5 Digital Alternatives to Paper Christmas Cards by @LWilson1980 | Dramel Notes

Paperless is here to stay — and for very good reasons, too!

Here, I want to explore five of the best digital alternatives to traditional Christmas greetings cards and show you how paperless can make this festive time of the year even more memorable.

If you are looking for seasonal inspiration for family or for work, check out these digital choices to complement or replace the paper card this Christmas.

1. E-Cards For All Occasions

Probably the biggest direct competitor is the electronic card (or e-card). There are many paid and free e-card services available online, but creating your own from scratch using email clients like Microsoft Outlook and Apple Mail are my preferred choice.

This gives you the chance to get creative and have fun with family, friends or colleagues, and really gives Christmas that personalized touch.

For those of you with family and friends overseas, or for people working away during the festivities, e-cards can also provide an instant means to say something special at the right time.

For business purposes, you can also use affiliate tracking software to make sure your message was received and fuel further conversation.

Here’s an example of e-cards in action. In this case, it was the team at Vertical Leap (my place of work) getting festive and donating to Save the Children Christmas Jumper Day:

2. SMS From Santa

For younger members of the family, what better way to say Merry Christmas than with a call or SMS direct from Santa Claus? Santa can chat directly to your children or even text your phone with a personalized message.

In this example from Personalisedsantaletter.co.uk, text messages will be sent over the festive season, and throughout the week building up to Christmas day.

This can be great for checking children have been good, reinforcing what they are hoping for from Santa, and making Christmas morning extra special for you and your family.

Here’s an example of the type of personalizing that can be achieved to make your children feel truly special this Christmas:

 

3. Video Greetings

Depending on how tech savvy you are, video greetings can be a fantastic way to wish people well over the holiday season.

Basic video greetings can be recorded and send from mobile to mobile, or you may wish to use some of the paid-for retail offerings. Examples of this include MoonPig and VideoGram, although many other alternatives are available (including free options).

Here’s the video explainer from MoonPig:

4. Audio Greetings

Saying (or even singing) your seasonal messages can be fantastic means to share personality this time of the year.

An audio message can be an easier option for the less technical savvy, and can be attached to emails, sent via SMS, or included as part of a digital or traditional card or message.

5. DIY Digital Photo Collages

From static images to photo slideshows and more, collages can be an excellent way to get everyone involved with the festive fun.

They are quick to create, provide lots of follow-up opportunities – including personalized gifts – and enable you to create whatever your imagination can come up with. It is also a great way to humanize your brand.

Almost every mobile phone includes app functionality for creating collages, as do most basic office applications.

Here’s some my work team showing a basic collage for Christmas:

Conclusion

At this time of the year, wishing colleagues, friends, family members and loved ones good will, regardless of the medium, is a great thing to do.

With the growth of digital alternatives to the traditional paper greetings cards, e-cards, audio, and photo collages, give you an immediate method to communicating when it is likely to matter the most. Whatever your medium, make sure your messages are well received this Christmas time.

Merry Christmas to you all and a happy New Year!

 

Image Credits

Feature Image: Stokkete/Shutterstock.com
In-post Photos: Images by Vertical Leap. Used with permission.
All screenshots by Lee Wilson. Taken December 2015.

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Four SEO Strategies Every Digital Marketer Needs to Understand | Dramel Notes

When it comes to SEO, there are several different types and the strategy is a little different for each one. To help clarify the differences, I will break them down and include tips on how to leverage each one as part of a digital marketing strategy.

Four SEO Approaches You Need

Local SEO

A local focused SEO strategy increases the visibility for brick-n-mortar businesses when consumers either in the radius of the business search on a mobile device or when they perform a desktop search for products and services in a particular geographic area.

Local searches will include keywords and phrases that relate to the businesses within their neighborhood, city, community or anything else that relates to a specific location and its surrounding area.

Local SEO strategies go beyond just your website and include things such as:

• Participating in chamber and community events (and sharing about those events on your blog and social media)
• Creating local profiles on Google My Business, Yahoo! Local, and Bing Places for Business
• Registering on top directory sites and submitting to data aggregators

Barnacle SEO

Barnacle SEO works in much the same way as the marine creature, which attaches itself to a much larger solid surface and then feeds on particles that float by in the water. A business with a lower search ranking can attach itself to a much larger site with a much higher search ranking and feed on the search results they are getting. When someone searches for the larger site, the smaller site, which has been connected to it, can now be found within the larger site.

Let me use a Dallas-based plumbing business as an example. We can all agree that Yelp would most likely rank higher in search results than a local plumbing business, so if the business were to focus some of their SEO efforts on increasing their number of positive reviews on Yelp they would be attaching themselves to Yelp, much like a barnacle to a ship. When someone searches for Yelp and plumbers Dallas, the business will be able to “feed” off Yelp consumers in search results. Yelp is just one example. Optimized profiles and business listings are another way of doing this.

