• 

  Are you starting a new business and you'd like to know how to plan out your marketing strategy? Maybe you are an existing business and you've hit a wall with your communication efforts and you need a fresh perspective?

  If you answered yes to either of the above questions, you should join Innovatory and amaraReps for this Introduction to Marketing and Communication Planning Workshop at Work Evolution. In the first hour of this two hour session, Amara Omoregie and Lincoln Bauer will provide you with an overview of marketing/communication planning focusing on goal setting and measurable objectives. In the second hour of this workshop, they will provide participants with group coaching, helping to develop solutions to challenge statements and marketing/communication needs.

   

  Heres the Link for rsvp

  http://bit.ly/1NAr3LN

   

  What you should bring: 

  • Detailed information on your marketing/communication challenges and needs.

  • A willingness to talk openly about them.

  • An open, creative perspective.

  This is an opportunity you won't want to miss. For more information, email [masked]. An RSVP for this event is required as space is limited.

   

   

  About our workshop facilitators:

  
  Amara Omoregie 
  www.amarareps.com

  Six years ago, Amara Omoregie created her independent marketing and PR agency. Over the span of this time, her experience of working with over 400 brands, including Fortune 500 companies has helped become her competitive advantage. Her dream was to create an environment where a village of Marketing Partners could obtain the resources needed to get exposure for their innovative brands and products. Offering ten times the value of traditional marketing, she helps people achieve huge results by deploying cutting edge digital marketing campaigns, executed by a staff of fun people with integrity. 

  Amara is more than the name of amaraREPS, she is a visionary and fearless leader of brands that fill the world with inspiration. Her expertise lies in being able to see the big picture and calling upon her network in the fashion, sports, entertainment, food and music industries to connect the right people at the right time.

  Lincoln Bauer 
  www.welabs.us

  www.equipcommunication.com

  Lincoln Bauer is an entrepreneur and a principal partner in the creative services cooperative agency Innovatory Solutions at Work Evolution (a partnership between Work Evolution and his firm, Equip Communication).

  He is also a principal partner at Innovatory Ventures, an MVP incubator at Work Evolution. He has co-founded two funded tech startups (ISCENE, RadarforLife) and is an experienced developer, business development professional and market communicator. His experiences include public relations, general marketing, organizational development, planning, business/organizational development, design and web development. He has worked in a communication role for companies and organizations such as MetLife, JohnstonWells Public Relations and the Open Media Foundation. 

  Lincoln specializes in cause marketing and has an advanced education in communication, entrepreneurial studies and social/economic/political relations. He has written professionally in a variety of settings, including media relations as well as writing other persuasive texts for marketing and sales purposes. He is also trained in web development and graphic design. He possesses an undergraduate degree in international politics (honors media studies) from Aberystwyth, a graduate degree in political economy from the University of Sussex and graduate certificates in entrepreneurial studies, technical communication and public relations from the University of Colorado Denver. 

The ePrix hit Long Beach and was a celebration of Innovation, Green Technology, Sustainability, and the City of Long Beach. Saturday April 4, the Long Beach Formula e race was open to the public free of charge and was won by Nelson Pique Jr. Fun fact Piquet’s father won the Long Beach Grand Prix in 1980! The Long Beach street circuit has been hosting races beginning in 1975, and staged F-1, CART, Champ Car, and IndyCar races on the 1.6-mile, seven turn route. Long Beach and Miami are the only US cities Formula E cars will race in 10 stops worldwide in the Inaugural season.

Today the pedestrians had the opportunity to run, walk, or skate a closed portion of the Grand Prix track. I had a chance to take my bike for a spin along the same route as race cars with over 700 horsepower. It was a surreal sight to see all the kids off this week for spring break sprinting down the track with reckless abandon, while their parents try to keep up.

The Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach  kicks off with the gate opening at 7am friday April 17.

by Lolly Spindler

via Robbie Brown Work Evolution

Being a freelance writer can be a difficult task. There’s no one around to keep you accountable and it’s easy to get distracted, especially if you’re working online. Therefore, it’s important to come up with a routine and a daily checklist to keep you motivated and on task.

According to Brian Tracy, a best selling Canadian author:

“Successful people are simply those with successful habits.”

