’ lives. In time, you come to a place where true growth can happen for your clients, your team, and you as a designer.

If you’re anything like most people, you can probably rattle off 100 different things you’d rather do than dig through your inbox.

It starts to feel like a chore, because what’s in there isn’t very interesting. In fact, only 21% of consumers reported that they’ve received a memorable promotional email in the past two months, according to a study by Litmus. 

To overcome that, many brands are using email personalization as a strategy for creating more engaging email experiences — ones that feel less like a robot, and more like a friend.

The best part? Email personalization doesn’t need to be insanely complicated to resonate with recipients. To see what I mean, check out these 12 great email examples that cleverly use personalization.

12 Examples of Email Personalization in Action

1) JetBlue

Oh, JetBlue. You shouldn’t have. 

This anniversary email highlights a creative example of a brand using something as simple as a date to provide a standout experience. Much like a birthday shout out, JetBlue used my colleague’s account creation date to trigger a personalized email to celebrate the fact that they’ve been “emailing for 365 days now.”

If you’re a HubSpot customer, this is an easy email to replicate for your contacts through fixed date or property-based workflows. It allows you to base your workflow on a calendar or contact property date, so you can send anniversary emails, digital birthday cards, renewal reminders, and more. And if your business is sending a high volume of these emails, we also offer the Transactional Email Add-On.

2) Spotify 

Here’s another great personalized email example that leverages a user’s interests to provide a relevant, value-packed message.

The copy in this email is particularly effective because it frames the personalization in a way that makes the recipient feel like they’re being rewarded for their usage. Phrases like “top listener” and “be the first to get access” lend themselves to a sense of exclusivity — making the user feel important. 

The email also closes with a written call-to-action that encourages the recipient to listen to Charles Kelley’s new song  — specifically on Spotify. Again, this push helps to ensure that the user is actively using the streaming service, and therefore continuously reminded of the value. 

3) Amazon 

Last Halloween, HubSpot’s blogging team dressed as the dancing pumpkin man from this viral video. (And, in case you’re wondering, we’ll probably be dressing as a bunch of bananas this year.) But before opting to DIY our own orange masks, my colleague, Lindsay Kolowich, set out on an Amazon search to find us the real deal.

Within just a couple of days, she received this personalized email from Amazon featuring “products similar to ‘full face plastic pumpkin masks’.” (Some of them are quite scary, aren’t they?)

This email serves as a great example of how to use a contact’s search behavior to re-engage them with your company, and hopefully move them closer to a sale. 

4) LinkedIn

Once upon a time, before I worked for HubSpot — practically another lifetime, it feels like — I was about to graduate from business school and actively applying for jobs.

I often used LinkedIn for my search — a business-focused social network that was paying attention the type of listings I responded to. Each day, LinkedIn sent me a roundup jobs it thought would pique my interest.

What’s interesting about this email is that LinkedIn wasn’t using it to earn my paid business. Rather, LinkedIn seemed to be keeping a close eye, algorithmically, to the locations and type of work I was seeking. While some of the listings were more applicable than others, all of them were clickable.

Did you catch that? Clickable. And even if none of these jobs piqued my interest, I had about 250 classmates who might have considered them, driving even more traffic to LinkedIn’s website.

So think about what’s going to make your content clickable, and how you can use personalized emails to drive traffic to your site. Then, set up workflows that remind subscribers how to continue taking advantage of these specially-tailored messages.

5) The Bowery Presents

I received this email back when I was living in New York address, but it still serves as a great example of how to use location information to provide a customized email experience.

In the email, The Bowery Presents pulled shows from New York venues — where I purchased tickets for many events when I lived there — for artists similar to the ones I saw live.  

And when I finally purchased tickets to see one of these artists in Boston? It re-personalized my emails to let me know about shows here.

By making it easy for me to quickly visualize what’s headed to the area and when, The Bowery Presents is able to lower the barrier between me and the point of purchase.

This type of personalization could be extremely beneficial for a company looking to deliver more relevant messages to international leads or existing customers. (For more tips on reaching international audiences, check out this article from our VP of International Operations and Strategy, Nataly Kelly.)

6) Twitter

After following one of her favorite brunch spots on Twitter, my colleague Corey received this email from the social network with suggestions for similar accounts to follow. 

What’s more is that the suggestions were actually super relevant — turns out, a couple of them were just right around the corner from her. (Hello, new grub options.)

When companies have as much data as Twitter does, they usually go one of two ways with personalization: They totally hit the nail on the head, or they have too much data to sift out what’s important. This is an example of accurately identifying what Corey would actually care about, and delivering it to her.

7) Hawaiian Airlines

There are few places on the planet that I love more than Hawaii. I’m constantly thinking about my next trip there, but for a while, could never quite commit to booking it.

