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Try This Amazing Date Night Recipe

Try This Amazing Date Night Recipe


Try This Amazing Date Night Recipe

According to a study from the Marriage Foundation, married couples who have a date night once a month were the most likely to stay together. 

There’s no denying the power of quality time spent together to make a couple feel closeness and happiness. Date night recipes are a great way to combine that quality time with delicious food. You can even develop your cooking skills at the same time!

Read on for a great date night recipe you can try this month!

Date Night Recipes: Brined Pork Chops

Brining is one of those fantastic cooking techniques that’s both easy and makes an amazing difference in the flavor of your food. Not everyone learns how to brine growing up, so with this simple addition to your cooking repertoire, you’ll take your easy date night dinners to a whole new level!

One of the most common troubles with cooking is making sure that you don’t dry out your meat. Brining not only adds flavor on its own, but it also makes it easy to avoid drying out your meat. In fact, your brined pork chops will end up juicier and moister than even the most carefully prepared pork chops without brining.

To properly brine your pork chops, you’ll need a brining bag. A good brining bag will not only allow you to comfortably brine plenty of meat at the same time, but it will also make it much easier to clean up after your cooking. Plus, you can use it for many, many other delicious date night dinner recipes at home that call for brining!

Before you put your pork chops into the brine bag, you’ll want to make sure they’re completely unfrozen. Sugar is a great addition to a brine solution, helping to brown the meat and add extra flavors.

For this recipe, you’ll also need a heavy bottom frying pan. There are inevitably tiny differences in the thickness and density of the bottoms of frying pans.

These little differences mean that the surface of your pan is hotter in some spots and cooler in others. The result can be unevenly cooked meat.

A heavy bottom frying pan helps to maintain a nice even temperature so your meat is cooked perfectly all the way through. This delicious date night dinner idea will become a go-to choice when you can’t figure out what to cook for a date!

After your pork chops are done brining, don’t be afraid to rinse them off and pat them dry. The juices and flavors penetrate deep into the meat, so this won’t hurt the meat’s flavors in any way. On top of that, a clean, dry surface on your meat will allow you to apply a delicious dry rub.

Check out this link for more details on making the perfect pork chop brine. 

Make Your Special Night Together As Memorable As Possible

We hope you learned something helpful about great date night recipes in this brief piece. To find more recipes to enjoy cooking and eating, especially from the Mediterranean, check out our other pages!

Business

6 Amazing Digital Marketing Strategies Law Firms Should Consider

6 Amazing Digital Marketing Strategies Law Firms Should Consider


6 Amazing Digital Marketing Strategies Law Firms Should Consider

We’ve all seen those corny ads for law firms on city buses, daytime TV shows, park benches, you name it. Those ads may have a time and a place if they fit with your brand. In 2020, though, you’re missing out if you don’t take advantage of the digital ecosystem, too.

The problem is that you’re a lawyer, not a marketer. How do you know where to start?

Fortunately, plenty of folks have faced this issue before you and have discovered the top types of online marketing for law firms.

1. Writing Blogs

How many times have you Googled a question about something in the past day? Probably several times, and so have your future clients.

People are always searching for advice and information, so writing blogs with your legal expertise is the best way to reach them.

The key is to focus on informing your audience, not selling to them. This article from Burman Law is perfect—it answers a key question many of their clients have, rather than spending 1000 words patting themselves on the back.

People will find your blogs because they’re searching for that topic or question. When they do find your content, they get to know you as a reliable legal expert. The next time they need a lawyer, who better to call than the one who has already proven themselves to be knowledgeable and helpful?

On top of this, blogging is one of the best things you can do for your search engine optimization or SEO. Your site will be full of relevant content about popular keywords, so you’ll land at the top of search results.

2. Getting onto Online Directories

Your own site shouldn’t be the only way clients can find you online. There are plenty of directories out there dedicated to helping people find lawyers. Are you on them?

There are two categories of directories you want: legal directories and local directories.

Search for as many of these directories as you can find. If you find any sites that don’t list you, submit your profile to the site.

When you find directories that already list you, check out your profile. You want it to be complete and robust. It should have a photo if the directory has this option.

Beyond the photo, make sure all your information is up-to-date. Be sure to include a list of your legal specialties so you show up in the right searches.

3. Going Social

Social media marketing isn’t just for brands selling eyeshadow palettes. It’s a critical strategy for law firms as well.

