Article URL: https://www.workatastartup.com/jobs/43771 Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27055759 Points: 1 # Comments: 0
Category: Business News
Business News
New comment by guhsnamih in "Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (May 2021)"
SEEKING WORK | NOIDA, India | REMOTE Only Skills: Python, Perl, JS, SQL Incompetencies: Frontend Development, Teamwork Résumé/CV: http://himanshugarg.github.io/assets/cv_4.pdf
The post New comment by guhsnamih in “Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (May 2021)” first appeared on Online Web Store Site.
The post New comment by guhsnamih in "Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (May 2021)" appeared first on ROI Credit Builders.
How to Merge Instagram Accounts
Managing one social media account is a lot of work. In many cases, managing two or more (when you don’t need both) can be a nightmare.
That’s why if you have many accounts on the same platform, it’s best to merge them.
Thankfully, platforms like Facebook make this easy as long as you’re the admin of both accounts you want to merge and the two accounts have similar audience demographics.
Can you merge Instagram accounts, though?
The simple answer is no, not at the present moment.
However, there are ways in which you can merge Instagram accounts. We’ll be looking at them in a moment.
Why Should You Merge Your Instagram Accounts?
Before we get into how you can merge your Instagram accounts, you need to determine why you want to merge your accounts.
What do you want to accomplish by merging your accounts?
Are you merging business and personal accounts?
Do you have multiple business pages and are struggling to maintain them?
Instagram marketing is a powerful tool for achieving your business goals. If you’re running two or more Instagram accounts, it’s a good idea to merge them. Here’s why.
Consolidate Your Content
One primary reason many businesses choose to merge Instagram accounts is to consolidate their content.
For example, if you have multiple accounts for different locations, you may want to consolidate your content to make it easier to manage your account.
Provide a Better User Experience for Your Followers
Another good reason for merging your Instagram accounts is it helps you give your followers a positive user experience (UX).
This is because they won’t have to hop from one account to another to get the most out of your content. A better UX will also help you build a stronger following.
Create a Stronger Brand
Bringing all your assets under one roof, whether merging a business and personal account or two (or more) business accounts, is a great way to create a stronger brand.
Humanize Your Brand
It’s easier for people to follow a personality than a brand.
Merging your personal and business Instagram accounts humanizes your brand and empowers you to connect better with your audience.
Adds Variety
Another excellent reason to merge your Instagram accounts is that it helps you add variety to your account. It helps add diversity in terms of content, audience, and even monetization methods.
Merging Instagram accounts is a great way to keep your followers engaged, too. That’s because it allows you to post different kinds of content, thereby spicing up your feed. Apart from that, it also helps you streamline your marketing efforts, resulting in your generating more leads and revenue.
Now, how do you merge Instagram accounts?
How to Manage Two Instagram Accounts When a Business Consolidation Occurs
Business consolidation occurs when two organizations merge into a single business operation.
When this happens, you will have to handle the Instagram accounts of both businesses. To make sure the process goes as smoothly as possible, keep your followers posted on the changes.
People don’t like change—especially when it happens fast.
That’s why you must always keep them in the loop concerning your consolidation. From both Instagram accounts, create posts explaining to your audience what the consolidation means and how it will benefit them. Make sure to tag the other account when you post.
Once your followers are notified, you can continue with the merge.
Merging Your Instagram Accounts
It’s advisable to merge Instagram accounts when a business consolidation occurs. Remember, Instagram doesn’t allow the merging of two or more accounts. However, there are ways to circumvent this. Here are a couple of ways to go about it:
Create a New Account
One way to merge your two accounts is to create a new account and manually transfer the content from the other accounts to the new account. You can make this process easier by using a third-party tool to repost your content.
This lengthy and tedious process also has the downside of losing all the likes and comments on your posts. However, it’s one of the best ways to ensure that all your content from your other accounts is in one place.
When creating an account to merge your other Instagram accounts, it’s advisable to set the live accounts to private. Doing so helps avoid any new engagement while you’re moving your content.
Move Your Followers
There’s no way to move your followers to your new account automatically. The only way then is to create a post notifying your followers of your new account and asking them to follow.
Make it easy for them to do so by tagging your new account in your posts. You can also edit your bios to redirect your followers to your new account.
Delete Defunct Accounts
Once all content has been moved to the account, and you’re sure most followers have come on board, you should delete the old accounts.
While this may sound counterintuitive, it’s necessary to prevent people from following and engaging with the defunct accounts. These are precious interactions that would better serve you on your new account.
Creating a new Instagram account for two businesses that have consolidated is the best viable option for merging your Instagram accounts. It may take a lot of work to move your followers and establish a strong brand presence, but the hard work will pay off in the long run.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts When a Business Acquisition Occurs
Taking over another business means taking over all their assets—including their social media accounts.
When an acquisition takes place, how do you manage the Instagram accounts of both brands?
The first thing to determine is whether the acquisition brings all business operations under one umbrella or whether the acquired company will maintain its brand image.
If the latter is the case, you’ll have to run the two social media accounts independently.
However, if the company you’ve bought will assume your brand, you must merge Instagram accounts. The easiest way to do this is move the followers from the business you’ve acquired to your main Instagram account.
To do that, alert your followers of the change and encourage them to follow your main Instagram. You will have to post several times and give your followers time to make the move.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts When You Change Your Business Name
If you’ve changed your business name, it goes without saying you’ll also have to change your social media profiles.
Thankfully, Instagram makes it very easy to do this. However, despite it being easy to change your business name on Instagram, there are a couple of considerations you must make:
Instagram Name or Username—Which One Are You Changing?
When you change your business name, you have two options to change your identity on Instagram.
You can either change your Instagram name or your username.
- Instagram name: This is the name displayed on your profile and under your posts.
- Username: Your username defines your account and is the one preceded by “@.” It also determines your URL.
You can easily change your Instagram name without any impact on the backend of your account. However, changing your username has a huge impact on what happens on your backend. That brings us to the next point.