In other words, in order to truly make freelancing a viable career, you need to foster successful habits.

5 Habits You Need to Nurture Now

Without further ado, here are five habits you should develop in order to be the most productive freelance writer you can be.

1. Get to Know How You Work

In order to develop or change a habit, you first need to know those you already have. Ask yourself questions like “During what time of the day do I get the most writing done?” and “What websites distract me the most when I’m supposed to be working?”

2. Develop a Routine

Many of the most successful people have routines they follow everyday. These routines not only help them stay focused, but they increase their productivity. Whether rising early and exercising before getting down to the grind is your thing, or you get more done after a mid-day coffee break, create a routine and stick with it!

3. Stay Organized

via Robbie Brown Work Evolution

Designate an exclusive working space for yourself and keep it clutter free. According to Becoming Minimalist, a study conducted by the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO) found that 91 percent of people said they would be “more effective and efficient if their workspace was better organized.” As a freelance writer, forms and online content for different clients can get jumbled. Make sure you keep physical forms in labeled folders and web content in separate folders on your computer.

4. Keep Yourself Accountable

If you only have enough time to dedicate to a certain task, make sure you complete it within a given timeframe. A great practice to keep yourself accountable is to set alarms on your phone or computer for when you should be completing a piece of content, have a phone meeting with a client, or need to move on to another assignment.

5. Remove Distractions 

If you’re the type of person who gets easily distracted while working, try to remove all distractions you can anticipate before you start writing. Block websites that tend to lead you astray, or put away your phone or other devices when it’s time to get to work.

Why Productivity Matters

Productivity is an important aspect of a freelancer’s life. If you’re not productive, you won’t earn a living. What’s more, your clients rely on you to deliver well-written content in a timely manner. After all, given the importance of content marketing in today’s digital world, their business in part relies on your productivity.

By adopting the above five habits, your career as a freelance writer will not only begin to take off, you’ll find that the process becomes easier and more like second nature. Productivity is important because it becomes a habit itself. Once you start producing more content and increasing your income, you’ll only want to write more and reach new freelancing heights.

The things we learned in English class don't apply to writing web copy. You have to play by a new set of rules to improve your search rankings and capture your readers' attention.

Here are four tips for writing web copy to help you improve SEO, drive traffic, and maximize reader engagement.

1. Include Keywords

What’s the Function of a Keyword?

This may be basic knowledge to some, and a foreign concept to others. For the sake of getting everyone on the same page, I’ll briefly explain why keywords are important and where you need to include them.

At its most basic, a keyword (either a single word or “long-tail,” meaning a phrase) signals to Google and other search engines what your piece of content is about. This is accomplished by web spiders, a program or automated script that browses the web to provide up to date data, crawling content on the web to tell search engines what’s out there.

Think of a baseball scout reporting back to MLB teams on what prospects they should consider. The baseball scout is like a web spider: s/he looks at all the prospects (content) out there and determines in which order they should be ranked; much like how Google ranks content on their results pages.

Now That I Have a Keyword, What Do I Do with It?

Once you’ve done some keyword research based on your industry and have decided upon a keyword or phrase, you need to use it correctly. Here are some keyword usage basics:

• Include your keyword in your title, the closer to the beginning of the title the better.
• Incorporate it into your first paragraph if possible.
• Use it at least once and at most five times within the body of your post.
• Include it in your meta description, the 150-character explanation of your content that will show up on search engine result pages (SERPs).
• If the keyword relates to the image(s) in your post, use it in your image alt text, the text that tells people (in words) what your image is.

2. Take Note of Content Length

It’s also important to keep length in mind when writing your content. Case in point: there is a rough 300-word minimum for Google and other search engines to even index your piece of content. Meaning your blog post won’t rank well, or rank at all, if it’s less than 300 words long.

The reasoning behind this is that you probably can’t provide a great piece of content about your chosen keyword in less than 300 words, and Google knows it. There needs to be some meat to your post in order for it to be considered a valuable source of information.

An even better practice is to make sure your blog posts are at least 500 words long. After all, this doesn’t take a whole lot more effort than churning out 300 words, and it will inherently provide even more value to your readers. 

