Blog - Page 47

A collection of 2,438 blog posts

On Empathy: A Letter We Shared with Our Happiness Heroes

(Our Chief Happiness Officer, Carolyn, shared this note with our Happiness team after some deep auditing and reflection on our communications with our customers. If Carolyn’s note inspires or resonates with you, we’d love to hear from you in the comments!) Hey Heroes. :) I need to start this note with an apology. Instead of creating an environment where you’ve felt entirely free to speak and write and care for customers in your own unique and special way, I fear that we’ve created some misconc

ResourcesDec 5, 2016
The 10 Best Social Media SlideShares of 2016 to Get You Ready for 2017

With all the great articles out there, it can sometimes be hard to catch up on every single one of them. So imagine being able to go through a 2,000-word article in a minute or two. Or even faster. Enter: SlideShare! With SlideShare, great ideas and strategies are condensed into a couple dozen concise slides. For marketers, it’s a powerful content network: Over 70 million people visit SlideShare, and we had several Buffer SlideShares that got over 100,000 views apiece [https://buffer.com/resources

PodcastsDec 5, 2016
The Power of Podcasting: Driving Social Media and Marketing Results On Air – Tyler Anderson [SSM020]

Have you ever considered starting a podcast for your personal brand or business, but aren’t quite sure where to begin or what results to expect? If you’re on the fence about podcasting, consider this: 21% of Americans ages 12 and up have listened to a podcast in the past month. That is up from 17% in 2015 . Monthly podcast listenership has increased 75% since 2013. Now is the perfect time

BufferchatDec 1, 2016
How to Keep Your Customers: A #Bufferchat Recap

This week, #bufferchat was all about how to keep your customers through awesome social media customer support. Jay Baer , author of Hug Your Haters and founder of Convince & Convert , stopped by the chat to share his strategies for providing top-notch social customer care! We discussed our top tips for responding to unhappy customers [https://buffer.com/resources/happy-customers-social-med

Celebrating Around the World: How Holidays Work on Our Distributed, International Team

Some people might be surprised to hear that we didn’t used to get time off for Christmas at Buffer—or for Hanukkah, Canadian Thanksgiving, Chinese New Year or any specific holiday at all! Instead, we had unlimited time off and the full trust of our teammates to make great decisions about how to use this privilege. Great in theory, but as it turns out, challenging in practice. Over time, we learned that unlimited vacation policies statistically

PodcastsNov 29, 2016
Top Strategies for Taking Your Online Community Offline with Marketing Events – Stefanie Grieser [SSM019]

How do you go from having no conference — from almost having no marketing team, just you being the 9th employee and one of the very first marketers — to a marketing conference of 1,000 attendees, acclaimed in your industry, a must-attend destination on the annual events calendar? How do you do all of that in just four years? We had the pleasure of speaking with Stefanie Grieser , International Marketing Manager at Unbounce , about the multif

OpenNov 29, 2016
Nomading and Working Across America in the “Rover and Hab” (Part Two)

Editor’s note: This is a multi-part series chronicling the journey of Buffer’s data analyst, Matt, as he and his wife and two dogs journey across America in an RV while remote working. Check out part one here! Hello from the road! I shared a bit in Part One about how a random “what if” question over a bottle of wine on the porch of our home in Boulder, Colorado spawned a total uprooting of our suburban life. Now myself, my wife, Jenna, and our two dogs are out on the road, traveling the Unite

BufferchatNov 28, 2016
Choosing Positivity: A #Bufferchat Recap

This week in #bufferchat, our community shared stories, experiences and inspiration about choosing positivity. We talked about why choosing positivity can impact our lives, strategies for bringing positivity into our workplaces , actions and activities we can do to feel more positive , and a lot more. Read on to discover all of the awesome inspiration that was shar

3 Breakthroughs and 2 Failures that Have Shaped Buffer

In Buffer’s past six years, we’ve experimented with product and culture and had some successes and some flops. And yet there have been some breakthroughs that evolved naturally, some intentionally. On the flip side, we’ve had some failures that have been outside our control and also fully within our control. Each up and down has shaped us as a company, as a product and me as an individual. Here are a few of those breakthroughs and failures. Breakthrough #1 – Living and working transparency

BufferchatNov 22, 2016
Tips for Widespread Content Distribution: A #Bufferchat Recap

This week in #bufferchat, we discussed tips for widespread content distribution — how to get our content seen far and wide! Adam Libonatti-Roche , head of social media at The Drum , joined us as our guest to share his insights throughout the hour. In the chat, we talked about content distribution platforms , the best tools to share content [https://buffer.com/resources/shareable-content-newsl

OpenNov 22, 2016
Remote Work Must-Haves: Our Team’s Gear, Gadget and Bag Recommendations

The remote work movement is a growing global phenomenon. 79 percent of knowledge workers worldwide said they work from home, and 80-90% of the U.S. workforce would like to work remotely at least part time. And while no two remote work situations are identical, there are some common themes when it comes to the tools and accessories for success. Of course, the most crucial element is wifi. But after that, there’s still plenty to consider: the desk setup, the commuter bag, the headphones, the tr

News and TrendsNov 21, 2016
Instagram Launches Live Video on Instagram Stories: Here’s All You Need to Know

Instagram has today released two major updates to their product: Instagram live video and disappearing photos and videos for groups and friends in Instagram Direct. Instagram Live lets you broadcast video to your followers in real-time as part of Instagram Stories — a feature that launched in August and is now used by 100 million people every day [http://blog.instagram.com/post/15347442