Your URL Will Change and Engagement May Drop
Your username is part of your Instagram URL. Changing it means altering your URL.
Once that happens, it may take a few weeks for search engines to index your new URL. As a result, the traffic and engagement you get from other places you’ve linked your Instagram account to will be affected. This includes other posts your account has been tagged in.
3 Quick Tips to Manage Your Instagram Account Name Change
Most people complain of losing followers and engagement when they change their business name. Here are a few tips to help you make the transitions smoothly.
1. Alert Your Followers of the Name Change
Before you change your business name, make sure to let your followers know that you’re rebranding. Doing so will let your followers know you’re still active, even if at times, they may not find your account when they search for it.
2. Change Your Handle On All Other Platforms
Changing your business name affects all your other social media platforms. So make sure to change your handle on all of them.
3. Edit Links to Your Account
Remember, your username affects your URL. Once you change it, your old URL becomes useless.
That’s why you must visit all blogs and other platforms you’ve posted your URL on and edit them with the new URL. Sure, this may be a lot of work, but it must be done if you’re to reduce the negative impact of the name change.
Changing your business name on Instagram can have some negative ramifications. Make sure you only do it when it’s absolutely necessary.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts if Your Business Has Multiple Accounts for Different Departments
If your business has multiple Instagram accounts for each department, juggling them can be quite a daunting task. In many cases, the hard work will be worth it as having multiple accounts will help you:
- Customize your messaging for each of your target audiences.
- Cater to the preferences of audiences in different geographic locations.
One of the easiest ways to manage multiple accounts is by switching between accounts. To do this, you must add the other accounts you want to manage on your Instagram app. On mobile, you can do this by:
- Going to settings.
- Under the “Login” section, click on “Add Account.”
- Enter the login details of the account you want to add and log in.
You can then easily switch between accounts by clicking on the profile icon.
Another way to manage multiple accounts is by setting up Multi-Account Log In. To do this:
- Go to settings.
- Select “Multi-Account Log In.”
- Choose the account you want to use to access the other accounts.
Anyone with access to the account you have chosen to use as the administrator account will have access to all other accounts.
Once you’ve set up your accounts this way, it becomes easier to manage multiple accounts without having to log in and out.
How do you manage multiple Instagram accounts on a desktop?
To manage multiple Instagram accounts on desktop, you’ll have to use Facebook’s free dashboard dubbed Creator Studio.
Connecting your Instagram accounts to Creator Studio is super easy:
- Switch to a business profile.
- Click on the Instagram icon in Creator Studio.
- Sign in to Instagram from Creator Studio.
With Creator Studio, you can post and schedule content to multiple accounts. You also get access to Instagram Insights, the native Instagram analytics tool.
Leverage a Social Media Management Tool
Managing multiple Instagram accounts from the platform itself can be laborious and time-consuming. An easier way to do it is to use a third-party tool that allows you to manage all your accounts from a single dashboard. Examples of such tools include:
- Hootsuite
- CoSchedule
- Sprout Social
- Buffer
Using a social media management tool will give you a bird’s-eye view of what’s happening across all your accounts from a single dashboard. It also has the advantage of assigning tasks to teammates, making collaboration much easier.
Managing multiple Instagram accounts for different departments may seem like a daunting task. However, with Instagram’s account switching function or the use of a third-party tool, it becomes easy.
Conclusion
Instagram is one of the best social media platforms for growing your business.
With over 1.2 billion active monthly users and as the fourth-most popular social networking site, you can’t afford to ignore it. It’s undoubtedly one network you must include in your social media marketing strategy.
That’s also why you must tread carefully when merging Instagram accounts. Executed well, the worst that could happen is losing a few followers. However, if you don’t do it well, you may end up having to start building your brand on Instagram from scratch.
What’s your experience with merging Instagram accounts?
Best Call Recording Software
Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.
Call recording software is a useful tool for businesses and individual users alike.
From quality assurance to employee training, compliance, record-keeping, dispute resolution, and more, there are dozens of reasons why organizations can benefit from recording calls.
But there are so many different call recording solutions on the market today. It can be a challenge to find one that fits into your workday. You don’t want to have to re-do everything just to record calls.
And you also don’t want to pay for a million features you’re never going to use.
Use this guide to learn more about my top picks and methodology for finding the best call recording software for you.
#1 – Talkdesk Review — The Best For Voice and Screen Recording
Talkdesk is a modern cloud contact center solution. One of the main benefits of using this platform for business communication is the built-in call recording capabilities.
With Talkdesk, you’ll gain deeper customer insights with encrypted screen and voice recordings.
By synchronizing the playback of voice and screen recordings, you’ll have more context for evaluating customer interactions with your support team. This also makes it easier to ensure compliance and provide your agents with in-depth feedback on their performance.
The software has a feature called Talkdesk Speech Analytics. The tool is perfect for analyzing calls based on customer sentiment, keywords, topics, and more.
Some of the other key features and benefits of using Talkdesk for call recordings include:
- Inbound and outbound call recording
- Custom storage options
- Ability to pause and resume live recordings
- Store recordings for as long as you need
- Storage available on Talkdesk’s cloud storage or use your own storage system
Talkdesk even has tools for quality assurance. Admins can add time-stamped annotations to recorded calls and fill out scorecards to improve agent performance. All of this can be managed from a simple and intuitive interface.
Request a demo to get started. Pricing for this contact center solution is based on the number of agents on your team.
#2 – Cube ACR Review — The Best Call Recorder For Android
Cube ACR is a smartphone app designed specifically for Android devices. It has 10+ million installs worldwide.
In addition to cell phone calls, this simple tool makes it easy to automatically record calls from VoIP platforms like Skype, WhatsApp, Viber, Telegram, WeChat, LINE, Slack, Hangouts, and more.
For such a basic app, Cube ACR has surprisingly good recording quality, and you can clearly hear both sides of the conversation. Just customize your settings to enable VoIP calls, automatic recordings, and control storage backups via Google Drive, Dropbox, etc.
