Writing Prompts

How to Be Productive While Unemployed

It can be difficult to be productive when you’re employed, but it’s even more difficult when you’re unemployed. It’s hard to find the motivation to do anything constructive when you’re out of a job, especially if you’ve been in that situation for a while. But not to worry—it might just be a blessing in disguise. Although you might not be earning a regular paycheck, you do have the time to do many productive things—other than look for a job—that will keep you on track. In fact, you might even gain a new skill as you learn how to be productive while unemployed.

Read these 20 tips for how you can remain productive, learn new things, and check items off your bucket list while unemployed:

Think about what went wrong at your previous job and why. Assess the situation so you can avoid the same thing happening in the future.
Do you have any habits that may have caused you to lose your job or that are preventing you from landing one, especially in your field? If so, take this time to work on fixing them.
Do you have a passion? Pursue it. Read about the skills and requirements needed to do a job in this field, and work toward obtaining them.
Obtain further training.
Read up on world and industry news; be informed about what’s going on and how you (and the industry you want to work in) might be affected by the current global situation.
Make a list and plan goals for each day. Your list and goals need not be extensive, but knowing what you’re going to do on a particular day will help you get it done. Plus, who doesn’t feel good after crossing something off a list?
Update your resume and have it edited and proofread by a professional editing company.
Search for small projects or freelance jobs to get by while you search for something more permanent.
Talk to friends, family, neighbors—anyone you come into contact with who could potentially help you with your job search or connect you to someone who could help.
Pay it forward and do your best to help those around you, even if they’re in the same situation as you are.
Visit a career services or recruitment agency to help you spruce up your resume and get you started on your job search.
Exercise! Make it a point to get out of the house and do something active at least once a day. Whether it’s walking your dog around the neighborhood or going to the gym, make an effort to get some fresh air and move your body. It will help keep stress away as well as break up your day.
On the same note, why not try meditating? Melt stress away and calm your mind through some relaxing meditation.
Stick to a schedule and treat your days as you would regular workdays. This way, it will be much easier to meet your daily and weekly goals.
Get out of your comfort zone and try something different. This can include something you’ve always wanted to do, or something that will make your resume stand out. For example, teach yourself how to code, learn a new language, or start playing an instrument.
Volunteer. This can be something in your desired field of employment or it can be a cause that you’ve always wanted to support. It will feel great to give back to the community, and you’ll be able to meet and interact with a whole new group of people who share your interests.
Join a club or professional organization. Not only will this give you a chance to network and meet people, but it’s always refreshing to get out, learn new things, and indulge your interests.
Create a profile on a career site such as LinkedIn. This is a great way for you to network, get a better understanding of your own skills and experience, and look for jobs in your field.
Read, read, read! Read books and articles about your industry and how to land a job in your field. Read articles about things that productive people do. Read books about how to boost your career. Gather information from credible sources that will help you in your job hunt, and take this opportunity to increase your knowledge (and share it with others).
Finally, spend quality time with family and friends. Relax and spend some time with your loved ones. You might not always have the time to do so, so use it to your advantage. They will appreciate it just as much as you do.

Writing Persuasive Web Copy (No Jedi Mind Tricks Required)

Star Wars. Responsible for inspiring the most popular Halloween costumes, inciting heated debates over who shot first, and turning chubby, lightsaber-wielding kids into overnight YouTube sensations. Among the Ewoks, droids, stormtroopers, and starships, one iconic image sums up the Star Wars empire (pun intended): Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader’s clashing green and red lightsabers, locked in a timeless struggle between good and evil.

Imagine what would have happened, then, if, instead of throwing himself down Cloud City’s air shaft in a final act of defiant heroics, Luke had accepted Vader’s offer to “rule the galaxy as father and son.” For all his mind tricks, persuasive powers, and paternal bullying, our dear asthmatic Sith Lord made a fatal error: he failed to read his audience, and thus didn’t speak to him effectively.

