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Will voters 'hit' or 'hold' on allowing legal gambling in Georgia?

Could we see horse racing and other forms of gambling come to Georgia in the near future? The Georgia state legislature is looking at the possibility of legalizing gambling on horse racing and the decision could land in the hands of the voters. Proponents say there is potential for a billion dollars in economic benefits, from job creation to a boost in revenues. Marsha Loda is an associate professor at Augusta University’s Hull College of Business. She said if approved, it will likely take more than horse racing for a track to survive. Loda cites Kentucky as an example of what tracks are doing there. “A lot of people think of Kentucky as the mecca of horse racing, but they don’t realize it might not exist without historical horse racing machines," said Loda. "HHRs are slot-like machines that let players wager on past horse races by a random number generator.” Many tracks nationwide have also expanded into casino and sports betting. While this isn’t what Georgia is looking to do initially, it’s not far off to think it could be on the horizon, with horse racing being the first step. Loda, who previously served as marketing director at Harrah’s Cherokee Resort in North Carolina, knows if casino gambling is approved in the future, most of those people who visit need to come from out of town. “You need to be able to import your people who are going to bet. That means you’re importing revenue. Otherwise you’re taking what’s already spent in your community and just slicing it up and giving it to different places. You’re not growing the pie at all,” said Loda. She has also seen the benefits of legalized betting, citing the added jobs a casino would offer. One aspect of gambling that has exploded is sports betting. More than two dozen states have legalized sports betting. Loda thinks if sports betting was on a ballot and went in front of the public for a vote, it would stand a better chance of passing. “I wouldn’t be surprised to see Georgia pass sports betting. I think sports betting has been very well accepted. I think they would come much closer to getting more voters to approve it if it were sports betting than if it’s horse racing or casino gambling.” This is an important topic with many angles to cover, and if you are a reporter looking to know more, then let our experts help. Loda is a leading marketing expert helping businesses in the hospitality industry bounce back from crises, including the COVID-19 pandemic, and also has had extensive experience in the gambling industry. She is available to speak with media regarding the idea of gambling coming to Georgia. Simply click on her icon now to arrange an interview today.

An Opening Day Predicament—Will Baseball Fans Side with Billionaire Owners or Millionaire Players?

