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Food for Your Brain.
Latest Trends and Best Practices from our Thought Leaders and Industry Experts.

Strange Times at the Hilton Bayfront

It’s the week of Interactive Day San Diego, and last week’s oddities at the conference venue are far from over. Since the original UFO sighting on June 10, we’ve come across all sorts of weird footage – however, none was actually seen firsthand by the Mindgruve team until now. As some of us Mindgruvers were out…

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Hivio: Bringing Buzz Back to Radio

Even with the advent of satellite and services like I Heart Radio and Pandora, radio is still struggling to be the American entertainment staple it once was. In fact, more than half of Americans feel radio brands fail when it comes to pushing fresh, interesting content, while 35% have no opinion whatsoever. So what’s a…

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PRISM: A Closer Look at Tech’s Newest Controversy

Over the past few days, PRISM, a government surveillance program, has become a hot button issue within the tech community. After National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden executed “one of the largest leaks in US political history,” major tech industry players including Facebook, Google, Apple, Yahoo!, and Microsoft were accused of giving the federal government…

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Something? Someone? is Going Crazy for IDSD

With Interactive Day San Diego fast approaching, there’s lots of activity going on around the Hilton Bayfront – some a bit more bizarre than the rest. It seems that the Hilton staff and guests have been seeing signs of an otherworldly creature popping up around the hotel and the Gaslamp area. We’ve included the latest…

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[INFOGRAPHIC] Social CTAs Work

As marketers, we’re all told call-to-actions (CTAs) are a must when grabbing someone’s attention. For example, did you know that including “please retweet” within your tweet significantly drives more retweets than not including it at all? Dan Zarrella from HubSpot presents an infographic (see below) detailing the stats on various common CTAs on Facebook, Twitter, and…

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How to Avoid Getting Hacked

These days, it seems like every major brand is getting hacked by one activist group or another. Recently, satirical news site, The Onion, was hacked by the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA), who took over The Onion’s social media accounts. As The Onion explains in their blog, the compromise was the result of gullible Onion employees…

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Exactly How to NOT Handle a PR Crisis

Almost every brand will deal with some level of adversity during its lifetime, whether it’s an unhappy customer or a bad review that snowballs into a social media call to arms. While no company wants to deal with a crisis, there’s a way to show transparency, maturity, and move on quickly, and there’s a way…

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[INFOGRAPHIC] Edgerank 102

Let’s be real – Facebook Edgerank can be… tricky. That’s why this infographic from PostRocket is so great. It puts the ins and outs of Edgerank in plain English and harnesses the help of the Dark Knight himself – can’t hate on that. Read up and you’ll be an expert faster than you can say,…

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Mindgruve Wins Four Communicator Awards

Mindgruve is the proud winner of four silver Communicator Awards, which honor brands and agencies making innovations in the communications and marketing industry. Securing more than 6,000 entries worldwide, the Communicator Awards is one of the biggest competitions in its field and covers ten categories including Mobile & Apps, Websites, and Integrated Campaigns.

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Updated: [OPINION] Facebook Home Not Home Sweet Home

Update: On May 13, Zach Epstein of BGR was the first to report that the HTC First will be discontinued. Signs pointed to distress several days ago when, after a little over a month on the shelves, AT&T announced that the price of the First would be dropped from $99.99 to 99¢. Although AT&T claimed…

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[INFOGRAPHIC] Long Live the Email

Thinking about ditching your brand’s email marketing strategy? Think again – email isn’t just thriving; it’s on the up-and-up. Open rates are up by 14% and newsletters still prove to be an essential tool for pushing readers toward converting, whether that means making a purchase or setting up a meeting. Check out this infographic from…

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Webinar Recap: Peter Shankman Says “Nice Brands Finish First”

In my experience, sometimes finding a good webinar can be a shot in the dark. They’re either not what they seem, or it’s a struggle to find good bits of info in the midst of thinly-veiled sales pitches. However, I thoroughly enjoyed the recent Vocus webinar, “Nice Brands Finish First,” featuring the always-entertaining Peter Shankman….

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Typeface vs Font: What’s the Difference?

Oftentimes, “Typeface” and “Font” is incorrectly used interchangeably. However, there is a difference, non-designers! I decided to ask Michael Tussey, our talented art director, this simple (or is it?) question, “What is the difference between typeface and font?”

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Mindgruve-Style Custom Forms with formIt

Here at Mindgruve, we do custom everything – and forms are no exception. Many times it can be difficult to choose a JavaScript or jQuery library and just go with it, especially one that will work for any project we take on. We needed something flexible, that we could style with as much CSS as…

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[INFOGRAPHIC] Pinterest Advertising: A How-To Guide

When you think of advertising on social media, Pinterest is probably one of the networks furthest from your mind. However, the reason why – no set advertising platform – is exactly the reason why you should be doing it: It’s easy to use the Pinterest format to create intuitive, attention-grabbing content fans will love. Brush…

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[INFOGRAPHIC] How to Handle a PR Fail

Nestlé, Domino’s, and United Airlines all have one thing in common – they’ve experienced major, attention-grabbing PR blunders. How each brand handled their crises and recovered, on the other hand, is very different. SDL Social Intelligence takes a closer look at what it takes to effectively bounce back from a PR misstep – and what…

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Crisis, Trolls, and Blunders: A Social Media Marketing World Recap

Last week, the Content and Social Media team had the pleasure of going to Social Media Marketing World here in San Diego. Of the many sessions I attended, one of my favorites was “Crisis, Trolls, and Blunders: How to Prepare for the Inevitable,” which was led by the entertaining Douglas Karr of DK New Media….

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SMMW Recap: Discussing Digital Trends with Kyle Lacy

I had the fantastic opportunity to attend Social Media Examiner’s first Social Media Marketing World conference here in San Diego this past week. For the very first conference put on by the blogging giant, SMMW was beyond impressive — not only with the caliber of speakers, but also the networking opportunities available to us. With…

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How Multi-Click Saved Social Media

So many marketers look at social media the same way Americans look at the metric system. We know it exists. Some of us know how to use it. But every time we try to show value behind it, we end up with a bruised ego. The challenge a social media marketer experiences is how to…

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