Now, if you were the teacher’s pet back in English class and want to be Google’s teacher’s pet now, you’ll have to put in even more effort (but hey, anything worth doing is worth doing well, right?). According to an in-depth study by SEO master Neil Patel (if you don’t know who he is, follow him on Twitter ASAP), longer posts usually perform better. In fact, content that gets ranked on the first page of result pages typically exceeds 2,000 words.

The greater the word count, the more link-backs and social shares you’ll get too. 

However, at the end of the day, if you’re choosing between a shorter, well-written, and informative post and a longer, adjective-and-fluff-filled post, always pick the former. No matter what, you should always prioritize quality over quantity.

3. Format Your Posts to be Web-Friendly

Long gone are the days of four sentence paragraphs and double spaces after periods. You’re not writing for a teacher or professor anymore, you’re writing for your target audience. And above all else, the formatting of your posts should make your content incredibly easy to read. 

First, start off by breaking up big chunks of text. Depending on the length of your individual sentences, these chunks (I call them that because they aren’t paragraphs in the formal sense) should be one to three sentences in length. If you skim through your article and your eyes find a big chunk of text, break it up at a natural point.

The reason you want to do this (see how I broke up this thought into two chunks?) is because people read content on the web differently than they would read a newspaper or novel. When reading content on-screen,people tend to skim. This is because if you look at a newspaper or a book, you can instantly gauge how long the piece is and therefore about how long it will take you to read. With web content, however, the only way to know the length of a piece is to scroll down to the bottom of the page. 

Other formatting best practices include using:

• Headings and subheadings
• Bulleted and numbered lists when possible
• Bold and italics to emphasize an important point
• Images to break up text and provide visuals that support it

4. Use Internal and External Links

Link building is one of the most important aspects of search engine optimization (SEO). To use Moz’s analogy, “for search engines that crawl the vast metropolis of the web, links are the streets between pages.” In other words, both internal and external links show how web pages are related to one another.

Backlinks, also called inbound links, act as votes for popularity and importance for any given piece of content. Through links, search engines “can not only analyze the popularity [of] websites and pages based on the number and popularity of pages linking to them, but also metrics like trust, spam, and authority.”

Because links are so important, it’s a good practice to incorporate both external links to others’ content as well as internal links to your own within every blog post. You should always try to incorporate at least one of each; but remember, always have links open in new tabs, not in new windows or the same tab. This way, people can open the link without it taking them away from your content.

Conclusion 

Here are the four main takeaways from the four points of this article:

1. Research and use keywords in your posts.
2. Make sure your content is at least 500 words long.
3. Ensure your content is formatted for web readers.
4. Include both internal and external links in every post.

If you follow these four basic tips for writing web copy, you’ll be well on your way to gaining a following, increasing web prospects, and closing more sales.

About the Author

Lolly Spindler

Lolly Spindler is the Content Marketing Manager at xoombi and member of WE labs. A writer by trade, Lolly loves to make the written word work for clients by delivering high quality, engaging content to their audiences. She leads the xoombi content marketing team in executing demand generation, SEO optimization, and copy editing strategies. Lolly is a graduate of Boston University.

https://www.facebook.com/xoombi

http://www.linkedin.com/company/xoombi 

https://twitter.com/xoombi

WE Lab Members Shaun Boyer and Skyler Boles are the Current champions and poster boys of SpikeBall.

Check out this write up done by RJ. Vogt (@rjvogt31) of Esquire Magazine (@Esquiremag)

The Story of Spikeball From a toy into a Sport - Esquire.

You can view it at, http://www.esquire.com/_mobile/blogs/news/spikeball-toy-to-sport?src=email

I talked a few friends into trying Spikeball with me at Brighton Beach. None of them had played before and only one had heard of it, but it took them 10 minutes to get the hang of it. The speed of the ball off the net and the lack of boundaries had us—grown-ass men and women—actually into it.

Slowly, the beachgoers around us started paying attention. A hairy man in a Speedo stopped searching for seashells to watch. A teenager in a Brooklyn Nets jersey asked us what we were doing. Two kids throwing a Frisbee paused to discuss if they had seen it before.

At one point, NYPD officers trundled over in their beach-tractor to check up on us. I explained the game to them, but the authorities didn’t seem to get it. Naturally, that just validated the whole afternoon.