A percolating labor showdown between well-heeled Major League Baseball team owners and well-paid baseball players threatens spring training and Opening Day. For the time being, it is an amicable negotiation to carve a new Collective Bargaining Agreement in time for the 2022 season, but it could turn sour, as these things tend to do. As usual, the fans are in that empty, helpless space between billionaire owners and millionaire players. “There’s still a little bit of time here before panic and pressure set in,” said Mike Lewis, Goizueta professor of marketing and a national expert on fandom who also serves as the faculty director of the Emory Marketing Analytics Center (EmoryMAC). “If we get to Opening Day and there is no baseball that is going to be a major shock to the system, and it is going to have major ramifications.” Lewis explains, “Fandom is built by the epic moment, the walk-off home run and the spectacular catch, but fandom is also hurt by the epic failure, such as canceling Opening Day. You might not see it in the data for this season, but it is going to be a hit on the fans’ long-term appreciation for their team.” So, whose side should fandom be on? The billionaire owners or the many millionaire players? The Baseball Collective Bargaining Agreement, Explained Lewis spells out the current baseball dilemma. Players want to reduce the time they have to wait to enter full free agency, which is currently six seasons. The players also want teams to be able to spend at least $245 million a season, per team, on salaries before MLB hits the clubs with a luxury tax, which is a way to keep rich teams from buying all the talent. The luxury tax ceiling is currently $210 million. Players are not happy with the luxury tax because it resembles a “soft” salary cap, or a limit on their pay. “A lot of what the players are looking for is the freedom for the owners to spend,” Lewis says. “And more freedom for the owners to spend is going to make the competitive balance issues in Major League Baseball worse.” Do the fans really want that the players to win this labor fight? Major League Baseball instituted a luxury tax system in 2002 with a new Collective Bargaining Agreement that charged a fee to teams whose payrolls passed a certain threshold. It was done to keep clubs like the Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers, and Cubs with their massive local television revenues from stockpiling all the stars, Lewis explains. He goes on to say that the luxury tax penalty has slowly lost its effectiveness because revenues have grown in MLB. The rich teams shrug at the tax and the results have been awful for competitive balance in the game. Fans of less wealthy teams despair in this state of oligopoly in baseball. There have been as many 100-loss teams in the past three full seasons (2018, 2019, 2021) as there were from 2007-2017 combined (11). Good players flee the less wealthy teams, losses pile up, and fans are put off. If we move back to the wild west with the market it is going to be harder to keep the franchise superstar in town. “We know what the system’s going to look like with a more open market. It’s going to look like the New York Yankees dominating, as they did in the late 90s and early 2000s. It’s going to look like Alabama in college football.” If the players have their way in this latest bargaining, they will be “stuck” for just three or four years with the team that drafts them, not six, before they hit free agency. Morgan Ward, Goizueta assistant professor of marketing with a research focus on consumer behavior, said the labor tussle between wealthy owners and wealthy players is a “rich people problem” that threatens the “folklore” of the game. “I think it could have a really alienating effect overall on the general public just because it changes the focus of the game, it takes something very communal and familial and makes it very transactional,” Ward says. “It can be very distancing for the fans and, if anything, illustrates the schism between the fans and these players. These are not your friends or neighbors. They are in a very different place in life.” So, Will Fans Side with the Owners? It’s more complicated than that. “The fans have an emotional attachment with the players and no real emotional attachment with the owners,” Ward says. What the Major League Baseball Players Association, or the union, better not count on, Ward notes, is the fandom rallying to the players just because we have seen a national shift toward worker’s rights that arrived with the COVID-19 pandemic. One of those shifts was college athletes, at last, being able to make money off their name, image, and likeness. Labor has been humanized on a certain level, but even though the baseball players are “labor” and in a “union,” Ward says there is no comparison between the fight for college athletes against the majordomo NCAA, the governing body of college athletics, and baseball players against baseball owners. “The public is sympathetic with people in low-wage, high-service industries that finally have the ability to negotiate,” Ward says. “But it’s hard for me to see the same victimization of baseball players that happened with college athletes.” The last time there was a prolonged labor dispute between the owners and players, which