Here is where to start:

• Identify sites that offer the most by conducting searches using top keywords, phrases, or categories where the business competes.
• Review the sites and directories that are usually on the top of those search results to help you determine where to focus your efforts.
• When looking for sites to include as part of your barnacle SEO strategy get creative and think outside the box to get the best results.

National SEO

National SEO is the opposite of local SEO and would apply to businesses that are not bound by a physical location, but instead can service anyone in the nation. Amazon is a good example of a business that would have a national SEO strategy instead of local. They do not have a brick-n-mortar location that they are trying to drive traffic to and, instead, they sell products and services that anyone, anywhere can purchase or use.

A national SEO strategy focuses on feeding search engines information so consumers will find the business no matter the location of the person searching.

To do this:

• Remove, or just do not include, any references to a specific location.
• The focus would be “digital marketing services” instead of “digital marketing services Plano”, for example.
• Look at other websites that come up in a national search and study the elements they have on their website.

One thing to consider when not including a local focus in your SEO strategy, unless you can compete with the big brands like Coke and Pepsi, getting your business found with only a national focus can be challenging.

Technical SEO

Every business needs to include technical SEO as a part of their overall SEO strategy. Technical SEO involves the backend of a website, and, if the backend is unfamiliar to you, then this is an area where you want to hire someone to help. Technical SEO is not something you can ignore.

Technical elements:

• Website page load time, page optimization and mobile friendliness
• Optimized page titles and URL, title tags and image titles & descriptions
• Monitor the site for 301, 302 and 404 errors

This is just a short list of the technical components. There are many more.

The most important thing to remember is whatever type of SEO methods being used, they all must support the overall SEO strategy and digital marketing strategy for the business to rank higher in search results than the competition.

As you can see SEO is a lot more than just putting the keywords on a website. What types of SEO strategies have you been using? Let’s discuss them and the results you have been getting.

 

Image Credits

Featured Image: PureSolution/Shutterstock.com
In-post photo: Bloomua/Shutterstock.com

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9 Camera Deals You Can Take Home Right Now | Dramel Notes

Is there a better time to get yourself a new camera than around the holidays? Lots of people end up spending tons of time with their family, which leads to all kinds of memories that are meant to be saved on film (or, well, digital).

Currently, there are all kinds of camera deals available on Amazon, and we’ve spent the time digging through all of them to bring you nine of the best. Whether you’re looking for a camera for yourself or one to get as a gift for a friend or loved one, you’ll adore the awesome deals we have for you below!

Mystery Camera ($699)

This is definitely something different, as you’re getting a camera at a discount without knowing what it is. Amazon offers some hints, such as the fact that it has a 4.8 star rating from users. It’s a lightweight DSLR, coming in at less than a pound. We know it’s a good discount, and we know it’s a good camera! Are you willing to take the plunge?

Nikon D3300 24.2 MP CMOS Digital SLR ($396.95, 39% Off)

If you’re in the market for an SLR camera and you don’t want to break the bank (under $400 is quite affordable as SLRs are concerned), then you should take a look at this Nikon. It comes with a flexible 18-55mm lens, so it will work with all kinds of situations. For 39% off, it’s a heck of a deal and one you should definitely take advantage of if you’ve been on the fence about picking up a DSLR.

Canon EOS Rebel T5 Digital SLR Camera w/ 2 Lenses ($449.00, 40% Off)

Stick with the reasonably-priced DSLR cameras, here we have a Canon T5 with not one but two lenses. It has the standard 18-55mm lenses as well as a telephoto 75-300mm for getting those massive zoom shots. On top of that, the bundle even comes with a bad for carrying everything around.

Canon EOS 70D Video Creator Kit ($1,249.00, 24% Off)

The 70D is one of the most popular DSLR cameras for creating video, and this bundle lets you get started with everything you need in one kit. It comes with the camera body, a Rode VIDEOMIC GO microphone, an 18-135mm lens, and a 32GB SD card. At 24% off, picking this one up is definitely a smart choice!

GoPro HERO+ LCD (Wi-Fi Enabled) ($249.99)

You don’t see GoPros on sale very often, so when you do, you should definitely grab it. This is a $50 discount on the HERO+, which is one of the better models. With winter coming for those of us on the northern hemisphere, skiers and snowboarders are going to want to grab this to catch all their crazy runs and tricks on video!

