General

Is Tweeting the New Research Paper?

March 11, 2012 by Basil Puglisi 9 Comments

Over the years, writing has changed immensely. Not only in words, but in structure as well. When I was in school, regular 4-6 page essays and stories were common. Go back a few hundred years and plays were more in style (ex: Shakespeare). Quite a few more centuries and you see epic (read: really long) poems (ex: Odyssey). The fact is that types of writing can also go in and out of style just as clogs do.
With the emerging world of social media, a new form of writing is beginning to rise. Rather than essays, English teachers are beginning to change their chosen method of writing. Teenagers are becoming so adept at turning long stories into short stories because of character limits that writing long essays is a mystery. In order to keep students interested and the classes modern, teachers are choosing to teach with social media.
While some litterateurs will forever scoff at these changes, there are also ways in which it makes a lot more sense than traditional rules and essays. One professor points out that when students are required to meet a certain page or word length, they resort to plagiarism, text that is too large, unnecessary spaces, long, drawn-out sentences, and repetition. The result is that the students are not necessarily better writers, but they can indeed write long papers, whether most of it is empty words or not.
An assignment that does not have a set length or has a short minimum requirement helps the student to write concisely and more creatively. And the best part? Students are doing homework every day without even realizing it, when posting new information on their chosen social media platform.
I’ve read stories of classrooms using social media to answer questions instead of raising hands. Students tweet their answer. Other classes give writing assignments with a word limit of 140; abbreviations are allowed, punctuation is optional. While some of it can go a little far, set limits are looking to be a great tool in producing great writers.
One interesting plan that I have seen is for the students to choose a short status update, tweet, or ad from the paper, usually one that is 10 words or less. Then have a discussion about what they mean, maybe imagine the story behind it. In turn, their assignment is to take a popular story like Cinderella or Harry Potter and make it into a 6-10 word story:
Unappreciated, abused stepdaughter, maid finds glass slipper with Prince.

In today’s world of limited patience and fast-paced workers, no one wants to sit down and read a long paper, essay, press release, or article anymore. As these factors change, it only makes sense that writing styles change, too. While I am all for a good long book, I like articles to be short and concise. If the students of today are leaning these new styles of writing, it seems that they may be more successful in a world of 140-character limits.
Author:

Megan Campbell has a degree from Clemson University in Graphic Communications, and is currently living in Germany during a Gap Year abroad, working as an au pair and freelance writer. Her degree set her up for a great interest and knowledge of social media. You can find her on her blog, balancewithadashofcrazy, or contact her via email at meganecamp at gmail dot com.
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Venture Pitch 2012 [Event]

March 8, 2012 by Basil Puglisi Leave a Comment

Thursday, March 15th 2012
Leonard’s of Great Neck
555 Northern Boulevard
10:00AM – 3:00PM

Business owners should enjoy Venture Pitch, produced by Expos Your Business in partnership with Advantage Payroll Services and based on a concept by Ana Carill-Grumberg, Internet filmmaker to Deepak Chopra, Global. It will feature a well-known panelist from the big hit ABC television series Shark Tank, Daymond John. Joining Daymond will be Rob Basso, President of Advantage Payroll Services.

The panelist include Bruce Zutler of the Inventors Association of Manhattan as well as Luis Cuneo from IBM Global Diversity Business Leadership. Venture Pitch, produced by Expos Your Business in partnership with Advantage Payroll Services and based on a concept by Ana Carill-Grumberg, Internet filmmaker to Deepak Chopra, Global, will be a part of EXPOS Your Business and NY Multicultural Business Expo that will be taking place at Leonard’s of Great Neck.

Why Attend?

Shaping up to be a very exciting morning, Venture Pitch, produced by Expos Your Business in partnership with Advantage Payroll Services and based on a concept by Ana Carill-Grumberg, Internet filmmaker to Deepak Chopra, Global, will be filled with new ideas and businesses who are focused and competing to take their own operations to new levels. All competitors will be charged with convincing the panel of judges that their idea should win the top prize. Produced by Expos Your Business, Venture Pitch will be an enjoyable breakfast with some top-notch business marketer entertainment.

