Weekend reading: The most persuasive words in English

It’s time for another installment of Weekend Reading. There have been a lot of great articles published this week. These few are worth taking the time with your tablet this weekend to read and digest.

1.  Does BuzzFeed Know the Secret? – New York Magazine’s feature story on BuzzFeed and founder Jonah Peretti could be the answer newspapers are looking for to solve their advertising conundrum.

2.  Understanding the Anatomy of Giving – This one is for my nonprofit friends out there. This whitepaper from SEI Private Wealth Management reveals insights into why “ultra-high net worth individuals” give and how much more willing they are to give. Hint, hint: give them a reason to form a partnership based on strategic philanthropy. (h/t David Lawson)

3.  The Most Persuasive Words in English: The Psychology of Language – It actually took me a while to get to this one, but I am glad I did. Buffer co-founder Leo Widrich has put together one of the most fascinating blog posts I have read this year. He makes a compelling case why changing the way we speak and write could make us all more effective at what we do for a living. This one is at the top of the list of the reads this weekend.

Happy reading!

Google’s gonna get you to be a G+ user one way or another

Even as Google shutters popular services like its Reader, it is doing everything in its power to get people and businesses join its Google+ social media platform. The latest ploy from the most used Internet search engine affects nonprofit organizations.

On Tuesday, Google announced it was incorporating nonprofits into its Knowledge Graph. If you don’t know it by name you know it by sight. The Knowledge Graph offers mini biography about your search so you know if what you are searching for is what you really mean to be searching for. You’re most likely to get these advanced results when searching for famous people or famous places.

Weekend reading: Using brain science to improve writing, and the public-speaking introvert

Just like any communications or marketing professional, I read, and read a lot of articles. A lot are just fun reads to take a break from what I’m doing, and others are super informative and make me think about how I can be a better professional. It’s the latter that I’ll be sharing with you.

This week was full of gold as far as the stories go. You must read these. I promise they won’t disappoint.

The Art of Asking For Help During the Job Hunt

Guest blog by Erica Moss

Everyone’s been there: Either you’re new to the job market completely because you were just handed your diploma, you find yourself unexpectedly on the hunt because of a layoff, or maybe you’re just feeling stuck in your current gig and you’re ready for a change of pace.

We all know there are right and wrong ways to approach this process, and I would argue the stakes are a bit higher when you’re in the communications/social/public relations fields because people expect you to be on-point when it comes to written and verbal communication.

Unfortunately, it seems as though some people still haven’t gotten the memo about the importance of being professional, whether you’re asking your college buddy for an introduction to a contact or sending your resume over to an old professor to review. How you present yourself in these seemingly casual encounters can positively — or negatively — influence the level of help you receive from that individual, and ultimately, your ability to land your dream job.

Here are a few easy-to-fix mistakes I’ve seen recently:

5 ways to help your pitch in the new era of the news media

We all know the media has changed significantly in the last five years. Newsrooms are smaller, and journalists are doing more with less and are busier than ever. And that means public relations professionals have to do more in order to grab the attention of journalists to get their stories told.

So when I had the privilege to hear from four local journalists about what it takes to get coverage in the new face of the news media I was ready to take copious notes.

But the thing is, even though everything is different in news, nothing is different. They still have to report the news; and they still have to search for interesting stories all of the time.

3 lessons the NFL could learn about crisis communications

The National Football League has a serious brand problem. The perception of the league has been tarnished by a number of bad moves and it’s getting worse as the days go by.

Since even before the 2012 season began the NFL front office has been making decisions that have been affecting its perception – conflict over benefits for former players, a 132-day lockout of the players, and now locking out the referees.

The latest hit to NFL brand was the final play during Monday Night Football Sept. 24 between the Seattle Seahawks and the Green Bay Packers. A clear interception of a Hail Mary pass should have ended the game in favor of the Packers but replacement referees claim a simultaneous catch and awarded a touchdown to the Seahawks, and the victory.

The reactions were swift and angry from fans, players, and the media.