Nikon Waterproof Digital Camera with Built-In Wi-Fi ($249.00, 29% Off)

Do you worry about taking your camera with you to places where water is around? With this Nikon, you won’t have to! It’s waterproof and super rugged, so you can take it with you anywhere you go! Plus it has Wi-Fi, so you can share your photos quickly and easily.

Samsung 16.2MP Smart WiFi & NFC Digital Camera ($97.99, 25% Off)

If you just need a point and shoot camera on a budget, this 16.2MP Samsung for under $100 is the perfect choice for you! It even has Wi-Fi and NFC for easy photo sharing. It will make the perfect gift for anyone who needs a camera in your life, or a nice device to own for yourself!

Samsung 28 MP Smart Mirrorless Camera with 16-50mm Lens ($497.99, 38% Off)

This camera has a 4.5 star rating on Amazon, with most buyers being incredibly happy with their purchase. On top of taking amazing photos, it also has Internet features, so you can share pictures whenever you have a Wi-Fi connection. It also features an interchangeable lens design, so you can purchase new ones later to suit your ever-changing photography needs.

Sony Mirrorless Camera with 16-50mm Lens ($548.00, 31% Off)

This is the best-selling mirrorless camera on Amazon right now, and with good reason, because it’s a fantastic piece of hardware. It comes with a 16-50mm lens, which offers a good amount of flexibility. With the 31% discount, this is the perfect time to take this camera home for yourself or as a really nice gift.

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How to Quickly Share Your Location Using Messages on Your Apple Watch | Dramel Notes

Trying to describe where you are and how to get you to a friend or family member? You can quickly and easily send your location to someone when viewing a conversation between you and that person in Messages on your Apple Watch.

Send your location through Messages by opening a text message notification you receive on your watch or by pressing the digital crown to access the Home screen and tapping on the “Messages” app icon.

If you opened Messages from the Home screen, tap the conversation for the person to whom you want to send your location.

Access actions to take on the current conversation using force touch on the screen. To use force touch, press and hold your finger on the watch screen…

…until you see a screen with three options. Tap “Send Location”.

A reply from you displays, saying “Locating…” and “Sending…” displays at the top of the screen.

Once the location is sent, you’ll also see it in the conversation.

The recipient will see a message saying that a specific phone number sent them a location and that they can view it on their iPhone.

On the recipient’s iPhone, a small map displays in the conversation.

The recipient can then tap on “Current Location” to open the location in the Apple Maps app and get directions to your location.

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A Guide to Data-Driven Holiday Marketing Strategies [INFOGRAPHIC] by @AkiLiboon | Dramel Notes

The holiday season is upon us!

For digital marketing professionals—whether you’re an SEO, social media marketer, web dev, etc.—this means it’s time to beef up your online marketing strategies. Why? Because according to a study, consumers will spend about $650 billion at both retail and online stores.

How can your business gain a piece of the $650 billion pie? This infographic from Pixel Road Designs (the company of our Chief Social Media Strategist, Brent Csutoras) shows you how to supercharge your marketing and improve your sales this holiday.

Aside from the tips mentioned on the infographic, are there other ways that you can boost your holiday marketing strategies?

 

Image Credits

Featured Image: Iakov Filiminov/Shutterstock.com
Infographic by Pixel Road Designs. Used with permission.

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TopRadio – Online Live Streaming For Radio Lovers | Dramel Notes

The days of battery listeners are long past. In this age of digital, we have more choices than ever without being bound by captive markets. KWRN might once have broadcast only to the residents of Victorville, California. Now everyone can tune in to this station from the internet.

Expats and foreign correspondents, on the other hand, can enjoy a little taste of home by tuning in to radio stations thousands of miles away. Feeling nostalgia not because of the music nor the tune that it is currently playing. News and reports broadcasted regarding a familiar town in a familiar language, one can forget that they are listening to a broadcast from abroad.

 

There’s a whole lot of stations that you can tune in to online and top-radio.org is a good example with over 20,000 stations to choose from. The advantage of digital technology means you can listen wherever and whenever you want. Live broadcast could be tuned in comfortably from your desktop PC, tablet and even from your mobile phone effortlessly.

 

The choices are almost endless with radio stations to cater to every taste. If heavy metal is not your style, do not worry. You are not the only one enjoying some good whiskey and a little jazz. House is more to your liking? Everyone can listen to their heart’s desire.

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How Does Shopping With Bitcoin Work? | Dramel Notes

Love it or hate it, there’s no denying that pretty much everyone you meet is going to have one opinion or another on the topic of Bitcoin. The digital, decentralized, encrypticized currency that only exists on the Internet and bows to no nation, Bitcoin has been predicted to either become the linchpin that completely revolutionizes how the world economy works, or could just lose the Winklevoss Twins a whole lot of their precious Facebook money when it eventually tanks.