Business owners who are looking for new ways to market their products or services will be able to take part in this unique business expo that is focused on helping to stimulate local economies while still promoting appreciation and awareness of cultural diversities. The NY Multicultural Business Expo will be supply a rare opportunity for many individuals or businesses to network in one of the fastest growing elements of our business population, the multicultural market.

There will be sponsors and vendors from many nationalities that will be representing companies that are working to build their own customer bases to help increase their own personal circles of influence. Mark Neuwirt, President of Expos Your Business and organizer of the event, shares that even though the event is not a massive one noted on a national scale, it is the first for the Long Island and NYC area and it has already elicited a high volume of response.

Who Will be Attending?

Reps from the LIDC, Empire State Development, National Grid, the US SBA, and the NYS Governor’s Office on Asian Affairs will be participating. Expos Your Business is partnering with Nassau County to extend outreach to those businesses that are minority owned by supplying them with relevant information as well as helpful panels and seminars on multicultural marketing, public speaking, minority business development, funding, social media, securing government contracts, and more.

Many local, regional, and national media venues have and continue to actively promote the EYB to their English speaking and ethnic communities. Entertainment will include a brief musical performance by the Asian-American Cultural Circle of Unity. There will be food tasting throughout the day supplied by local restaurants beginning around 1pm. Neuwirt offers the reasons behind the EYB.

“Globalism has come to Long Island and beyond its borders and we embrace it wholeheartedly.”

Tickets to the event are $60 and attendance is free with preregistration. VenturePitch 2012 is taking place at Leonard’s of Great Neck in New York, kicking off the NY Multicultural Expo. For submission details or more information, please visit tinyurl.com/VP2012 or call 516-931-0540.

Author:

@BasilPuglisi is the Executive Director and Publisher for Digital Brand Marketing Education (dbmei.com). Basil C. Puglisi is also the President of Puglisi Consulting Group, Inc. A Digital Brand Marketing Consultancy that manages professional and personal branding for Fortune 500 CEOs, Hedge Fund Managers and Small Business Owners.

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A New Kraze has Arrived. Meet LifeKraze.

March 4, 2012 by Basil Puglisi 7 Comments

When Facebook and Twitter were first launched, it’s safe to say that a collective thought went through everyone’s mind: “Why didn’t I think of that?” As LifeKraze enters the realm of social media, I believe that question will be whispered once again by a majority of the population.
If you haven’t heard of LifeKraze yet, you will soon. The beta version was launched to the public in March 2011 and has since built a strong group of followers. Their current team consists of 10 employees and is based in Chattanooga, TN, surrounded by mountains and rivers, making it a perfect “active” base.
What is LifeKraze?
It begins with one simple question, “What have you done?”
I spoke with the co-founder and CTO of LifeKraze, Michael Brooks, Jr., in order to step into the mindset of LifeKraze: “If Facebook is what you are, Twitter is what you say, then LifeKraze is what you do.”
The idea is that people need motivation in order to lead an active and healthy lifestyle. “Our entire idea was based around encouraging others, because with a little motivation, and people cheering you on, you can achieve anything,” comments Brooks.
LifeKraze helps to create this motivation through a social media platform. It is a community of people that all have similar goals, whether it is losing 10 pounds or writing a chapter in that book you’ve always wanted to write, the goal of the community is also the slogan of LifeKraze, “Live like it counts”.
Not only does the community help to inspire you by giving words of encouragement and helping to hold you accountable for your goals, there are also reward points involved, which you can redeem for products. You receive 200 points daily, to be spread around to other people. For example, maybe someone posted that they helped a child in math today. If you like that action, you can reward them with some of those 200 points. In return, when you post an action that is admired by other users, they can reward you with points. Points can then be redeemed for various products from partners of LifeKraze, which so far include big names such as Reebok and PowerAde Zero.

