Pro

Introducing Send Tracker: Track who’s engaging with your SlideShare content

by Ross Mayfield on February 12, 2013

Ever wonder when you send someone content if, and how, they actually engaged with it? With SlideShare’s new Send Tracker, a new content analytics tool for SlideShare Pro, you can now send content to a potential customer, see when they opened it, how they engaged with it and gain better insights on which parts resonated most.

Send Tracker allows you to send new or existing content from your SlideShare account to a prospect via email. Real-time alerts let you know when the recipient has opened and clicked your email, while analytics enable you to track how they engage with that content.

This means sales and marketing professionals, trainers and consultants can now proactively manage content based on real-time data. For example, salespeople can focus their attention on the prospects most engaged with their content, at the right time. No more guess work. Less time wasted on blind emails and content that doesn’t resonate with the intended audience.

With Send Tracker you can now:

Understand how people engage with your content – including how much time they spend reviewing the presentation and on each slide
Gain meaningful insights on how your content is resonating or not with your audience
Compare engagement across your content library

Send Tracker is the latest addition to SlideShare Pro, a premium suite of Content Marketing tools that give you access to analytics, sales lead capture and more. We want you to be one of the first SlideShare members to test out this new feature, so we’re giving you immediate access to Send Tracker for free.

Here’s some press coverage of the Send Tracker launch

“LinkedIn’s SlideShare updating marketers with data from content shared via email” – ZDNet

“SlideShare is also at the center of the public company’s strategy to become a hub for professional content.” – Jennifer Van Grove, CNET

“The San Francisco-based company is one of the Web’s most well-established presentation-hosting service, letting companies and individuals create presentations and embed them anywhere on the Web.” – Paul Sawers, TheNextWeb

“The detailed analytics data is intended to help presentation owners in their jobs.” – Juan Perez, IDG ComputerWorld

“This demonstrates the changing face of the Web and gives social media the features marketers find invaluable in search engine marketing.” – Laurie Sullivan, MediaPost

Smile! Add your videos to SlideShare

by Kit Seeborg on December 12, 2011

One of the most popular features here on SlideShare is the use of video presentations. With a PRO account, you can upload a video without embedding it into a slidedeck. Unlike YouTube videos, Pro videos are ad-free and provide viewer statistics. And just like with slidedecks, you can embed your video on websites and blogs.

Check out this video from small business consultant, Shahar Boyayan. Her company, BuzzBooster Marketing, uses video to deliver a tutorials and to report live from industry events…

How to use Google Plus for business, BuzzBooster TV #39

You can do it!
If you can upload a slidedeck, you can upload a video. Here’s how:

Log in to your SlideShare account
Click on the orange UPLOAD button at the top of the page
Click on the blue UPLOAD+ button
Select a video file and start uploading!

Add tags and a description just like with your slidedeck presentations. You can make the video private if you’d like, and assign a password to control who can view it.

Upload videos of your own presentations
Conference and event planners are more likely to ask you to speak if they have a sample video to preview. The video can be professionally produced, or can be recorded with a Flip cam or other video camera. Take a look at this keynote presentation video that Sean McPheat recently uploaded.

Sean McPheat Keynotes at the ISMM

Keep all of your presentations in one place
Video is becoming an increasingly important element in speakers’ portfolios. It’s also a great way to share a recording of your presentation without relying on the event’s organizers to record it. Although there are other video platforms available, SlideShare keeps all of your presentation materials together – videos, slideshows, slidecasts, and documents. Take a look at how Amazon Web Services has all of its content in one place. You keep your slidedecks on SlideShare, why not add videos? Remember, you can:

Upload a variety of formats
Embed your videos on other websites and blogs
Keep your videos private and share only with specific people
Play ad-free videos
Capture leads right from your videos

Here are some ideas from the SlideShare community to get you inspired…

A short video interview: Liz Ngonzi’s Cornell eClips Interview
A tutorial: How to shoot a web video using a flip camera
Tell the story of how your product is used: Using video at Pymble Ladies College
Provide deeper understanding of your product or service: The Value of Data Visualization

Go ahead and experiment
You probably have a video that you can upload and experiment with. If you aren’t ready to show the world, add a password. It won’t take long to find more reasons to have your videos on SlideShare. We always like to hear your ideas, so please leave a comment below.