Cube ACR is always coming out with new updates to ensure recordings are stable and reliable.
Other noteworthy features and highlights of Cube ACR include:
- Cloud backups
- Silent mode
- Geotagging to see where calls take place on a map view
- Data security with a PIN lock
- Automatically remove old recordings to free up storage
If you want to mark an important part of the conversation, simply shake your phone, and Cube ACR will highlight that part of the call so that it’s easy to find later.
While the app is popular for individual use, the software has business-specific features as well. It integrates with certain business tools, has custom development, and offers special business licensing options.
The app is free and has a 4.3/5-star rating with 510,000+ reviews on the Google Play Store.
#3 – Callcap Review — The Best For Call Monitoring
Callcap is a bit unique compared to some of the other software on my list. It’s not really a standalone call recording tool. This platform is branded as a call tracking and monitoring solution, but it does have call recording capabilities.
Marketers leverage Callcap to gain deeper insights into consumer behavior. Any business seeking an advanced solution beyond basic call recording should consider Callcap.
Callcap will automatically record all of your business calls. These recordings are available at any time. You can use them for agent training, employee recognition, lost opportunity analysis, disputes, and more.
All recordings are stored in the cloud and accessible from anywhere, and it is easy to share recordings with team members.
But Callcap takes these recordings to the next level with third-party monitoring services. Their trained analysts provide unbiased scoring for all inbound and outbound calls. The data from Callcap allows agents to improve, close more deals, and increase customer satisfaction.
Other benefits of Callcap include:
- Catalog item tracking reports
- Track revenue by campaign or employee
- Secure and PCI compliant recording and monitoring
- Manual pausing and automated scrubbing
- Call tracking
- Call recovery
Callcap is not for everyone. If you just need a basic solution for recording calls, look elsewhere. But if you want one of the most advanced call recording and monitoring services on the market today, Callcap should be at the top of your list.
#4 – Rev Call Recorder Review — The Best Call Recording App For iPhones
Rev is best known for its online audio transcription and video captioning services. It’s trusted by more than 170,000 customers worldwide, across industries like marketing, legal, media, education, and more.
But they also have an excellent iPhone app for recording calls.
This is a simple and straightforward solution for call recording. It’s a viable option for both personal and business use cases.
Here’s a quick overview of Rev’s key features:
- Automatically record incoming and outgoing calls
- Free and unlimited call recording
- Convert any recording to text with the in-app transcription feature
- Easy to share recordings and transcriptions via Dropbox, email, and more
Aside from the ability to transcribe and share, Rev is a no-frills solution for call recordings. It’s perfect for anyone who wants a free and simple way to record calls on their iPhone.
#5 – Aircall Review — The Best Call Center Solution
Aircall is more than just call recording software. It’s a complete cloud-based call center solution made for business teams.
You can set it up in seconds without any hardware, downloads, or headaches associated with traditional phone systems. Best of all, every Aircall plan comes with call recording capability.
If you just need a way to record calls on your existing phone system, Aircall probably won’t be a viable option. This software is designed for businesses that need a completely new phone system. The call recording features are just some of the many perks you’ll get with an Aircall subscription.
Some features of Aircall include:
- Automatically record inbound and outbound calls
- Customize recording settings at any time
- On-demand playbacks
- CRM integrations
- Clear recording quality
- Unlimited calls in the US and Canada
Aircall has additional services for things like call monitoring, call whispering, and call analytics. These advanced features are not available on the entry-level plan.
Pricing starts at $30 per month per user, and you can try it for free for seven days.
#6 – Kixie PowerCall Review — The Best Chrome Extension For Call Recording
Kixie PowerCall is another all-in-one business phone solution. It’s a top choice for remote teams looking for a simple way to manage calls.
This robust Chrome extension can be installed in seconds on Mac, Windows, and Chromebook devices. All Kixie PowerCall plans come with call recording capabilities.
As a Chrome browser extension, it’s easy for agents to make and receive calls from anywhere. Recordings can be managed with a single click, and the software is ready to use out of the box.
Since Kixie PowerCall is an all-in-one phone system, you’ll also benefit from features like:
- Single-click voicemail drop
- Local presence phone numbers
- Click-to-call dialing
- Live call coaching
- Call reporting insights
Like some of the other software on our list, Kixie PowerCall is better for teams that need a complete business phone solution. If you just want basic call recording features on your existing phone service, you’ll find other options more suitable for your needs.
You get 300 free minutes when you try Kixie PowerCall free for seven days.
#7 – Ooma Office Pro Review — The Best Price for the Total Package
A lot of the best call recording options available come as part of wider business phone solutions. When it comes to getting voice and video with all the features you’d need—including call recording—you can’t beat Ooma Office Pro.
I usually save the pricing information for towards the end of these reviews, but here it’s lede: Ooma Office Pro is just $24.95/user per month.
That sort of pricing for the feature set you get usually requires you to have 20 or more users. Ooma offers just one flat price, which makes it great for teams of any size to update their calling capabilities.
Here’s just a sampling of that feature set:
- Virtual receptionist
- Virtual extensions
- Multi-device ring and ring groups
- SMS messaging included
- Desktop calling app
- Voicemail transcription
- Call logs
- Call parking
Plus, call recording is adaptable for automatic and on-demand recording. And they’re all stored in your call logs automatically.
Keep in mind, you’ll need to sign up for Ooma Office Pro, as the standard Ooma Office plan does not come with recording features.
If you need a more customizability and analytical capability in the form of a full UCaaS solution, you can step up to Ooma Enterprise for just a few bucks more—$27.99/user per month.
Ooma also offers device flexibility—their mobile app allows you to call from anywhere, but they also sell equipment like traditional desk phones and base stations.
For customer service, sales, or even the legal and medical fields, Ooma Office Pro is a modern business phone solution that will give you the call recording features you need for compliance and improvement.
Get started with Ooma by getting a quote today.
#8 – Nextiva Review — The Best Call Recording for Massive Organizations
In a large company, a lot of different people need to use call recording for a lot of different reasons. And Nextiva is the business calling solution built to handle the strain.
