hese tools can truly help catapult your productivity and accuracy.

1. TLDR

Businesses these days still attempt to gather leads through implementing outdated pop-ups or information collecting banners. These usually only serve to annoy visitors and diminish the user experience; especially if they are implemented on more than one page. This is a great way to boost your bounce rate, which is obviously a metric you don’t want to see increase.
TLDR takes a different approach to lead generation. This tool, which was created by HubSpot’s Global Head of Growth and SEO, Matthew Barby, generates custom summaries for your website’s content and implements relevant CTAs. Employing a content summary will help to keep visitors engaged; most individuals will only skim an article as opposed to reading the entire post. Providing this is convenient for users and greatly enhances UX. By embedding a unique CTA you can capture a visitor’s attention almost immediately by offering content upgrades, eBooks on related topics, and similar offerings. The only catch is that the visitor must input their email address and other data to obtain additional content. Since the user has already clicked on a related article, you stand a much greater chance of getting their contact information.

2. Yotpo

When it comes to making a sale, possessing an ample amount of user reviews is an absolute must. 90% of individuals read reviews before making a purchase. 88 percent of these people regard a review as highly as a personal recommendation. If you don’t have a sizable number of positive reviews, you aren’t making enough sales. Enter: Yotpo.
This customer content marketing platform helps businesses build user generated content and trust among consumers through engendering online reviews. The company’s algorithm determines the optimal time to send out emails requesting user product assessments. Yotpo says their technology leads to a 40-50% email open rate with a 6-11% response rate. For each review that is left, Yotpo implements a “trust badge” so consumers know if the review came from a buyer, reviewer, or merchant; a great feature for brand transparency. Reviews also include author demographic, which creates an even deeper sense of trust and credibility. The user generated content cultivated with Yotpo can also help amplify marketing efforts, SEO, and much more.
Reviews are only one channel of UGC that Yotpo helps cultivate. Community Q&A forums, enabled commenting, and gamification modalities all help to manifest high levels of engagement and discussion, which assist in your retention and acquisition efforts.

3. Leadfeeder

Promising leads can be extremely challenging to accrue; especially when you consider that 98 percent of site visitors leave without supplying their contact info. Now there’s a way to circumvent the process of begging visitors for their email addresses -- Leadfeeder to the rescue.
Leadfeeder connects to your Google Analytics account and fetches data about your visitors so that you don’t have to. With the ability to view the details about the folks that visit your page, their LinkedIn contacts, B2B connections, and more, you can construct an ample list of leads to help you gain scads of sales. Leadfeeder also integrates with several CRMs, provides customizable notifications, and allows an unrestricted amount of users to participate so that you can turn your company into a lead generation powerhouse.

4. Improvely

Advertising your business on sites like Facebook and Google can cost a pretty penny; and it can completely drain your ad budget if click fraud is occurring. Click fraud is when a person or computer program continuously clicks on an ad in order to send advertising costs sky high. This malicious activity could cost marketers as much as $7.2 billion this year alone.
Improvely is a critical tool that can help put an end to this mischievous practice.
This software monitors every click that takes place on your business’s ads to verify that no fraud is committed. If Improvely does detect any suspicious activity, you will be notified immediately. Additionally, this tool generates fraud reports which include IP addresses, locations, exact times and dates, and other pertinent information for you to submit in order to recoup losses.
Improvely isn’t just a prevention tool as the system also supplies conversion tracking features to uncover the source of each signup or sale to help you understand which ads are working, and which are floundering.

5. HotJar

Looking for an analytics platform that will supply you with metrics that you can’t get from Google Analytics? HotJar is where your search ends.
HotJar is a powerful tool when it comes to understanding user behavior. The service tracks each user’s visit to a site and displays the information through heat maps, which depict sections of websites that are most popular. Everything from scrolling to tapping, clicks, and other actions are all documented so that your site can be optimized to its fullest.
HotJar also provides recordings to capture a visitor’s exact session, polling and survey features, sales funnel optimization tools, and a plethora of other resources to help you maximize conversion rates.

6. InfusionSoft

InfusionSoft is one of the industry’s leading CRM, sales, and marketing platforms for small business owners. The software features everything from marketing automation and lead generation tools, a stellar customer relationship management (CRM) interface, social media engagement features, and everything else you need to engage audiences and score conversions. Additionally, InfusionSoft houses a plethora of ecommerce elements to help generate sales, meet fulfillment expectations, and keep customers coming back again and again.

