In the midst of holiday shopping and seasonal sales, it’s easy to get caught up in spending. But sometimes, the best things are free. 

Over the years, HubSpot has developed a number of free tools and programs that we love to share with others.

In celebration of the giving season, we’ve packaged up 12 days of free features that you can use, no strings attached. (Well, maybe they’re tied up with a proverbial bow.)

12 Free Features & Tools for Marketers

1) HubSpot CRM

Give your sales team everything they’ve hoped for and more this holiday season: an entire, all-in-one customer relationship management platform. For free.

Our CRM is easy to adopt and helps businesses automate their sales processes to save time, money, and energy. HubSpot CRM comes with a searchable database to simplify researching and prospecting, powerful browser and email integrations, and impressive enrichment capabilities. 

2) Free Stock Photos

Why pay for stock photos when you can get them for free? HubSpot’s new site, freestockphotos.org, catalogs photos that you can use for blog posts, social media, or wherever else you need high quality photos. The site is broken down into categories such as office supplies, technology and cities to facilitate your browsing. Not to mention, all photos are tagged and searchable. New photos are being added consistently, so keep checking back as you work on projects. 

3) Website Grader

How’s your website doing? Great websites are key to attracting (and keeping) traffic. This free tool grades four key areas of your website: performance, mobile, SEO, and security. See how you rate in each of these areas and get actionable tips to make your website even better than it already is.

4) Academy

Learning can be expensive, but it doesn’t have to be. HubSpot’s Academy is a tuition-free way to get inspired and learn new things. In-depth courses show you how to set up campaigns, create content, optimize pages, and nurture leads.

Learn better by doing? Academy also offers Projects — a series of step-by-step guides that help your leverage HubSpot tools to reach your goals — so you can learn as you go! 

5) Sidekick

The easiest way to know when your email has been opened? Sidekick.

This tool helps put the data in your hands about who, when, and where your emails are accessed. Emailing doesn’t have to be a dreaded activity — make your inbox work for you instead.

6) Inbound.org

Inbound.org is the ultimate community of marketers. Members can stay informed about what’s happening with their inbound marketing peers and connect with new people who are passionate about the same things. More than 500,000 members are already taking advantage of this free-ness — don’t be left out!

7) Inbound Certification

Expand your skills and grow your career with our free inbound certification. You’ll learn things that can be instantly applied to your organization and help you grow your career. If you’re looking for a job, it’s not bad to have on your resume either. 

8) Marketing Salary Grader

Wondering how your salary stacks up against other marketers? This tool shows you where your salary ranks among your peers in similar geographic areas, with similar levels of experience. Oh, and it also gives some fun personality facts to compare with others.

9) INBOUND Decks

Missed out on HubSpot’s annual INBOUND event? No worries. The slides from the 250+ inspiring speakers have been posted online. Yep, that means you can do all the learning, for free, without ever leaving your desk. Get insights from amazing INBOUND speakers like Joel Comm, Jason Miller, and Marcus Sheridan on topics ranging from getting inbound marketing buy-in to selling the inbound way. 

10) Marketing Library

If you’re looking for templates, guides, or in-depth ebooks, the marketing library is your one-stop shop. (Metaphorically, of course, because the content is all free). The library includes a range of topics and styles including presentation templates for sales meetings, budget spreadsheet templates, and webinars from remarkable marketers such as Oli Gardner and Noah Kagan.

11) State of Inbound

Check out the latest report on the state of inbound marketing and sales. The result of surveying nearly 4,000 marketing and sales professionals is an in-depth look at the priorities and challenges of your peers. 

12) Leadin

Leadin is the free tool that gives you insights about visitors to your site. With a quick, 5-minute setup, the plugin is easy to use and immediately helpful. 

Nobody likes wasting money, so we’re always on the lookout for free ways to get the job done. Celebrate the season of giving this year by showing others how to save themselves money (and time) with awesome free tools.

Whether you’re driving across town, stuck on a layover, or settling down for an overnight train ride, you’re going to have some time to kill the next time you travel. If you’re anything like me, spending hours window shopping at the airport or scrolling aimlessly through your Facebook News Feed feels like a total waste of time.

But there are much better ways to pass the time while traveling — which is why we’ve curated a list of our absolute favorite movies, TV shows, podcasts, books, and apps that our readers might also enjoy.

Whether you have thirty minutes, two hours, or five hours to kill, we’ve included plenty of options.

Pro Tip: If you’re into the podcasts on this list, the free app Stitcher lets you make playlists of all your favorite podcasts.

Under 1 Hour

1) NextDraft (Free App)

NextDraft is hands down my favorite newsletter, which you can either get in your inbox every day or check on your own time via their free app. What is it? It’s ten quick summaries of the most fascinating news stories of the day, shared in a way that’s expertly written, witty, and always relevant. 

If this sounds interesting to you, download it now in preparation for your trip so you have plenty to catch up on.

Image Credit: NextDraft

2) Pocket (Free App)

The great thing about reading articles while you travel is that you finally have time to read the whole thing (instead of just skimming the first few paragraphs), and then actually reflect on what you’ve just read. Pocket is a place for you to save all those articles you stumble on when you don’t have time to read them.

It lets you save articles, videos, and images either from your browser or from over 1,500 apps like Twitter, Flipboard, Pulse, and Zite. While you’re traveling, you can open Pocket — no internet connection needed — and finally spend time reading through, digesting, and pondering all the cool stuff you’ve saved.

3) Headspace (Free App)

Headspace calls itself “a gym membership for your mind.” It’s an app that helps you learn how to meditate — which you can totally do inconspicuously on the train, bus, or airplane. All it takes to learn meditation and mindfulness is ten minutes on the app.

4) Duolingo (Free App)

Ever wanted to learn a new language, or just brush up on those French skills from high school? Duolingo is an awesome app that makes learning languages fun — and you can make progress in only a few minutes, if that’s all you have. Each lesson is short, painless, and legitimately enjoyable. Slate called it “the most productive means of procrastination I’ve ever discovered.”

The languages available are Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Irish, Danish, Swedish, Russian, Polish, Esperanto, Turkish, Norwegian, and Ukrainian.

You’ll need headphones to listen to pronunciation. And while speaking isn’t required, be warned that you may want to repeat words out loud to practice your pronunciation.