Think of a huge customer service team—dozens of people need to touch the software, from the reps recording their calls to the customer service and HR managers who will use them to run quality assurance, employee evaluations, and training.
Multiply that by the number departments in your office, then again by the number of offices in your organization…
You can see how call recording frequency and storage needs add up quickly.
With the Enterprise and Ultimate plans of Nextiva One (their voice and video service), you get unlimited recording of both calls and video conferences. Plus, both plans accommodate an unlimited number of users, so everyone can utilize the recording features and access (if you grant it) saved recordings.
Plus, you unlock advanced features of Nextiva’s overall calling service, like advanced voice call analytics, and custom productivity reporting.
When you think about it, it all comes together nicely. Call recording for anything from training to stakeholder meetings can be used in tandem with the analytics, reporting, and Nextiva’s built-in team messaging and collaboration tools to spur improvement everywhere in your organization. And at scale.
What seals the deal for Nextiva is the price point for large teams. The Enterprise plan—which includes everything I’ve described above—is $31.95/user per month for 100 or more users.
That’s a better value and feature set for teams that large than just about anybody else out there.
Want to get started? Reach out to Nextiva and schedule a demo today.
#9 – RingCentral Review — The Best Archiving and Storage for Recordings
Whether you’re using recordings for training, posterity, note-taking, or anything else, what good are they if you can’t access and store them easily?
If you choose RingCentral Office for your team messaging, video conferencing, and phone system, you get generous call recording limits and an excellent dashboard for managing them.
You get the full suite of communication tools, plus features like:
- Call whisper and barge
- Hot desking
- Real-time call analytics
- Open API
- Single sign-on
- Dozens of integrations
RingCentral allows storage of 100,000 call recordings per account, kept for up to 90 days. That’s a nice allowance without even getting into their tool for organizing and storing recordings.
That would be the RingCentral Archiver, a clean, easy-to-use dashboard for viewing and accessing all call recordings in your organization.
In it, you can see recordings, voicemails, and SMS messages all at once, see the numbers they came from, and when they were made or received.
You can easily connect the Archiver to Dropbox, Smarsh, or Google Drive, allowing you to easily sync and backup recordings on your cloud storage. That way you can save any recordings that may be about to hit the 90-day expiration date.
Automatic call recording and the Archiver only come on RingCentral’s Premium and Ultimate plans. You can utilize on-demand call recording on the Standard plan, but you won’t have many options for accessing, storing, or downloading them.
RingCentral Premium is the best plan for most businesses wanting voice, video, messaging, recording, and easy archiving. Pricing for that package scales based on the number of users:
- One user: $44.99/user per month
- 2-99 users: $34.99/user per month
- 100+ users: $32.99/user per month
For teams of 50 or fewer, you can even try it out for 15 days with RingCentral’s free trial.
What I Looked at to Find the Best Call Recording Software
There are certain factors that I looked for while narrowing down the top recommendations on my list. You can use this methodology as well when shopping around comparing different tools side-by-side. Consider this as your buying guide for call recording software.
Use Cases
Why are you seeking a call recording solution?
The answer to this question will help narrow down your options. Some tools are better for sales and marketing, while others are better for training, management, monitoring, and quality assurance.
There are smartphone apps for call recording for personal use and full-scale business phone solutions with built-in call recording features.
The type of calls you’re recording will impact your decision as well. Some solutions only support traditional calls, while others support WhatsApp call recording, Skype call recording, and other third-party platforms.
On-Demand vs. Automatic Recording
Do you want every inbound and outbound call to be recorded automatically? Or would you prefer to control if and when a recording starts and stops?
The ability to choose between on-demand and automated recording is definitely something to keep in mind as you’re shopping around.
For large-scale business use, automatic recording will probably be your best option. It’s one less step your staff has to think about during a call. But for personal use, you probably don’t need to record every single call you make or receive.
Live Monitoring and Call Evaluation
Live monitoring is a crucial tool for call centers. In addition to recording the call, this feature allows managers or admins to listen in on calls in real-time.
Overall, this is a proactive way to improve quality assurance.
Some software takes QA one step further by providing call evaluation metrics. There are tools out there that can use recordings for sentiment analysis, conversion insights, and more to provide advanced scoring grades for each call.
Security and Compliance
Security needs to be a top priority for conversations that include sensitive information. Examples include credit card information, medical information, personal details, and more.
Certain businesses must follow industry-wide regulations to ensure compliance. Make sure the software you’re considering meets all necessary regulations, even if it’s something as simple as notifying the caller about the recording and giving them the option to opt-out.
Storage
Another factor to consider is to assess the way recorded calls are stored and accessed from platform to platform.
What type of storage restrictions does each plan have? How easy is it to access, organize, and listen to those recordings at a later time?
For example, let’s say you’re dealing with a customer dispute. A customer claims that they never gave your staff permission to charge their credit card over the phone. Can you quickly locate that recorded call to find out what happened?
The best call recording storage systems are searchable and well-organized.
Conclusion
Call recording software comes in different shapes and sizes. The best option for you will depend on your unique wants and needs.
I’ve made suggestions in my reviews of the top products:
- Talkdesk — Best for voice and screen recording
- Cube ACR — Best call recorder for android
- Callcap — Best for call monitoring
- Rev Call Recorder — Best call recording app for iPhones
- Aircall — Best call center solution
- Kixie PowerCall — Best Chrome extension For call recording
- Ooma Office Pro — Best price for the total package
- Nextiva — Best for massive organizations
- RingCentral — Best archiving and storage for recordings
Consider a smartphone app or standalone call recording tool for simple call recordings. More advanced call recording software will come with features for screen recordings, call monitoring, and customer insights. Choose an all-in-one business phone system to get features that go above and beyond just call recording.
Regardless of your call recording needs, you can find what you’re looking for using my recommendations listed in this guide.