I learned something on the sand that day—Spikeball might be the next great American backyard sport. At the very least, it beats the hell out of lawn darts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bubKNFVZvE 

Here’s the setup: Four people, three hits, two teams, one net. Imagine if volleyball and foursquare (the kid’s game; not the app, you dweeb) had a love-child, and you’ve got the concept.

Usually played on a beach or lawn, the game consists of a palm-sized rubber ball and a hula-hoop sized, trampoline-like net placed a few inches off the ground. Players stand around the net, and each two-man team has up to three hits between the two of them to send the ball into the net, transferring possession to the opponents. The object of the game is to hit the ball into the net so that the opposing team cannot return it. First team to 21 points, wins.

According to Chris Ruder, the founder and CEO of Spikeball Inc., the curiosity we experienced at the beach has followed him and his friends ever since they first discovered the sport in the late 1980s. Back then, the set they played with was from Toys R Us, and Ruder said people would always ask the same three questions.

What’s that game? How do you play it? Where can I get one?

The first two questions were easy to answer, but the third was impossible—Toys R Us only sold it for a short period of time.

Twenty years went by, his set's duct tape fraying in its old age. While playing with his wife and friends at a couple’s retreat in Hawaii, Ruder realized the game might have a more universal appeal than his circle of friends. He envisioned a sturdier, more portable set-up, a reincarnation of the Spikeball he’d grown up playing.

“So we acquired the rights – my brother, my cousin and some childhood friends all chipped in – and we launched it, fully intending to lose our ass because none of us had ever done anything like this,” he remembered, laughing. “Lo and behold, it’s worked thus far.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOvoklexswk 

Spikeball Inc. sold its first set in 2008—no Toys R Us involved—and by October 2013, the company had grown large enough to allow Ruder to quit his day job selling online advertising. It’s now spreading through P.E. classes, youth ministries, ultimate Frisbee groups, and even non-lame places like college campuses. Clubs have cropped up at Ohio State University, Harvard University, and the University of Alabama. Even the SEC, an unbudging football stomping ground, is buying in.

Mike Schwind, a data analyst who recently graduated from the University of Tennessee, says he first played the game on spring break, shortly after the company launched. He and a few friends developed a passion for the sport, returning to UT to spread the Spikeball gospel.

“You can literally play it anywhere, as long as you have room for four people and a net,” Schwind says. “That’s what I like most about it.”

That versatility makes Spikeball both a sport and a game, competitive and casual, athletic event and prime shit-shooting, beer-drinking activity. Like all great games, Ruder points out, Spikeball lends itself to alcohol. Just play with a beer in hand, or for the more energetic boozers, play under the rule that each team can only pick up a beverage and drink when the other team is hitting.

“Is it a lawn game? That is where we began, and a lot of people do throw us in the bucket of, you know, lawn darts or cornhole,” Ruder says.

Although Spikeball is potentially the world's No. 1 sport for pissing off your dog at your next barbecue, the company is focusing on the opposite end of the spectrum – full on, officially-ranked, 100-percent sober sport. At USASpikeball.com, teams can register and enter tournaments. There are regional and national events held all across the country. Schwind says he played in the 2013 Nashville Spike-A-Palooza tournament, which attracted 62 teams from eight different states, including California.

Tournaments happen almost every weekend, and Ruder himself has been known to pop in and host raging after-parties, throwing down credit cards at local bars and inviting all the players to celebrate the sport.

“We did that in New York,” he says. “Basically measured it in kegs.”

This devotion to the player community can be traced to Spikeball Inc.’s early start, when Ruder would personally email customers to thank them and ask how they heard about the game. Now he’s taken on the herculean/impossible task of responding to every tweet and Facebook post that Spikeball is tagged in.

Devotion begets devotion, and Spikeball has achieved cult status. There are more than 125,000 players now, 578 registered teams.  Just last week, the world’s first known Spikeball tattoo was inked on a P.E. teacher’s arm in Cornwall, NY.

The Santa Monica Spikeball tournament in June attracted players who made 22 hour treks just to get there. Chris said the nation’s top-ranked team—Chico Spikeball, a pair undefeated in the last 12 months—gets asked for autographs because they have an acute case of Youtube fame.