New ways to share private presentations

by Kit Seeborg on October 19, 2011

You know that SlideShare is a great way to share presentations publicly. But did you know that SlideShare Pro gives you the ability to share presentations and documents privately? You can share private presentations with a sales prospect, a group of collaborators, with your students in a class, or with people at your company. We have been hard at work on private sharing enhancements. From each of your ‘My Uploads >Edit Presentation Detail’ pages, you’ll notice we have added several features to provide you with more flexibility for private sharing:

A private presentation can now be assigned a password.
The password can be set to expire in a specific number of days and hours.
A private presentation can be scheduled to go public at a specific time and date.

Password protect a private presentation
With a SlideShare Pro account, you have always been able to share a presentation privately by generating a secret URL. We have recently added the ability to password protect a private presentation, ensuring the maximum amount of access control. This is valuable when you’re sending the link to someone, and are not sure who they might share it with. By adding a password, even if the URL is distributed in a way you didn’t intend, the password will keep unauthorized viewers from gaining access.

Does your company have an internal review process when creating presentations? By password-protecting your draft presentation, you can be sure that it doesn’t get published before the review and approval process is complete. And don’t overlook your intranet. If you want to share a presentation within your company intranet, just keep it private on SlideShare, and turn on the option for embedding elsewhere.

Set an expiration time for the password
We’ve automated the password expiration process. You can now set in advance the number of days and hours that the password remains active. Setting the password expiration time allows you to automate how long the presentation is available for viewing.
This added control is particularly valuable when presenting to remote audiences, and in situations where you need to manage the the length of time that someone has access to a presentation.

Schedule a time for your private presentation to go public
You can also now schedule a specific time for a private presentation to be made public. This is a useful feature when you are giving a preview of your presentation to a select group of people, and intend for the presentation to be made available to the public at a future time.
For example, event organizers who want to maintain the exclusivity of their live event are now able to request that presenters keep their slideshows private until after the presentation or event. Or, when your company is launching a new product or service, give a private preview to your executive team or the press. Then schedule the presentation to be made public when your launch is announced.

Here’s a recap of these new private-sharing features. Now you can:

Assign a password to your private presentation.
Set the password to expire in a specific number of days and hours.
Schedule a private presentation to change to public at a specific time and date.

Would you like to be able to share presentations privately? You can sign up for SlideShare Pro anytime.
We’re gathering user stories of how these privacy features are used and would love to hear your experiences. What other types of private sharing features would you like to see? Please tell us below.

Welcoming all non-profits to SlideShare Pro

by rashmi on August 10, 2011

SlideShare has been a hub for nonprofits from the beginning. Some non-profits use it for fundraising, some for creating awareness, some for reaching constituents. They use SlideShare on their own, or in conjunction with their Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, and LinkedIn profiles.

When we launched SlideShare Pro last year, nonprofits all over the world asked us about nonprofit pricing. Today, we are pleased to announce a new Pro Annual Plan for Nonprofits, which offers a 50% discount off the regular price for the annual plan. When you go to the Pro plans page, click on “Nonprofit pricing” below the pricing table to get the discount. You will be asked to upload a document showing that you are registered non-profit in your country.

Benefits of going Pro

Each level of Pro account offers your organization access to analytics, private presentation sharing, premium Zipcast meetings, an ad-free channel, and more. We rolled out the new annual pricing last week, and several nonprofits have already signed up, including international organizations like The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and Oxfam, to more local organizations like Mercy Home in Chicago, to Alliance for Community Trees in Washington DC. To see more Non-Profits who have gone Pro on SlideShare, go here.

We at SlideShare believe that non-profit organizations have an important role in making the world a better place. Beth Kanter, author of How Non-profits Can Use Social Media, says this about SlideShare Pro:

“Slideshare Pro is a must-have tool for nonprofits that need to build networks and movements by showcasing their thought leadership and content on specific topics or issue areas. Slideshare has been critical to my own success as a trainer, blogger, and capacity builder in the nonprofit sector and is well worth the upgrade.”