ReportsNov 21, 2016
Buffer in October: Instagram upgrades, Unsick Days and planning our 8th retreat

Editor’s Note: Every month we share an update with all of Buffer’s investors. We also publish that note in full for our Buffer Open audience in keeping with our value of transparency . Buffer Investor Report October 2016 * Last month’s report * All Investor reports * All Buffer reports MRR $1.03m ARR $12.36m MoM 4.4% from Sept

Where Social Media Is Headed in 2017: The Biggest Trends to Watch For

What does the future look like for social media? That’s a question we regularly discuss here at Buffer and one we’re not quite sure anyone has a concrete answer to. However, there are some clues out there as to what the future in 2017, and beyond, may look like. As part of our State of Social Media week, it feels like a great time to sit back and reflect on the social media landscape and what may be ahead. So let’s take a look at some of social media’s biggest platforms (Facebook, Instagram, S

PodcastsNov 21, 2016
Social Media ROI: How to Connect Social to Real Business Results – Neil Patel [SSM018]

We’ve found that one of the biggest challenges for social media marketers today is connecting social media to real business objectives and goals. From brand awareness right on down to customer conversions, social media has the potential to fit into many parts of the marketing and sales funnel . But where does social media fit best? That is the important question we set out to answer! We had th

OverflowNov 16, 2016
How We’re Implementing Service-Oriented Architecture at Buffer After 6 years of Technical Buildup

As Buffer is well into its sixth year of existence, we’ve evolved a lot as an engineering team. When I joined the team in early 2014, we were six engineers, four of whom worked on our main web application and API specifically. We’re now a larger team of 27 engineers, many of us still pushing more code into a single large repo every day. Over time our workflows have evolved to try to keep the development and deployment

ToolsNov 16, 2016
The 20 Best New Social Media Tools to Try in 2017 (And How to Use Them)

Update (January 2018): We have an updated list of the 20 best new social media tools to try in 2018. Feel free to check it out! The social media world is a fascinating one. Every so often, a new social media platform emerges to capture our attention (Peach) or become part of our daily lives (Snapchat). The social media tools landscape can be just as fascinating — and robust! Every week, people build and launch new social media tools, empowering us marketers in our day-to-day work. To give yo

OpenNov 16, 2016
The Key to Meaningful Productivity: Being Receptive (and 5 Tips to Make It Happen)

We all want to be more productive and fulfilled in our day-to-day. Even the words that we use to describe productive people and actions are filled with aspiration: ship, create, code, get things done, make things happen. A quick search of Google for the phrase “increasing productivity” returns nearly half a million results. There are countless books, blog posts, tips, and tools designed to help us maximize our ability to get things done. There’s also a real danger of becoming unbalanced. I’

PodcastsNov 15, 2016
Actionable Social Media Trends and Stats to Help Guide Your Marketing in 2017 – Bonus Episode [SSM017]

We are excited to share our third, very special bonus podcast episode with you on important social media trends and stats going into 2017! Our bonus episodes offer a fun change of pace from our traditional “interview-style” episodes on The Science of Social Media . Get to know the hosts Hailley, Kevan, & Brian a bit better as they share thoughts on the future of social media – complete with actionable takeaways and useful insights. This week we’re chatting all about

Creating a ‘Toeless’ Company: How We’re Working to Keep Customers at the Heart of All We Do

A business is nothing without its customers. And yet as businesses grow and team members become more specialized, it’s easy to get further and further from the customer. Buffer is no exception – in the course of our journey, there have been multiple times when we’ve felt a much larger distance than we’d like between us and our customers. What’s interesting is that every time that distance starts to make itself felt, something amazing happens to close the gap. Sometimes it’s a deliberate chang

ResearchNov 14, 2016
The Future of Social Media (And How to Prepare For It): The State of Social Media 2016 Report

Imagine being able to predict the next big thing on social media, knowing what social media will look like in 2017 and beyond and how will brands use social platforms to connect with their audience. As someone who works with social media every day, this information would be invaluable. At Buffer, we’re always eager to dig up new research into social media marketing — things like how marketers are using social media and what they’re excited about heading into 2017. To better understand how soc

PodcastsNov 14, 2016
Is Your Social Media Strategy Working? Try These Tips to Maximize Your Impact – Hiten Shah [SSM016]

One of the biggest challenges marketers often face with social media is understanding the impact is has on a business or brand. Is social media for lead-gen? For brand awareness? For something else? Measuring social media success and overall impact is a task that may not have one simple solution. So how do you know if your social media is working? We had the pleasure of speaking with Hiten Shah , entrep

Tips / How ToNov 10, 2016
5 Surprising Reasons To Reconsider Google+ (That You Can Act On Today)

Editor’s note: Google announced on October 8, 2018, that they will be shutting down Google+ for consumers in 2019. Farewell, friend! Here are some ideas on where you could share your content instead . I’ve personally always been a huge fan of Google+, but it’s been several years since I’ve been consistently active: It simply became too difficult to keep u

ReportsNov 8, 2016
Lisbon, Madrid or San Diego: Which City For Retreat #8?

Buffer People Ops Report October 2016 * All People Ops reports * All Buffer reports Team members 79 Revenue in cash receipts $1.02m +2.7% MRR $1.02m +3.3% ARR $12.2m +3.4% Debits $822k +3.8% Profit $192k +57% Organizing our next retreat: Location, location, location As we continue organizing our next retreat, we’re excited to bring the team together in one of the three following locations: Lisbon, Madrid or San Diego! We find that taking a “best out of 3 approach”