No matter what you think about it, these days more retailers, restaurants, and online shopping portals have begun opening their doors to the previously-fringe payment method, but how do these transactions work compared to a regular credit card, and is it just as safe?

Sending/Receiving Bitcoin Online

Without getting too deep into the nitty gritty of how a Bitcoin transaction works (you can read all about that in our guide here), here’s a brief overview of the order of events when two people or retailers pay each other with the currency online:

If Steve sends some bitcoins to Sarah, that transaction will have three pieces of information:

• An input: This is a record of which bitcoin address was used to send the bitcoins to Sarah in the first place (who herself got them from her friend, Tim).
• An amount. This is the amount of bitcoins that Sarah is sending to Steve.
• An output: This is Steve’s bitcoin address.

In normal Bitcoin transactions, the “miners” are responsible for the process of going through and double checking that the receipt is being backed up by a valid “blockchain” (again, our guide is great for getting anyone up to speed on all the need-to-know lingo).

This whole process usually takes about ten minutes back to front, and while this may not matter all that much when shopping on a website for something that will take a week to ship, it’s far too long to be a viable solution for checkout counters mobbed with hundreds of voracious shoppers during the holiday rush. This is where a third-party would need to come in and foot the bill while both sides of the equation settle up the final amounts on the backend in order to reduce the transaction delay from 10 minutes to under 10 seconds.

How It Might Work in Retail Tomorrow

The problem with the whole “decentralized” part of Bitcoin is that you aren’t going to find any of the PayPals or Visas that are willing to step forward and take care of the bill for hundreds of thousands of transactions at once, lest it all suddenly go missing one day. If the attack on Target last year was any indication of the lengths that hackers will go to to get their hands on our bank account information, it’s understandable that the industry is still going to be weary of trying to roll a Bitcoin-based POS out worldwide.

The closest entity Bitcoin has that’s similar today is Coinbase, an online platform and app that lets you buy, sell, or transfer coins all from the comfort of your phone.

Coinbase works slightly different from most Bitcoin buying/selling online wallets in that it actually backs the real funds in your preferred currency immediately, while the bitcoin transaction itself is only registered several days later. They assume the risk of the transaction with the knowledge they gathered from each individual when they signed up, and so far haven’t run into any issues with people attempting to defraud the blockchain or steal the contents of other user’s wallets.

The easiest way to think about it is in the terms of a more popular solution that most of us have probably already used (or seen our friends use) at least once: Venmo.

With Venmo, two users who have added each other through an email address can choose to either send or request money through the app on their smartphone. As long as both users had their bank accounts verified at the time they registered for the service, they’ll be able to “pay” any amount instantly to a friend, family member, roommate, or even their local hairdresser.

If the person who sent the money defaults on the amount due to a lack of funds in their account, Venmo then accepts that debt while letting the payee cash it out to their bank account the next day. If the debt isn’t repayed, the money is written off as a loss. Unfortunately, the only way for a company to make enough money to cover those kinds of losses would be to become the centralized entity that the Bitcoin community is doing everything it can to avoid.

Bitcoin in POS

Last, there’s Bitcoin POS (point-of-sale) systems. Eager to jump on the train while it’s at the ground floor station, dozens of companies have already begun developing their own Bitcoin POS systems that mirror the model of Coinbase. These work off the same concept that credit card vendors have relied on for years: fronting the cost of an item in good faith that you’ll pay back the sum within a reasonable amount of time), and then incurring the temporary debt until the transaction is fully verified 10 minutes to an hour later.

Thanks to options like QR code scanning and mobile NFC secure wallets like what we’ve seen with Apple Pay, it might not be as long as we think before these types of terminals start popping up in stores. They’ll need to feature universal payment options (not just Bitcoin) if they’re going to be accepted as a mainstream product, but as long as the vendors can assure all sides of the purchase (customer and store) that Bitcoin is a viable alternative to the current implementation of credit and debit cards, shopping with the cryptocurrency could be a whole lot easier in just a few short years.

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Bitcoin, like the modern US dollar, is a fiat currency – it only exists as much as we believe it does, and not for a second longer. We can’t eat a digital coin just as much as we can’t light a pile of one dollar bills on fire to drive our car down the road, and because it’s an ethereal, yet widely-agreed upon method of payment between two parties, there’s no reason why a third-party company wouldn’t be able to stand in as a trustworthy signatory in between transactions.

For now, that workaround appears to be in the form of sites like Coinbase, which unfortunately are still nowhere near prepared to take Bitcoin where it needs to go for your local Starbucks to be accepting it at the cashier. Until a more creative solution is agreed upon by the community itself, the challenges of how to reduce the transaction time to the same as what you’d get swiping a debit card will mount as Bitcoin’s userbase continues to grow.