Besides points, though, it really is the care and comments from other users that I believe is the gem of LifeKraze. The community really supports each other through comments. They really seem to care about each other. It’s what you need to keep yourself on track of your goals.
Where did the idea come from?
“Things really started to come together for us after we had our initial idea, but what drove us to really push to make this a business was providing a platform to encourage and motivate others to achieve their goals,” says Brooks. “We always had coaches and teammates to push us through our lives (through Sports) and when we graduated, we lost that.”
That is the power of LifeKraze. I asked Michael Brooks, Jr. about the response they’ve received from users since launching almost 2 years ago. One word he used to describe them was “unbelievable”. After reading them, I’d also add inspiring. One user signed up months ago and could barely make it around her neighborhood without being exhausted. She just ran her entire first half marathon. People have posted of losing 30-50 pounds since joining LifeKraze and using the platform to stay motivated. “People post about getting engaged, cleaning out their garages, and acing exams. The accomplishments are spread out from health, to fitness, to positive actions,” says Brooks.
In a world where healthy and active lifestyles are on the forefront of minds with shows like The Biggest Loser, a wide variety of health magazines, and an increasingly large amount of diet books on the shelves, LifeKraze seems to fill a gap. While we have all of the information and applications to be active, the motivational, community aspect was missing. Until LifeKraze.
“We care about what people are doing, and we want to provide a community and a platform that is always there for you, and we are always in season, encouraging and motivating you to do your best,” finishes Brooks.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypYm2HCj58E&feature=player_embedded]
Author:
Megan Campbell has a degree from Clemson University in Graphic Communications, and is currently living in Germany during a Gap Year abroad, working as an au pair and freelance writer. Her degree set her up for a great interest and knowledge of social media. You can find her on her blog, balancewithadashofcrazy, or contact her via email at meganecamp at gmail dot com.
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Optimizing Your Landing Page for Better Conversions

March 2, 2012 by Basil Puglisi 6 Comments

Your Landing page is the heart of your site. Irrespective of whether you have a product or a service to sell, landing pages can provide a subsequent boost to the conversion rate. Optimizing them is not hard if you know when and where to tweak the various elements. However, the hardest part is to find the elements that require some tweaks. This brings us to the fact that there is no rule sculpted over the stones which provides guidance towards the perfect optimization of landing pages.
Some ideas can optimize your landing page for better performance. They are:
Loading speed:
A landing page that loads faster has better conversion rate when put into comparison with a page that loads slower. Therefore you very first aim should be to increase the loading speed of your landing page. Factors that can be an obstacle to increase the loading speed are:
1. Images: Too many images over your landing page can be responsible for slow loading. Though images are eye capturers and are very much essential, it is necessary that you limit their usage. Cut down on any images that is irrelevant to the content. As far as possible try to eliminate the images of huge sizes as these consume more loading time. A single image at any specific fold of the page is the best practice.
2. Videos: Videos are widely used to replace written content. However, you should be aware of the fact that videos can never replace written content. Some people have completely stripped their landing page of written content and have replaced them by a long sales video. Users those who have a high internet speed connection will be sated whereas the users with slow internet speed will have no other option but to leave the page.
A smart marketer will tell you to balance your page in terms of written content and videos. A video clip should be used only when you are unable to explain a certain idea in written content. For example, let us say you are promoting your dancing lessons. The landing page can be a mix of written content which will be used to promote your product and the videos can be used to show clips of some complex dancing steps which might be impossible to put into written words.
Note: In many cases the loading speed of your page is attributed to your hosting company. Webhostingpad and register.com are some of the hosting companies that provide excellent hosting with fast loading speed.
Length of the page
What should be the length of the page? Should I provide the readers with just the basic information or detailed information about the product? These two questions spring simultaneously while designing a landing page. Again, there is no rule stating the length and the amount of the information that has to be provided as the answer to the above two questions depends upon the answer of the following question, how much information do your customers require to trust your product?
The amount of information provided should be enough for your customers to trust your product. The content in question can be of just a short paragraph or can be a never ending landing page. However, your copywriter should be talented enough to create a stunning copy so that your reader is adhered to the page until they make a purchase. Moreover, a balance between video and content will make your landing page look great.
Tone of the copy
Personalization is the magic word when it comes to marketing. The sad part is the overuse of the magic word. Imagine yourself to be looking out for a product and you suddenly arrive at a landing page where it is full of colloquial language sprinkled with emoticons. Would you like to risk your $40 in purchasing the product though the price seems to be reasonable? Hardly any of us will make a purchase from such a place.
When marketers mean personalization, they are telling you to write a copy that can be taken as personal without losing the soul of business. An image of yours is critical when it comes to personalization. The next part is to write a copy which appears to be a personalized one while still holding the nature of business. Once you get a good copywriter this shouldn’t be much of a concern to you.
Experiment
In some cases changing just a sentence can affect the conversion rate. Therefore, consistent experiment with your landing page is necessary. Split experiment can provide better results when using trial and error methods.
These few tips will, though trivial, when applied can affect the conversion rate in huge numbers.
Author:
Richie Richardson is a prolific writer on Internet Marketing and Social Media. He also writes for webhostingpad discount codes and register.com discount codes. You can make use of the deals provided by webhostingpad and register.com for your hosting needs.
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Basil C. Puglisi talks about getting Social with Social Media.mov