7. Unbounce

A landing page is often the first impression a prospect has of your business; and first impressions are crucial. Unbounce is an incredible tool designing landing pages to ensure that first-time encounter is a lasting one.
The software touts that it was “designed with conversions in mind” and helps marketers achieve exactly that through A/B testing features, a robust drag-and-drop design interface, a myriad of page templates, and integration with more than 60 commonly used applications like Google Analytics and Salesforce.
Related: When You're Hungry for Sales, Consider These Lead-Gen Tools

8. SpyFu

A vital element to gaining traffic is ranking for the right keywords. SpyFu is the ultimate tool for identifying the keywords competitors rank for as well as the ones they purchase through AdWords. Simply by entering a competitor’s website domain, users are presented with an abundance of data including total paid and organic keywords, estimated value of organic traffic, organic competitors, and virtually any other data points you need to formulate a strategy. SpyFu provides comprehensive keyword data on all fronts so that you can drive the masses to your site and not waste money fighting battles you will never win.
The virtual space is bursting with great tools to help businesses reach their goals. No matter if it’s engagement, conversions, or a new trick or trend, there is a tool to help elevate your business’s performance and reach peak levels of optimization; you just have to know where to look.

Today is Earth Day and more than one billion people across the globe are expected to celebrate with environmentally friendly events. Among those will be the leaders of 160 countries, who will sign the Paris Climate Agreement today.
But what exactly is Earth Day? Here's what you need to know:
When did Earth Day start?
The first Earth Day celebration took place 46 years ago, in 1970, after a devastating oil spill in America brought environmental issues to the forefront of public consciousness. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, 22 million people across the country came out in support of environmental reform.
"That day left a permanent impact on the politics of America," wrote Gaylord Nelson in the April 1980 edition of the EPA Journal. "It forcibly thrust the issue of environmental quality and resources conservation into the political dialogue of the nation.
"It showed political and opinion leadership of the country that the people cared, that they were ready for political action, that the politicians had better get ready, too. In short, Earth Day launched the environmental decade with a bang."
Since then, celebrations have only grown. This year, organizers estimate more than one billion people in 192 countries will participate in events the world over. The day is celebrated each year on April 22.
Is there a theme for Earth Day 2016?
This year, organizers are starting their four-year countdown to Earth Day's 50th anniversary by focusing on planting new trees.
"This year we are raising the stakes," the Earth Day Network, which partners with tens of thousands of organizations in 192 countries to organize Earth Day events, said in March. "Earth Day Network is pledging to plant 7.8 billion tress worldwide -- one for every person on earth.
"That's incredibly ambitious, but we believe this down-payment must be made in order to combat climate change and keep our most-vulnerable eco-systems from facing extinction."
How are people celebrating?
In Shanghai, China, people will gather today at the Okura Garden Hotel for a recycled art show, according to the Earth Day Network. In the Philippines, organizers have planned a coastal clean-up and children's storytelling hour in metro Manila. Tree plantings were scheduled for Slovenia's Golovec District, high school students in Ontario, Canada, and hundreds of other locations worldwide.