Image Credit: Google Play

5) This.cm (Website)

Itching to get lost in a rabbit hole of great internet content? This.cm is a website that curates some of the best links on the internet. If you’re looking for entertaining, relevant stories, it’s a great place to spend some time. You’ll need internet connection to browse, though.

6) Death, Sex & Money (Podcast)

This is my colleague Ginny Soskey‘s favorite podcast of all time — and it happens to be one of the best in the business. It’s hosted by Anna Sale and covers the big questions and hard voices that are often left out of polite conversation.

Nicholas Quah of The Vulture wrote: “Anna Sale is the absolute best at exploring difficult, intimate, and harrowing topics — loss, loneliness, survival, being left behind, pain, secrets, sex (or lack thereof) — while maintaining a deep, deep sense of dignity for the people she interviews.”

7) The Message (Podcast)

Ever hear of Orson Welles’ radio drama “The War of the Worlds” from 1938 about an alien invasion of Earth? Here’s a fictional podcast that’s also about aliens, albeit with a much more modern take: It’s a fake pop-science series about cryptographers investigating mysterious transmissions. It was produced by General Electric, making it a great example of native advertising and branded content in podcasts.

If you liked the Serial podcast and enjoy science-fiction, this one could be a great choice for your next trip. David Sims wrote for The Atlantic, “The Message is clearly inspired by the success of Serial, but it plays with the format in a creative way.” My colleague loved it so much, she started and finished the entire series during her drive home for Thanksgiving. If you want to break it into smaller chunks, each episode is between 10–20 minutes long.

8) Freakonomics (Podcast)

How do you win a Nobel Prize? Should kids pay back their parents for raising them? What are the tactics of competitive eating? The Freakonomics podcast will challenge your perspective on some common (and some not-so-common) issues, from gossip to violence to exercise — and all from an economic perspective.

It’s the type of content that really makes you think, and delivers a good framework for how you should approach analyzing everyday things in your work and personal life. 

9) BBC’s Global News (Podcast)

Getting news from podcasts can be a lot more efficient than getting them from articles — especially if you’re prone to getting sucked into the black hole of “recommended reading” sections. BBC’s Global News podcast is especially great because it curates some of the best stories they’ve covered from a global perspective. Each episode is about thirty minutes long.

1–2 Hours

10) Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me! (Podcast)

If you like keeping up with current events but get bored with the normal format, NPR’s weekly podcast could be a perfect match. It’s a quiz-style news show that catches you up on current events in a fun and totally unique format, where you’ll have to test your knowledge against guest stars and figure out what’s real news and what they totally made up.

11) You Made It Weird (Podcast)

Here’s another personal favorite of mine. In this podcast, host Pete Holmes interviews comedians (for the most part) and covers comedy, relationships, and God. The best part about this podcast is that it’s unstructured, so it’s just like listening in on a great conversation. Holmes is very open and does a good job of creating an environment where guests want to open up.

Each episode lasts anywhere from 90 minutes to 2+ hours, so if you download a few before you leave, you’ll get through your flights with some top-notch entertainment.

12) “Moneyball” (Movie, 2011)

One of the underlying principles of inbound marketing is that you can bring some sense of order to chaos using a methodical, data-driven approach. The movie illustrates how sports learned the same lesson. Starring Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill, it’s based on a true story of the general manager of the Oakland Athletics baseball team who was faced with a tight budget and had to reinvent his team by outsmarting the richer baseball teams.

It may sound like it’s all baseball all the time, but you don’t need to be a big sports fan to enjoy this movie: It earned a 94% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

13) “Particle Fever” (Documentary, 2014)

If you’re at all captivated by science, the universe, and the unknown, then you’re gonna love this option. In the documentary, scientists recreate conditions from the big bang theory to investigate the origin of matter and unravel the mysteries of the universe.

Not a science nerd? Don’t be intimidated by the subject matter. The producers did an amazing job presenting it in such a way that anyone can understand and enjoy. Plus, it earned a 96% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

14) “Thank You For Smoking” (Movie, 2006)

Here’s a super interesting movie on sales and marketing positioning — from the days when it wasn’t so noble. It’s about a big tobacco lobbyist struggling to balance his duties defending tobacco with those of being a good role model for his young son. It earned an 86% critic rating and 87% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

15) “Glengerry Glen Ross” (Movie, 1992)

Looking for another great movie on sales and marketing position from the olden days? Here’s an oldie but goodie that any marketing or sales professional would appreciate. It’s a movie based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning play by the same name. The movie is about a team of New York City real estate salesmen who are told that everyone except the top two reps will be fired by the end of the week. Talk about “survival of the fittest.” It earned a 94% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Here’s a famous scene from the movie featuring a monologue from actor Alec Baldwin on how to “always be closing.”

(Warning: NSFW language.)

16) “Man On Wire” (Documentary, 2008)

Here’s a documentary that’ll have you holding your breath — even though you know how it ends. It’s about a young French man named Phillippe Petit who, in 1974, decided he wanted to (illegally) string a wire between the New York World Trade Center’s twin towers. After dancing for nearly an hour on the wire, he was arrested, taken for psychological evaluation, and brought to jail before being released.

The documentary incorporates Petit’s personal footage with modern film and interviews — and it’s absolutely mesmerizing. It earned a whopping 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, making it a guaranteed worthwhile way to spend an hour and a half of travel time.

Over 2 Hours

17) “The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst” (Documentary Miniseries, 2015)

Here’s one of the best and most controversial documentaries from 2015. If you haven’t seen it yet … well it’s gripping, not to mention a phenomenal example of great storytelling.

It’s about a man named Robert Durst, son of a New York real estate mogul and suspect of three notorious murder cases over three decades. He was arrested on first-degree murder charges the day before the finale aired. (Just wait until you see the finale.) The HBO miniseries is broken up into six episodes, each of which run under an hour.

It won two 2015 Emmy Awards, including best documentary or nonfiction series, and earned a 94% critic review and 98% audience review on Rotten Tomatoes.

18) “Mad Men” (TV Series)

This multi-season television series is a big commitment … but let’s be honest, this is to marketing what “Boiler Room” and “Glengarry Glen Ross” is to sales. It’s about a Madison Avenue advertising firm in the 1960s — and alpha male Don Draper’s struggles to stay on top of the heap in a high-pressure world. For marketers like us, it’s a fascinating look at how things in marketing used to be, which gives us context to help drive changes in our own companies.