Image Credits: Bitcoin Talk, CoinKite, US Department of the Treasury, Venmo, Coinbase

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Teach Yourself Adobe InDesign for Free | Dramel Notes

Adobe describes InDesign as the “industry-leading page design and layout tool” for both print and digital. Despite its industry leading status, learning how to use InDesign needn’t be as hard as you think.

Adobe InDesign is an industry-level tool for professional graphic designers to create single or multiple page documents. We’re talking brochures, eBooks (including designing book covers), interactive PDFs, magazines (including digital), flyers. It offers similar functions to software such as LucidPress (read our review), though includes many more features.

If you — a newcomer to print design — are wanting to create these documents to a professional level, InDesign is the option you’re looking for. Not Photoshop or Illustrator.

Photoshop’s primary use is to edit raster art. That is, images constructed of pixels (i.e. photos). You can find out how to learn Photoshop here.

Illustrator (teach yourself) edits vector art. That is, images and elements constructed of points, lines, and shapes (i.e. logos). These elements can be scaled without loss of fidelity.

InDesign, on the other hand, is where you bring all of these elements — raster art, vector graphics, typography — together to create a polished document that’s ready for print.

Reasons To Use Adobe InDesign

There are a number of reasons why you’d choose to use InDesign over alternatives, including Photoshop and Illustrator.

• Plenty of fine-tuning options for printing on high-end print and plating systems.
• Insert elements from other programs (i.e. Illustrator) without converting those elements into pixels. In other words, files retain their native format (raster or vector)
• Amazing word-wrap functions
• Designed with multi-page projects specifically in mind
• Easily create elements that exist on all pages (page numbers, headers, etc.)
• Easily export to .EPS
• File sizes are smaller than if a similar design were saved in, for example, Photoshop

7 Free Learning Resources For InDesign

Adobe Tutorials

Adobe’s InDesign CC video tutorials cover all the basics you’ll need to get started. As you progress, these videos will help you get to a pretty advanced level.

Within the Get Started section, you’ll quickly get to know where to find things in InDesign, and what the program can actually do. From there, advance to the Learn Essentials area which delves into each area in more detail.

Once those novice steps are mastered, the Key Techniques and some of the videos in the New Features sections will see you rapidly become an expert.

If you’re using InDesign CS5, Adobe has a separate, free course for that.

InDesign Tips For Starting Out

This detailed article from Lisa Valuyskaya in Smashing Magazine goes through 10 tips she wished she’d known before starting to use the program.

This covers understanding margins and bleeds, image formats, and working with color, among others.

InDesign Training For Beginners

These 13 videos on TrainingTutorials101 are taken from the full, 19-hour-long Lynda course (you have to sign up for a paid, monthly account to access the remaining lessons). The first video, below, shows you what’s in store for you:

Despite this not being a complete set of videos, the content offers a great primer for getting to grips with navigating InDesign. You’ll also learn a host of InDesign “secrets” to help you save time while designing.

Tuts+

The huge selection of in-depth tutorials from Tuts+ makes this one of my favorite places to discover new ways to use InDesign.

Whether you want to create a vintage, clothbound book cover, or create a cool typography poster, these step-by-step tutorials will show you exactly how.

Terry White’s InDesign Course

Although this isn’t a structured course, Terry White’s YouTube videos on InDesign have helped over 100,000 beginners start making the most of InDesign.

The videos are tailored for CS5, CS6 and CC, with the vast majority of lessons being relevant for each version of the software.

Some lessons include How to Get Started With InDesign CC, Publishing from InDesign to iPad, and How To Create a Fixed Layout Ebook, along with around 50 other lessons.

InDesign Secrets

InDesign Secrets is a massively comprehensive online resource for all things InDesign. Once you’ve got the basics nailed, this site should become your new best friend. It’s the guys behind this site that put together the InDesign Training For Beginners Course, mentioned above.

You’ll find thousands of articles, InDesign templates, podcasts, video casts, and an active forum to have your questions answered.

Layers Magazine

This site focuses on all things Adobe. Though new articles are published very sparingly, head over to the InDesign section of Layers, and you’ll find a treasure trove of wisdom. This library of articles covers topics from the very basics, to the very advanced.

Some of their more detailed articles and videos act as independent tutorials to teach you a whole new aspect of the program. For example:

• Constructing Interactive EPUBs in Adobe InDesign
• Using Nested Styles in InDesign
• Creating QR codes in InDesign

A Few More Places To Check Out

Above are the top free courses and resources we’ve found. There are some fantastic paid-for courses, too.