That is, until I received this special birthday email from Hawaiian Airlines. In keeping with the Hawaiian tradition of presenting someone with a lei on his or her birthday, the airline instead chose to present me with 500 bonus miles, just for booking a trip within the next year. Aloha, indeed.

There’s more than one noteworthy thing about this email. First, the only reason I received it is because I’m enrolled in the Hawaiian Airlines mileage program, and getting emails like these is just one of the “rewards” of membership. Plus, the airline understands that I joined for a reason — because at some point, I planned to visit Hawaii again.

With that in mind, Hawaiian Airlines used this personalized email to give me an incentive to finally book that trip, with a birthday greeting to boot. That’s a great way for brands to achieve customer reactivation — by using a fixed date, like a birthday or anniversary, to remind people what it was that they loved about your business in the first place. By offering something special from your brand to commemorate the occasion, you’re giving your audience the motivation to take action and making a purchase.

8) HubSpot Academy

There’s a thing about licenses and certifications. They’re valuable. They help you master knowledge and become an expert. Having them makes you look good. But they also have to be kept up-to-date, and unless you’re reminded, letting them expire can be all too easy.

If you have any HubSpot certifications, you know that doesn’t have to be the case. Our Academy team creates personalized emails to let certification-holders know which ones they currently possess, which ones need to be renewed, and which ones might be helpful to add to their credentials.

Eric Peters, the senior growth marketing manager with HubSpot Academy, explained the technology that makes emails like these work. Each certification box in the above email is made “smart,” to show users which certifications are available to them.

“All nine certifications are available to partners. Eight are available to customers, and four to non-customers,” Peters says. “Each one of those certifications has a Smart CTA that appears as a different color, depending on whether the user is actively certified — which means they passed within the last 395 days — expired, or incomplete.” 

“In other words,” he explains, “it’s a bunch of Smart CTAs embedded in a smart rich text box. The CTAs point to the splash page describing the certification.”

(HubSpot Professional and Enterprise customers: You can create Smart CTAs like these in your own emails with your HubSpot CTA tool.)

9) Netflix

Am I the only one that spends more time looking for a movie on Netflix than I do actually watching it?

Aware that its database can be overwhelming, Netflix regularly sends out these personalized emails that suggest movies for its users. (If you want to learn more about the science behind the Netflix algorithms, you can brush up on it here.)

By providing a custom recommendation, Netflix helps ensure that users are actively seeing the value of their subscription. In other words, it keeps them watching, which ultimately keeps them paying. 

This approach could be applied to a number of marketing materials — ebooks, webinars, and blog articles, to name a few. For example, if you find that someone downloaded an ebook on social media tips, you may want to set up a workflow to trigger a follow-up email that suggests they check out your social media guide on SlideShare. 

10) Pinterest

In an effort to keep my colleague Ginny pinning, Pinterest sent her this personalized email. Based off her past activity on the site, the social network provided some suggestions for other topics she may want to explore. (Butter, Lauren Conrad, and cheese — I like your style, Ginny.)

And given that, at the time, she was planning a yellow-themed wedding, I’d say the results were pretty accurate. 

What we love most about the email is its simplicity. It offers up just six topics, which is enough to interest the recipient without overwhelming her. Plus, the copy is quick, friendly, and clear. 

11) WeddingWire

In other wedding-related news, my colleague Ginny also received this email example from WeddingWire, an online marketplace for venues, cakes, dresses, and other wedding-planning items.

While the copy was clever in and of itself, what really struck us was the personalization used in the subject line. After all, your recipients aren’t going to see the content unless you persuade them to click first, right?

By using a witty, custom hashtag —  #GinnysLastHurrah — in the subject line, WeddingWire inspired her to click on the email, check out their tool for creating hashtags, and forward the email to the rest of us. 

If you want to boost the word-of-mouth influence behind your product or service, you should consider how personalization can help propel your message. 

12) Birchbox

Birchbox is a company that’s fixated on personalization in all the right ways — and all it takes is one glance at the header of this email to see why it’s effective.

Birchbox transparently admitted that they took a peek at my colleague Carly’s sample and purchase history before crafting this email. That gave her the sense that what came next would likely be relevant to her — and it was. 

These little, personalized messages always reinforce why Carly continues to subscribe to the Birchbox service — they strengthen her loyalty. 

Let’s Get Personal

With 62% of millennials feeling that online content drives their loyalty to a brand, and 46% of U.S. consumers admitting that they’re more likely to switch providers than they were 10 years ago — it’s clear that fostering loyalty through personalization should be a priority.

It may seem like a big undertaking, but by observing, understanding, and investing in the behavior of your customers, you can help to ensure that they’ll stay customers. So start getting personal — and building loyalty.

Is your company leveraging email personalization? Share your favorite tips below.

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in February 2013 and has been updated for freshness, accuracy, and comprehensiveness.