Starting with Season 1? Great choice: It got an 87% critic review and a 95% audience review on Rotten Tomatoes.

19) Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds For the Better (Book)

If you’re trying to get some serious reading done while you travel, here’s a great choice. Smarter Than You Think is a brilliantly written book by science and technology writer Clive Thompson about how the introduction of new technology advances our society and extend the way we think. Moreover, it’s nice counterargument to similar books which decry that the internet is making us lazy, dumb, and isolated.

20) Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things No One Taught You About Being Creative (Book)

This book by Austin Kleon is an interesting, quick read on how to come up with creative ideas. It’s based on the premise that that no idea is original — and it walks you through ways to collect ideas, remix existing ones, and get in touch with your inner creative.

Listen to the book’s author talk about some of the ideas in the book at a TEDx conference to see if it’s up your alley:

21) Contagious: Why Things Catch On (Book)

Here’s another great book for marketers, written by Jonah Berger, the Wharton professor and best-selling author my colleague Carly Stec interviewed for her blog post on the secret formula for ideas that take off. In Berger’s book, he talks about why some ideas catch on — and others don’t — by highlighting his research on social influence and word-of-mouth.

Now, then: Go forth and travel without getting bored!

What other movies, shows, podcasts, books, and apps would you add to this list? Share with us in the comments.

AOL may have scaled back its Patch.com presence in 2013, but the market opportunity for regional publications is still alive and strong.

Community newsletters and magazines are timeless concepts, and they’re gaining in popularity in the digital ecosystem, too. Just take a look at the following study from Havas PR UK: local newspapers took the lead for most trusted and popular local news source. Despite this, print has been declining as a percentage of total revenue for local magazines since 2005. For local publications to hold their place in the minds and hearts of readers, a change in direction is a must.

Media brands like 5280 in Denver and D in Dallas have built strong followings in their local markets by experimenting with personalized newsletters, content marketing for their advertisers, and more channels for monetization. They’re riding the line between news and entertainment and have an opportunity to explore new monetization and engagement opportunities—And it’s not so daunting to do the same if you know where to start.

Regional publications face a lot of competition to stand out, and there’s lots of room for improvement. Many of these initiatives will require long-term planning and experimentation. Here are some tips to guide you:

Keep a Clean Database

Even though you’re a local publisher, you’re still attracting readers from around the world. You’ll want to pay attention to this distinction: it impacts the monetization channels that you choose for each audience segment.

With local readers, for instance, you have many creative ways to drive revenue. You can sell tickets to local events, sponsor your own events, and work with local advertisers. It doesn’t make sense, however, to target these same offers to outsiders who are looking in and observing.

When building your lists, keep track of who lives where. Account for the fact that people are mobile: in your sign-up process, ask whether your new subscribers ever visit your region. Here are some tips to help you facilitate that process: 

• Run a sample survey among your audience base
• Use LiveChat software to reach readers in the moment, with specific questions 
• Collect some data in the sign-up process, and let audiences know that you might be asking some follow-up questions in the future
• Cross-check your lists with a third party data provider, if there is one available (it will vary by region and industry). Note: This does NOT mean you should purchase lists for mailing

This perspective will help you keep things organized and improve the efficiency of your monetization efforts.

Build Audience Profiles 

When it comes to ad targeting, demographic data is only one piece of the puzzle. Marketers also need access to psychographic, behavioral, and interest-based data—and when it comes to using data to build campaigns, accuracy is the ‘name of the game.’ It’s critical to be reaching actual people with buying intent. 

As a media company, it pays to have this data in-hand and to be able to execute campaigns efficiently—the more ROI you’re able to deliver, the more likely your readers are to come back. Advertisers will want to know audience preferences around nightlife activity, restaurant preferences, and general habits around town. With this data, you can also build custom audience profiles—which means that you’ll be able to target your readers off-platform, through channels like Facebook or Twitter. 

With the right information, you can help advertisers write better sponsored content and offer more relevant promotions. With true audience profiles, everyone in the equation wins: readers get better offers, advertisers improve their targeting, and publishers can offer more value.

Gate Local Promotions 

Chances are that your company attracts awesome advertisers who have great local promotions to share. As a middleman, you’re giving away value—and your audience knows it. It doesn’t hurt to ask for something in return.

The most valuable asset that your audiences can provide is information. What local events do the enjoy attending? What advertiser offers would they find valuable?

Identify four or five questions that are relevant to your team and advertisers. Then, gate your free offers. Give your audiences full transparency into your decision for gating your content. Create a win-win scenario for your audiences and advertisers, making sure to emphasize the value that you bring to the table as a regional publisher, too.

Plan to Segment Your Marketing Efforts 

As you collect more data about your audience, you’ll start to build clearer customer segments. With this information in mind, you can better target your list-building efforts and marketing campaigns. Along the way, you’ll offer more value to your advertisers: you can guarantee that you’re reaching local audiences and share data around reader interests too.

It may take some time to create a long-term segmentation strategy, but the key is to just get started. Collect information about the articles that subscribers are reading, and make sure you know each account-holder’s geography. This approach will help you implement the bare bones of a segmentation strategy that you can use to test and refine different versions of your newsletter. And don’t wait until you’re segmentation strategy is “perfect.” You can start now.

Many local magazines, for instance, already segment their websites by news, dining, politics, music, and other content categories. These topics can be powerful starting points for pairing online activity with information that audiences volunteer during the data collection process. The goal is to pair online activity with data and then connect specific advertisers to ‘smart content’ that is interest based.

This process will become more refined over time. Start collecting data sooner rather than later to refine your targeting process.

Focus on Delivering Value

Running a regional publication, you’re in a position to deliver unique value to your audiences and advertisers. The key to success here? You need to build comprehensive audience profiles so that you can better serve them with high-quality content and marketing messages.

Unlike larger, broad-scale media companies, you have instant access to (and a close rapport with) a niche, local community. In a world where advertisers and publishers alike are tackling the complexities of ‘marketing at scale,’ you don’t suffer from the same pain point. It’s your advantage—your gem. Harness it to build an amazing media brand, and monetization will fall into place.

 

Whether you’re meeting with colleagues who are working from home that day, or with clients located half a world away, running a productive and effective remote meeting can be a challenge.

When you’re face-to-face with people, it can feel much easier to communicate efficiently and gauge how they’re feeling and reacting to different ideas.

