Life is stressful. These four weighted blankets, tested by Fast Company editors, can help. 2020 has been an incredibly difficult year and around the world, people are experiencing record levels of stress. Some researchers have observed that that there’s been a spike in sleeplessness—they’re calling it Coronasomnia—which is leading to declines in productivity, shorter fuses, and increased health risks. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like we’ll be out of the woods anytime soon, so here at Fast Company , we’ve been trying to find ways to manage our anxieties. Over the past few weeks, writers and editors here have been testing weighted blankets, which are designed to help people relax. Read Full Story

‘Immunity passports’ might be coming to air travel—but should they? Airlines have adapted to the COVID-19 pandemic with policies on face masks, keeping middle seats empty, and requiring evidence of a negative coronavirus test before heading to some destinations. So when the first doses of a COVID-19 vaccine are rolled out in the coming months, will you have to prove your immunization to board a plane? Read Full Story

Posted by ChristopherHofman Currently, many businesses face challenging times and are moving their SEO budget to disciplines which offer quicker wins. But you can also create instant results with SEO, and it can be done on a small budget even when you are up against bigger players in your industry. In this blog post I will show you my framework to do SEO sprints. I will show you how you can use Google’s ability to index and rank faster to your advantage. Later, you will be presented with a case study, where we used SEO sprints for a chain of opticians. The result: an increase in bookings of vision tests of 73%. But first, let's have a look at the layout on page one of Google (for most queries). Google never took SEOs into account when designing for the user. As a result, their transformation over the last few years …

The Vistaprint face mask is comfortable, washable, and has perfectly fitted filters that you can stock up on. A few months ago, like everyone in the Northeast, I found myself searching blindly online for a suitable face mask. Though companies from Everlane to the Gap to Adidas are now offering their own styles, initially the pickings were slim—especially if you wanted something soon. On a whim, I took the advice from another Fast Company article and ordered five masks for myself and my family from Vistaprint (a seemingly random conference swag company). Now we’re well into our new normal and masks abound, but I still find myself opting for my Vistaprint mask over everything else. Read Full Story

Posted by R0bin_L0rd Many of us are helping businesses that are facing hard times, or we’re facing hard times ourselves. If you’re working for a company (or client) that's in trouble, the use of SMS chatbots could be a way for you to look outside your normal list of solutions and help them succeed in a completely different way. If you’re a marketer looking for work, adding this to your list of skills could mean you keep things ticking along while many of the usual doors are closed — or that you open new doors. What you’ll get In this post, I give you instructions and code to produce not just one, but a series of text-based chatbots that can be managed by Google Sheets. The example here is set up to work with restaurants, but could be adapted to work with any business that needs to receive orders, check …

Face masks will be here for a while. One company is trying to make them more humane. If you’re looking for a face mask, options abound. But whether it’s leopard print, splashed with your team’s logo, or the standard blue medical variety, all of these opaque masks have one problem in common: they cover half of your facial expressions. They’re challenging for the deaf community , not great for babies’ development , and can be dehumanizing. Read Full Story

Posted by Portent This blog was written by Tim Mehta, a former Conversion Rate Optimization Strategist with Portent, Inc. Running A/B/n experiments (aka “Split Tests”) to improve your search engine rankings has been in the SEO toolkit for longer than many would think. Moz actually published an article back in 2015 broaching the subject, which is a great summary of how you can run these tests. What I want to cover here is understanding the right times to run an SEO split-test, and not how you should be running them. I run a CRO program at an agency that’s well-known for SEO. The SEO team brings me in when they are preparing to run an SEO split-test to ensure we are following best practices when it comes to experimentation. This has given me the chance to see how SEOs are currently approaching split-testing, and where we can improve upon the …

Posted by Portent This blog was written by Tim Mehta, a former Conversion Rate Optimization Strategist with Portent, Inc. Running A/B/n experiments (aka “Split Tests”) to improve your search engine rankings has been in the SEO toolkit for longer than many would think. Moz actually published an article back in 2015 broaching the subject, which is a great summary of how you can run these tests. What I want to cover here is understanding the right times to run an SEO split-test, and not how you should be running them. I run a CRO program at an agency that’s well-known for SEO. The SEO team brings me in when they are preparing to run an SEO split-test to ensure we are following best practices when it comes to experimentation. This has given me the chance to see how SEOs are currently approaching split-testing, and where we can improve upon the …

Posted by timaj100 We are living in a fast-moving time with new technology, ever-evolving social and political landscapes, and a pandemic on top of that. Any predictions about what to expect in 2020 for marketers was no doubt lightyears off what we’re experiencing now . So what can we learn from this year as we move forward? You can bet things will continue to change and evolve in unpredictable ways. What worked last year might not work now. Heck, what worked last week might not work next week! How, then, can you be sure you’re getting the most out of your marketing efforts? Evolving and finding opportunities There are a few ways you can try to stay on top of things. No matter what, having a strategy for post-COVID is important. Learn from others For one, pay attention to those around you. Learn from your peers and competitors. Some may …

Apple should steal Android’s “Trusted Device” feature, so we can still unlock iPhones with masks on. Back in 2013, Motorola released an authentication feature for its Android phones that was brilliant in its simplicity. Read Full Story