The same goes for writing persuasive web copy. A beautiful website design and a perfect SEO system may bring a Star Destroyer full of consumers to your webpage, but if your writing doesn’t resonate with your audience, it will fail to convert those visitors into leads. In short, you’ll be left hanging—just like Vader, hand outstretched—failing to make the sale. (Maybe he should have rethought that one—offering a hand right after chopping off Luke’s. Bit of a costly oversight there, Anakin.)

From Jedi mind tricks to dark side scare tactics, Star Wars can teach us a lot about writing persuasive web copy. Grab some popcorn and blue milk, tell your friends you’ll have to pick up power converters at Tosche Station another time, and settle in to learn a few things from the denizens of a galaxy far, far away.

Use positive language

“Fear leads to anger; anger leads to hate; hate leads to suffering.”

Like the divide between the light and dark sides of the Force, the message here is about positive over negative language. How did Obi-Wan divert the stormtroopers who were searching for R2-D2 and C-3P0? Some Jedi mind tricks, to be sure, but also positive language. “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for; you can go about your business. Move along.” Negative language has a tendency to be memorable in a bad way; the last thing you want is for your readers to develop a negative association with your content. You want them to feel empowered to tackle whatever problem they came to your website to solve. Another technique is to ask a question early on—a question you know the consumer will answer with a “yes.” Unless your readers are Toydarians, they’ll develop a habit of saying “yes” to other questions or offers you pose.

Use the active voice

“Do, or do not—there is no try.”

Write in the active voice. The active voice is direct, simple, and easy to understand. The passive voice removes the power of action from the subject and can quickly muddy your meaning with convoluted turns of phrase. The active voice is particularly important when writing headlines or titles, meta descriptions, image captions, and calls to action (CTAs). You want clear, effective language to draw users to your landing page and compel them to take the desired action. As much as we love Yoda, you should probably avoid his legendary speech patterns.

Be authentic and believable

Luke: “I can‘t believe it.“ Yoda: “That is why you fail.“

Consider your audience. If your content is not culturally relevant to your target group—or worse yet, not believable—your chances of gathering successful conversions are slim to none. Avoid salesy jargon and claims that sound too good to be true. Don’t hesitate to link to factual supporting evidence, research studies, testimonials, or other verifiable sources to demonstrate your credibility. If your users don’t believe you, they aren’t going to buy.

Choose your titles wisely

“Don’t call me a mindless philosopher, you overweight glob of grease!”

Names are important. Put extra effort into names, titles, and headlines. Imagine if the Death Star had been called the Planet Zapper, or if Obi-Wan Kenobi had described Mos Eisley as a “wretched hive of icky people.” Doesn’t quite have the same zing, does it? Your titles and headlines need to draw users to your page and encourage them to keep reading. For tips and tricks, take a look at this guide for writing headlines more engaging than an Imperial tractor beam.

Tell a story

“I’m not much more than an interpreter, and not very good at telling stories.”

Emotional response can be the deciding factor in changing visitors to conversions. A fantastic way to make a connection with your reader and elicit emotion is through storytelling. While only a small part of the brain is triggered by facts and figures, stories can activate the entire brain, including emotions. This can be a powerful tool for swaying your audience. Need proof? C-3P0 wooed a whole civilization of Ewoks by telling them stories of the Rebel Alliance’s battles with the Galactic Empire, inspiring the Ewoks to fight beside the Rebels against the Imperial troops on Endor.

Get to your landing page

“Stay on target!”

Everything you write needs to maintain focus. Your ultimate goal is to get consumers to your landing page by convincing them that your product will solve their problems. There are many ways of doing this—showing empathy by acknowledging your own experience with their problem, providing testimonials for emotional relatability and positive assurance, or simply describing the benefits your product will bring to the user, as opposed to merely listing its features. Whatever approach you take, make absolutely sure your content relates directly to your audience and points toward a solution. If it doesn’t, cut it out.

Create scarcity

“Control, control, you must learn control!”