But when you’re meeting virtually, it can seem like some attendees sort of … disappear into the abyss.

Here’s a pretty hilarious video poking fun at some of the challenges people face when conducting a remote meeting:

Hits a little close to home, doesn’t it?

While remote meetings will likely never achieve the same level of intimacy as face-to-face meetings, there are ways to make them more effective and productive. To help you get more value out or your remote meetings, we’ve come up with 12 top tips for running better ones. Check ’em out.

12 Tips for Better Remote Meetings

1) Choose the right remote meetings tool for your needs.

Perhaps the most important thing about running a remote meeting is the tool you use to run it. Different team and meeting arrangements may call for different types of tools. If you’re meeting with someone for the first time, or you’re meeting with people in a country whose meeting tools you aren’t familiar with, consider asking them ahead of time which tools they’d prefer. Not everyone is familiar with the ones you use on a day-to-day basis, and you don’t want to add any stress to the meeting around logistics.

Here’s a list of some of the best ones out there. If you’re looking for even more tools, here’s our full list.

• GoToMeeting: A robust and reliable online meetings program that boasts screen sharing and great call quality.
• Google Hangouts: Often the most convenient options, thanks to the ubiquity of Google — especially if you’re using Google Calendar to manage your schedule.
• Join.me: Great for fast and easy screenshare meetings.
• Kato: Lets you use chat, video, audio, or screen sharing to collaborate with your coworkers — for free. Bonus: All of your conversations are searchable.
• Uber Conference: No meeting PIN numbers, among other features, means a much less painful conference call experience. It also allows screen sharing and has a mobile app.
• Skype: A decent option for chatting with folks all over the world — even though it can be a little finicky sometimes.

2) Include a dial-in option.

This deserves its own tip. Many remote meeting tools are designed to work primarily over internet connections. But what happens if someone’s internet goes down or slows down? It’s important to give the option for folks to listen to the meeting and talk over the phone.

3) Be mindful of time zones.

If you’re the one setting up the meeting, be sure to set it for a time that works for everyone on the attendee list. There’s nothing worse than realizing you’ve been scheduled for a meeting that at 6:00 a.m. your time — or in the evening when you’d normally have other plans.

There are a lot of great time zone apps out there, but we recommend World Time Buddy:

4) Avoid rescheduling or canceling last-minute.

Hey, having to reschedule or cancel a meeting last-minute happens. What’s important is how you go about doing it. Before you simply change the time on the calendar invitation and call it a day, put yourself in your meeting attendees’ shoes. What inconveniences might you be causing? What special plans and arrangements might they have made around your meeting?

A meeting is a commitment, and rescheduling or canceling last-minute is (under most circumstances) a bit rude. If you really have to do it, send a personal note apologizing and explaining the situation.

5) Be crystal clear about how people will be connecting.

This is where the description in the calendar invitation comes in. Don’t assume people will see the meeting link you might have attached to the calendar invitation. Instead, be very clear with your instructions on how everyone will be connecting in the calendar invitation description so everyone has it in one place.

Here are some details to include:

• Repeat the name of the meeting, the date, the time + time zone, and the duration.
• “HOW TO JOIN:” followed by the meeting information like the meeting PIN number, dial-in number, and any access codes or websites.
• Contact information for those who have trouble connection.

Also, specify whether video is required beforehand. Ever joined a call with video on when everyone else had it switched off? Awkward.

Pro tip: If you’re only meeting with a handful of people who are remote, you may want to require video. It helps people stay focused when they know everyone can see them. Plus, it helps people identify more personally with remote colleagues.

6) Choose your location wisely.

A colleague of mine once had a call with a client whose neighbor was mowing the lawn right outside his home office window. Sounds super distracting, doesn’t it?

Moral of the story: Be mindful of where you are and what’s going on in the background. Certain rooms are noisier than others, even if you’re at home. And while it’s probably adorable when your dog jumps on your lap and peers into the camera, you’re typically better off letting pets go outside to play before the meeting starts.

7) Have a mobile hotspot ready.

There’s always, always a chance that the WiFi where you’re located for the meeting will fail right before your meeting starts. That feeling of panic is never a good one. Thankfully, most smartphones have the ability to turn into mobile hotspots — which has saved me on multiple occasions. Keep in mind that it may add to your data usage and cost you extra. If you have iOS 7, you’ll be able to monitor how much data you’ve used. If you’re desperate, though, it could be worth it.

How to Make Your iPhone a Mobile Hotspot

Go to Settings > Cellular > Personal Hotspot, and then tap to turn on the hotspot. Then, follow the instructions on that screen. (Click here for more detailed instructions.)

How to Make Your Android Phone a Mobile Hotspot

The exact menu names can vary slightly, but for most Android phones, go to Settings > More > Wireless & networks > Tethering & portable hotspot. Here, you can choose from a few different tethering options, along with the option to give your hotspot a strong encryption if you’re in a public location. (Click here for more detailed instructions.)

8) Join the meeting five minutes early.

Whether you’re running the meeting or just attending it, don’t waste valuable meeting time setting up the meeting on your end, or troubleshooting if something goes wrong. Instead, plan for at least five minutes of set-up time ahead of schedule whenever possible.

9) Introduce everyone at the very beginning.

It’s a personable way to get the meeting started, and it lets everyone know who’s actually in attendance — both in the main office room and on the phone.

10) Mute and silence any distracting sounds.

Mute your microphone while others are presenting to silence any overwhelming background noise (like that darn lawn mower).

In the same vein, turn off your computer sounds and notifications, especially if you’re sharing your screen with the group. It’s super distracting for everyone else in the meeting to see pop-ups on your screen while trying to take in the information you’re presenting.

11) Don’t be too apologetic or deferential when people start speaking over each other.

My colleague Corey Wainwright describes it like driving up to a four-way stop with other cars who get there at the same time. Everyone’s gesturing and mouthing to one another, “You go,” “No, you go,” “No, it’s fine, you go!” Then, everyone goes at the same time. And then everyone stops again. 

That’s what happens when people try to talk in remote meetings. It’s inevitable that two or three people chime in at the same time. At that point, one person should just take the lead instead of being overly apologetic and just talk. 

12) Ask for feedback on how people are feeling or what they’re thinking throughout the meeting.