• Udemy: Intro to Adobe InDesign ($100) — 53 lectures over 6 hours covering everything you need to get started.
• Lynda: InDesign Tutorials ($15pm)—by subscribing to Lynda, you’ll have access to over 6,500 InDesign tutorials covering pretty much everything you could imagine.
• DigitalTutors: Designing an Interactive Ebook in InDesign ($29 pcm) — this is becoming an increasingly common use of Indesign, which could serve you well. Sign up for a DigitalTutors account to access this course, and many others.

Get Started With Adobe InDesign

I’m currently in the midst of teaching myself InDesign with no prior experience. These are the free resources, along with scouring Pinterest for InDesign tutorials, that have helped me most, and I hope they can help you, too.

Which other free online resources are you using to teach yourself Adobe InDesign? And are you finding the learning process easy going?

Image Credits:  Office Woman Gets Annoyed by racorn via Shutterstock, Magazine Spread by Alex Von Dorp (Flickr)

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Understanding Time Travel on the Apple Watch | Dramel Notes

Today we want to talk about Time Travel. No, we don’t mean actually going forward and backward temporarily. Rather, we want to talk about Time Travel as it pertains to the Apple Watch, what it is for, and what it does.

If you own an Apple Watch, then you might be wondering what the heck is going on when you spin the digital crown while it is showing a watch face. You’ll notice that the time will shift forward and depending on which watch face you have showing,

Time Travel works in conjunction with each particular watch face’s characteristics as well as any complications that may arise. Complications are simply things that happen during the course of a day, whether it’s sunrise/sunset, weather events, meetings and appointments, or anything else that may occur and display on the watch face. You can even add third-party complications to your Watch so it is has further functionality.

[relate]http://www.howtogeek.com/229577/[/related]

Let’s look at some examples of what different watch faces can display. One of the most comprehensive examples of Time Travel can be found on the Modular watch face.

In the example on the left, we see the current time and date but when we spin the digital crown ahead (or back) a little over 9 hours (you can see how far forward or backward in the upper-right corner), the watch face shows us the time at that point, that we have no more events, and what the temperature is expected to be.

If we go further ahead, the temperature, time, and date will change. If we have any further events, those will appear as well.

Here is an example of the Astronomy watch face. Here we see the current phase of the moon and if we spin the digital crown ahead 23 days, the face shows us there will be a full moon on December 25th.

If we tap on the solar system view, we can view the alignment of the planets on this day, or at some point in the future.

The Solar watch face will display where the sun is in the sky now, and on the right we see where it will be in about seven hours at sunset.

Time Travel doesn’t work with all watch faces including Motion, Timelapse, Photo Album, and X-Large. Moreover, some features will obviously not be available with all Time Travel compatible watch faces. So, it really all depends on which face you want to use and what you want to use it for. You may not need to know what events you have coming up or care what the temperature will be in the next 12 hours.

On the other hand, Time Travel is very useful for anyone with a busy schedule or who simply wants to be in-the-know about upcoming as well as previous complications.

As you can see, Time Travel is a very simple concept to grasp and utilize so if you find yourself wondering what the rest of your day or week holds in store for you, it’s a great of staying abreast of your schedule.

We hope you found this article useful, if you have any questions or comments you would like to add, please contribute your feedback to our discussion forum.

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How to Make Money from Your Smartphone Photography | Dramel Notes

If Instagram was a country, it would have more citizens than the United States.

400 million digital citizens make an awful lot of photographic memories. 40 billion photos and counting actually. How many are you taking? And what are you doing with them?

Maybe, you are stitching them together as memories. Maybe, you are putting them up against the best in photography contests.  Or maybe, you are someone like Mike Gutkin who puts his smartphone and photography skills to good use by making money from them. It’s hard to argue with someone who has 63,000 followers on Instagram!

In a Verizon Wireless story, he has the best advice,

“Dive right in.”

Thanks to the sheer number of apps and stock photography sites, selling your photos for some extra cash has no narrow hoops for us to jump through. The obstacle is the skill level.

Make no mistake – it is hard because it is creative. It is hard because everyone is a smartphone photographer. But as many have already proven, it can be done. Let’s first understand who will buy your photos.

Who Will Buy My Photos?

It is cheaper for brands and companies to buy photographs from community-powered stock photography services than from professionals. Buyers look for photos with creativity and realism, rather than the staged images from traditional agencies.

Stock photography can also get boring after a while, and stop saying those 1000 words you want them too. They may not be localized enough to reflect culture and festivals. They might not be timely enough to capture a breaking news event or even something as mundane as a college football match. Brands today often prefer user-generated images that are taken from everyday life. For example, babies, photos of family holidays, people working in natural settings and so on.

