The Best of Pepper Blog 2013
Before we wrap up the year, we’d like to show you the highlights of Pepper’s blog this 2013. We have covered some of the latest business stories, unlocked the secrets of leading brands, and provided a comprehensive inside look at the outsourcing industry. We hope you...
Why You Need to be on Google+
Many users still think that Google+ does not have a place in the social media world. It seems to be sending off a serious image that makes users perceive it as uncool. Some are wondering who exactly are on Google+. Whether it's the netizens' generalized opinion or...
Facebook Tweaks News Feed Prioritizing High Quality Content
Facebook recently announced in its blog that it has made some changes in its News Feed algorithm. The News Feed is basically where you see all the updates from your friends and family. Facebook Engineering Manager Varun Kacholia said that the goal of the News Feed is...
Men are from LinkedIn, Women are from Pinterest: How Gender Influences Social Media Usage
Social media has changed the way we communicate and interact with each other. In 140 characters or less, you can either inspire people or cause online outrage. The photo you shared can become viral in minutes. In one quick search, you can reconnect with your former...
5 Ways QR Codes Can Boost Your Marketing Campaign
QR codes or quick response codes are making marketing efforts more multidimensional than ever before. It is capable of uniting your marketing campaign in one quick scan. It gets even better because this unique two-dimensional matrix can contain any information you...
Locked In: How to Keep Your Data Secure When Working with Virtual Assistants
Data security is one of the primary concerns of business owners who are considering outsourcing their business processes. A study done by Ponemon Institute reports that 65% of companies that have outsourced to a third party have experienced data breach on its consumer...
Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) leaves catastrophic damage in the Philippines
Super typhoon Yolanda, known internationally as Haiyan, is estimated to have killed 10,000 people in one province alone. There are 4.5 million Filipinos affected in the Eastern Visayas region, leaving thousands of families homeless. Yolanda wreaked havoc on November...
Halloween Fun Facts
Are you all set for your Halloween party? You may not know this but Halloween is the second highest grossing holiday in the world next to Christmas! For kids, it means candies and post-Halloween toothache. For adults, it means spooky parties and over-the-top grotesque...
The Bold and the Brilliant: How Facebook Created a Global Social Network
A brand’s impact on its consumers can easily be determined by their loyalty and frequency of usage. Over the past weeks, we’ve been looking at brands that have achieved these and more. In our previous blogs, we’ve explored the principles that characterize Apple and...
The Bold and the Brilliant: How Google Became More than a Brand
Brands can make or break a culture. The strongest brands we’ve known have created a new norm not only in their industry but also in society in general. Last week, we kicked off our three-part blog series on The Bold and the Brilliant: Brands that Made a Difference by...
We’re Not Internet Marketing Experts, and That’s a Good Thing!
“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.” ― Socrates When I first joined Pepper a few years back, the firm’s focus was, as our About Us page states, “to provide you with an exemplary assistant who not only shines in performing simple tasks, but is also...
The Bold and the Brilliant: Brands that Made a Difference by Being Different
Every person is brand conscious to a certain extent. From the basic things we use to our niche preferences, we all have reliable brands that we always return to even if we’ve tried their promising competitors. Some brands are so good that they develop a deep sense of...
Strategic Outsourcing: 5 Aspects of Business You Should Never Outsource
Outsourcing has revolutionized business processes in many ways. From manufacturing to information technology, customer service, writing, administration, and even health care, outsourcing has removed the boundaries of traditional office space to make way for a more...
Picture Perfect: A Blogger’s Guide to Copyrighted Images Part 2
Images give life and character to any blog. A boring text-laden page becomes interesting when striking images are strategically placed along the way. We have previously tackled how to choose quality images for your blog. Today we’re concluding our two-part series on...
The Role of Social Media in Moving Filipinos to Action
Over the past couple of months, social media has become more than just a “personal” platform to thousands of Filipinos. It became a powerful instrument for Filipino netizens as they leveraged the reach of social media to gather resources, unite different people...
Picture Perfect: A Blogger’s Guide to Choosing Quality Images Part 1
Creating a blog involves multiple elements. Aside from your core content, you need images to support it. Pictures add variety and interest to an otherwise text-heavy page. As a blogger, you need to be discerning on what image you will use on your site. You can’t...
The Art of Building Your Blog Reputation: Encourage Reader Engagement
Businesses have been recognizing the increasing importance of blogs over the past years. In the 2012 study done by the Center for Marketing Research at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, it showed that 171 (34%) of the Fortune 500 companies have corporate...
The Art of Building Your Blog Reputation: Create Quality Content
Building your blog reputation is no easy task but that is not to say that it can’t be done. It takes specialization, content building, and reader engagement to back it up. In our previous post, we looked at how you can establish your expertise. Reputation is all about...
The Art of Building Your Blog Reputation: Establish Your Expertise
The blogosphere is practically a world without limits. Despite the more than 133 million blogs indexed by blog search engine Technorati since 2002, more are still being created every day. The demand for blogs has been huge as well with 77% of internet users reading...
Navigate Through Your Brain with Mindmapping
In a previous post on Beating Writer’s Block, we briefly mentioned mindmapping as a way to get ideas out from our heads and onto paper. Today, we’ll revisit that topic and delve a bit deeper into mindmapping. Many of us take notes in a linear fashion. Lists and...
A Virtual Assistant In My Hand: Apps That Help Me Stay Productive
I've often joked that my brain is stored on my phone. Compared to the amazing virtual assistants I work with everyday, I'm a veritable mess. Fortunately for me, my gadgets (and the apps I install on them) help me stay productive, and in a way, serve as my own virtual...
Be our Valentine: Get 27% off VA Services and a Full Custom SEO Gift
We're always looking for ways to spice up your life, and for the entire month of February, we've got two hot new ways to do so. Hot New Plans First up is a pair of hot new packages designed to give you more time with your loved ones. After all, you want to spend...
2013 List of Official Philippine Holidays
The Pepper bunch are a hardworking crew, and that's a good thing. On the other hand, some of us run the risk of pushing ourselves too hard, and that's not quite so good. Fortunately, every so often, the powers-that-be require us to take some time off to relax,...
Making the Most of Our VA Services, Part 2: Communicate!
Welcome to the second part of our primer on virtual assistants. Since you're here, it's a safe bet that you, like many people, you don't quite know what to expect from a virtual assistant, or VA for short, and aren't quite sure how to work with her. The simple fact is...