March 2, 2012 by Basil Puglisi Leave a Comment

Social Networking is not new, Social Media Networking is just a digital extension of an age old practice. It’s important to take the time and develop IRL (In Real Life) strategies that support digital practices and tools.
[vodpod id=Groupvideo.11044167&w=450&h=325&fv=%26rel%3D0%26border%3D0%26]

1st collector for Basil C. Puglisi talks about getting Social wit…
Follow my videos on vodpod

Monitoring Your Social Reputation with Kred

March 1, 2012 by Basil Puglisi Leave a Comment

Social influence is gaining notice as more advertisers, marketers, consumers, and affiliates use it as a method of gauging the knowledge, credibility, and reliability of prospective new clients or business contacts. There are other systems of influence measurement, such TwentyFeet, Klout, and Peer Index. Between them all there is a whopping level of social influence analysis to be found. So which should you be using? From someone who has experimented and experienced a little of what each has to offer, I’d have to say, use each of them for the best option they offer for social influence measurement.

[slideshare id=9465635&doc=kredslidedeckv15-110928212859-phpapp02]

What Does Kred Offer?

Kred offers many of the same options as the others. A collaborative algorithm will allow you to enter your social network accounts to gather an overall score listing the highlights of your personal topics, and circles of influence. However, Kred does offer a few things that the others do not, or lack a particular focus on.

Analytics

Kred seems to have an analytics platform that is a bit more detailed than the others. Using a system known as PeopleBrowser, Kred has based their analytics system around the notion that they believe social analytics can depict accurately, how human behavior and influence can provide data to help businesses increase productivity, community, and growth.

Community

An important element to any brand is the ability to find the right community that cares about your services or product offerings. When you include the chance to pinpoint top influencers in your industry or topics, a brand marketer’s job gets a lot easier.

Transparency

Kred is unusually upfront about how scores are handed down, down to every mention, retweet, follow, like, and so on.

See what Scott Milener of PeopleBrowser has to say about their platform.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKTEXlGuxgM]

Influencer Reality

True influencer reality is not going to come from Lady Gaga, or a Kardashian. Although any company would be delighted to have one of those famous influencers tweet or share their brand, the true consumer is unlikely to run out and purchase relentlessly just because Gaga or Kim said they should. However, the true consumers, those that may buy your product or services, and then relate their wonderful experience with you to all of their friends, is the epitome of influencer reality. Klout and Kred both seem to have a good realization of what it means to base an algorithm and platform on the real consumers companies are clamoring for attention from.

Kred vs Klout – Fun Fact

If you think that the competition between Kred and Klout when it comes to providing the best tool for social influence, it may also be important to note that these two companies also share the same city and office space, not just the same views on social influence. However, as much as each company seeks to shed light on the same platform of social influence, they also appear to have different viewpoints on the true sources of online influence.

If you want to learn more about the basics of Kred, check out this helpful PDF.

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Did you try? A Look at the data from #SMWsmac [InfoGraphic]

February 29, 2012 by Basil Puglisi 15 Comments

What can you do in 16 days? Try!

With just under a month before Social Media Week 2012, it came to our attention that NYC did not have a daylong event that was tailored to teach the small business owners and professionals how Social Media is and can be used. On Feb 1st, 2012 dbmei authors decided to launch Social Media Action Camp! The event which a few days later became an official part of Social Media Week was set for Feb 16th 2012 at the Roger Smith Hotel in NYC.