Traditional stock photography outlets are also looking beyond digital SLRs. Your camera doesn’t matter any more — anything with emotion sells.

Fotolia which is a well-known stock photography biggie has got into the game with Fotolia Instant. Shutterstock might have a strict rule for contributions, but it also gives registered users the Shutterstock Contributor app for discovering what customers want and contributing to the pool. A similar offering comes from Dreamstime.

If you don’t want to sell your shots, sites like Photoshare will gladly accept your smartphone snaps for educational use.

Sell Your Creativity with 7 iPhone Photography Apps

There are stock photography websites. And then there are specialized photography apps with a community behind them. These apps are a single window solution to taking a photo, automatically getting it authenticated, and then submitting it for a sale.

Twenty20

A large community of mobile photographers use Twenty20 (earlier known as Instacanvas) to explore photography and earn cash from their own photos. Nearly 300,000 photographers and 46 million photos give brands and digital creators a lot to choose from.

Use the free Twenty20 iPhone app to join as a photographer. Those without an iPhone can use the website as there is no Android app as yet.

Twenty20 has a good explanation of the type of photos that get sold.

How do I sell a photo?

1. Upload your high-resolution photos with detailed descriptions and keywords. This makes them easier to be discovered.
2. Participate in Challenges around specific themes. A new challenge is posted every day.
3. Submit your photos to the Signature Collections. These are photos are nominated by the community with a final selection from the editors.

How much can I earn?

Twenty20 gives out a commission of 80%. A single photo can sell for $20, $40, or $80 depending on the size of the photo purchased. You earn 80% of the sale price on each buy.

There are other price points that depend on the kind of inclusion. There are four ways to make money from your photos on Twenty20.

Download: Twenty20 for iOS (Free)

Snapwire

Snapwire is a connecting platform for more than 200,000 photographers and buyers who are looking for custom photos. Photographers follow Requests and Challenges from brands, creatives and small businesses who need to license authentic custom photos.

Requests are open only to approved photographers of Shooter level or above. Challenges are open to all. Requests pay more than Challenges.

The crowdsourcing site follows a leveling system that rewards photographers based on their performance. It has seven levels: Explorer, Shooter, Advanced, Expert, Elite, Pro, and Master. Each has its own perks.

Follow the How to Succeed tips and tricks for selling your first photo on the platform.

How do I sell a photo?

1. Follow the creative briefs of the challenges and requests. Upload your photos.
2. Buyers nominate the best photos and photographers are awarded points. Photographers are paid for their winning photos.
3. Photos can be liked by both buyers and photographers. Unsold photos can also become a part of Snapwire Marketplace for future purchases.

How much can I earn?

Snapwire pays out 70% of every photo sold on a buyer’s paid Request and 50% when your photos sell in the Marketplace. You retain the copyright to your photo.

Download: Snapwire for iOS (Free) | Android (Free)

Foap

Foap is one of the simplest places to sell your mobile photos. The iPhone and Android photography marketplace is one of the many corners of the web you can turn to for micro-jobs in your free time. Some of the world’s largest brands like MasterCard, Hyatt, Volvo Group, Absolut Vodka can buy your photos.

The payout isn’t terrific ($5 per photo) but the dollars can add up if you are regular contributor. One of the benefits is that you can sell the same photo as many times as you like.

Foap has an excellent community portal. Here’s a brief guide on how to sell well here.

How do I sell a photo?

1. Follow the Foap Missions which use specific topics to encourage contributions.
2. Create a portfolio of your best photos for better exposure to buyers. Tag it well.
3. Rate other photos even as you upload your own. Explore the photos that sell, and the Foap community portal for insider tips.

How much can I earn?

Every photo is priced at $10. Foap pays out $5 each time one of your photos sells. The photographer owns the photos. Missions also offer larger prize purses starting from $100.

Download: Foap for iOS (Free) | Android (Free)

Clashot

Clashot is an online “photo bank” — which is just another way of saying crowdsourced stock photography site. The free mobile apps for iOS and Android help you make, publish and sell photos. After a quick moderation process, the photos are stocked for sale at Depositphotos.

Question 8 in Section 2 of the FAQ should fill you in on Clashot’s requirements for photographs selected for sale.

How do I sell a photo?

1. Upload photos around a particular theme or common subject that is offered on the app.
2. Learn about new offers through regular notifications in the Clashot app and on the website.
3. Photo themes can be customized and offered to users by their geographic region.
4. Photos are open to peer review and comments from other users.
5. Take part in contests on the site.

How much can I earn?

Photographers earn up to 44% of the profits from each sale. Prices on the site start from $5. Do remember that one photo can be sold an unlimited number of times to an unlimited number of people.