was in 1994, it was disastrous for baseball. The players went on strike in August that season, which canceled the World Series. Average attendance per game that season was a then-record of 31,256. It took 10 years for baseball to average more than 30,000 fans to a game because fans became disgusted with the owners and players. “How much should we expect fans to endure this time?” Lewis asks. “They just came off Covid when there were restrictions on attendance and a shortened season,” Lewis said. “This stuff adds up. The fan is going to say, ‘Why am I loyal to these guys?’” If you're a reporter looking to know more - then let us help. Professor Mike Lewis is an Associate Professor of Marketing at Emory University’s Goizueta Business School and is an expert in sports analytics and marketing.  Morgan Ward is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at Emory University’s Goizueta Business School and is an expert in consumer behavior. Both experts are available to speak with media  - simply click on an icon to arrange a discussion today.

UCI expert sources for the Russia/Ukraine Conflict

On Friday, Feb. 25, 2022, UCI’s School of Social Sciences hosted a webinar titled, “Understanding the Russia-Ukraine Crisis.” Several of the experts below offered perspective on key issues surrounding the escalating conflict between Russia and Ukraine. You can watch or listen to the webinar here: https://www.socsci.uci.edu/newsevents/news/2022/2022-02-25-understanding-the-russia-ukraine-crisis.php UCI faculty members available to comment, and their areas of expertise, are found below. Matthew Beckmann, Associate Professor, Political Science. Professor Beckman studies the organizational structures and operational strategies presidents can use to pick their team, invest their time, focus their attention, channel their effort, discipline their thinking, coordinate their subordinates, and, most importantly, make decisions. Contact: beckmann@uci.edu Jeffrey Kopstein, Professor, Political Science. In his research, Professor Kopstein focuses on interethnic violence, voting patterns of minority groups, and anti-liberal tendencies in civil society, paying special attention to cases within European and Russian Jewish history. As pertains to the Russia/Ukraine conflict, he can speak to politics in Russia and Ukraine, Authoritarianism, NATO and the transatlantic alliance, and European Union policy. Contact: kopstein@uci.edu Erin Lockwood, Assistant Professor, Political Science. Professor Lockwood’s research areas include international political economy and global financial politics. She can speak to questions related to economic sanctions, financial sanctions/financial infrastructure and payments systems more generally (for example, the prospect of cutting off Russian access to the SWIFT financial communications system.) Contact: eklockwo@uci.edu David Meyer, Professor, Sociology, Political Science and Planning, Policy & Design. Professor Meyer’s research examines the relationships between social movements and the political contexts in which they emerge. Topics surrounding the Russia/Ukraine conflict that align with his expertise include sanction strategy; the resistance strategy that might emerge in Ukraine in the face of occupation; the history of the Cold War and its influence today; and the possibility of a powerful peace/isolationist movement emerging in the U.S. Contact: dmeyer@uci.edu Gustavo Oliveira, Assistant Professor, Global & International Studies. Professor Oliveira is a specialist in global political economy and critical geopolitics, focusing on the BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) and international commodity markets, especially agricultural trade and natural resource governance. He can speak to the basis of the Russia/Ukraine conflict on natural resources, and the repercussions of the conflict for international commodity markets, inflation, and disruptions to global food supply chains. He can also speak about the anti-war movements in Russia, Europe, the United States, and broader political repercussions of the conflict in Brazil, Latin America, and the U.S. Contact: gustavo.oliveira@uci.edu Stergios Skaperdas, Professor, Economics and Director of the Center for Global Peace and Conflict Studies. His general area of research is political economy, the interaction of economics and politics. Among other issues, he has studied conflict and wars, the role of the modern state in economic development, and the interaction of globalization and geopolitics. Contact: sskaperd@uci.edu Etel Solingen, Distinguished Professor, Political Science and Thomas T. and Elizabeth C. Tierney Chair in Peace and Conflict Studies. Solingen studies the reciprocal influence between international political economy and international security, globalization and its discontents. She can discuss the crisis in terms of historical precedents (of international crises), the utility of sanctions, bargaining in crisis, Russia’s economic decline and how it bears on the current crisis. Contact: etel.solingen@uci.edu Media Contacts: • Tom Vasich, Communications Officer, UCI | 949-285-6455 | tmvasich@uci.edu • Heather Ashbach, Executive Director of Marketing and Communications, School of Social Sciences | 719-651-3224 | hashbach@uci.edu