New comment by benhalllondon in "Ask HN: Who is hiring? (May 2021)"
Ro (https://ro.co) | Software Engineer (Frontend, Backend. Mobile) | NYC and Remote (Worldwide) | Full-Time Corporate blurb: Ro is the healthcare technology company building a patient-centric healthcare system. Ro’s vertically integrated primary care platform powers a personalized, end-to-end healthcare experience from diagnosis, to delivery of medication, to ongoing care. With a nationwide provider network, in-home …
The post New comment by benhalllondon in “Ask HN: Who is hiring? (May 2021)” first appeared on Online Web Store Site.
The post New comment by benhalllondon in "Ask HN: Who is hiring? (May 2021)" appeared first on Buy It At A Bargain – Deals And Reviews.
BillionToOne (YC S17) is hiring software engineers to advance genetic testing
BillionToOne is a YC Top Company (https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/) that has the most advanced genetic tests in the world. Our proprietary DNA sequencing technology has enabled us to launch:
– The world’s first and only blood test to use pregnant mom’s blood to detect fetal diseases like sickle cell disease and cystic fibrosis (www.unityscreen.com)
– The only prenatal test in the US for detecting fetal Rh blood type incompatibility (affects 15% of births)
– The first FDA Emergency Use Authorized COVID-19 test to run on high-throughput Sanger instruments (https://billiontoone.com/covid-19/)
In the coming years, we will also launch a cell-free DNA test for cancer detection and monitoring.
We’re looking to hire a few engineers to help us with a number of projects that are used by patients, physicians, and internal staff.
Our HQ is in Menlo Park, but engineering is fully remote (US based). Tech stack: Python/Django, PostgreSQL, React, etc.
Apply here:
– Frontend / Fullstack: https://apply.workable.com/billiontoone/j/4ED9B27860/
– Backend / Fullstack: https://apply.workable.com/billiontoone/j/14D61DA914/
Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27052498
Points: 1
# Comments: 0
Pachyderm Is Hiring Senior Demand Gen, TMM, and Product Marketing Roles
Article URL: https://www.pachyderm.com/careers/#positions
Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27048812
Points: 1
# Comments: 0
Dow Industrials on Track for New High
The blue-chip index rose toward a fresh record as concern about the potential for a rise in interest rates eased.
The post Dow Industrials on Track for New High first appeared on Online Web Store Site.
Get to Know Your Experian Business Credit Report
Do You Want to Learn About Your Experian Business Credit Report?
This is a good time to learn about your Experian business credit report.
But first we should start with some definitions and background on business credit.
Business Credit
This is credit in the name of a business. It is not tied to the creditworthiness of its owner or owners. Rather, business credit scores will depend on how well a company can pay its bills. Hence consumer and business credit scores can vary dramatically.
Business Credit Benefits
There are no demands for a personal guarantee. You can quickly get business credit regardless of personal credit quality. And there is no personal credit reporting of business accounts. Business credit use won’t affect your consumer FICO score. Plus the business owner won’t be personally liable for the debt the business incurs.
Business Credit Details
Being accepted for business credit is not automatic. Building business credit requires some work. Some of the steps are intuitive, and some of them are not.
Fundability
Fundability is the current ability of our business to get funding. Some factors are within your control. Others (like your time in business) are not. Your online presence and data are one area which is at or close to 100% with your control.
The better your business credit and fundability are, the more likely you will get approval for business financing.
Build Fundability on Business Credit Applications to Avoid Denials
Keep your business looking fundable (legit) with:
- A professional website and email address
- A toll-free phone number
- List your phone number with 411
- A business address (not a PO box or a UPS box)
- Get all necessary licenses for running your business
Online Fundability
There are some aspects of fundability where you should pay particular attention to what is online. Such as:
- Business owners listed and listed ownership uniform
- Business name and address uniform
- Industry aligned
- Company domain
- Data uniform on all records
Business Ownership Listings
Records consistency matters here. Your website should show who owns your business. And that info must be consistent. So if the owner is named Susan Johnson on your website’s About page, then she should not be listed as Sue Johnson on your Contact page. If your business ownership changes, you need to show that here.
Business Name and Address Uniformity
Abbreviations can be your downfall here, as can punctuation like hyphens, commas, and colons. Maybe your Contact page says your main office is on Main Street. Then your About page should not say it is on Main St.
If your business moves, or you add subsidiaries and other locations, then you need to update that info everywhere. This even means whether you use your 5-digit ZIP code, or a ZIP plus 4 code (9 digits).
Fundability: Industry Alignment
If your business is over the road trucking, then it needs to be listed that way. Pro tip: when your industry can be called several different names, mention those other phrases on your site.
Your Business Email and Website: Company Domain
When your company domain matches your business name, it helps with fundability. Pro tip: try to match what people are searching for online. So if the word ‘brothers’ is in your company name, then determine if ‘brothers’ or ‘bros’ is used by people searching for your company online.
Keep your business protected with our professional business credit monitoring.
There are Three Different Credit Bureaus – But What Makes Your Experian Business Credit Report Special?
What distinguishes an Experian business credit report from reports through the two other big credit bureaus? And can you use that data to your advantage?
There are three major credit bureaus for business: Dun & Bradstreet, Experian, and Equifax. FICO SBSS and CreditSafe are also players.
In the business world Equifax and Experian are up there. But it is Dun & Bradstreet which is the major player.
Dun and Bradstreet has more than 10 times the records of the next closest reporting agency. See dnb.com/about-us/company.html. It makes sense to start with Dun and Bradstreet even when going over your Experian business credit report. This is because you must start the business credit building process with them anyway.
Dun & Bradstreet
Go to the Dun and Bradstreet website and look for your business, at dnb.com/duns-number. But just what happens if you are unable to find it? Then get a free D-U-N-S number. You will always need a D-U-N-S number to start building business credit. Go here to get a D-U-N-S number: dnb.com/duns-number/get-a-duns.html.