Download: Clashot for iOS (Free) | Android (Free)

Moment (Getty Images)

Getty Images is the top stock photography company in the world. Its specialized mobile app for iPhone photos is less known. That’s probably because the app is currently intended for existing Getty Images and iStock contributors. Users without contributor contracts can only view the content submitted by other users.  They cannot submit photos.

The company has however made a commitment that this policy will change, so keep an eye on Moment for your own moment to shine.

How do I sell a photo?

1. Follow new requests for creative and editorial photography in the app.
2. Approved photos are licensed for sale on Getty Images and/or iStock by Getty Images.

How much can I earn?

Royalties will be paid according to any existing Getty contributor agreement. There wasn’t any hard data on actual sale prices.

Download: Moment for iOS (Free)

EyeEM

EyeEM is a creative filter photo app first and a stock photography site second. The EyeEM Marketplace is an offshoot of the community behind the app. You can use the EyeEM camera and its 24 filters to shoot and upload the photos to the Marketplace. You can also just upload any other photo from your camera roll.

EyeEM has an option called Open Edit which helps you learn editing tricks from EyeEm’s top photographers. Notice the Open Edit icon on some photos. You can also reap benefits from EyeEM’s Tutorial Archives.

How do I sell a photo?

1. Follow requests and upload photos.
2. Take part in community photo competitions for prizes and exposure.
3. Participate in these Photo Missions and also Learn & Shoot Missions via the app.

How much can I earn?

Prices start from $20. Revenues are split 50/50 between the photographer and the company. The same photo can be sold to different clients. The non-exclusive rights also allow you to use and sell the photos anywhere else.

Download: EyeEM for iOS (Free) | Android (Free)

Scoopshot

Scoopshot is a Finland-based hiring platform for photographers around the world. News outlets, bloggers, brands and companies as well as individuals crowdsource requests on Scoopshot. Photographers send them specific photos or videos. Scoopshot as the middleman takes care of image rights transfers and monetary transactions.

The site has gathered 1,800 accredited professional photographers in 55 countries so far. Scoopshot is open to both photographers and videographers.

The Scoopshot blog is a good read to understand what sells on the micro-stock photography site. This very early blog post on sweating it out with a smartphone camera is inspiring too.

How do I sell a photo?

1. Sign into the service and set up a portfolio of photos.
2. Participate in tasks announced by companies and buyers. Tasks may be sent by geographic location.
3. Showcase your photography skills in daily contests. Members vote for the best photos. Nine daily contests run every day.
4. With a focus on real photos, Scoopshot does not encourage use of filters to modify an image.

How much can I earn?

On Scoopshot, you can set your own price if the photo has some good news value. Brands set a price around the tasks they announce. This can range from $7 all the way up to $150. Daily Contest photos that get sold receive $5. A photo picked up by an online publisher also receives a percentage of the advertising revenue via Scoopshot’s In-Image Ad Network.

Download: Scoopshot for iOS (Free) | Android (Free)

What About Instagram?

Let’s not forget the smartphone photo community that started it all. Though there is no direct way to make money on Instagram, some time and effort can yield wonderful results. The secret sauce is in “engagement” — more followers on Instagram could open up opportunities, even among the billions of photos on the social network. I will keep it brief, but look at the two platforms below:

Mobile Prints – Use your Instagram photos on MobilePrints.com to make and sell framed prints, canvas prints, greeting cards, and more. Buyers can use the Pixels.com app for iOS and Android to visualize the artworks before purchase.

The Mobile Media Lab – A creative agency that sources photos from influential Instagrammers around the world. It connects brands to the right Instagrammer for specific campaigns.

You would also do well to follow these eight tips from my fellow author Rob Nightingale on how to get noticed on Instagram. Number #3 on the list is the one to remember always: use only your best photos.

Honorable Mentions of Other Crowdsourcing Photography Apps

The business model of the seven stock photo apps is similar. Every photo submission is beaded around assignments, themes, and contests. Here are a few more that deserve attention:

• Stockimo
• Picsastock
• 500px Marketplace
• Fotolia Instant
• Iconzoomer

What Are You Doing with Your Smartphone Photos?

Smartphones can take great pictures, you just have to focus beyond selfies and work on your creative eye. The bad news is that the number of photos uploaded each day outstrips the number of people buying them. The good news is that people are earning a decent amount of money from their smartphone photos instead of letting them become memory bytes for the future.

Pick the right app, or more than one app and try your luck. An app like Foap might be good for a smartphone photography beginner. Snapwire might demand a keener photographic eye. Even if you don’t sell a single photo, rest assured your photography will get better by the day as you combine learning with crowd wisdom.

Have you sold a photo yet? What is the best tip you can offer? Tell us about the photography apps on your iPhone.

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