You are here: Home / Archives for Graham Jones

About Graham Jones

Graham Jones is an Internet Psychologist who studies the way people use the online world, in particular how people engage with businesses. He uses this knowledge to help companies improve their online connections to their customers and potential customers and offers consultancy, workshops, masterclasses and webinars. He also speaks regularly at conferences and business events. Graham is an award-winning writer and the author of more than 30 books, several of which are about various aspects of the Internet. For more information connect with me on Google+

Kindle Cash Success

10th May 2012

Kindle Cash SuccessKindle Cash Success is a short book of just 26 pages which shows you how to use the Kindle publishing system to make money from publishing short reports and booklets for the Amazon Kindle. I did not write this book, I admit, but it helped me produce material I have published for the Amazon Kindle. There’s practical advice and tips and hints inside which will help you get your book selling on Kindle. And if you think the Kindle is not for you, well only last week I read about a young author who sold more than 1m copies of his first novel at 99p a go by self publishing on the Amazon Kindle. It is worth a try….!

pdf Kindle Cash Succcess
Size: 151.91 kB – File type: pdf

Comments: Please add your comment
Categories: Internet Business
Tags: , , , , ,

Make things up to truly engage your online visitors

10th May 2012

Once upon a time there was a website visitor who started reading a blog post about making things up. The reader sat in his office surround by books and files gripped by the words scrolling past his eyes. Surely, it could not be true, he thought. The blog post was telling him not to tell the truth on his own website. The website visitor sat their stunned, staring at the screen with his mouth wide open in amazement. How on earth could it be worthwhile making things up instead of telling people the truth, he thought.

Reading engages people

You might be thinking the same as our blog reader – surely I can’t be advising you to make things up on your website. But I am. Honest…!

New research shows that when people read fiction they become much more emotionally engaged with the subject. The researchers used fictional accounts of voters and gave them to people who were due to vote in elections. The people who read stories where the main character was very similar to them actually voted in higher numbers than people who read stories where the characters were remote. In other words, when people read fiction with which they identified it changed their behaviour.

Story telling is an essential component in all communication. Indeed, news media call everything they do “stories” and when you watch TV shows like X-Factor you get the story behind each contestant, which often looks at their triumph over adversity. And what do the judges do? Well they ensure there is conflict – an essential component of a good story. The show may parade itself as a talent contest, but in reality it is a series of stories – and that’s central to its success.

This new research adds to the massive amount of material available which shows how fundamental the concept of story is to communication. It suggests now that by using stories you can change behaviour. If you want your website visitors to do certain things, then telling them fictional stories about what other people have done could help. Of course your stories must be realistic and you need to identify the fact that they are made up (otherwise you’ll generate mistrust once you are found to be lying). But if you use stories then you can increase engagement and produce behavioural changes in your website visitors.

So, for example, imagine you are a business consultant offering management advice. A set of fictional tales about managers in certain situations could well help engage people. Similarly, what if you are an SEO company? You could produce a set of short stories about people desperately trying to get better placings on search engines. Think of them as case histories you make up. Just as long as you make it clear that these are fiction, you can engage your readers and make it likely that they change their behaviour – such as taking that trial of your SEO software or booking an appointment with your management consultancy.

Stories are important, whether fiction or fact, but too few websites use the concept of story telling – much to their detriment.

Related articles
Comments: Please add your comment
Categories: Blogging, Internet Psychology
Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Social businesses make more money

9th May 2012

Forgive me, but every time I see a blog post like this one saying that social media helps your business I let out a very loud “OMG”. Almost everywhere you look online these days there is some debate about whether or not social media can actually help your business. Each week there are new tools to help you measure the return on investment of being social. And there are all sorts of experts helping you understand how being social can boost your sales.

The reason for my amazement is that this all appears to be a surprise to people. It’s as though there has been some kind of revolutionary awakening with business leaders going “Goodness me, being social and actually talking to our customers helps? We must try some of that.” Let’s get the facts straight: business has ALWAYS been social. It has always been about PEOPLE connecting with other people. Period. That’s business. Social media is NOT NEW. Indeed, those of us old enough to recall the late-1970s mainframe driven technology revolution will remember “bulletin boards” where business people used to chat online with their suppliers and customers. That was social media – 35 years ago…!