When people meet remotely, especially if there’s no video involved, you’re missing out on the ability to read facial expressions and body language. That’s why it can be useful to solicit feedback on how people are feeling throughout the call. Every five or ten minutes, ask the remote attendees how they’re feeling and whether they have any concerns. This’ll help the folks who are remote feel involved and like their thoughts are heard and cared for. It also helps you keep track of the emotional pulse of the “room.”

What tips do you have for making remote meetings better? Share with us in the comments.

It’s not uncommon to feel like marketers and designers speak different languages. You have marketers focusing on the timeline, designers focusing on the creation process, and neither of them understanding where the other is coming from.

For example, less than 30% of marketers say designers are anticipating problems and following a transparent process. But at the same time, 39% of designers say it’s difficult to estimate the scope of projects in the first place.

What are the most common misunderstandings between marketers and designers? What can each do to address these misunderstandings? To help break down that communication barrier, check out the infographic below from Visually.

If you’re in marketing, you know that headlines are important. But did you know that subheadlines are just as important?

Sure, the headline is responsible for capturing a visitor’s attention … but then what?

To give you a better sense of how it all works, I’m not only going to explain what a subheadline is, but I’ll also detail a process that you can follow to use them to inspire action. 

Once you’re done reading this article, you’ll know exactly how to unleash a killer headline, subheadline, and CTA combo that will make people see, want, and click on your site. 

What’s a Subheadline?

First off, let me explain what I mean by subheadline. Here’s a good definition from Wiktionary:

A smaller, secondary headline that usually elaborates on the main headline above it.

Similarly, Merriam-Webster define the term as:

An additional headline or title that comes immediately after the main headline or title.”

But rather than just tell you what a subheadline is, let me show you. Here is an example from Mention. They use a big, powerful headline, and then a little bitty subheadline:

It’s a secondary line of text that expands, advances, and otherwise informs the user beyond the standard headline.

Here’s another example from Kissmetrics:

Got it? Now, let’s talk about why they are essential …

Why Do Subheadlines Matter?

Subheadlines are important because you can’t say everything you need to say in just a single headline. 

Your headline should grab the reader’s attention. But what’s next?

Subheadlines have the power to reel the reader in. While the headline may grab the user’s attention, you need to do more than that in order for the user to stay. You want to compel the reader to look, to click, to sample, to scroll, or to do whatever it is you want them to do. That usually takes more than just 10-20 words

The subheadline also gives readers that extra nudge. Or, to put it in the word’s of Gary Korisko, “the often overlooked subhead is really a stealthy and lethal ninja writing weapon just sitting there quietly waiting to be put to good use.”

The Formula for a Winning Headline, Subheadline & CTA Combo

Now, let’s get into the good stuff: the surefire, failsafe, absolutely reliable way to make your subheadline as atomically powerful as it can be.

I want to explain how you can create a subheadline that will do what you want it to do. To do so, you must use your subheadline strategically with two other elements: the headline and the call to action. Together, these three elements work like quick, successive bursts of information and opportunity.

It’s kind of like a three-man basketball team: one person dribbles it in and passes it to the second guy, the second guy tosses the layup, and the third guy dunks it.  

Here’s another way to look at the formula:

• Headline. Grab their attention.
• Subheadline. Draw them in deeper.
• Call-to-Action. Tell them what to do.

Now, let’s walk through what each element does.

1) Headline

The reason why headlines are such a big deal is because they are the first thing that a user looks at when they see a webpage. (Obviously, you want to make that first line really pop.)

Here’s a sample eye tracking study demonstrating the power of the headline. According to the map, more eyes spend more time on headlines than any other part of the page.

Image Credit: Wholegrain Digital

With your headline, you should say something that grabs their attention, revs up their engine, or makes them excited. If you don’t give them a strong reason to linger on your headline, then your subheadline won’t get read. End of story.

2) Subheadline

Explosive headlines should pull the reader down into the content, making them want whatever it is you are featuring or talking about.

Here are three things that you can do with your subheadline:

• Explain more. If your product or service needs a bit more explanation, then try expanding on it with your subheadline.
• Talk about benefits. Benefit-focused headlines are great. By emphasizing how a product or service will improve the user’s life, you can dramatically advance the page’s power.
• Encourage action. A subheadline is also a great way to get users to do something. If you successfully encourage action, it’s only a short hop for them to click the call to action button below.

The nature of your subheadline depends on your headline. You can choose one of the techniques above, or split test different varieties to see which one is best for your users.

3) Call-to-Action

Your call-to-action closes the deal. Your headline and subheadline should bring the reader to the logical climax of acting on what he or she knows.

Without the call-to-action, the reader is left wondering “What now?” Don’t let that happen. Instead, make the user respond to the message that they have just read.

Let me review the model once more:

• Headline. Grab attention or spark curiosity.
• Subheadline. Explain, show benefits, or encourage action.
• Call-to-Action. Give them a chance to do it.

What’s the impact of this three-step process on the reader?

• Headline. “What is this?”
• Subheadline. “I want it!”
• Call-to-Action. “I’ll do it!”

Let’s take a deeper dive into the five things that will produce outstanding subheads.

5 Elements That Will Make Your Subheadline Irresistible

Here are the key factors that will make your subheadline shine.

The right words. Choose your words carefully because you can’t use very many. Here are some options, taken from Buffer’s “Big List of 189 Words That Convert”: new, sensational, remarkable, secret, take, you, introducing, improvement, amazing, free, because, suddenly, promote, increase, etc.

Here are a few tips to help you narrow your focus:

• Choose the right length. A good subheadline should take just a few seconds to read. I recommend keeping your subheadline between 10 and 30 words. Double the length of your headline is a good length.
• Aim for the right amount of information. Tell the user just enough. You don’t want to explain everything. You want some of that curiosity to stay with them so they will click on the CTA below.
• Include the right amount of persuasion. It’s important to use your subheadline for its intended purpose — to coax the user to convert. Go ahead and pull out the persuasive stops!

13 Examples of Great Subheadlines

Seeing helpful examples of headlines is one of the best ways to learn the magic. Check these out.

1) Spotify

See how Spotify uses the top headline to grab your attention. It’s a short, punchy statement with visceral appeal. The subheadline explains and encourages action.

2) Scratch Wireless

Scratch Wireless actually uses two subheadlines. I guess they needed to add a few extra benefits. The main headline is a head-jerking command and the subheadline coaxes users with the word “free” and a few more benefits.