NEWARK, Del. — Three objects found hanging from a tree on the University of Delaware’s Green were not nooses or evidence of a hate crime as first suspected, school officials said Wednesday morning, but remnants of paper lanterns left from a June event.
Less than 24 hours later, members of the UD community packed The Green in front of Memorial Hall to discuss the incident and find ways to change the campus climate. The school’s interim president had initially called the incident a hate crime late Tuesday night.
“Diversity isn’t something UD can say it’s already achieved because it hasn’t,” said sophomore Anima Agyeman at the Wednesday gathering. “You can’t fulfill a multicultural requirement with a history of fashion class ...  it’s about teaching an experience.”
One by one, students like Agyeman, along with top university officials of all races, took the stage to share harrowing experiences of how they were treated as minorities on and around campus. Agyeman fought through tears, recalling her first night on campus when she said a white man followed her back to her dorm, asking her how she could be “so f------ black.”
Rick Deadwyler, the university’s director of government relations and a UD alumni, said he had similar experiences as a student but said he still didn’t want to believe that “whatever you want to call it” happened on UD’s campus.
“To wake up early and see that caption,” Deadwyler said, referencing the photo that circulated social media late Tuesday night of the objects hanging from the trees.
“The image and the idea that something like that was plausible on our campus was concerning.”
Acting UD President Nancy M. Targett announced the finding that the objects were lantern remnants in a statement and released photos of the original lanterns early Wednesday morning. The university said then that the lanterns were from an event in early September, but about 2 p.m., UD officials said they from Alumni Weekend in June.
“Thanks to tips from students who responded to our earlier call for information and the investigative work of University of Delaware Police, it has been determined that the three noose-like items found outside Mitchell Hall were not instruments of a hate crime, but the remnants of paper lanterns from an event previously held on The Green,” Targett said in the statement, also posted on UD’s website.
In the statement, UD Police Chief Patrick Ogden said, “I am confident that we have determined the origin of these items.”
But many students, including those who turned out for Wednesday night’s gathering planned by students and the university, dismissed the explanation and said the objects implied a bigger problem at UD — one that many say the university has failed to address.
Obichukwu Maduka-Ugwn stood in front of the hundreds gathered, staring out into the crowd before leaning to down to the microphone.
“We are not here to attack anyone, but at the same time, you have to understand what is here,” the junior from Nigeria said, gesturing to students. “We all pay equally to go here.”
Throughout the night, speakers and signs referenced the Black Lives Matter movement, which has sparked national attention in recent months. The chant — used to remind people that black lives matter just as much as white ones, students said — has become a rallying cry in the wake of black men repeatedly dying across the country at the hands of police.
The lantern remnants were discovered one day after a Black Lives Matter silent protest took place outside of a speaking event by Fox News commentator Katie Pavlich. Pavlich, who spoke about the second amendment and the right to bear arms, previously called the Black Lives Matter movement a “violent hate group.”
Deadwyler reminded students of the pride he felt in how they chose to express their frustrations with the speaker Monday and said the act showed a unity among students dedicated to this cause.
Now, he’s ready to move forward from Tuesday’s incident and turn the crisis into an opportunity.
“We need it put it in the rear view mirror where it belongs — not to forget it, but to move forward,” Deadwyler said. “Please don’t let this thing stop at 5:30 today.”
How it happened, what it means
Chief Ogden detailed how the incident unfolded, why he labeled the investigation that of a hate crime at first and how he became convinced that it wasn’t one.
About 10 p.m. Tuesday, he said, a student called UD police “to report what he believed to be a noose, a noose-like object, hanging from a tree by Mitchell Hall.”
Officers responded and took pictures of the objects before removing them and keeping them as evidence, he said, noting, “I thought it was a noose-like object myself.”
Because of the Black Lives Matter protest as well as the reactions of students including “social media buzz around it,” Ogden said UD police “launched a hate-crime investigation and made the decision to notify the whole university.”
After a UD Alert notification went out, he said, “eight different students came forward to say that the objects that were hanging from the tree were there at least as early as the 1st or 8th of September,” he said.
Another student provided a picture Tuesday night that was taken of the hanging objects without lanterns on Sept. 16, he said. That student believed the items were left from some kind of student engineering project, Ogden said.
But not long after the UD Alert, Ogden got what he felt was positive proof after “a student came forward and said she took down the paper lantern[s] from the tree.”
She had seen one lantern hanging from one of the strings and took it “to decorate her room,” he said. When she pulled down the paper part of the lantern, the string and a wire from the inside of the lantern stayed on the tree, Ogden said.
“When we put the wire inside the lantern, it fit,” Ogden said. “There is no doubt in my mind that the wire that was recovered hanging from the tree branch was the wire that was designed inside the lantern and fits inside the lantern.
At the request of The News Journal, the police department produced a video showing how the wire fit inside a lantern.
Knowing the situation it caused, he said, the girl who took the paper lantern said she “felt terrible for causing all this.”
As to how the lanterns’ wire stretchers and hanging strings went unnoticed in the tree since June, UD spokeswoman Andrea Boyle-Tippett said, “no one knows.”
Objects’ discovery
Students who found what were thought to be three makeshift nooses hanging from a tree Tuesday night near Mitchell Hall recalled being brought to tears Tuesday night.
Ayanna Gill, one of the organizers of the Black Lives Matter protest Monday night and a student activist, said the image reminded her of photos and stories she had seen and read in history books about her ancestors.
But she believes that there is hope and strength in moving forward together, especially after Wednesday’s gathering.
“We are here today because we’re not returning hate with hate,” she said. “But this is not the end.”
Some students, however, said they thought the university jumped the gun by calling the incident a hate crime the night before.
“We are both saddened and disturbed that this deplorable act has taken place on our campus,” Targett said in the Tuesday night statement.
A few students who walked by Mitchell Hall at lunchtime Wednesday paused to read signs on the trees or talk about the “noose-like objects” found in one of the trees.
Elexis Keels, of Washington, D.C., said the discovery unsettled her.
“I shouldn’t feel unsafe walking past a building where there were supposedly nooses hanging down,” she said, “but I do. ... I don’t think it was paper lanterns.”
“I think it’s all just so ridiculous,” said business major Emily Cyrus of Wilmington. “They [UD police and officials] immediately jumped to the worst possible conclusion."
But no matter what the items were, change is coming, said Carol Henderson, the university’s vice provost of diversity.
She told the UD community Wednesday night that a diversity action plan is circulating among senior leadership and awaiting approval before beginning implementation.
“We hear you. We see you,” Henderson said, gesturing to the crowd. “We need to walk arm in arm with them and say ‘I am concerned because you are concerned.’”
She paused before continuing.
“It cuts to my soul that we have this kind of pain on campus,” she said, before noting that Tuesday’s incident and Wednesday’s outpouring have provided her with a new mantra.
“Not on our campus,” she said. “We are bigger than hate.”