5 Ways Expertise Marketing Supports Digital Transformation

Digital transformation is much more than merely redesigning your website or moving your files to the cloud. It’s about harnessing digital technologies to elevate your business. Specifically, digital transformation is strategically adapting your business processes to change company culture, empower your staff and keep up with rising consumer demands. Organizations of all sizes are taking on transformative initiatives to meet today’s expectations in the digital space, but research by IDG has concluded that we still have some growing to do: “IT leaders are making steady and sequential progress to becoming digital-first organizations – though not at the same breakneck speed that the technologies themselves are proliferating. For many organizations, the foundational pieces are in place, and they’re actively working on adopting newer technologies like AI and IoT. But successful digital transformation will also require equal attention to change management and workforce strategy for the entire organization.” Supporting the Bigger Picture It’s easy to get hung up on the technology but successfully transforming your business means thinking about everyone involved – including your experts. Here are five ways expertise marketing supports digital transformation: It aligns people. Most companies aren’t particularly good at telling their people that their expertise is valued and many employees don’t understand the role they play as brand ambassadors. On top of that, outdated biographies on the company website fail to share the work that these experts with the audiences who are looking for it. A well-constructed expertise marketing program helps get experts and executives aligned on how they can help the brand – and it helps marketing teams feed the content beast. It tracks data. Metrics on visitor behaviour are critical to calculating ROI and ensuring your content is working. That said, most organizations don’t have an intuitive way of tracking internal contributions to the corresponding engagement data – making it difficult to determine which people and topics are driving results. Expertise marketing programs are designed to capture essential metrics on employee contributions and ensure that leads are captured and routed to appropriate individuals and departments for prompt follow up and reporting. It enhances search and SEO. Part of digital transformation is creating a sustained online presence. By harnessing your collective expertise, you can quickly publish a large volume of quality, searchable content that boosts your owned content footprint. It also provides a way to capitalize on earned media opportunities related to breaking news and emerging trends. It drives collaboration. Many organizations corporate policies and standards tend to lack guidelines for generating and promoting individual experts. As a result, individual groups within the organization are forced to fill the void and essentially, do their own thing. This leads to a disconnected set of expensive, custom projects. Organizations with structured expertise marketing programs consistently report an increase in collaboration and organizational alignment. It minimizes risk. It’s becoming more and more important to ensure adherence to corporate brand standards and editorial guidelines, as well as regulatory standards such as accessibility compliance. By centralizing your content and utilizing a federated content management structure, you’re not only providing your employees with a common source for branded assets and templates, but you’re empowering them to get things done in the simplest way possible. This approach mitigates risk, speeds time to market and dramatically lowers costs to implement a program. Filling the Gaps with Expertise As mentioned above, digital transformation is a comprehensive business strategy with many moving parts. While expertise marketing is one component of this organizational change, it works in tandem with your other programs and complements any initiative aimed at boosts your digital presence. In fact, it’s proven to support many of the activities that organizations have yet to complete. IDG’s 2018 State of Digital Transformation Expertise marketing is a powerful tool for enabling and elevating digital transformation. By encouraging company-wide participation, it’s shown to increase internal uptake, generate higher-quality content and ultimately, drive better results in terms of ROI. If digital transformation is in your future, then you need to start thinking about your experts today.  Download the Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing For a comprehensive look at how expertise marketing benefits the entire organization and drives measurable return on investment, follow the link below to download a copy of ExpertFile’s Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing: The Next Wave in Digital Strategy or download one of our tailored Guides for Corporate & Professional Services, Higher Education Institutions, Healthcare Institutions or Association & Not-for-Profits.