As with your blogs, your social media posts need to focus on informing the public rather than selling yourself. People are tired of blatant advertising and may react negatively.

Post all of your blogs, videos, and other content on your social media pages. Focus on trending legal topics and give your expert opinion about high-profile questions.

Don’t forget to interact, too. Comment on other posts with your legal expertise. For instance, local news outlets’ posts tend to be popular, and your expert opinion will be welcome.

4. Giving Your Site an Audit

Having a website is rule #1 for digital marketing, but is yours up to snuff? When was the last time you gave it a checkup? Do you know what to look for?

Start by checking how well your site is optimized for search engines. An SEO checklist of the essentials is an easy place to begin.

Your site also needs to perform in certain ways to get strong results. It needs to be mobile-friendly, and ideally, it should be responsive. This makes it easier for mobile users, and Google penalizes sites that aren’t mobile-friendly in their SEO rankings.

Don’t forget to check your site’s loading time. Users have little patience for sites that load slowly, so it will lose traffic for you.

Finally, aesthetics play a part too. Your site’s design needs to display your brand while having an updated look. If your site looks outdated, users will assume that your legal knowledge is outdated, too.

5. Video Marketing

Videos are engaging, easy for anyone to explore, and well-optimized for SEO. If you aren’t using all that to your advantage, you should be.

Start producing videos on a regular basis, at least weekly. They don’t need to be expensive, just quick videos of you giving your expert take on a trending legal topic.

Post your videos on YouTube first and foremost. From there, you can share them on social media, embed them on certain pages of your site, and more.

Be sure to mix up the formats of your videos, though. Some can be straightforward “talking head” videos of you, but add some interview videos, demonstrations, live videos, and so on.

6. Paying for Clicks

Many businesses expect that they can get to the top of search engine results pages with organic SEO alone. While that isn’t impossible, it can be far more difficult to catch your competition than you expect.

To put your results into hyperdrive, try pay-per-click ads or PPC ads. These are the ads that show up at the top of Google’s results pages, looking like organic results.

With these ads, you set a specific budget and you choose which types of users to target based on location and the keywords they’re searching for.

Keep in mind that successful PPC ads aren’t just about pumping in as much money as you can. It takes strategy to determine the best keywords to target, how to further customize your audience, and how to compel users to click through.

Getting Serious About Online Marketing for Law Firms

Some law firms make the mistake of assuming that if they do good work, recommendations will bring in all the clients they could want. That isn’t a safe gamble to bet your business on anymore.

In this digital age, many people don’t bother to ask anyone for recommendations before they hit the internet and search for themselves. That’s why it’s so critical for you to have an online presence.

These strategies for online marketing for law firms will help you jumpstart that process. For more tips about content marketing and other ways to spread your message online, check out more articles on our blog.

Business

4 Interview Tips and Tricks To Help You Land That Amazing Job

4 Interview Tips and Tricks To Help You Land That


4 Interview Tips and Tricks To Help You Land That Amazing Job

Do you have an interview coming up?

First off, thumbs up. Considering that the average job opening attracts over 250 applicants and only 4 to 6 people get invited for an interview, you’ve done well so far.

However, you aren’t there yet. You still need to excel in the interview if you’re to stand any chance of beating other candidates to the job.

To help you make the best preparations, we’re sharing top interview tips and tricks. Keep reading to learn how to ace your interview.

1. Research the Organization

Before you applied for this job, you probably did some background research on the company. After all, a whopping 69 percent of job seekers consider things like brand reputation before making an application.

Now that you’ve got the nod for an interview, it’s time to go deeper with your research.

For instance, try to establish how the company conducts its recruitment process. Do candidates go through a multiple-step interview process or they just one shot to impress?

A good way to find this information is to scour through company review sites like Glassdoor and Indeed. Smart Circle reviews on Indeed is a good example of how you can use online reviews to know more about a company’s hiring process.

2. Understand the Role

During the application process, you no doubt reviewed the job’s description, including qualification requirements and roles and responsibilities.

However, it’s not uncommon for advertised positions to carry generic descriptions.

With this in mind, it’s important to research the role you’re interviewing for and know the specifics. If you know someone (or someone who knows someone) in the company, reach out to them and gather some information on the position’s everyday duties.

3. Comb Through Your Resume – Again

Your recruiters or interviewers already have your resume. They have combed through it, looking for, among other things, gaps and inconsistencies.