Details of the discount

Regular price for Silver Pro is $228 per year. After 50% discount, it is only $114 per year.
Regular price for Gold Pro is $588 per year. After 50% discount, it is only $294 per year.
Regular price for Silver Pro is $2988 per year. After 50% discount, it is only $1494 per year.

What are you waiting for? Come join the growing community of nonprofits on SlideShare Pro.

SlideShare Pro now gives you extra features on Linkedin

by amit on November 29, 2010

We have good news for SlideShare Pro users. If you use Linkedin (who doesn’t?), then we just rolled out a couple of features that will give you some extra edge. SlideShare Pro users now have

- a complete dashboard in their Pro analytics section for their Linkedin content that shows the number of uploads, views, favorites, comments etc they are receiving on Linkedin

- a special customizable and interactive widget called “Portfolio Widget” for displaying their portfolios on their LinkedIn public profile.

Check out the slide deck for details.

Extra Features for SlideShare Pro users on Linkedin

View more presentations from SlideShare Help.

So here’s what you need to do

- if you are already a SlideShare Pro member, make sure you are using the SlideShare Linkedin app and this is linked to your SlideShare account. This will give you access to your Linkedin data in your SlideShare Pro dashboard.

- if you are not using SlideShare on Linkedin, we suggest you do that now by adding the app. Link your Linkedin app to your SlideShare account (look for the tab that says “Link your Linkedin profile to SlideShare”). And sign up for SlideShare Pro from within the Linkedin app.

- alternately upgrade to SlideShare Pro directly and make sure your Linkedin app is linked to SlideShare. This will give you the Pro features for Linkedin.

Let us know your feedback for this new launch.

Interview: Daniel Klaus of Fujitsu Technology Solutions

by Kit Seeborg on September 30, 2010

We are always learning from our customers. In this, the third interview in our ongoing series, we talked with Daniel Klaus of Fujitsu Technology Solutions. Daniel was kind enough to share his experiences and suggestions for other SlideShare Pro customers.

How long have you been using SlideShare?
We started using Slideshare in October 2008, initially under the brand Fujitsu Siemens Computers. In 2009 we opened our new channel for Fujitsu Technology Solutions.

Fujitsu Technology Solutions is a global brand with a vast array of products and services. How does SlideShare Pro help you reach your global audience?
With its 40 million visitors per month – among them a majority of business decision makers – I think SlideShare is a useful social media channel to support business decisions, as it provides case studies, presentations and white papers, which can be easily forwarded and shared among the various social networks.

How are you using SlideShare Pro to support your marketing campaigns?
Currently our channel is branded with our LIFEBOOK visual to support our LIFEBOOK campaign. As for the business purchasing process, we think that social media has an impact on all stages of the sales funnel: Many business decision makers are going straight to Slideshare to look for relevant information that may help them solve their business problems, especially during the “consideration & preference”-phase. That’s why we uploaded case studies (e.g. about the “almost paperless cockpit” at Lufthansa ) or white papers about our touch technologies in our TabletPCs to support our customers best.

Which reports in your SlideShare Pro dashboard do you find most useful?
One of my favorite reports shows the statistics for each presentation. So I can easily see which kind of document – be it a white paper, a presentation or a case study – is of most interest for which country and for which topic. Another great report is the “tweets mentioning” of our slideshows. This shows us how often someone talks about our slides on twitter – and who.

What have been the most important benefits of going pro with SlideShare?
One of the most important benefits, besides the dashboard, was certainly the option of rebranding our channel with current campaign visuals. We also benefit from the possibility of organizing our content according to our main topics e.g. GreenIT, LIFEBOOK, case studies and others.

Are there any features you’d like to see added to SlideShare Pro?
As described above, I am a huge fan of the analytic service. What could be additionally helpful for our authors is to see which single slide of their presentation is the most popular. An indicator for that could be the average time a user spends with a certain slide set, which slide makes a user drop off and which slide a user maybe watches more than once. So you easily can find out about “hot” and “cold” spots within presentations and edit the presentation accordingly to keep the audience engaged.