3) GitHub

GitHub’s subheadline is a bit long-ish … but it does a comprehensive job of encouraging action. If you’re ready to sign up, the subheadline tells you what you need to know — product capabilities, scope, and price.

4) Oscar

Oscar health insurance uses a clean and simple interface to advance their idea of health insurance — smart and simple. They’re subheadline (in black) explains what Oscar is.

5) Bellroy

The Bellroy shop has a bold three-word headline. Your eyes are naturally searching for an explanation, and the subheadline provides it. The subheadline explains what the product is and why you should consider buying it.

6) Avocode

Avocode uses their headline to explain the product, and their subheadline advances this explanation with even more information and a benefit.

7) Kalexiko

Kalexiko’s brilliant site has a simple headline and simple subheading. The subheadline explains what they are: a “digital design & development agency.”

8) Apple

Apple is the master of compelling subheadlines. Their products need little explanation or introduction, so they woo users with persuasive tactics.

9) Fitbit

Fitbit produces wearable fitness devices. Their subheadline does a helpful job of explaining the image below in brief terms so users will want to see the product selection.

10) Chrome

Chrome takes the benefit-focused approach with their subheadline.

11) Infusionsoft

The main page for Infusionsoft has a three-benefit headline. Their subheadline explains it. And it does it all in 19 words.

12) Medium

Medium’s two subheadlines explain and encourage action.

13) Crazy Egg

Crazy Egg is a tool that shows user-behavior on your website. The subheadline helps to advance this concept further by explaining what the product does.

The most powerful subheadlines are those that speak directly to the user and help them take the next step. By using the combo, following these tips, and writing with clarity, you can watch your website’s effectiveness increase.

What are some good examples of subheadlines that you’ve seen? Share them in the comments section below.

It’s the most wonderful time of the year—when all of your current customers are joined by brand new buyers hoping to find something for the ones they love. This is the beauty of the holiday season, but only if you managed to make those brand new customers stick around in the New Year. If you’re settling for a bump in sales in November and December, then you’re really missing out on the true gift.

So, how can you make that one-time buyer your new best friend? Let’s take a look.

Listen

It’s busy this time of year, and you’ve got a lot on your mind. In between updating your website, creating your sales, hiring new staff, and carrying packages to the post office, you might forget the most important piece: the customer. Remember that people often buy for loved ones rather than themselves for the holidays. That means the people shelling out their hard-earned dough probably have no idea what your company is all about.

They’re going to have lots of questions, and they won’t be afraid to ask. They will, however, take their business elsewhere if you’re not responsive. Be ready to catch emails, social media posts, phone calls, and even questions in the comment section of your blog. Give thoughtful answers that focus on the need rather than an answer you think will sell a product. Transparency and honesty go a long way toward starting a relationship. 

Inform

Sometimes people are too busy to ask—or maybe they don’t even know which questions should come first. If you take a proactive position of informing and educating, you can get them the answers they don’t even know they need yet. Start with the questions most people ask when they encounter your company or products.

You can also show various ways for your product to be used, share tutorials, advise on upgrades and accessories, and—maybe most important during this time of year—provide information for returns and refunds. 

Take That Extra Step

If you know the products ordered are gifts, consider helping the buyer along with the wrapping stage. By tossing the items in a box and sealing it, you take some of the magic out of the holiday season. You may even take some of the magic out of your own company.

If you take a few extra steps by folding garments neatly, including decorative packing materials, and maybe even gift wrapping the box, you show that first-time buyer that you really do care about each dollar they spent.

Prep for Returns

You never want to see a purchase come back for any reason, but sometimes it just happens. Maybe the buyer got a wrong size. Maybe the recipient changed his mind. Whatever the reason for a return may be, you want to be as engaging and helpful as possible. If you’ve already made your return policy clear, then you’ve already won half the battle.

When you get the request, listen to the reason. Maybe you can make suggestions that fix the problem. Do they need a different size? Can you send them a tutorial on assembling the product? Was there something wrong with the product? If you can provide a solution that makes everyone happy, the buyer will remember that. If you can’t, happily refund the money and thank them for their purchase. Keep in mind that buyers who’ve been happy with your company so far might just accept that refund in the form of gift cards.

Keep in Touch 

Once the purchase has been made, be sure to follow up with the buyer after the holiday season. Did the recipient love the gift? Are there other questions you can answer for the buyer? Can you share some other items that might make the gift even better?

Remembering that the first-time customers only found you because of a gift for their loved ones, make suggestions that the buyer may find interesting. With the data you’ve already collected by this point, you can segment your emails in new and exciting ways to reach them. And hey, maybe they’ll never need your products for themselves, but if you impress them enough, they may return later for other gifts.

Work and a busy schedule can take a lot out of a person. Thankfully, the holidays are a great time to slow down, recharge, spend time seeing your loved ones, and do things you wouldn’t normally have time to do.

While it can be tempting to fill your holiday schedule with travel and funtivities, there is something to be said about making time to tackle some of the things that have been collecting dust in your mental backlog.

To help you get ahead for the upcoming year, we’ve put together a list of 17 ideas for productive things to do during your downtime this holiday season. Once you’ve picked your favorites, try using one of these awesome to-do list tools to keep yourself on course.

17 Productive Things to Do During Your Downtime

1) Play around with new technology.

There’s never a good time to learn how to Snapchat when you’ve got a billion other things going on, but learning those new technologies is important. For example, Snapchat gets 4 billion video views per day, according to an International Business Times report. That’s the same number as Facebook.

So why not use your downtime over the holidays to download and play around with some of these new technologies? A few that we recommend include Snapchat, Periscope (read this post for some great Periscope tips), messaging apps like Slack and WhatsApp, and photo editing apps to improve your content creation skills.

2) Write thank-you notes.

Take advantage of the opportunity to make someone’s day by writing them a meaningful, personal thank-you note. It’s a way to distinguish yourself in our increasingly informal, digital world.

Thank-you notes are an easy way to show your appreciation, but there are two roadblocks that cause people to not do it: They don’t have thank-you cards or they don’t know what to write. Let us help out:

1. Buy blank or thank-you notes in bulk. It’s as easy as searching “thank-you cards” on Amazon and buying your favorite pack. (Don’t forget to stock up on stamps, too!) Or, you could go digital using the Postagram app for iPhone: It lets you type up a quick thank-you note to someone, snap a photo, and then they receive an actual, physical card.
2. Here’s a thank-you note template from Hallmark.