Before showing up for the interview, go through your resume again. If there are inconsistencies, this is not the time to correct. Right now your focus should be on figuring out how to explain them, just in case an interviewer picks them out.

You also need to remember crucial details in your resume without referring to it. Off the top of your head, you should be able to say when you earned your degrees or started on previous jobs.

4. It’s Not Just About the Actual Interview

A common mistake interviewees make is thinking only the actual interview matters.

In truth, every interaction you have with your potential employer counts.

If you didn’t reply to the email inviting you for an interview, for example, or replied with a bland message like “will be there,” you’ve likely already shot yourself in the foot. If you show up during the interview day looking unbothered – perhaps you decide to plug in your earphones and listen to some music before your turn – you won’t be sending an impressive picture.

In short, treat the interview like a process that starts from the day of your invitation right to your first day on the job – and even longer if the job has a probationary period.

Interview Tips and Tricks to Get You Hired

Interviews make most people nervous.

The best way to get over your nervousness is to prepare yourself adequately. With these interview tips and tricks, you’re now in a better position to transform yourself into a compelling candidate for the job.

May the force be with you and don’t forget to explore our blog more career tips and insights.

Technology

Follower Frenzy: 5 Amazing Social Media Tips for Getting Followers

Follower Frenzy: 5 Amazing Social Media Tips for Getting Followers


Follower Frenzy: 5 Amazing Social Media Tips for Getting Followers

Are you trying to grow your social media following?

Gaining new, authentic social media followers can be a challenge, especially in a time when it’s easy to pay to gain followers overnight. But buying followers is never the way to go, especially if you’re looking to increase engagement, convert customers or work with brands on sponsored content. 

Now it’s getting easier and easier for people to spot who has a genuine following and who has purchased their followers. How do you gain true followers when most social media outlets are crowded? Keep reading to find out ways to organically get new followers. 

The Best Social Media Tips 

Getting organic social media growth can be difficult, but it’s worth the time and effort. Here are five great social media tips to gain more followers:

1. Post High Quality, Shareable Content 

Social media is a crowded space, so people have high expectations when it comes to content. To get the most likes, shares and comments, you need to create high-quality content that people will respond to. 

If Instagram is your outlet of choice, invest in good equipment or learn photo editing. For Facebook, share things that are funny and engaging. Videos are also popular on outlets like Facebook. Know what your target audience likes and give them what they’re looking for. 

2. Engage With Other Accounts 

Getting new followers is all about being active and engaging on the social media platform you’re trying to grow. So don’t just be a ghost on the platform, actively engage in what others are doing. Comment on posts that you admire and like or share content often. 

3. Post Frequently and Consistently 

If you want to gain followers you have to post frequently and consistently. You can’t post once a week and then disappear for months at a time. Social media algorithms determine who sees your posts, and many of them will punish you for not posting very often. 

Try posting at least three times per week and keep up with posting. You can use a scheduling tool to post for you when life gets busy and you can’t be on social media in real time. 

4. Use Hashtags 

Hashtags are still a great way to get your content discovered by new users. The key to hashtags is to make sure they’re targeted, specific and relevant to your content. Don’t just use a hundred random hashtags and hope for the best. 

Do your research to find out which hashtags are trending to get your posts in front of the most people. 

5. SEO Optimize Your Content

Just like using hashtags, SEO optimizing your social media content makes you easier to find when people search online. 

If you’re not sure how to get started with SEO optimized content, you can try a software platform that will help. This SEO software from SEOJet is an awesome place to get started. 

Learn More Marketing and Blogging Tips 

Just like building a blog or a business, getting organic social media traffic takes time and patience. You won’t have millions of followers overnight, but you will build a lasting network of followers who actually want to hear what you say, engage with your posts and share your content. 

Now that you know our best social media tips, there is still plenty to learn about marketing and blogging. This article on link building is a great place to start and it’ll help you drive more traffic to your website. 

Health

The Amazing Benefits of Being Sober

The Amazing Benefits of Being Sober


The Amazing Benefits of Being Sober

Recent surgeon general figures estimate that 1 in 7 people will struggle with a substance issue during their life. There are unique reasons why each person deals with substance abuse. One common denominator is they often don’t know the benefits of being sober.

When you’re in the throes of addiction, you might not realize the impact your addiction has on your health, your friendships, and your career. If you’re in a situation where other people around you have a similar relationship to whatever substance you’re using, it’s hard to see an alternative. The first thing you need to do is to take a break from any situation that’s encouraging your behavior.