 

via:www.itsastrangeworld.com

Do you believe in ghosts? What about UFOs and aliens? Think nobody does? No? Well, think again. According to Atlantic Magazine, some 42 percent of Americans believe in ghosts and 36 percent believe in the existence of Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs).  Pictures of both so-called ghosts and UFOs/aliens really began back in the 19th century.  And now we even have videos of purported sightings. Is any of it real? Are the people who support the idea that ghosts and aliens exist all a bunch of crazies who need to get a life? Or are the authorities covering up the truth? Often, each side will look at the same picture or video and come up with predictable, entrenched positions.
Take the “Battle of Los Angeles” in 1942. The story goes something like this: In the wake of the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, Americans were decidedly anxious. And when “something” flew over LA in 1942, search lights were focused on a mysterious slow moving object. Spotlights were beamed into the sky and the heavy guns were brought out. Many assumed the Japanese had arrived. Ufologists claimed to see UFOs. It got even more confusing as, after the fact, officialdom was vague about what had happened, saying little, other than “false alarm”. Maybe as some speculate, it was a weather balloon off course. Or, maybe it was an alien ship. And no one can prove either side of the argument.
So, we present a catalog of creepy, mysterious photos and videos of assorted monsters, ghosts, and UFOs, both old and new, and we will leave you to decide.

12. The Ghost of Alcatraz

In the Summer of 2014, British tourist Sheilia Sillery-Walsh visited San Francisco and decided to go and see Alcatraz, the city’s infamous former island prison. She whipped out her iPhone and was clicking away, only later to discover that a picture of an empty prison cell contained a cloudy image in which the shape of ghostly hands and arms were visible. It was picked up by local news and by UK’s The Daily Mail. When The Atlantic Magazine’s Tiffanie Wen wrote a piece on the incident she, at first, expressed a healthy skepticism. But when the ghostly image of a man who had not been there appeared in an iPhone picture taken by Wen herself, she began to wonder. Fake the skeptics say.  Undaunted, Wen kept the picture, just to scare herself and her friends.

11. The Office Ghost and the CCTV Camera

It starts off with seemingly endless shots of deserted offices. It’s 3 am and the middle of the night. And the scene is set in Manchester, England’s Castlefield House. You begin to wonder how overnight security guards can possibly stay awake through this stuff. Then suddenly chairs zoom around on their own, computer screens flare to life and die again, papers fly across the room, and file drawers open and close on their own. The Manchester Evening News reported that people across the region were mystified.  Some believed. Others claimed it was faked. No matter which side you are on, the video is indeed interesting.

10. Doris Bither

Just like Chucky the evil movie doll in Child’s Play was based on a real “Killer Doll” named Robert, the 1982 movie The Entity, was based on the story of Doris Bither.   Doris Bither was poor and living in squalid conditions with her children in California when, in the 1970s, noted parapsychologist Dr. Barry Taff first encountered her. She claimed to being followed and abused, even sexually assaulted, by evil spirits and demons and had bruises to show for it. Taff claims that the black and white picture of light shooting across a room was a real manifestation of evil spirits and demons. He also claims to have seen glowing orbs in the Bither home. Wherever Doris moved to, the demons, she claimed, followed her.

9. The Hampton Court Ghost

Hampton Court Palace, located in a leafy suburb of London, is, according to its curator, chuck full of ghosts. Rumors of ghost sightings have come and gone over the years, but in 2003 one of the ghosts, dubbed “Skeletor”, was actually caught on film by a CCTV camera. Alarms went off, indicating a door had been opened, but when security staff rushed to investigate, the door was closed. Only when they reviewed the CCTV footage did the ghostly Skeletor reveal himself. Not to be outdone, another ghost, dubbed “The Gray Lady” made an appearance in 2015, shocking a party of school girls.