Trademarks and Patents...Oh, My!

So, you've come up with a unique idea and want to protect your rights in it. But how?  Should you apply for a trademark, a patent, or maybe even both?! Truth is it all depends...there’s a lot of confusion on which is right for you and your idea. So what are the key differences between a copyright, trademark and design patent?

A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol or design, or a combination thereof, that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others. Trademark rights are obtained when the mark is used in U.S. commerce. The rights can be based in common-law, or due to registration with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, which provides for stronger enforcement of trademark rights.

Patents give inventors the exclusive right to duplicate their invention’s design. Patents cover devices, formulas, tools, and anything that has utility. For example, the recipe for a unique sausage can have a patent. To get a patent, you must apply to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and submit the invention’s design. You must show that the design is unique, and a patent examiner will determine if you are entitled to a patent. If so, a patent is granted that prohibits anyone else from making, using, offering for sale, selling, or importing the invention. A patent lasts 20 years.

Got an idea?? At WE labs, there’s always something new being discussed, whether it be a product, process, platform, even (these are the most fun!) occasionally wildly unrealistic ideas. When you do come upon your million dollar idea, you’ll want to be able to protect yourself and navigate the sometimes confusing and intimidating United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) system.

Join us February 11th @ 7pm for a free Patents & Trademark Flash Lab with attorneys from the US Patent and Trademark Office.

Bring your friends, your ideas, and your questions as we go deep into the jungle of Trademark & Patent Law with expert tour guides Jason Lott (Trademark) and Jeffrey Siew (Patent). We’re excited to have such well respected speakers - special shoutout to Mike Daniel at the downtown Long Beach Small Business Development Center for all his help in organizing and co-hosting! Here’s a little more on their backgrounds:

Jason Lott is an Attorney Advisor for Trademark Educational Outreach within the Office of the Commissioner for Trademarks at the USPTO headquarters in Alexandria, VA, where he helps create, refine, and expand educational activities in the area of trademark fundamentals. For four years prior, he spearheaded the Pro Se Video Work Project, tasked with creating multimedia-based trademark educational materials. Mr. Lott has been with the USPTO since 2000, previously serving as a Law Office Examining Attorney.

Jeffrey Siew is a quality assurance specialist and part of the outreach team under the USPTO’s Office of Innovation Development based in Silicon Valley, responsible for outreach for the West Coast. Mr. Siew graduated from Cornell University with a BS in Biology, and went on to earn Master’s degrees in both Biotechnology and Computer Science from Johns Hopkins University. In addition, Mr. Siew obtained his law degree from George Mason University in 2005 and has negotiated several treaties and international agreements in intellectual property while working in the international policy department. For nearly 20 years he has worked as an examiner and Patent Attorney for the USPTO, where his unique expertise has allowed him to oversee the examination of biotechnology, bioinformatics and immunology applications.

What is a “Flash Lab” you ask? It’s a crash course (just one evening of your time) designed to give you an understanding of the complex concepts involved so you can better refine your business ideas and strategies.

In 2014, WE Labs Founder Markus Manley and members Menchie Caliboso and Sarah Bennett conceptualized and co-founded the Society for Long Beach Music (SLBM), a collective that fosters the appreciation of music and culture in Long Beach. SLBM documents, investigates, and celebrates the music and culture of Long Beach, the most diverse city in the nation. Anyone who lives, loves and wants to learn more about Long Beach through its multi-genre aural output is a welcomed member.

The Society for Long Beach Music's mission is to provide a space in which artists, fans and community members can discover, re-learn, discuss and revel in the stories and unique culture of Long Beach through its diverse music scene. Devoted to creating a more innovative Long Beach, SLMB members are interested in sharing this city's music past and present while sparking conversations about its future.