Data provided by Synthesio , and a few other sources .

The event tag #smwsmac generated over 1,000 tweets! Which represents about 5% of the social media activity in New York City. The Social Influencers reached over 116,000 followers and generated tweets in 15 countries globally!

In addition to the info from Synthesio, we also know that:

102 people attended throughout the day
128 viewers at one time on LiveStream
976 views on the Live Stream Channel
1484 tweets to date #smwsmac
71 check-ins on foursquare to the Roger Smith Hotel

The Official Social Media Week event page hosted on SocialMediaWeek.org generated 177 Facebook “Likes”, 250 “shares” on LinkedIn and 834 tweets that did not feature #smwsmac as a tag. Making the event the most socially shared event for ALL Social Media Week 2012 globally!

The Social@Olgivy Movers & Shakers platform supported by Kred featured organizer @BasilPuglisi as the top influencer for Feb 16th and both @BasilPuglisi and @dbmei as the top 5 influencers for the following day Feb 17th 2012.

The event was a mix of speakers featuring some of the digital names like Google, Klout, Synthesio, StumbleUpon, EmpireAvenue & Constant Contact. The event featured digital media professionals like David Meerman Scott, Amy Vernon, Mardy Sitzer, and Lujure’s Nathan Latka. Lisa A Burns, representing Corning Inc., spoke about the wonder of how a Fortune 500 Company used YouTube to capture more than 17 million views. Then the dbmei authors Bill Corbett Jr., Jeff Ogden, Craig Yaris and Basil C. Puglisi contributed their take on using social media to generate action!

The real success resulted from the response that the attendees reported. The mix of content and style presented, generated useful information in many areas with actionable advice and solutions.

“The diverse group of presenters offered extremely valuable best practices and actionable advice. It was also nice attending a social media event that didn’t cater to newbie’s or skeptics” said David Gise

The event exemplified the point that “you don’t know till you try”, and while we have a long list of things we can do to make the next event even better, it’s an important point for dbmei as well as the individuals involved to say not only did we try, but we succeeded. If you take nothing else away from the article, we hope that when a opportunity presents itself, you be so bold as to try and make it happen.

Social Media Week Made Manhattan Move for #SMWsmac

February 29, 2012 by Basil Puglisi 2 Comments

An attendee at our event submitted a wonderful poem about his experience at the Social Media Week Social Media Action Camp event. #SMWsmac

Social Media Week Made Manhattan Move

By Serge Zenin

Social Media Week made Manhattan move;
Networking and negotiating, we never grew numb;
Give out a business card and go with the groove;
I’ll friend you on Facebook, wherever you’re from;

Developers need diagrams drawn by art directors;
Bloggers benefit as they beckon a bigger crowd;
Consultants collaborate with crafty data collectors;
Programmers pick projects that make guru’s proud;

Puglisi Consulting prudently puts people together;
Implementing inactive ideas with inherent passion;
If a logo looks cold let’s lightly add a little leather;
If a fangate’s too flashy let’s frame it with fashion;

Social Media Week electrified the wire that conducts;
It’s about providing solutions, not selling products!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXfJQLVPsXA&feature=youtu.be]

Serge Zenin is the founder and director of BD at Media Contours, an NYC based PR and marketing company. When he’s not working, Serge enjoys writing poetry about relationships, love, modern phenomenon, and various other topics. If you would like Serge to poetically capture the essence of your business or your event, please contact sergezeninpoetry@gmail.com with your request.

Is Social Media the Cure for Writer’s Block?