Building Trust with Expertise Marketing

With advancements in technology and a number of new channels, it’s important to remember that at the end of the day, people want to deal with people. Studiesconsistently show that we’re more likely to trust other humans when making decisions. While many organizations leverage brand personas to fulfill that human connection, they often overlook the power of their people to lead and support conversations. If your audiences are looking to connect with people, then it only makes sense to give them our best.  Who Is Looking for Expertise? As mentioned in last week’s blog, the ‘About Us’ section of a website is the second most visited area next to the homepage and the reasons for this are simple: people want to see who is behind the scenes. From prospective customers to journalists looking for an expert source, there are a wide range of audiences who want to know who you really are before they engage with your business. Here are just some of the audiences who are taking a close look at your expertise: Customers & Partners: Subject-matter experts are consistently rated as one of the most influential sources of information for buyers (Source: ITSMA), and a whopping 78% of B2B buyers start with a Google search (Source: Demand Gen). Media: Experts who serve as media sources are in high-demand with newspapers, broadcasters and digital outlets – and it’s not just research they want. They often require a plain language explanation of how something works, or insights to help them localize a story for a regional audience. Conference Organizers: Conference organizers and industry associations are constantly looking for experts who can educate their attendees as a panellist, workshop leader or keynote speaker. Alumni & Donors: For institutions, showcasing the relevant work that experts and staff are doing helps alumni better connect to your mission and makes it easier to fundraise and drive larger donations. Government & Foundations: Government bodies and foundations rely heavily on experts to conduct research, develop policy and implement the various programs they fund. They are increasingly focused on reporting the social and economic impact stories of the research they are funding. Better Digital Conversations When we look at audience engagement, your success boils down into three critical stages: Attention, Interaction and Trust. Each of these areas can be addressed by making experts and their content more visible with a sustained, amplified digital presence. Don’t underestimate the value of rich expert profiles; today’s audiences will quickly scroll past a list of names and titles. Expertise marketing is about providing individual credentials and sharing what their collective experience represents for your organization. The richer offering, the more trust you can build. Plus, experts who serve as brand ambassadors are more likely to drive personal, relevant and authentic connections with key audiences. The following framework outlines how you can create an expertise marketing program that empowers your people to better navigate the customer journey: Creating Touchpoints for Expertise Whether it’s a research page on your website or an upcoming speaking engagement, you need to develop touchpoints for key audiences to interact with your experts and their content. This often requires businesses to step back and determine how visible your experts are across your physical and digital environment. As you go through the auditing process, you not only surface gaps in your delivery but in many cases, you’ll also find a wealth of expert content hidden in personal websites, social media and external publications. It surprises many businesses to discover that your experts are already engaging with audiences – just not from within your organization. Make your expertise more coherent by turning a disconnected group of experts into a powerhouse of brand ambassadors. In addition to aggregating their existing content, you’ll need to speak directly with your experts and develop an expertise marketing program that aligns with their professional objectives and incentivizes their continued efforts. This collaborative approach will mutually benefit both your business and your experts while simultaneously generating excitement and buy-in throughout the whole organization. Download The Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing For a comprehensive look at how expertise marketing benefits the entire organization and drives measurable return on investment, follow the link below to download a copy of ExpertFile’s Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing: The Next Wave in Digital Strategy