Once you get away from the triggers for your addiction, you’ll start to see the benefits of being sober. Here are five of the major benefits of being sober.

1. Relationships Will Get Better

When you’re making decisions influenced by an addiction, you could be hurting your friends and family without even realizing it. One of the benefits of being sober is that you’ll be able to treat the people who care about you better.

While you’re influenced by an addiction, you could choose nights alone with a substance or with people who use the substance over your loved ones. When you leave the substance behind, you might see the people you were using with didn’t care about your well-being as much as the people you avoided. During an addiction, you’ll avoid anyone who you feel is judging your addiction by asking you to quit.

If you have children, they will be impacted by your addiction no matter how you might try to keep them away. Children can be permanently traumatized by living with a parent who has a substance abuse problem. You can repair the damage done by getting sober now.

2. Your Memory Will Improve

Substance abuse can cause brain damage and affect your ability to remember important events and information. One of the benefits of being sober is that you’ll experience life from a more connected position.

If you’re employed during the period of your addiction, you could make mistakes, forget meetings, and miss appointments. This can damage your earning capability and the future of your career.

When you attend a wedding, birthday, or anniversary while sober, you get to remember every moment vividly. You can be present with the people you love the most and share the things they love with them.

When you remember their birthday or an important event, you’ll make the people around you happy. People appreciate when you make time for them and are sincerely excited about what’s going on in their lives.

3. You’ll Be in Better Shape

Exercising while you’re under the influence is far less effective than when you’re sober. Recovery time takes longer and so it’s harder to do the kinds of high-impact workouts that have an impact on your body.

If you’re abusing alcohol, you’re regularly dehydrating your body. Your body needs water to metabolize food and to refresh itself after a workout. Dehydration can cause you to pull a muscle or sprain a part of your body.

Using drugs and alcohol can be visible on your face. Some drugs can do damage to your lungs, your air passageways, and even your skin. Alcohol causes you to retain water and can make your face appear fatter than you would be otherwise.

One of the benefits of being sober is that it’s easier to get out of bed in the morning. You can wake up early to squeeze in a morning workout or have energy and time at night to make it to the gym. Living a Clean Life is equivalent to living a healthy life.

4. An Addiction Isn’t Free

No matter what your addiction is, kicking it will free up some extra cash. Even the money spent on cigarettes by the average smoker could pay for a weekend out of town.

If you don’t have all of the things you want to have out of life, money could be a factor. For people struggling with an addiction, it could be hard to pay for basic housing, food, and leisure costs. Kicking an addiction could show you just how much you could be doing with the money that you’re making.

Some people even go into an illegal or unethical trade in order to pay for their addiction. You won’t have to make those kinds of difficult decisions if you’re sober. Sobriety is free.

5. You’ll Have More Time in the Day

One of the hidden benefits of being sober is the amount of time that will suddenly be freed up in your day.

Drug and alcohol abuse takes time out of your day that you could be using to pursue your dreams. If you’ve always wanted to start a small business, pursue acting, or pick up an instrument, the time and money you save by being sober could be a windfall.

You might have a stack of books you’ve been meaning to read or a bunch of work that’s piled up over time.

Instead of putting it off, the extra time you’ll have allows you to prioritize what matters. You could have been putting off something that only takes a few minutes to deal with. Rather than putting up with that daily stressor, you can check those items off of your list and get on with your life.

The Benefits of Being Sober Are Huge

The newfound energy, balance, and outlook on your future will be a huge benefit to every aspect of your life. Being sober might seem daunting right now, but the work will pay off tenfold. Seek help if you need it and you’ll be surprised how willing your friends and family will be to get you through this tough time.

To stay on track, you should consider keeping a journal or starting a recovery blog. Check out our guide to starting an addiction recovery blog to make sure you connect with the audience who needs you.

Business

7 Amazing Healthcare Content Marketing Tips Professionals Use

7 Amazing Healthcare Content Marketing Tips Professionals Use


7 Amazing Healthcare Content Marketing Tips Professionals Use

80% of Internet users search for health information online. As a healthcare company generating and distributing useful health content should be a top priority.

But getting your content in front of potential customers to build this trust takes strategy.

Let’s explore what you need to know to build an effective one in healthcare content marketing the way professionals do.

1) Get a Written Plan

Studies show that nearly 40% of companies try to implement content marketing without any written plan.