A D-U-N-S number is how Dun and Bradstreet gets your company into their system. And a D-U-N-S number plus 3 payment experiences leads to a PAYDEX score. A payment experience is a record of a purchase from a business which reports to a credit reporting agency. In this case, Dun and Bradstreet. Once your business is in Dun and Bradstreet’s system, search Equifax and Experian’s sites for your business. You can do so at creditsuite.com/reports.
Your Experian Business Credit Report
Business credit is in a business’s name. And it depends on how well a company can pay its bills. But Experian uses both consumer and business credit data to gauge risk.
They have found that blended data and reports work a lot better for them. For troubled businesses, blended scores dropped an average of 30% over the four quarters leading up to a bad event. The owner’s consumer scores showed no statistically significant decline during the same period.
53% of the time, the first signs of credit problems were on the business credit reports. 46% of the time, the first signs of credit problems were on the owner’s personal report. Blended scores outperformed consumer or business alone by 10 – 20%.
Per Experian:
“By combining personal and commercial credit information in one report, Experian provides a complete picture of the creditworthiness of small businesses”
You Must Get Set Up with Experian
Get a BIN (Business Identification Number) from Experian. Experian’s BizSource assigns a BIN.
How Long Data Stays on Your Reports at the Different Credit Bureaus
Per Experian Business, bankruptcies stay for 7 to 10 years. Chapter 13 bankruptcy rolls off your credit report 7 years from the filing date. While Chapter 7 bankruptcy stays for 10 years from the filing date. Trade data stays on for 36 months. Judgments, collections, and tax liens stay on for 6 years and 9 months. UCC filings stay on for 5 years. See experian.com/small-business/how-long-credit-report. There are similar time frames for the two other big business credit bureaus.
Keep your business protected with our professional business credit monitoring.
Your Experian Business Credit Report: The Particulars
We’ll look at a Typical Experian Business Credit Advantage SM Report. Experian provides a sample report where you can get an idea of what to expect. Experian changes its reports at times. So the best, most accurate and up to date source for this info is the Experian website. Find it online at https://sbcr.experian.com/pdp.aspx?pg=Sample-BCAI&hdr=report.
Business Background Information
The first part of a report has:
- Name
- Address
- Main phone number
- Experian BIN
- Annual sales
- Business type (corporation, etc.)
- Date Experian file established
- Years in business
- Total number of employees
- Incorporation date and state
Experian Business Credit Score
Business Credit Scores range from 1 to 100. Higher scores mean lower risk. This score predicts the chance of serious credit delinquencies within the next 12 months. This score uses tradeline and collections info, public filings as well as other variables to predict future risk. This part of the report has a graph to show the score.
Key Score Factors:
- Number of commercial accounts with terms other than Net 1-30 days
- The number of commercial accounts that are not current
- Number of commercial accounts with high utilization
- Length of time on Experian’s file
Experian Financial Stability Risk Rating
Financial Stability Risk Ratings range from 1 to 5. Lower ratings indicate lower risk. A Financial Stability Risk Rating of 1 indicates a 0.55% potential risk of severe financial distress. So this is within the next 12 months.
Experian puts all businesses in one of five risk segments. This rating predicts the chance of payment default and/or bankruptcy, in the next 12 months. This rating uses tradeline and collections data. It also uses public filings and other variables to predict future risk.
Key Rating Factors:
- Number of active commercial accounts
- Risk associated with the business type
- Risk associated with the company’s industry sector
- Employee size of business
Credit Summary
This part has several counts of various data points. For the most part, the details are further within the report.
The data outlined shows:
- Current Days Beyond Terms (DBT)
- Predicted DBT for a particular date
- Average industry DBT
- Payment Trend Indicator (stable, or not)
This part also shows:
- Lowest 6 month balance
- Highest 6 month balance
- Current total account balance
- Highest credit amount extended
- Median credit amount extended
- Number of payment tradelines
- Also, how many lender consortium experiences
- Number of business inquiries
- Number of UCC Filings
More on the Credit Summary
This part also has:
- Number of Banking/Insurance/Leasing
- A percentage of businesses scoring worse than the company in the report
- Number of bankruptcies
- How many liens
- Also the number of judgments filed
- Number of accounts in collections
- Company background
Company background has info on founding date, and where the company’s headquarters are. Plus there’s a basic background of what the business does.
Payment Trend Summary
This part starts with two graphs. They show the company in question versus its industry on Monthly payment trends and Quarterly payment trends.
These are percentages of on-time payments by month and quarter, respectively.
This part then shows tables with recent payment info by month and quarter. Then there are three more graphs:
- Continuous Payment Trends: continuous distribution with DBT (days beyond terms)
- Newly Reported Payment Trends: newly reported distribution with DBT
- Combined Payment Trends: combined distribution with DBT
Trade Payment Information
This next part shows details on payment experiences (financial trades). There is also data on lender consortium experiences (financial exchange trades):
- Tradeline experiences (continuous trades)
- Aged trades
- Payment trend detail
- There is also a link to send any missing payment experiences
Keep your business protected with our professional business credit monitoring.
Inquiries, Collection Filings, and Collections Summary
The Inquiries part shows the industry making the inquiry and a total made during a given month. The Collection Filings sector has the date, name of the agency, and status (open or closed). If a collection is closed, the Collection Filing sector also shows the closing date. The Collections Summary shows: status, number of collections, dollar amount in dispute, and amount collected (even if $0).
Commercial Banking, Insurance, Leasing
For leasing, this part shows:
- Leasing institution name and address
- Product type
- Lease start date and term
- Original and remaining balances
- The scheduled amount due
- Also the number of payments per year
- The number of payments which are current, late, or overdue
Judgement Filings
This part shows:
- Date and plaintiff
- Filing location
- Legal type and action
- Document number
- Liability amount
This part shows cases where the company in the report is plaintiff or defendant.