Thought Leadership 2.0: A New Approach

The term “thought leadership” has been exploited by self-proclaimed experts and overuse of the phrase has made the market weary of its practice. But before it was a buzzword, thought leadership was the crown jewel of content marketing. According to the Oxford Dictionary, thought leadership is “intellectual influence and innovative or pioneering thinking.” In practice, thought leaders leverage research and experience-based content to draw in audiences and support their organization’s reputation as an industry authority. This marketing concept has the power to transform product pitches to strategic insights and approaches into best practices, but not everyone found the same success with their programs – and there are a couple of good reasons why. This Is A Classified Project While it’s still true that thought leadership boosts customer engagement, some programs simply lack the depth needed to connect with audiences and see meaningful results. Many organizations are quick to jump on the latest marketing trend, but they don’t always have the vision to turn their expertise into a viable solution for their business. In fact, a leading research and consulting firm, Sirius Decisions, has suggested that “the purpose and process of thought leadership are widely misunderstood and misapplied, causing mixed results.” One of the most significant issues with thought leadership is that the C-Suite and other top-level teams tend to lead programs in a silo from the rest of the organization. It’s not uncommon for executives to outsource their thought leadership activities to special teams and agencies as a series of projects. This approach leads to disconnected outputs that miss the mark when it comes to audience engagement. It not only prevents subject-matter experts from elevating your content, but it also dismisses the wealth of knowledge they have about your audiences. Experts know who is looking for content, where they’ll go to find it and which topics they’ll follow. So when you exclude them from the process, you’re going to miss out on opportunities to drive market visibility, brand reputation and new customer connections. Your Experts Are People Too When you put something on a pedestal, you make it easy for people to see but hard for them to reach – and that’s a problem in the digital world. People want to deal with organizations who provide the information they need on the channels they use, and in a voice they understand. To be successful with thought leadership, it’s vital to understand these needs and take a human approach to your marketing and communications. Unfortunately, many thought leadership programs take a campaign-oriented approach and can mimic the dated marketing practices that centre around products rather than people. They come off as too formal and use “corporate speak” which makes them far less approachable. Worst of all, they often lack the authenticity audiences are looking for – so why not let your people do the talking? Your in-house experts make great brand ambassadors for your organization. By expanding your notions of thought leadership, you open the door for many voices to share your message in a manner that’s inclusive, genuine and accessible. This also makes it easier for you to maintain your online presence and insert diversity into your content marketing. Rather than repeating the same ideas over and over, your broader team of experts will be able to capture varying perspectives and insights – supporting your position as a leader in that domain. Evolving Thought Leadership While the concept of thought leadership still resonates with audiences, it’s time to make a few changes. Here are just a few reasons to transition dated thought leadership projects into profitable expertise marketing programs: Excerpt from the Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing As you can see, expertise marketing takes the best parts of thought leadership and makes it more inclusive, sustainable and agile – and all at a lower cost. On top of this, expertise marketing incorporates human connections as a fundamental component of both the strategy and execution. It surfaces diverse expert perspectives, delivers authenticity and creates two-way conversations between you and your audiences. Most of all, it can easily be adapted as our environments change and new audience needs emerge. If your thought leadership program lacks results, you’ll likely have to broaden your views on expertise and leadership. Take a closer look at all of your people and the value they bring to your business. This inclusive approach to expertise marketing will not only make it easier to manage thought leadership, but it will also deliver the long-term success you want from your marketing. Download The Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing For a comprehensive look at how expertise marketing benefits the entire organization and drives measurable return on investment, follow the link below to download a copy of ExpertFile’s Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing: The Next Wave in Digital Strategy or download one of our tailored Guides for Corporate & Professional Services, Higher Education Institutions, Healthcare Institutions or Association & Not-for-Profits.

“More Brains – Less Bots: Driving Reputation & Revenue with Expertise Marketing” – Collision 2019 Keynote [VIDEO]

On May 22, in Toronto, ExpertFile’s CEO and Co-founder Peter Evans presented at the Collision Conference in the “Growth Summit Track.” As the fastest growing tech conference in North America, Collision drew over 25,000 attendees. As one of the world’s largest and most influential tech events, Collision attracted CEOs of the world’s largest companies, founders of the most exciting start-ups, leading investors and media, from more than 120 countries. Click here to watch the keynote. In his keynote session titled “More Brains, Less Bots: Driving Reputation & Revenue with Expertise Marketing,” Peter speaks to how organizations can better engage their internal experts to competitively differentiate their brand and drive new revenues. The session outlined how trends such as the erosion of consumer trust and increasingly complex buyer journey are driving enterprises and institutions to make experts more approachable to key audiences as media sources, speakers and customer advisors. Peter also shared key insights learned from working with top organizations in sectors such as corporate, healthcare, higher education and industry associations.