They end up picking random topics. They don’t have clear objectives or goals. They think they’re just going to publish a blog or two a week and see them “take off”. They share them on FaceBook. They don’t consistently measure results.

Then they wonder why “content marketing doesn’t work”.

Get a plan and get ready to execute a healthcare content marketing strategy that gets results.

2) Follow the Plan

The great thing about a plan is that it has clear benchmarks, methods, who’s responsible for what, etc.

You can look back to see what’s working and where you need to make changes. You can identify if things are going as expected and if everyone’s on task.

Follow the plan that you have established for your healthcare content marketing.

Through this, you can answer the question: Is it the plan that needs to adapt? Or is the team simply not staying on task to execute your healthcare marketing strategy.

3) Be Clear on Your Target Audience

If you’re in private practice, you want more patients. We get it. But who are your ideal patients? Some healthcare companies market too broad. They don’t want to exclude anyone. This seems like the right and ethical thing to do.

But the success of any healthcare content marketing strategy is dependent on its ability to connect with people. You can’t connect if you don’t have a clear vision of who you’re trying to connect with.

In content marketing, you may have 5+ distinct targets. But each piece of content that you create and distribute should have a single target in mind.

4) Do a Competitive Analysis

On average, search results account for 51% of a website’s traffic. One of the goals of content marketing is to increase your ranking in searches so that you earn more of this organic traffic through SEO.

92% of traffic goes to page one results so this is where you need to be.

Evaluate who’s appearing on page one in your local market for key phrases people would use to find your website.

Take a close look at their sites. What kind of content are they creating? Where are they focusing their social media efforts? What is their domain authority?

How many links do they have from other sites? You can invest in tools that will help you gain a clearer understanding of what the competition is doing to earn page one spots.

5) Generate Shareable Content Topics

An effective strategy needs two primary types of content topics — evergreen and trending. They serve different purposes and work together to help you achieve your goals.

Evergreen Topics

A portion of your topics should be evergreen. They should be timeless topics that people are always looking for. They may be the answers to common healthcare questions in your niche or other tips and tricks that your target finds helpful.

You can keep the ideas flowing by listening to your industry. Stay active on social media sites to keep your finger on the pulse of the industry.

Talk to your sales department and patient support services teams. Find out about commonly asked questions and concerns. Address them in evergreen content.

You can actually cut patient support costs by making these resources available online.

Mayo Clinic is an example of healthcare company that produces great evergreen content. They address everything health and are one of the top resources that people turn to when they have a health question.

Trending Topics

And some of your content should be on trending topics likes relevant news stories. Whenever you can find a way to integrate a trending topic into your specific healthcare content marketing niche do so.

Not only does this demonstrate that you’re current, it helps drive traffic because you have a topic that people are very actively looking for.

Get creative. The news doesn’t have to be exactly in your niche. In fact, the more you can bend the content to fit into your niche, the more original piece of content you’ll create.

Whether you’re creating content for addiction recovery or a power wheelchair company, you can find trending stories to fit into your niche.

6) Get a Personality

People don’t get behind a business. They get behind the people behind that brand. The more you can humanize your brand, the more easily you’ll connect with people.

You may have noticed the recent Gillette commercials where they’re doing just that. Founded over 120 years ago, this shaving company is having to adapt to changing consumer behavior.

Instead of commercials with flashy images and slogans, they’re placing their employees prominently in the commercials. It gives the company a human face.

A 2nd example, Saint Thomas Hospital Systems in Nashville, isn’t alone in its attempt to give its impersonal hospital brand a makeover. For the past several years, they’ve been creating content that tells the stories of their patients — with permission of course.

These heartfelt pieces connect with people going through similar health struggles. You can’t do that with a how-to video or 11 quick tips article.

7) Measure Everything

You can’t optimize your healthcare content marketing if you don’t know what’s working best for you. Use free tools like Google Analytics to evaluate how people are interacting with content.

How much traffic is it getting? Do people stay on the page?

Does it encourage people to click on another page to continue to browse the site? Schedule an appointment? Or buy something?

When you know what to measure and consistently measure it, you know where to go for more info when your strategies aren’t working.

Don’t be in the dark. Leverage this data to improve your strategies.

Healthcare Content Marketing

To get results with content, you need a written plan. Lay out how you will create, curate and distribute content.

Follow your plan. Create content that people are looking for and love.

Show your human side. Measure your results.

For more tips on leveraging content in your industry, follow our blog.