Tax Lien Filings
This part has:
- Date and owner
- Filing location
- Legal type and action
- Document number
- Liability amount
- Description
UCC Filings
This part has:
- Date
- Filing number
- Jurisdiction
- Secured party
- Activity (filed, or not)
UCC Filings Summary
This part shows:
- Filing period
- Number of cautionary filings
- Total filed
- Also the total released
- Total continued
- Amended/Assigned
Cautionary UCC Filings have one or more of the following collateral:
- Accounts
- Accounts receivable
- Contracts
- Hereafter acquired property
- Leases
- Notes receivable, or
- Proceeds
Score Improvement Tips
Experian offers suggestions on how to improve your reports. Such as:
- Get net-30 terms, if possible, from existing and future tradeline suppliers
- Pay accounts on time or work with the tradeline supplier on a payment plan so a business is not delinquent
- Lower credit utilization
- Make sure all the data in the report is correct
Disputing Issues with Your Experian Business Credit Report
None of the different business bureaus will change your scores without proof. They are starting to accept more and more online disputes. But include proofs of payment with it. These are documents like receipts and cancelled checks.
Fixing credit report errors also means you specifically spell out any charges you challenge. Make your dispute as crystal clear as possible. If you need to snail mail anything in, use certified mail. This is so that you have proof that you sent in your dispute. With all the different credit bureaus, be specific about the concerns with your report.
You can correct Experian issues at: experian.com/small-business/business-credit-information.
Monitoring Experian Credit Scores and Reports
The costs of monitoring at all three big business credit reporting agencies can add up fast. At Experian, your best (least expensive) bet would be a Business Credit Advantage. Subscription Plan. It currently costs $189 per year. See sbcr.experian.com/pdp.aspx?pg=Sample&link.
Monitor Business Credit at D&B, Experian, and Equifax for Less
All of Experian’s reports are expensive! But did you know that you can get business credit monitoring for all 3 of the big business CRAs. And all in one place – for less? Credit Suite offers monitoring through its Business Finance Suite (through Nav). See what credit issuers and lenders see. So you can directly improve your scores and get the business credit and funding you need. See suitelogin.com and creditsuite.com/monitoring.
Your Experian Business Credit Report: Takeaways
So Experian has revamped their reports dramatically. They no longer use the term ‘Intelliscore’. This major business credit reporting agency is committed to correct data, and to helping companies improve their reports. To monitor Experian, Equifax, and Dun and Bradstreet for a lot less, monitor through Credit Suite!
The post Get to Know Your Experian Business Credit Report appeared first on Credit Suite.
How to Optimize Microsoft AdCenter for More Effective Paid Campaigns
Gaining paid search footholds can be challenging, and once you’ve built a successful Google Ads campaign and watched it perform, it can be disheartening to reach the end of that campaign’s lifespan.
However, it doesn’t have to end there.
An excellent strategy for expanding the success of your PPC campaigns is to look beyond Google Ads to other platforms like Microsoft AdCenter, which allows you to advertise on Bing, Yahoo!, and other affiliate platforms.
It’s simple to translate your Google Ads campaign to the Microsoft platform because they have similar functionality. Using the same fundamental best practices, you can create more leads through PPC on an entirely new platform.
What Is Microsoft AdCenter?
Microsoft AdCenter is the centralized hub where advertisers go to buy sponsored ads on Bing or Yahoo!
Previously Bing Ads, the platform underwent a rebrand after combining forces with Yahoo!
While it’s safe to say that the majority of internet search traffic comes through Google, that doesn’t mean digital marketers should be sleeping on Microsoft AdCenter.
In fact, with a combined 30 percent market share of the internet’s search function, you’re going to want to add a visit to Microsoft AdCenter to your digital marketing itinerary.
Benefits of Optimizing Microsoft AdCenter for Your Ad Campaigns
Whenever you’re running a PPC campaign, you want to be constantly optimizing.
Why?
When you recalibrate through optimization, you increase your chances of reaching your target audience. This practice will not only increase your overall revenue but will also decrease your ad spend.
Microsoft AdCenter is no different. You want to continuously optimize your campaigns for success. While there’s much work to be done before launching a campaign, it’s arguable that the most valuable work is done post-launch.
With 1.03 billion unique users each month, Bing offers advertisers extensive reach.
However, without optimizing your campaigns, how can you ensure you’re reaching the right audience members?
Short answer: You can’t, which is why understanding how to optimize in Microsoft AdCenter is vitally important to your success on the platform.
Difference Between Microsoft AdCenter and Google Ads
As mentioned above, Microsoft AdCenter has similar functionality to Google Ads. However, the two PPC platforms differ greatly in five key areas: campaign-level control, closed variants, engagement rates, search partner targeting options, and ad scheduling.
Campaign-Level Control
Google Ads requires users to set the language, ad rotation, network, ad scheduling, and location settings at the campaign level. Groups are then restricted to these settings.
On the other hand, Microsoft AdCenter opens these options at the ad group level, permitting users to easily make change settings at any time, rather than having to build an entirely new campaign.
Closed Variants
After eliminating exact and phrase match keywords by enforcing a “close variant” target within Google Ads, the reach of exact and phrase keywords extended by 7 percent, including misspellings, pluralized terms, and grammatical iterations.
While Microsoft AdCenter does have an option to use the close variant query, it is just that: optional.
Increased Engagement and Conversion Rates
Users who engage with Microsoft AdCenter PPC ads have increased engagement with the selected sites and landing pages.
In fact, studies found that automotive search users who interacted with Microsoft AdCenter content had conversation rates 10-56 percent higher than Google Ads.
While this is clearly a particular audience subset, it is still indicative of increased interaction overall.
In addition to these factors, another difference emerges between Google Ads and Microsoft AdCenter.
As we discussed above, it’s simple to import your Google Ads campaign into Microsoft AdCenter. Despite this ease, there are considerable differences to keep in mind as you optimize your campaigns on each respective platform, including:
- search partner targeting options
- ad scheduling
While both Google Ads and Microsoft Ads have search partner networks (external sites that permit advertisers to expand reach on their platforms), the networks are notably different.
Search Partner Targeting Options
Unsurprisingly, Google boasts hundreds of sites in their search partner network. If you’re not seeing big returns on including this extended network in your targeted campaign, you can remove the function. Unfortunately, that removal is all or nothing—you can’t cherry-pick which partners you’d like to reach.
