Tag: Growth

Need to send a fax and not sure where to start? We’ve got you covered in six simple steps.

Step 1: Prepare Your Fax

Obtain a paper printout of the document or set of documents you’d like to send. Ensure that all writing and graphics, whether printed or handwritten, are clearly legible. Any inconsistencies in your original copy will also affect the faxed copy.

Keep in mind that faxed copies typically only render in black and white, so any ink or graphics that feature colors—particularly red, yellow, or pink—may not show up in the faxed printout.

Step 2: Turn On the Fax Machine

Verify the fax number of your recipient, noting any external or international prefix codes required for landline dialing. Ensure that the machine is switched on and connected, usually indicated by a lighted control panel on its face.

To power up, locate the machine’s main button or switch—usually located on the left-hand lower panel of industrial fax/copy print machines and on the back of desktop units.

Step 3: Place Document in Feed Tray

Place your entire document into the top paper feed tray. Make sure pages are in the proper front-to-back order, beginning with a cover page that details important information such as:

• Your company information
• Your direct contact information
• The recipient’s name and fax number
• The total number of pages
• The send date
• A short message detailing any additional or specific instructions

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Most customers who get on the phone with call centers don’t really care about the analytical jargon or omnichannel marketing intricacies behind how call centers operate. All they’re looking for is a solution to their problems without the hassle of contacting support lines over and over again.

That said, there are four core trends that genuinely enhance the customer experience, which call center leaders and organizations ought to keep in mind.

First-Call Resolution Focus

Why It’s New

First-Call Resolution (FCR) is trending because word-of-mouth travels faster than ever before. This means user reports of a single negative experience can move quickly on platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and Yelp—reaching thousands, if not millions, within hours.

According to ReviewTrackers, 94% of consumers admit that they’ve avoided a business after seeing a bad review online. That’s why getting things right on the first try is so valuable, because all online businesses are under the microscope.

How It Helps Customers

FCR shoots for efficient customer interactions straight away. Customers don’t want to spend their time being passed from one representative to another—especially when that means repeating their story over and over again. Unsurprisingly, research from Accenture found that 89% of customers get frustrated when they need to go over the same issues with multiple agents.

Achieving FCR means not only solving the customer’s issue promptly but also making sure that they don’t have to say it twice. This approach builds trust and demonstrates to customers that their time and business are genuinely valued.

How to Get Started

Implementing an effective FCR strategy starts with training agents to be ready with both answers and problem-solving skills. Consider running simulated training sessions that focus on common issues. These practice sessions can help agents anticipate problems and fine-tune their responses….

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In most marketing strategies, emails will often play second fiddle to ads or social media. Still, those who know it well will tell you that emailing can be your most reliable and lucrative marketing channel.

But before you can start raking in the big bucks from email campaigns, you’ll need a collection of viable contacts. List building is the only way to grow emailing into a profitable marketing effort.

The What and Why of Email List Building

An email list is a collection of email addresses from people who have expressed interest in getting your content delivered to their inboxes.

Consider your email list as a community of people interested in what you have to offer. Email list building is the practice of growing your community by getting more people to subscribe.

On the simplest level, email list building is essential because without a list you don’t have anyone to email. But beyond that, email lists can be one of the most effective ways to connect with prospective customers—because as long as they’re subscribed, you know your emails will get delivered where they can see them.

When you post to social media, you either have to pay for ads to promote your content or leave everything up to the mercy of the algorithms. Some of your followers will see your posts, and most of them won’t.

But email gives you a direct line to people who have already expressed interest in your business. That means an engaged audience is ready to receive your content and offers.

The Challenges of List Building

The first challenge of growing your email list is getting—or inspiring—people to subscribe.

As a rule, people won’t give you their personal contact details for no reason. You need to offer them something in return. But more on…

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To reach wider audiences, websites must use elements that ordinary users can grasp quickly.

In web design, an HTML accordion provides online visitors with a user-friendly option to navigate layered content. It also provides a streamlined structural design with interactive visual cues so that users can display the content of their choosing.

If you’re new to building an HTML accordion and want to do so with the least amount of hassle and technical complexity, there are many things that you should know—starting with the very basics, like what HTML accordions are and what they’re good for.

What Is an HTML Accordion?

An HTML accordion is a type of website menu with vertically stacked headers. It is an interactive web element that responds to user inputs in the form of clicking, tapping, or using keyboard inputs on its title headers. Once triggered, an individual header will open and close to display or hide the content of its underlying section.