What suggestions do you have for other enterprise users of SlideShare Pro?
I would like to encourage them to experiment with Sideshare Pro by integrating it into their campaigns, embed presentations into their blog posts to make them more appealing or provide event presentations to non-attendees online. Track each activity and see what works best for your target groups!

JESS3 Uses SlideShare Pro as Platform for Clients

by Kit Seeborg on August 17, 2010

This week we talked with Jesse Thomas, founder of JESS3, about how JESS3 uses SlideShare Pro…

Who is Jess3? Is it a person or a company?
JESS3 is a creative interactive agency that specializes in product design, branding, social media and data visualization. Based in Washington, DC JESS3 has studio spaces in New York City, France, the UK, Argentina and other creative hubs all over the world.

How long has JESS3 been on SlideShare? How do you use it?
JESS3 has been using SlideShare since April 2007, initially under my personal account. But my history with SlideShare goes back even further: One of my most popular presentations of all time is The 25 Basic Styles of Blogging… And When to Use Each One which I designed along with strategist Rohit Bhargava when we both worked at Ogilvy PR together (uploaded 4 years ago, it has received over 120,000 views).

How does your use of SlideShare differentiate your firm from other agencies?
We’ve been experimenting with the customization and advertising options since they were available. We also take a lot of our internal ideas and move quickly to turn them into decks, without a planned use other than to test and refine ideas.

One such example is my “rant” about the shortcomings of geosocial; this has since turned into a mini-movement, supported by various employees at top platforms (e.g., Facebook, Gowalla and Foursquare) and featured this week on Mashable in an “op-ed” of sorts I wrote titled Why Location-Based Social Media Needs to Get “Passive” Aggressive. If it wasn’t for SlideShare, we wouldn’t have had such a low barrier to entry for testing ideas, crowd-sourced additional thinking and sharing it in a concise, snackable, updatable and visually engaging way.

Lastly, we take full advantage of uploading a new version without losing views, Likes or embeds. We view content as living and breathing, so that SlideShare allows us to do this means a lot.

You have a very interesting banner on your channel page. Tell us about it…
Yes, we certainly do (“JESS3 LOVES SLIDESHARE”). We wanted to get SlideShare’s attention and tell them how much we loved their service, so why not dedicate our banner to doing so? It also has given us the opportunity to double-down on this platform with our clients, putting our money (and our banner) where our mouth is.

Why did you decide to join SlideShare Pro? What are your favorite features in Pro?
We wanted to customize our page in the way that we have for platforms like Twitter, while also removing the ads and taking advantage of the “featured content” opportunities.

The social web is all about personalization and, when done right as is the case with SlideShare, the impact can be even more powerful than creating your own site.

We notice you brought two of your clients (Eloqua and Zogby) onto Slideshare. What do they value most about the service?
For a B2B client like Eloqua who has an amazing trove of data, resources and insights it was a no-brainer. We are also confident that their target audience — marketing professionals and C-level decision makers — are either on SlideShare with their own accounts and / or speak in the “PowerPoint” dialect pioneered by business schools near and far.

As for Zogby, their brand has been rapidly growing in the market research industry, so having a content distribution “hub” like SlideShare that will allow them to share the reports and infographics we will be working with them on makes a lot of sense. Like Eloqua, Zogby (and, frankly, any company) speaks to decision makers who are used to receiving information in digestible, visually-impactful formats.

How are you approaching the design of their channels?
With both clients, we have been asked to use our illustration skills. This is super exciting for us, as we believe the social web facilitates the most human interactions the digital age has known. What better way to herald this than to have a team of illustrators create these pages through sketches and by hand? Also, it is a great contrast to have illustrations along side more corporate, clean content.

Additionally, we have a number of Fortune 500 brands interested in creating channels. Where we are in those conversations is first identifying that there will be a consistent supply of good content and a purpose for being on SlideShare (e.g., marketing within the community, as well as leveraging the content offsite). From there, the fun begins: customizing the channel and mapping out the SlideShare “editorial calendar” just like you would a YouTube channel, really.

To learn more about JESS3, visit their SlideShare Channel http://www.slideshare.net/jess3.