February 27, 2012 by Basil Puglisi 2 Comments

The growing world of social media means that everyone is now a writer. There are status updates on Facebook that could rival a short story, and the creativity required in order to twist that status update into 140 characters on Twitter can rival that of a poet, indeed inventing a new phrase, “twaiku”. These new ways of communicating have not only made everyone a writer, but they’ve opened up new doors of inspiration for working writers.
As a freelance writer, I spend a lot of time writing for various websites and blogs. There are times when the subject is dealt to me, but most of the time it is my job to think of a new and original idea. Aside from my freelance writing, I also write two blogs. And as any writer knows, it takes a lot of creativity, imagination, and determination to spend your days constantly writing about fresh, original subjects.
In Steps Social Media…
Just like so many other procrastinators, Facebook, Twitter, or some other form of social media often distracts me while I am trying to do my work (writing). Rather than hindering me, though, the updates and information I read on social media often inspires ideas for later.
Facebook as a Resource
One of my jobs as a freelance writer is to complete articles on various subjects. These subjects are usually out of my general-knowledge-range and require some research to complete. In some of these instances, I’ve begun using Facebook as a source. I recently was called upon to write an article on Global Warming, including facts. One of my Facebook friends is constantly posting news articles and videos dealing with global warming, so I utilized these posts to my advantage when writing the article.
Facebook, Twitter, and StumbleUpon as Inspiration
Writing for your own blog can be very rewarding, but it can also be stressful if you want the blog to be successful. A successful blog is one that is always fresh and has something different than other blogs. They require a lot of work and new ideas for posts daily. I keep a list of ideas that I’ve come up with, but when I get stuck, I regularly flip through Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, or any other social media site to get some sort of inspiration. I recently wrote about an article that a friend posted on Facebook, was inspired by a photo from StumbleUpon, and am continuously adding ideas to my lists from information I see through social media.
While the Internet evolves, it’s important for an internet-focused writer to evolve, too. Finding new areas of inspiration and information is one of the most helpful and rewarding ways that a writer can become and stay successful. Luckily, with the way that social media is constantly moving, there are no shortages of subjects.
Author:
Megan Campbell has a degree from Clemson University in Graphic Communications, and is currently living in Germany during a Gap Year abroad, working as an au pair and freelance writer. Her degree set her up for a great interest and knowledge of social media. You can find her on her blog, balancewithadashofcrazy, or contact her via email at meganecamp at gmail dot com.
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New Facebook Ads Platform Goes Live on February 29th

February 26, 2012 by Basil Puglisi Leave a Comment

Image representing Facebook as depicted in Cru... — Image via CrunchBase

Facebook plans to release a new ad platform on February 29th that may profoundly change the way business is done on this social media network. Peter Corbett of iStrategyLabs, a social media marketing firm, recently said the following,

“The company expects the new ads to perform 40 to 8o percent better than its previous product”

That is a serious and significant increase in ad performance. Peter also posted a helpful PDF and Slideshow that seem to have come from Facebook that introduces the new ad platform.

Facebook Premium Ads Overview

[scribd id=82289675 key=key-1labfziiyerffsz1rkus mode=slideshow]

Facebook Premium Ad Guide

[scribd id=82289681 key=key-ml1e2c124st5qe456l0 mode=list]

Expected to be released at the fMC Marketing Conference, both documents reveal that Facebook’s plans to provide advertisers the opportunity to take any type of content and turn it into an ad. The new system will replace many of the classic premium options as well.

Premium Events
Premium Likes
Premium Polls
Video Comments

However, Marketplace Ads and Premium Ads will still be available.

The new Premium Ad platform will make content that is posted viewable to your Fan pages fans and subscribers, as well as adding the ability to target any Facebook user, even non-fans.

The slide above shows us that Facebook is directly sharing with advertisers that they can expect at least a 40% increase in user engagement, while gaining 80% in branding, with 16% in fan rate increase from the soon-to-be released Premium Ad platform.

Ways to Use the New Ads

Advertisers will be able to do a few more vital tweaks on the new ad platform.

Event Advertisement – Advertisers will now be able to create hype around their upcoming business events.
Update Engagement – Any update will be capable of conversion to an ad. Questions, polls, and other media updates can be very engaging ways to improve your ad campaign.
YouTube Love – Video ads can have very positive results. Send extra traffic to videos by building a comment base.
90 Characters – Only the first 90 characters of the new ads will be visible to browsers. You will need to optimize on those as much as possible. Find a skilled copywriter if you are not sure how to do this.
Strategic Updates – Fashioning a fan page that helps to encourage followers to leave positive reviews on your products or services will enable advertisers to use those updates as ads. This provides a level of social proof in advertising.

It definitely looks like Facebook ads are going to undergo some improvements. DBMEi will stay current on the successes or failures that advertisers will experience once the new ads go live.

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