The goals and benefits of using an HTML accordion menu

When deployed appropriately, an HTML accordion is a hallmark of responsive design. It improves the user experience in various ways, especially when users are viewing from smaller screens.

Since the real estate on a web page is visually limited, improperly managed space can lead to unnecessary clutter and a suboptimal user experience. As a result, the aim of a web designer or developer is to utilize the space on a web page effectively and efficiently.

An HTML accordion is designed specifically to achieve this purpose. It provides a minimalist, economical view of long-form content that would never fit or look good on a single page in its entirety. Instead, it gives users control of a more compact element that they can toggle and expand at their convenience.

To…

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When durable data storage devices first came out, they were the game-changer that helped transform the personal computer (PC) into a cornerstone of the information age. The centerpiece of this revolution was the high amount of storage space made available on both solid-state drives (SSD) and hard disk drives (HDD).

However, despite how hard disk drives were once king of the hill, SSDs showed up with newer flash memory technology and required no moving parts. This key difference enabled SSDs to operate faster and more smoothly than their HDD counterparts, which boosted their popularity.

The Difference Between SSD and HDD

SSD is the acronym for solid-state drives and represents a new-generation computer storage device. It is a more recent technology, replacing the erstwhile HDD with its faster, more efficient flash-based memory. Today, SSDs are the most common storage drives found in modern computers and laptops.

Meanwhile, an HDD is a computer data storage device that uses magnetic material and moving mechanical parts to access data. HDDs were the initial technology, making them more commonly found in older personal computers and digital gadgets. While HDDs are still in use, the advent of SSD has diminished their need.

The core difference between SSDs and HDDs lies in how they access data. SSDs rely on a digital memory chip to quickly access data, while HDDs move a read/write head across mechanical spinning platters.

Consequently, SSDs offer improved reliability, performance, and a faster computing experience. Due to their blazing speeds, SSDs are also ideal for storing files and digital media that require them to be accessed quickly and frequently.

In short, SSDs are best suited for storing files that you need to access quickly and often, while HDDs are ideal for storing large personal files, applications, and boot systems that you…

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Typically measuring 16×16 pixels, a favicon is a small icon included on a website to reflect its own unique brand. In the tabs of a web browser, favicons are the small logo-like images located to the left of the webpage name or title.

Favicons are also known as tab icons, shortcut icons, bookmark icons, URL icons, and website icons. All of these names reiterate their function as icons used in browsers, and they represent a vital piece of how online audiences view and perceive your site.

The Importance of Including a Favicon on Your Website

They say first impressions matter and a favicon is usually one of the first things internet surfers/web browsers use to recognize your website.

A favicon is useful because it creates a visual distinction for identifying your brand, which is especially pertinent for internet users who habitually leave many browser tabs open simultaneously. On the flipside, if your website doesn’t have a favicon, browsers like Chrome will fill the void with a generic symbol by default.

Favicons are small, but their importance belies their size. In fact, search engines started using them in the mobile search engine results pages (SERPs) a couple of years ago. Favicons are good at attracting user attention, and they consequently boost brand identity and awareness.

Microsoft developer Bharat Shyam first created the favicon in 1999 with some serendipity while experimenting with Internet Explorer’s “favorites” feature for bookmarking web pages. Shyam combined the words “favorite” and “icon,” thereby christening his new creation that we still use today.

When a site that lacks a…

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Website performance can make or break a business, which is why you need to ensure that all areas of your site are performing as they should—including your images.

And when it comes to those images, the all-important question is, “PNG or JPG?”

At Quick Sprout, we choose the PNG format for most of the images on our website. On some other sites, it makes more sense to use JPG.

The similarities and differences between PNG and JPG make it easy to make the correct decision for your site and your business. There are also pros and cons to each, so there’s a good time when and when not to use them both.

The Difference Between PNG and JPG

PNG is a popular image format that supports high-quality images and those with transparent elements.

PNGs retain the original image data in a process known as lossless compression, which means that the file size is usually larger, and the image quality greater than it would be in JPG format. A company logo is a good example of an image that works well in a PNG format.

Meanwhile, JPG is a popular image format that supports photographs and graphics with complex color gradients.

JPGs lose some of the original image data in a process known as lossy compression. This process makes images smaller so that they’ll load quickly on the web, but it’s worth noting that too much compression will hinder the quality of the image. A photograph is a good example of an image that works well in a JPG format.

Pros of PNG Images

High image quality: PNG images retain their clarity, detail, and color accuracy—even after multiple saves—thanks to the format’s use of lossless compression. This is particularly useful when choosing a format…

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