5 Tips On Creating Engaging Expert Profiles

If you’ve ever taken part in a website project, you know that not all content is created equal. We spend countless hours perfecting the homepage, but we often forget to tell our audiences who we are. The people behind the scenes in an organization provide some of the best opportunities to create relevant and relatable content for audiences. Take the “About Us” page for example. Ironically, it’s often an afterthought for digital teams who upload some boilerplate copy and call it a day. But people buy from people and the more human you can make your content the better the user experience will be. Here are some tips to help you create that personal connection. The Old Profile  Our research shows that most employee content comes up surprisingly short when audiences conduct an online search. This is becoming a more critical element to consider, given that 78% of B2B buyers now use Google as a starting point for their online activities. While there can be several factors impacting your Google rank, the issue often comes down to a lack of quality content on employee-related pages. Many organizations resort to posting outdated headshots next to a title for their employee sections. If you’re lucky, you might find a boring text biography that fails to capture the depth of experience and expertise offered by your team. These tactics may have worked a decade ago, but today’s audiences now expect expert profiles to contain detailed biographies, multimedia and social content. This is especially true for B2B prospects like journalists and prospects looking for professional services. Any half-decent writer can make a person sound pretty important in a bio, but these audiences are looking for proof of your expertise. It’s not enough to tell audiences you’re great – you have to show them. Today’s audiences consume content differently, so it’s essential that you bring your expert profiles into the 21st century. The New Profile Here are 5 ways you can improve your employee content to better drive visitor attention, interaction and trust: Go Beyond Boring Bios: The new way to create expert profiles is to provide a detailed overview of an employee’s expertise and experience. This means that in addition to creating a detailed biography, you should also share content that shows key accomplishments that build credibility and trust: Are they an author? Have they spoken at a conference? Interviewed for a podcast? It’s important to get this information listed. Get Visual & Social: Beyond the written biography, look for ways to make content for your people more interesting for your audiences. Are there YouTube videos, Slideshares, Tweets, or thumbnails to books they have written? If so, you can leverage these assets for their profile. Remember if you are pitching media or conference organizers, this information is becoming tablestakes for journalists or event bookers who are vetting media sources or speakers. Show You Are Relevant & In-Demand: Public appearances and news spotlights can take your experts from unknown to sought-after. There are two ways to tackle this. The first is to capture any existing media releases to ramp up their credentials. If your expert hasn’t yet participated in this type of activity, publish content that speaks to emerging topics and news trends and provide quotes available to the media on newsworthy topics. This is a proven way to earn the attention of journalists and allow you to start building visibility as an industry insider. Go Beyond Your Website: While your website is ideal for hosting expert profiles, it’s not the only place to let your team shine. If you want to boost your visibility, make sure you take advantage of opportunities on third-party sites and platforms. This might include industry directories or your client/partner websites. By using the ExpertFile Platform, you can also publish your expert profiles to reach thousands of newsrooms through our media partners. Be More Approachable: It’s funny that almost every page on most websites has a call to action. However if you visit most people profiles, the journey ends there – or worse, it takes the visitor off your website and to an old, tired Linkedin profile. Instead, let your audiences get in touch with your business by including a specific call-to-actions (CTAs) within your expert profile. Depending on the size and capabilities of your organization, you might have want to enable direct connections to experts or opt to funnel leads through a various departments. Either way, the key to getting leads is starting a conversation. Download the Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing For a comprehensive look at how expertise marketing benefits the entire organization and drives measurable return on investment, follow the link below to download a copy of ExpertFile’s Complete Guide to Expertise Marketing: The Next Wave in Digital Strategy or download one of our tailored Guides for Corporate & Professional Services, Higher Education Institutions, Healthcare Institutions or Association & Not-for-Profits.

How to Show Your Smarts: A Proven Approach to Expertise Marketing

If you’re operating in a knowledge-based industry, you’re in the business of selling expertise. Unfortunately, many organizations in these expert-rich sectors take an ad-hoc approach to planning and executing their expertise marketing initiatives. As a result, they often lack coordination across departments and fail to leverage valuable assets such as talent, content, technology and media channels. By following some simple rules, you will see significantly better results.  It Starts with A Conversation First we need to talk about cross-team collaboration. Expertise marketing is a team sport, so it’s vital that your star players are ready. Throughout your organization, there are a broad range of people who are eager to support this type of initiative.Don’t focus too much on roles or seniority levels. At this stage, it’s about having candid discussions with the people around you and then expanding the conversation. You could start by discussing the value of expertise with stakeholders in your organization and sharing how it would help you meet your targets. Or you could reach out to department leads and team managers to get their insights and generate ideas. Most importantly, you need to get to know people outside of your immediate circle and discover the hidden talent within your organization. Sometimes the best results come from surprising places. The ExpertFile Approach As we go through the key elements of an expertise marketing program, you might find that you’re already following some of our best practices. However, when we start working with our clients, we often find that their expert content is disconnected and scattered across various teams and channels. If this sounds like you, that’s ok – you just need a bit of help putting the pieces together. Below, we’ve provided an overview of our proven approach and its alignment with the 5 key elements of expertise marketing: Strategy & Talent: The first step is to assess your expertise bench strength in your organization at various levels. Using a range of evaluation tools and techniques, we set out to identify any hidden expertise in your organization and establish what each expert can contribute. By engaging experts to share their expertise early on, we can define a strategy and open up doors for a range of high-quality content. Storytelling: Now, we need to establish your strengths and how we can best position your experts for your target audiences. Not only do we want to create stories that highlight your core offering, but we also need to showcase your experts in the context of breaking news and emerging issues. This ensures that you are always putting out timely and relevant content for high-value audiences like journalists, conference organizers and other media professionals. Digital Experience: Once you know which topics are best for your organization, we need to boost audience engagement with rich online experiences. We audit any existing channels and develop comprehensive “content footprints” for your experts. These footprints map out the future state of your expert content – such as new webpages, speakers’ bureaus, improved expert profiles, multi-media and/or social content assets.  Search & Discovery: All the planning in the world won’t help you if your content isn’t visible. At this stage, we look to optimize your channels and maximize your reach with new and existing audiences. By publishing your expert content in searchable formats, we can make your organization more approachable and discoverable across your owned channels, search engines, social networks and newsroom platforms. Measurement: To show momentum it’s essential that we measure and track important content metrics to ensure the expertise marketing program is meeting expectations. We focus on key metrics such as expert content contributions, visitor engagement, and direct expert inquiries. And because we consider this from the onset of a project, we’re able to accurately report on your return on investment (ROI).