Take control of a user’s impulse to click away from an offer by creating the feeling of product scarcity. This is a tried-and-true aspect of writing persuasive web copy: you want your readers to feel as though they’ll miss out if they don’t act on your offer now. Marketing a product as available for a limited time only, or to a limited number of consumers—an ebook available free for just three days, for example, or a special discount for the first 100 buyers—can move someone who might otherwise wander off to “think about it” to jump on the limited opportunity instead.

Target Millennials

“Truly wonderful, the mind of a child is.”

It’s time to acknowledge the new greatest power in the universe. It isn’t the Death Star anymore—it’s Millennials. These tech-savvy, Internet-dominating, information-processing machines are what drive online marketing success. They are your future consumers. So it’s time you learned to speak (and write) their language. Millennials value engaging, relatable content that can be skimmed quickly for key points. Break up your copy with visual aids (bolded headings, photos, embedded videos, graphical content) and divide large sections of text into manageable chunks with concise headings so that readers can find the information they need via a quick scan.

Never stop adapting

“You must unlearn what you have learned.”

Internet technologies change, and they change fast. Effective online marketers extend their brand presence across a variety of web spaces, from product websites to social media networks. Your web copy should reflect the attitudes and behaviors of each platform. A Facebook post that directs users to your landing page, for example, requires language that is considerably more attention-grabbing and concise than the copy for your website’s homepage or a blog post.

To market in each space effectively, it’s important to stay on top of the trends. Relying on your knowledge of past Internet trends or writing styles is a mistake, as these become obsolete faster than the Millennium Falcon can complete the Kessel Run. You’ll also want to keep in mind changing social attitudes and needs when you consider the tone of your writing. In the wise words of Obi-Wan Kenobi, “Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.” The buying cycles that marketers used in the past aren’t effective anymore, especially with Millennials. Writing to satisfy the conventions and buying patterns only of older groups won’t resonate with this now-dominant Internet generation and will result in lost conversions.

So you’ve soaked it all up? Great, kid. Don’t get cocky!

When writing persuasive web copy, it’s important to continuously remind yourself of the personas of your target consumers and their stages in the buyer’s journey. Creating a personalized experience that applies the right emotional triggers will enhance the likelihood of your users’ completing the action you’ve laid out for them. If Luke could feel comfortable flying the Death Star’s exhaust port corridor because it reminded him of shooting womp rats from his T-16 back home, you can certainly give your users the confidence to follow your CTAs by creating a positive, action-oriented, culturally relevant experience.

In the words of Jedi Master Yoda: mind what you have learned, and may the Force be with you.

Five Obstacles Businesspeople Face When Learning English (and Why You Can’t Afford to Let These Obstacles Defeat You)

English is indisputably the language of business around the world. It’s no longer just an asset for businesspeople to become fluent—it’s a necessity.

But behind this trend toward using English in business (regardless of citizenship or native language) are millions of individuals devoting time and patience to becoming fluent and able to compete in such a market.

Yet businesspeople who are learning English face many obstacles. According to a 2013 study by KnowledgeAdvisors about the use of English in business, these obstacles could be thwarting the attempts of many businesspeople to learn the language.

According to the GlobalEnglish white paper in which this study’s results were published, despite the need to be able to interact in English, “companies around the world find themselves ill-prepared. Only 7% of global workers feel their English is good enough to do their jobs, and only 13% of university graduates in emerging countries are hirable in multinational companies due to their poor English skills.”

So what’s holding non–English-speaking businesspeople back from gaining these coveted skills? Certainly, learning a new language is no small task, but the rewards for adapting to the demands of the business world are many. The GlobalEnglish white paper says that “one in four CEOs say they are missing market opportunities because of talent challenges.” If you can expand your skill set to fill this need, your value as an employee is almost certain to increase.

The following are five obstacles businesspeople face when learning English. Don’t allow these obstacles to hold you back.

1. Lack of time

Let’s start with the most obvious hurdle to learning any language: not having enough time. Businesspeople in particular always seem to be on the go, juggling work responsibilities and project ideas, maintaining a healthy lifestyle, caring for families, and keeping up with friendships.

