Let your body do the talking

Have you ever gotten the prickly suspension that someone didn’t care much for you and couldn’t figure out why? It was likely their body speaking to you.

Learning to understand and use body language can help you capture and attain positive attention.

Grasping the impact of even some of the smallest gestures can be the key to understanding a new companion or putting your best foot forward when meeting others.

Here are seven ways your body can speak positively without your mouth saying a word.

1. Like an old companion

Upon meeting someone new the best thing you can do is to remain calm and confident. The best way make your body appear relaxed is to treat your new acquaintance like an old friend. Your body will automatically loosen and soften.

2. Greet THEN smile

Your smile is a powerful force, one that you should be keenly aware of. Instead of meeting new acquaintances with a smile immediately, hold back until you’ve had a moment to look over the person’s face. They’ll believe the grin was meant for them and perceive you in a more positive light.

3. Angle your body

During a greeting, be certain to point your body toward the person completely. This will confirm that they have your undivided attention.

4. Forget the fidgeting

Keep the frequency of squirming and fidgeting to a minimum. For many this is difficult to do while you’re holding a continuous gaze. However, you might considerate counting the amount of times your speaker blinks. It will help you focus on something other than how much you want to wiggle. Plus, in various studies, participates who did this trick were perceived more fondly than their peers. Just remember to focus on what they’re saying too!

5. Perfect posture

Think about keeping your head up, with your chin at a 90-degree angle from your neck. Keep your body erect, as if someone is pulling at your puppet strings!

6. Continuous eye contact

After an initial meeting, a person’s eye contact is imperative. Don’t break eye contact until the person is finished speaking. When you do, do it ever so slowly.

7. Scanning

As mentioned above, continuous eye contact is important, but if there is someone of specific interest within a group, make certain to scan back to that person when there are conversational cues that might provoke a response or reaction. Caution: Be careful to use this one correctly. Otherwise, you might just look like you’re staring. We want to invoke a positive response, not a creepy one!

Use these body language tips the next time you meet someone new and interesting, and they’ll want to know you right away!

#BodyLanguage

Let’s talk about that wearable bandwagon

Wearable technology seems to be the latest buzz, but how many people have actually jumped on the bandwagon? Apple’s recently launched smartwatch was the latest addition to wearable tech gadgets. While it drew significant interest, recent research by GlobalWebIndex suggests that most adults are not partaking in the wearable technology trend.

GlobalWebIndex surveyed 170,000 adults, across 32 markets and only 9 percent report owning a smartwatch and a mere 7 percent own smart wristbands. This is in heavy contrast to the 80 percent of adult who own a smartphone.

While smartphone ownership has reached an all-time high, according to the survey, it has yet to overtake the 91 percent of people who current use PCs to access the Internet. A surprising fact of the research: only 47 percent of those surveyed use a tablet. Personally, I would have though tablet use would be more heavy than this figure.

One particularly interesting point in the GWI survey is in regards to VPNs. Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) are increasing in popularity. The rise of restrictive firewalls in some markets has led to their necessity. VPNs allow you to appear on the Internet as if you were somewhere else than your actual location.

Most users are not searching for apps…

According to GWI, 27 percent of survey takers said they had used a VPN at some point. While using a VPN, the most highly accessed service is Google Play. It seems a bit surprising, perhaps, but most of these users are not searching for apps, but rather audio and video gaming content. A close second to Google Play, is the iTunes store.

Mobile Internet use is also on the rise. GWI states that 75 percent of smartphone users are accessing mobile Internet services on their smartphones with the average amount of time spent browsing coming in around 1.85 hours. This is quite an increase from the 40 minutes spend in 2012. Some markets are seeing PCs being replaced by phones, so it makes sense that their mobile devices are seeing more usage.

So what does this mean for you?

This may change the way you develop your content. Pages that display beautifully on a PC, may not do so on mobile devices. With more and more people using Internet on-the-go, it may change the way content is displayed as well as consumed.

Additionally, while wearable technology may be trendy, it doesn’t seem as though everyone is on board (yet), so it may be prudent for developers to wait a bit before taking the plunge into that particular marketplace.

#wearables