8. Freddy Jackson

This is a classic case. This picture, taken in 1919, is a standard group portrait of a World War I flying squadron. Freddy Jackson (shown in the back row) was a member of the squad and an aircraft mechanic. The only thing is that Freddy Jackson had been killed in a tragic accident two days earlier. And his funeral took place on the day this picture was taken. The owner of the picture, Sir Victor Goddard, nor anyone else, for that matter, can explain what is going on.

7. The Astronaut and the UFO

Tim Peak is British and an Astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS). In fact, he is the first Brit to serve on ISS. In December of 2015, he snapped some footage which appears to be another spacecraft that nobody can identify. The Express called it the best piece of UFO evidence captured in years. Apparently, in years gone by, the Russian Soyuz spacecraft also encountered UFOs whilst flying around in space. If you can’t trust an astronaut, who can you trust? Huffpost said the picture had stargazers and scientists alike “in a spin”.

6. Nessie the Lochness Monster

Lochness (Lake Ness) is deep in wilds of the Scottish Highlands and, since this first picture of the “monster” was snapped by a surgeon in the 1930s, some believe the home of Nessie, the Lochness monster. Some believe Nessie is a holdover from the dinosaur age. Since the 1930s, Nessie has been sighted a number of times. Most recently, some very grainy video footage shows a creature like Nessie swimming in the Thames River in London. Although, how she got from a land locked lake to the Thames is a question for better minds than ours. Well, somebody must have believed the story because in 1933 the Secretary of State for Scotland ordered police to protect Nessie from attack.

5. The Carlisle Castle Hotel Ghost

A ghost with a taste for red wine? Apparently, this particular ghost is attached to Newtown, Australia’s Carlisle Castle Hotel. Its CCTV cameras have captured creepy footage of cloudy images moving around a dining room. In other footage, objects  spontaneously fly off the bar and red wine bottles zoom off shelves, causing a mild panic. According to one local news outlet, some think it may be the spirit of “Old Peter” who worked at The Carlisle in the 1990s. You can check out more footage on their Facebook page. According to the owner, they are trying to laugh it off, but can’t quite figure out what is going on.

4. The White Lady of Worstead

In 1975, Diane Berthelot and her husband Peter, visited The Worstead Church in Norfolk, England. Diane sat on a pew while Peter snapped pictures. But, when they got home, they realized that there was the image of a lady dressed in old fashioned clothes sitting behind Diane. Only thing was, she was definitely not there at the time. The legend of the White Lady and her connection to the church goes back to the 19th century. The story goes that in 1830, a man who was intent on disproving the ghost story spent the night in the church and was found the next morning quivering and in a panic saying that he had seen her.

3. Ghost Captured on CCTV in One of Britain’s Oldest Pubs

The spooky footage was filmed late on Valentine’s Day in the Ye Olde Man and Scythe in Bolton in the UK. The Telegraph reported that staff believe the figure to be the spirit of an Aristocrat that was executed during the bloody 17th century English Civil War. Tony Dooley, the pub’s manager, came down the next morning to find a glass shattered on the floor. He checked the CCTV footage thinking he would find the culprit. Well, he did, but this particular break-in won’t be reported to the coppers. He also said he had, before he saw the footage, been a skeptic, but had become “a believer”. You can see the figure approach the bar and then move along the wall of pictures.

2. The Screaming Ghost in Room 209

Some have decried this footage as a fake. Others believe. The scene was supposedly shot by CCTV cameras in an Illinois Wingate Hotel, in 2003. A man named John has been sent to investigate screaming heard coming from Room 209. But no one was checked into the room. He gets to the door and we hear screaming inside. He goes into the room and comes out again saying the carpet has been ripped up and the furniture is turned upside down, but no one is there. But wait, what is that ghostly fog following him down the corridor?

1. The Ghost of Lord Combermere

This is another classic. Taken in 1891, it shows the faint image of a man sitting in a chair on the left. Parts of his body are clearly visible. Some think it is the ghost of Lord Combermere, who had a distinguished military career in the early 1800s. Combermere had died a few days before and, reportedly, when the picture was taken by a Sybell Corbet, his funeral was taking place. Taken long before the wonders of Photoshop, it makes you wonder how on earth an image like this one could have been faked.