3) Schedule all your appointments.

Go see your doctor, your dentist, and your barber or hair stylist. Take your pet to the vet for a check-up. Get the oil changed in your car. Think of all those minor inconveniences you just can’t seem to get to when you’re on your regular schedule, and check them off the list. (Or at least schedule them for the future.)

4) Talk to your friends and family about what you do, if they’re interested. 

While you should take advantage of the time you have away from work to dial back and focus on other parts of your life, you don’t need to remove work from your mind completely. Talking about what you do with the people you love is different from actually doing it. Work is such an important part of our lives and takes up a huge chunk of our waking hours, so sometimes sharing that with family and friends can actually be a bonding exercise.

If your friends and family aren’t familiar with what you do or are interested in learning more, now’s a great time to fill them in on what you do all day, why you like it (or don’t like it), and what you’re hoping to do in the future. Who knows, you could pick up some great insights from people who are removed from your day-to-day. 

(Inbound marketers, feel free to steal some ideas from this oldie but goodie: “6 Ways to Explain Inbound Marketing to Your Family.”)

5) Call your long-distance friends.

You know that list of friends and family members you’ve been meaning to catch up with, but never seem to find the time? Open your phone, find a comfortable spot to sit, and give them a call with your full attention. Now’s the perfect time to connect with people you don’t see regularly but want to stay in touch with.

6) Start building a habit.

Some say it takes 21 days to build a habit. Others say it takes a lot longer. But exactly how long it takes doesn’t really matter. The point is, you have to put the work in up front if you want a habit to stick. So why not use the holidays to get started?

Whether you want to start flossing every day or writing in a journal before bed each night, take the time during your downtime to start habit-forming and set yourself up for success.

7) Learn a new skill for your job.

Most people have a skill they’ve always wanted to learn to advance their career, but simply haven’t gotten around to.

Ever wanted to learn basic coding? Codecademy’s HTML/CSS courses can be finished over the course of a holiday without overly interrupting family time.

Ever wanted to learn your way around Photoshop? Start by following along with a beginner’s tutorial like the one in this blog post. (And if you’re a marketer who’s not sure where to start, here’s a free ebook that analyzes today’s most in-demand marketing skills.)

If you really don’t have the time to dig into a new skill, you can at least use the time to set yourself up for starting to learn one in the new year. Spend some time browsing conferences or classes you could take and figuring out where you can fit them into your schedule.

8) Learn a new skill not for your job.

Skills that aren’t related to your job are usually even more fun to learn. What about learning pottery? Taking a new type of workout class? Learning a new language with an app like Duolingo — perhaps for a country you’ll be traveling to this year? Try to pick something that uses parts of your brain that you don’t usually tap into during the workday. It can do wonders for your happiness, creativity, and wellbeing — and hey, you may even find a new passion or meet people who end up making a huge impact on your life.

9) Make reservations for future plans and trips.

Whether you have a whole trip coming up or even just a dinner, spend some time doing the thoughtful research you may not otherwise have time to do — and make reservations as far in advance as possible. These things can end up sneaking up on you, so making plans early helps guarantee you won’t lose out on some cool opportunities. Not to mention, it’ll leave you feeling less stressed out down the line.

10) Catch up on reading.

Here’s a classic but essential vacation tip: Catch up on those books or articles you’ve been wanting to get to so badly. It’s really hard to find time to read when you’re busy with work, but now that you’re on vacation, you can cuddle up with a blanket and a book. If you’re looking for suggestions, check out this list of 11 fascinating books on Harvard Business School’s required reading list.

11) Listen to podcasts.

Podcasts serve as an amazing way to pass the time on planes, trains, and automobiles during the heavy travel season. The key is picking and downloading what you want to listen to before you go on the trip, when you have WiFi. That way, you’re not draining your battery while on the move.

We recommend a good mix of genres: business, comedy, true crime, etc. Here are two lists of exceptional podcasts we’ve put together in the past year: “8 of the Best Overall Podcasts” and “The Top 10 Best Business Podcasts.”

12) Organize your inbox.

There are a lot of ways to organize your inbox. If you use Gmail, my personal favorite is the Klinger method for getting to inbox zero and staying there. If inbox zero isn’t your cup of tea, here’s a list of 11 of the best tools for organizing your inbox.

Organizing your inbox isn’t the same as checking email, though. Don’t get sucked in! Organize your inbox, and then log off and enjoy your break.

13) Volunteer.

Serving others has a long list of intangible benefits, like pride, satisfaction, accomplishment, connections with others, strengthening your community, and improving the lives of others. There are health benefits, too: Along with social benefits, a growing body of research shows there’s a strong relationship between volunteering and physical health.

Don’t have a specific cause in mind? Check out your local library, youth center, animal shelter, homeless shelter, or hospital to see if they’re in need of volunteers. VolunteerMatch.org is another great place to find good causes in your local community for a wide variety of time commitments.

14) Find a quiet space to let your mind wander.

When we’re deep in our work routines, it can be hard to tear ourselves away from our immediate tasks and goals. But not removing ourselves from these things can mean we miss out on seeing interesting new connections and developing innovations. This is especially true during the busy weeks leading up to the holidays.

Take some time to remove yourself from your day-to-day — even from your family and friends — to be alone and reflect. Daydream about being your own customer, or your competitor, or what it’s like to be the product you produce. Analyze how you’ve been spending your time over the past few months and whether you’d like to make changes in the upcoming year. 

15) Get exercise in.

I’m not going to get into the benefits of exercise (or we’d be here for a while), but the holiday season is an especially hard time to keep a consistent workout routine. Factors like cooler temperatures, less daylight, busy travel schedules, and food-oriented gatherings can all throw off your schedule. But staying active — even just a little bit each day — can be easy and fun. The American Heart Association recommends 40 minutes of aerobic exercise three to four times per week.

Not an athlete? Physical activity doesn’t have to be intense. Find an activity like walking, shoveling snow, vacuuming — heck, even shopping — that gets the blood flowing. Something is always better than nothing.

16) Set goals for next year.

It’s amazing how quickly the New Year can sneak up on you. You’re better off setting aside some time during the holidays to reflect on the past year and make goals for the new one. Setting goals gives you a baseline for measuring success, and the motivation to stay on course when things get crazy.