Business is social

And when the Encyclopedia Britannica relied on door-to-door sales staff who would come knocking on your door of an evening and get your Dad to buy a set of books and a lovely shelf to put them on, guess what – that salesman was being social. Gosh, your Dad even invited him in and gave him a cup of tea. And every Friday after school I used to rush home because that’s when the United Friendly Insurance Man came to call and he always had a tube of Fruitgums for me. He was social.

Every business activity is social. Every business activity involves people talking with other people. Shop keepers talk to their customers, suppliers make friends with their customers and people who buy things go back to certain places because the “people there are friendly”. Social activity is what makes business survive. So why are so many business owners surprised that online social tools can help their business?

Indeed, there is reticence amongst many business leaders to engage in online social activity. They want “proof” it works, it seems – which kind of suggests they haven’t yet “got” that their business IS social. Business leaders also are frightened that being social online will expose them to all sorts of mayhem and problems.

However, new research confirms – yet again – that the fears are ungrounded and the successes are there for the taking.

According to a study from Pulse Point Group, businesses that are socially engaged are earning up to 7% more than similar businesses which avoid online social technologies. This merely adds to previous studies which show that the companies which do the most social media have increased their profits and also have raised their share prices. In other words being social – whether that’s online or offline – increases your bottom line and raises the value of your business.

The United Friendly insurance man who came to my house every Friday afternoon realised that. It seems he was way ahead of many of today’s business leaders who are still searching for “evidence” that being social is going to help their business. OMG.

Related articles
Comments: Please add your comment
Categories: Social
Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Switch off email for a happier life

8th May 2012

Bing-bong – here comes another email. Most people have constant reminders that email has arrived. Whether it is the familiar bing-bing sound, the little pop-up alerts at the bottom of your computer screen, or buzzes on your smartphone, email is omnipresent. Most people it seems also keep their email window open all day, whether in a separate application or a tab in their browser if they use webmail services like Gmail. But new research confirms earlier studies which suggest this could be harmful to your health.

You have new mail

Being constantly interrupted by email is stressful because you feel a lack of control. Being unable to control our own life is a significant trigger for stress. And when you are stressed you produce hormones which long-term have a negative impact on your body, ultimately causing organ damage if they are present in excess for any length of time.

New research now adds to this knowledge by showing that when you have email “always on” you tend to multi-task much more, with people switching activities from work to email around 37 times an hour if they have an email window constantly open. Such people are in a state of “high alert” as a result and these new findings show that their heart rates are constantly higher too. Constant, fast heart rates are not good for you – they are linked to heart damage.

Furthermore, the constant switching between windows is actually less productive. Your brain cannot accommodate the constant change in focus as easily as we might think. As a result, we have to keep going back to emails to do things again – doubling up on work and ultimately taking longer to do things. Keeping an email window constantly open actually reduces productivity.

The new research also undertook an interesting piece of analysis. The researchers gave people an “email holiday” where they did not look at emails for five days. These individuals had heart rates which were returned to normal and reported that they were much happier. Their stress levels were much lower.

Not only that, but when people were given an email holiday they became MORE productive being able to focus more on their real work.

Having “always on” email is an illusion. You think you are more productive, when in fact you are less efficient and effective. Not only that, you are more stressed and doing your body harm.

Here’s what to do to INCREASE productivity and REDUCE STRESS:

  1. Only open your email program when YOU want to send or answer emails
  2. Switch off all alerts to new incoming emails
  3. Set aside times of the day when you will deal with emails – a couple of times a day is enough
  4. Ensure you have an email processing system in place. Emails will fall into one of three categories: for deletion, for immediate answering, for answering later.
  5. Have an email filing system- your inbox should ALWAYS BE EMPTY once you have completed your email activities

Ultimately your aim should be for you to control email, not the other way around. Your health depends on that.

Related articles
Comments: 1 Comment
Categories: Email, Internet Psychology
Tags: , , , , , , ,

Men’s Health

8th May 2012

Just been interviewed by Men’s Health magazine about email stress.

Comments: Please add your comment
Categories: Media Appearances
Tags: ,

Some of the links on this page are Affiliate Links and lead to sites where I can earn commission income should you buy anything.
Graham Jones is a participant in the Amazon EU Associates Programme, an affiliate advertising programme designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees
by advertising and linking to Amazon.co.uk

This site uses cookies. For more information please see the Privacy page.

Follow Graham Jones RSS Pinterest Google+ YouTube LinkedIn Facebook Twitter