Most in-demand jobs in Ontario for newcomers

Ontario is one of the most popular provinces among newcomers. Its cultural diversity, economic prosperity, and ever-growing job market are just some of the reasons newcomers from across the world choose to settle in Ontario. The government of Ontario periodically invites newcomers with the skills and experience to meet the province’s growing labour requirements to work and settle in Ontario as Permanent Residents (PR) through the Ontario Immigrant Nominee Program. This article provides information on Ontario’s job market. This includes the top industries that contribute to its economy, the most in-demand occupations for newcomers in the region, NOC codes, and median wage estimates, so you can arrive prepared to kick-start your career in Canada. What are the top industries in Ontario? Services industry: The services sector is the largest contributor to the province’s economy and employs nearly 79 per cent of the people living in Ontario. Some of the key service industries include banking and financial services, professional, scientific and technical services, and arts and culture. Manufacturing industry: Ontario’s manufacturing industry is one of the biggest in North America. Some of the most prominent manufacturing industries are automotive, information and communication technologies, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, and medical devices. Agriculture: Ontario’s farming sector contributes nearly 25 per cent of Canada’s farm revenue. Mining industry: In addition to being one of the world’s top 10 producers of nickel and platinum, Ontario is also rich in gold, silver, copper, zinc, cobalt, and non-metallic minerals. Southern Ontario also has a sizeable oil and gas industry. Forestry industry: The forestry industry in the province creates nearly 200,000 direct and indirect jobs. Which cities have the most job opportunities in Ontario? Toronto and the Greater Toronto Area (GTA): This is the most populous region in the province, and Toronto is the financial hub of Canada. Other large industries in Toronto and the GTA include technology, real estate, trade, and manufacturing. Ottawa: As the capital of Canada, Ottawa offers significant job opportunities in administration. It is also a major centre for the high technology and finance industries. Brantford: This city is a manufacturing hub and offers job opportunities in food and beverage manufacturing, advanced manufacturing, rubber and plastic production, and warehousing and distribution. In addition, Brantford also has a growing media and entertainment sector. Hamilton: Another manufacturing centre, Hamilton has a large job market in the food processing and agribusiness industry, as well as in advanced manufacturing. Waterloo: The Toronto-Waterloo region is often referred to as the ‘Silicon Valley of the North’ and presents significant opportunities in the technology sector. Which jobs are in demand in Ontario? Health care jobs in Ontario Managers in health care (NOC 0311): Managerial positions in health care typically require a degree in management and pay around $48.21 CAD per hour. • Registered nurses and psychiatric nurses (NOC 3012): You’ll need a nursing degree and a provincial nursing licence to qualify. The median hourly pay for registered nurses in Ontario is $36 CAD. • Medical laboratory technologists (NOC 3211): As a lab technologist in Ontario, you can earn a median income of $38 CAD per hour. • Opticians (NOC 3231): Opticians make between $27 CAD and $34 CAD in Ontario. • Licensed practical nurses (NOC 3233): Licensed nurses make a median hourly wage of $27 CAD. • Nurse aides, orderlies, home support workers, and patient service associates (NOC 3413, 4412): For these occupations, the hourly wage ranges between $17.50 CAD and $20 CAD. Service sector jobs in Ontario To qualify for service sector jobs, you’ll usually require at least an undergraduate or graduate degree from a university. Administrative services managers (NOC 0114): Managerial positions in administration typically pay a median salary of $41 CAD per hour. Banking, credit and other investment managers (NOC 0122): Managers in the finance sector earn a median income of $50 CAD per hour. You’ll usually need a degree in management or finance to qualify. Advertising, marketing, and public relations managers (NOC 0124): These roles require a degree in marketing or management and pay a median income of $40 CAD per hour. Business services managers (NOC 0125): These roles pay an average hourly salary of $43 CAD. Corporate sales managers (NOC 0601): Sales manager roles in Ontario can be fairly high paying, with a median hourly wage of $52 CAD per hour. Restaurant and food services managers (0631): Compared to other managerial positions, restaurant and food services managers have the lowest median wage at $19.23 CAD per hour. Construction managers and managers in transportation (NOC 0711, 0731): Employees in these roles earn a median hourly wage between $38 CAD and $40 CAD. Human resources professionals (NOC 1121): HR professionals make an average income of $35 CAD per hour. Professional occupations in business management consulting (NOC 1122): In Ontario, business consultants make a median hourly salary of $41 CAD. Mathematicians, statisticians, and actuaries (NOC 2161): As a mathematician, you can earn an average of $45 CAD per hour. However, you’ll need an advanced degree in mathematics, statistics, or a related subject. Technology sector jobs in Ontario To work as an engineer in Ontario, newcomers require a licence from the province in addition to an engineering degree. Engineering managers, computer and information systems managers (NOC 0211, 0213): Managerial level in-demand jobs in Ontario pay a median hourly wage between $52 CAD and $53 CAD. To qualify, you may require a degree in engineering, management, or both. Computer engineers (NOC 2147): As a computer engineer, you can earn a median income of $44 CAD per hour. Database analysts, software engineers and designers, computer programmers and interactive media developers (NOC 2172, 2173, 2174): These technology sector roles pay between $40 CAD and $46 CAD per hour in Ontario. While many such positions require an engineering degree, some roles may also be open to applicants with a degree in computer science. Web designers and developers (NOC 2175): Web designers in Ontario can earn a median hourly wage of $31 CAD. Manufacturing jobs in Ontario Manufacturing managers (NOC 0911): Managers in manufacturing make a median income of $43 CAD per hour in Ontario. Machine operators in the mining and processing, chemicals, plastics, woodworking, and food and beverage industries (NOC 9411, 9416, 9417, 9418, 9421, 9422, 9437, 9446, 9461): Machine operators and process control workers typically earn a median hourly wage between $15 CAD and $23 CAD, depending on the industry they are in. Assemblers, fabricators, inspectors, and testers in the electronics and mechanical industries (NOC 9523, 9526, 9536, 9537): The median hourly wage for these jobs is between $16 CAD and $22 CAD. Agriculture jobs in Ontario The median hourly wage for in-demand agriculture jobs is between $14.35 CAD and $20 CAD. General farm workers (NOC 8431) Nursery and greenhouse workers (NOC 8432) Harvesting labourers (NOC 8611) Industrial butchers, meat cutters, poultry workers (NOC 9462) What is the minimum wage in Ontario? The general minimum wage in Ontario as of October 1, 2021, is $14.35 CAD per hour. For student workers, the minimum wage is $13.50 per hour. What is the unemployment rate in Ontario? The unemployment rate in Ontario in September 2021 was 7.3 per cent. However, the province’s economy is still recovering from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and, with each quarter, the unemployment rate is inching back towards the pre-pandemic level of under six per cent. How can I move to Ontario? In addition to the federal Express Entry program, the province also invites permanent residents through the Ontario Immigrant Nominee Program. If you’re planning to work in Ontario temporarily, you may be able to qualify for a work permit if your skills align with the province’s in-demand occupations. Ontario also boasts of some of the best universities in Canada and, each year, thousands of students come to Canada on study permits, with the aim of receiving a world-class education and settling permanently in Canada. Original article located here, published by Arrive. About Arrive Arrive is powered by RBC Ventures Inc, a subsidiary of Royal Bank of Canada. In collaboration with RBC, Arrive is dedicated to helping newcomers achieve their life, career, and financial goals in Canada. An important part of establishing your financial life in Canada is finding the right partner to invest in your financial success. RBC is the largest bank in Canada* and here to be your partner in all of your financial needs. RBC supports Arrive, and with a 150-year commitment to newcomer success in Canada, RBC goes the extra mile in support and funding to ensure that the Arrive newcomer platform is FREE to all. Working with RBC, Arrive can help you get your financial life in Canada started – right now.