With Microsoft Ads, however, you can select which partners to reach, a key difference as you optimize your campaigns.
Ad Scheduling
While ad scheduling is a key component of any PPC campaign, different parameters for setting ad schedules apply when transitioning your Google Ads strategy to Microsoft.
With Google Ads, dashboard time is automatically set to the time selected upon account creation, so users need to update scheduled times depending on the time zone they’re trying to reach.
Microsoft Ads, however, allows users to set schedules based on the location of the target, making scheduling infinitely easier.
While these differences may not seem huge, they’re important to note as you begin your Microsoft AdCenter campaign.
Tips for Optimizing Microsoft AdCenter
We’ve already highlighted the importance of optimization; now it’s time to break down exactly how to optimize your Microsoft AdCenter campaigns.
1. Perform Keyword Research
If you don’t have a solid grasp on your keywords, now’s the time to start. By researching what terms apply to your purpose and audience, you can incorporate that language into your campaigns to ensure you’re reaching your desired audience.
2. Use Negative Keywords
When you include negative keywords in your campaign, you can exclude confusing or irrelevant terms from your strategy. This allows more accurate audience reach as well as reduced ad spend due to more precise matching.
3. Segment Your Campaigns
For data-driven PPC advertisers, segmenting campaigns into ad groups will allow you to make more intelligent optimization decisions. Segmentation lets marketers focus their message on different groups, which enables the collection of targeted metrics. Through a more segmented audience, you can tailor the message and receiver.
4. Use Ad Extensions
With ad extensions, you can add additional pieces of information about your business, including phone number, address, or a particular link. These free-to-add options can increase the visibility and utility of your ads.
5. Follow Ad Writing Best Practices
Strong, relevant copy is vital to the success of any PPC campaign. As you optimize your Microsoft AdCenter content, keep these best practices in mind:
- Underscore the audience’s primary pain point: By speaking toward your audience’s primary pain point, you not only establish how you can solve their pain; you also establish that you understand their pain. This builds trust and connection between the advertiser and consumer.
- Incorporate numbers or statistics: Historically, numbers work to grab reader attention. This was true long before the internet and will continue to be true as the internet evolves.
- Utilize emotional triggers: It’s no secret that people react to emotional triggers. When you harness the power of emotion in your ads, you can almost guarantee a reaction from your audience. Check out how this law firm used emotion to advertise its services:
6. Adjust Audience Type
Microsoft Ads provides users with several different types of audiences to use to ensure your ads reach the right group. You can adjust the type of audience to optimize your campaign and improve your reach.
7. Experiment With Dynamic Search Ads
These ads will automatically target relevant search queries formed from your website content. The ads are then dynamically created to react to those custom queries, reducing workload and increasing audience reach.
8. Use the Microsoft Audience Network
This audience marketing solution draws on Microsoft’s artificial intelligence (AI) to better target your ideal audience. Be sure to take advantage of this Microsoft-exclusive offering, as it can drastically boost ad performance.
9. Use Universal Event Tracking (UET)
Yet another Microsoft-exclusive solution, you can use UET to view customer behavior after they interact with your ad. By placing a UET tag across your website, Microsoft gathers data that tracks goals and audiences with remarketing lists.
10. Set up Conversion Tracking
By setting up conversion tracking in Microsoft AdCenter, the platform matches you with relevant searchers across the Microsoft network. Conversion tracking also provides tools to optimize your campaigns for success.
Measuring the Success of Your Microsoft AdCenter Campaign
You’ve optimized your campaign throughout its lifespan, and now you want to know if it should be deemed a success or a failure.
Below, we break down three key metrics that will highlight your campaign’s overall performance.
Click-Through Rate (CTR)
This metric is key to understanding whether your ads are relevant to your customers. CTR is determined by dividing the number of clicks your ad receives by the number of times your ad is shown.
Conversion Rate
Strong conversion rates indicate that what you spend on clicks is returning to you in profits. This metric is calculated by dividing the number of conversions by the number of total ad interactions tracked to a conversion in a given time period.
Cost Per Conversion
If you’re overpaying for conversions, it’s time to go back to the drawing board. This metric is determined by dividing the total cost for clicks by the number of conversions.
These three metrics provide a strong, foundational assessment of your campaign’s performance. While you can get lost in the intricacies of data, these figures always provide a clear result.
Examples of Great Microsoft AdCenter Campaigns
Although Microsoft AdCenter is filled with examples of great PPC advertising, here are three excellent PPC ads that used a unique feature of the platform for a successful campaign.
Maybelline
Maybelline uses a detailed breakdown in their paid listing to allow searchers to find exactly what they need. By segmenting by eyes, lips, mascara, and face makeup, the beauty company increases the likelihood that the searcher with clear intent will readily find what they need.
From You Flowers
These product ads rely on visuals to interest the searcher. By placing product images, pricing, and information along the side of the page, searchers have all the information they need instantly.
Papa John’s
Ad extensions can go a long way for PPC ads. Pizza vendor Papa John’s made their listing as informative as possible, while also touting their success and visibility by sharing the number of monthly site visitors. This strategy not only provides helpful information like deals and pizza type options, but it also increases consumer trust through the sheer number of social visitors.
While all three of these ads use extensions in very different ways, they bring more texture to the search engine results page (SERP), engaging the audience through images, increasing the immediacy of search success, and building consumer trust.
Conclusion
While both Google Ads and Microsoft AdCenter offer similar functionality, the options to optimize in Microsoft AdCenter are completely different.
Be sure to take advantage of Microsoft’s unique offerings and optimize your content and strategy through the Microsoft lens, ensuring that you get the most bang out of your advertising buck.
As you become more familiar with Microsoft AdCenter’s features, you could see your success rate rise as you optimize for target audience reach.
If you’re ready to find an agency partner to help you kickstart your paid campaign on Microsoft’s ad platform, let us know!
What’s the best Microsoft AdCenter campaign you’ve ever seen?