Setting goals can be as simple as creating two lists: one of your accomplishments this past year, and one of your goals for the next year. To get more specific, you can break larger goals into smaller ones by month. If you want to really dig in to your goals and ground them in reality, try setting SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-bound) and make a plan for staying on course.

17) Do any work-related tasks in the morning.

Although it’d be ideal to leave all your real work for when you’re back in the office, some people simply get more stressed out when they’re disconnected. The thought of missing an important email, or even just returning to an inbox that’s bursting at the seams, can be incredibly daunting for some.

If you’re one of those people, use the morning hours when everyone else is asleep to get your work-related tasks done. By the time everyone wakes up, you’ll have checked off a few key to-dos, made yourself feel better, and will be able to focus on spending time with family and friends.

What other ideas do you have for using your downtime during the holidays? Share with us in the comments.

This post originally appeared on Agency Post. To read more content like this, subscribe to Agency Post.

Few of us truly enjoy meetings in large part because they are often cited as a huge waste of time. For instance, in a study for Harvard Business Review, a group of consultants from Bain & Company analyzed the calendars of key employees for one company and found that one weekly executive meeting consumed 300,000 hours each year.

Here’s the specific breakdown:

• A weekly meeting took up 7,000 hours for the top executives involved.
• Another 20,000 hours of meetings among department heads and executives were generated in preparation for the meetings listed above.
• Each team averaged 63,000 hours in preparation and generated an additional 210,000 hours in more preparatory meetings.

Although the size of the company had some influence on the numbers, it’s clear that employees are spending a hefty portion of their work lives in meetings. However, are there any behaviors or phrases that grind away at employee engagement and color participants’ general feelings toward meetings? The team at Igloo Software decided to look for answers. Their researchers surveyed 1,000 people to see what aggravates employees the most about meetings and grouped responses by age and gender for even further insights.

Here I’ll walk you through four key takeaways to keep in mind as you plan your next meeting.

1) Although there is a general consensus that meetings are productive, millennials actually find meetings more productive than their older counterparts.

Igloo’s data indicate that most people — exactly 53% — actually find meetings productive. However, further analysis indicates that though each gender’s view on productivity was similar, there is a key distinction between millennials and older generations: Nearly 20% more millennials than older employees find meetings productive. More specifically, the data indicate the following:

• Women are just shy of a 50/50 split — exactly 51% of women find meetings productive.
• More than 55% of millennials find meetings productive.
• Nearly 55% of older respondents believe meetings are actually unproductive.

2) Although more than 75% of participants are annoyed by meetings they deem unnecessary, older generations are less tolerant of off-topic meetings compared with millennials. 

The data set reveals that a majority of participants are annoyed the most by meetings they consider unnecessary. However, when Igloo broke down the results by millennials and older participants, the numbers indicated a clear distinction in the second-largest pet peeve: Nearly 10% more of those age 35 and older find meetings that stray off topic annoying compared with younger participants. Other insights include the following:

• The second most popular meeting pet peeve to millennials is when someone repeats what another person said, earning more than 55% of the vote.
• Older generations tend to be more annoyed in general with in-person meetings than younger participants: Only three pet peeves — unnecessary meetings, repeating what someone else already said, and not staying on topic — earned more than 50% of the millennial vote compared with the six peeves that earned more than half of the age 35 and older crowd’s vote.
• Most participants aren’t too annoyed with people eating or drinking in meetings — it earned less than 25% of the vote in each age group.

3) Females are more annoyed by “win-win,” and “synergy” is a key pet peeve for males.

The survey also took a look at some common corporate buzzwords to see if any words are more annoying than others. The research indicates that although four out of the top five most annoying phrases are the same for each gender, there is one noticeable distinction: “Synergy” is included in the top five for men but absent for women; it is replaced with “win-win.”

When the data set is expanded to look at the 10 most annoying words to each gender, the list reveals similar results. Although the phrases aren’t in the same order, both males and females tend to be annoyed by the same ones:

• Think outside the box
• A lot on my plate
• Bring to the table
• Touch base
• Win-win
• Going forward
• Rockstar
• Synergy
• Paradigm shift

Which words should you avoid? Nearly 50% of all participants are annoyed by “think outside the box” — exactly 80% more than those annoyed by “return on investment” and “bandwidth” combined.

4) Generational gaps exist for conference calls: Nearly 20% more millennials are less tolerant of people who forget to mute themselves compared with their older counterparts.

As working remotely becomes more common, more businesses are relying on conference calls to connect with their teams. Igloo took a closer look at this trend, and the data indicate that pet peeves differ between millennials and older respondents. Although a majority of participants in each age group — nearly 65% — are most annoyed by overall poor reception/not being able to hear on conference calls, key distinctions surface after analyzing other behaviors:

• Exactly 10% more respondents over the age of 35 are annoyed by callers who try to talk over others compared with their younger counterparts.
• Although most participants are annoyed with people who call from a noisy place, the data favor older generations slightly — by less than 10%.
• Regardless of age, though, a majority of respondents agree that all six conference call peeves listed are annoying — fewer than 5% of each age group are not annoyed by all six.

The biggest takeaway from Igloo’s research? It’s easy for employees to feel like they are wasting time in meetings, and worse — if you’re not prepared, they could be. Some recommendations to optimize your efforts include outlining an agenda and designating a set time for questions near the end. Pay attention to how much of your workday is slated for your next meeting, and look for areas where you can improve. Although it might be nearly impossible to eliminate meetings entirely, check out the infographic below for insights into which phrases to avoid in an effort to boost engagement and productivity.

This post originally appeared on HubSpot’s Sales Blog. To read more content like this, subscribe to Sales.

As the saying goes, people don’t leave their jobs, they leave their bosses. So if you’ve been blessed with a teamful of rockstars, you should probably make sure your management style isn’t making direct reports anxiously eye the door.

Pepperdine University put the following infographic together as a primer on how to be a good manager. Some of my favorite snippets of wisdom:

• “Keep your sights on what’s right — not what you want right now.” (Tweet This)
• “Accept changes as part of growth, and encourage employees to do the same” (Tweet This)
• “Celebrate success. Don’t just say it — show it!” (Tweet This)

Whether you’ve recently been appointed the head of a team or you’ve been a manager for 30 years, the graphic below is well worth a read.