Read more below from our own WE Labs member Menchie Caliboso in her piece on highlights from the scene in 2014 and visit their website at www.societyforlongbeachmusic.org to support and join the SLMB movement:

2014 Society for Long Beach Music Highlights

Written by: Menchie Caliboso

2014 was a year of both proud accomplishments and heart-wrenching tragedy. Markus, Sarah, and I (Menchie) met regularly from Spring 2013 to March 2014 to conceptualize Society for Long Beach Music. It was clear that we were on the same wavelength. We wanted people to see our local music not just as entertainment, but through a cultural perspective that has strengthened the dynamic spirit of Long Beach and its diversity. We wanted to strengthen our community, not by curating live shows and booking local talent, but by talking about how our local music scene, from its inception after World War II, has impacted people and music worldwide, as well as how our local music reflects the stories of our community members.

In March 2014, Long Beach lost Markus Manley — suddenly and without warning, our friend, innovator, collaborator and fellow local music lover was gone. We decided to launch Society for Long Beach into the public as soon as possible in his honor. If you lived in Long Beach during that time, you felt the weight of his passing, whether you knew Markus or not. From the arts and music to technology and from non-profits organizations to creative start-ups, Markus was a renaissance man who strived for a stronger, better, and more connected Long Beach. Naturally, he knew so many people and contributed his efforts to countless projects in Long Beach and beyond. We will always miss him and part of his legacy lives through Society for Long Beach Music.

We also dedicated our first zine to Markus Manley. You can still view the entire zine HERE where you find snippets from Sarah Bennett’s comprehensive thesis on Long Beach music (with particular regard to the diversity of Long Beach and the globalization of music), Top 5 Long Beach Songs chosen by Rudy De Anda (Wild Pack of Canaries) and Jesse Carzello (Bobby Blunders), and lyrics by local hip-hop duo Shining Sons, who often rap about their experience as community organizers in Long Beach.

We also successfully launched an Indie Week Campaign with Localism, Porch Party Records, Long Beach Independent, and Falling Mirrors Collective. Our goal was to connect local residents to local businesses using music, so we booked four different bands in four different stores on four different days during the week of Independence Day. Altogether, 16+ small businesses and 16 local acts  participated. 

You can still DOWNLOAD a compilation of the participating Indie Week LB artists. Although we worked under a time budget, we were happy with the diverse lineup of artists we were able to book, as a diverse lineup would truly represent the rich cultural mosaic of Long Beach. Among many in this compilation, you will find hip hop and electronica producer NiceGuyxVinny, who has recently been signed onto Los Angeles record-label Soulection. You’ll also find Gnocchi, a low-key jazz outfit who spend most of their time touring for national acts, such as Nas and Kanye West, and playing local gigs during their time off.

In 2015, our main goal is to simply keep growing by spreading cultural education and appreciation of Long Beach music through more articles, a music anthology project, and maybe even a video series! Given our limited capacity, we are always on the look out for people who are interested in writing, producing video content, or contributing digital or physical copies of Long Beach music for Society for Long Beach Music. 

Most importantly, we thank you all so much for your support and we look forward to a good year! 

1. We have 8500 square feet of space to accommodate you and your party.
Have you been to WE Labs? WE occupy the entire 8th floor in a building that is in the exact center of the downtown area. Located on the corner of Long Beach Boulevard and Broadway, WE have a 360 degree view of the city of Long Beach where, every night, you can see the fireworks from Disneyland, Knott's Berry Farm, and the Queen Mary.

2. Getting here is EASY!
Downtown Long Beach is a notoriously hard place to find parking, but not at WE Labs. WE are located one block away from the free 2-hour City Parking lots.  If that isn’t enough time, there are two (count ‘em, two) City of Long Beach lots that cost only $5 for the entire day located across the street from us!!!  As if that weren’t easy enough, WE are also located one block away from the Transit Mall.  You can go green and get drunk at the same time.

3. Affordable
WE Labs is a community-minded connector organization that welcomes all organizations and parties. Our focus as a business is to have a space where anyone can drop in and connect. WE don’t expect you to work by yourself, why do you think that we would want you to party by yourself? WE have packages available at all price points.

4.Access to a super awesome event coordinator.
Did you even know that WE Labs has an event coordinator?  Well, it does, and she is AWESOME!!! Award-winning and notorious for wrangling zombies and WE Labs staff, Ina can help you with all of your party needs. Remember how WE don’t want you to work or party by yourself?  Well, WE also don’t want you to plan by yourself—that’s what Ina is for!

So really, what are you waiting for? Contact us about your next event. WE are here for YOU.