How on earth can anyone find the time to learn a whole new language on top of all that?

The key here is prioritization and consistency. Let’s face it: certain things, such as family, just have to be more important than learning a language.

To overcome this obstacle, you’ll need a combination of willpower and cunning. If you’re serious about learning English, you must commit to practicing the language consistently. Then, even if you can’t spend as much time learning the rules as you’d like, try supplementing this by finding a buddy to practice with during downtime, such as on your lunch break.

This brings us to our next obstacle . . .

2. Isolation

No one—or very few people—can learn in isolation. We need teachers, peers, and learning tools to support us in the learning process. This is particularly true when learning a language; language is all about communication, which requires the involvement of more than one person.

Instead of burying yourself under a pile of dictionaries and language books, try seeking out people to have conversations with in English or courses that offer engaging language training with clearly defined learning outcomes.

The Internet can be a great place to practice interacting in English, and finding coworkers who are also seeking to learn is a great way to supplement this because you can encourage one another throughout the learning process. Whichever route you take, be intentional about finding support and accountability.

3. Simply not enjoying or liking the language

Finding time to learn something you’re interested in is enough of a struggle—this obstacle can become insurmountable when coupled with a genuine abhorrence of the material you’re learning.

Perhaps you don’t enjoy learning any language, or perhaps you just can’t take to the sounds and rules of English in particular. Whatever the case, the key will be using methods of learning that you do enjoy. Try reading online English articles about a topic that does interest you or watching some of your favorite television shows in English or with English subtitles.

Hopefully, these methods will help get you to a place in the learning process where you can begin to enjoy the language itself; if not, at least they get the job done.

4. Fear of losing cultural identity

Despite the pressure to learn English in business, some people are hesitant to get on the bandwagon for fear that it will weaken their own cultural identities.

Because language and culture are so closely related to each other, one can see why such fears are legitimate. The solution to this obstacle is less straightforward than the solutions to previous obstacles. As a native English speaker, I am certainly not in a position to pronounce such fears as unfounded. However, in the interest of helping people overcome obstacles to learning English, I do present the humble suggestion that learning English could actually strengthen cultural identity, allowing people to discuss their own values, backgrounds, and cultures with a greater number of individuals from differing circumstances.

Also, even though practicing a language as much as possible while learning it is beneficial, if the loss of cultural identity is a fear of yours, try to keep your use of the English language specific to your situation. For instance, use English when speaking to international clients and colleagues, and use your native language at home and with friends.

5. Discouragement

Embarrassment and discouragement when learning English are bound to affect the learning process. According to Tsedal Neely in an article in Forbes, “Incredibly competent employees who are experts in their various areas of work . . . say they feel ‘childlike’ when they have to switch to the working language.”

In the professional world, people are judged by the quality of their ideas, and because language is the medium through which these ideas are communicated, not being able to communicate effectively is particularly frustrating.

Overcoming this obstacle must be a joint effort between native (or fluent) English speakers and learners of the language. Those who are already proficient in English should be patient and respectful of English learners, and they should also alter the way they speak by using shorter and more widely known words.

Not only is this a kind thing to do, but it will also allow for more productive communication. To overcome discouragement, English learners need to be patient with themselves and remember that learning a language is a difficult task that takes time—years, even—to accomplish.

It seems trite to say, but remember that no matter your level of proficiency, you are working to accomplish a very difficult task that requires tremendous effort.

Try to avoid becoming too disheartened; if you can persevere, you will eventually get to a place where you’re confident in your English-language ability.

Conclusion

Apparently, the global use of English in business is here to stay, at least for a while. Although this means that businesspeople who do not speak English must now learn the language, the stability of English in the business world also means that those who expend the time and effort in learning the language—be it through practice with peers, an online training course, or a combination of both—will surely reap the rewards.

If businesspeople who are learning English can overcome the obstacles to the learning process, they can be the ones to fill the talent gap that is affecting so many companies.

Don’t give up!