Imagine dedicating your entire childhood to one dream, only to watch it crumble just as you’re about to achieve it. That’s exactly what happened to me when my lifelong goal of becoming a professional soccer player fell apart at 19. What felt like a devastating life crisis turned out to be the push I needed toward a career as an entrepreneur.

I was born in Miami, but when my family moved to Hyderabad, India when I was 5, it introduced me to a completely new world. School was never really my thing; soccer was my true calling. At 14, my passion caught the attention of India’s national team manager, and I got a chance to train with one of the top German teams. It was a huge opportunity, but the reality of adapting to a new culture at such a young age was overwhelming.

My soccer journey continued at Ellesmere College in the U.K., where I played for the varsity team. But despite all the hard work, a professional contract eluded me. The alternate path took me to play soccer at Monroe College in the U.S. Though we won the NJCAA Division I national championship, I often found myself on the sidelines, realizing that I wasn’t good enough to go pro. It was a devastating blow.

The day I accepted that my dream of becoming a professional soccer player wouldn’t come true is seared into my memory. It felt like my world was falling apart. Everything I worked for was gone. I felt directionless and unmotivated. I had hit rock bottom. But then I found a new path at Babson College, where I continued to play NCAA Division III soccer and where I joined eTower, an entrepreneurial living community that reignited my passion for building and creating ventures. It not only gave me a renewed sense of purpose but also helped me overcome that feeling of not being good enough.

Surrounded by people who were just as driven as I was, I launched Kickstart Sports, a consulting business helping athletes in India find opportunities in Europe and the United States. The pandemic cut that venture short, but it opened up new opportunities. In 2020, I worked at Compstak, a real estate data company, took on a role at a real estate hedge fund in China, and ran a VR/AR sneaker startup. All of these experiences eventually led me to create DesignAI, a company that leverages technology to redesign how cities are built.

My entrepreneurial journey has been far from straightforward, filled with failures and successes, heartbreaking frustrations and rewarding celebrations. Along the way, I persevered and pivoted. Here are three key lessons that have shaped my journey and how you can apply them to yours, even in the face of feeling like you’re not good enough.

Related: How to Get Comfortable Being Uncomfortable, No Matter Your Age — Lessons for Entrepreneurs

1. Rebuild confidence and find a new purpose

When my soccer career ended, it felt like I’d lost a big part of myself. I had to rebuild my confidence from scratch. This wasn’t about finding just another job; it was about rediscovering who I was outside of soccer. I threw myself into new activities — rugby, student organizations, networking with people from different backgrounds. This exploration was crucial in helping me find a new sense of purpose, which eventually led me to entrepreneurship.

My advice: Actively seek out new experiences, even when it’s uncomfortable. You’ll discover what truly excites you, what motivates you and what you excel at.

2. Build and leverage a strong support system

During this tough transition, I learned just how important a solid support system is. I reached out to mentors, leaned on friends who understood my struggles and even found therapy incredibly helpful. This network became my lifeline, offering emotional support and practical advice. One thing I did that worked really well was sending monthly updates to my mentors and key connections. It kept me accountable and made sure I stayed on their radar for opportunities.

My advice: Build a support system with people who can challenge you, support you and help you see things from different angles. And, most importantly, keep those relationships alive, because they will continue to provide the support and feedback you need to push through adversity.

Related: I Couldn’t Sleep. I Obsessed Over My Failures. Then I Found the Weirdest Cure — Flyfishing?

3. Embrace failure as a stepping stone

The failure of my soccer dream was a harsh wake-up call, but it taught me resilience. I had to face the reality that life doesn’t always go as planned, and that’s okay. I started seeing failure as a learning opportunity, a chance to grow and pivot. Books like The Psychology of Money and The Hard Thing About Hard Things helped reinforce this mindset. I learned to reflect on my setbacks, extract the lessons and use them to guide my next steps.

My advice: Don’t fear failure. It’s a vital part of the entrepreneurial process, and it’s what helps you refine your approach and keep moving forward. Every failure or setback is an opportunity to improve — with your venture or your career.

When my soccer dream was dashed and I realized I wasn’t good enough to succeed down that path, I learned that resilience, a solid support system and embracing your failures are critical skills, especially for entrepreneurs. Challenges will come and the path will be messy. But if you surround yourself with the right people and refuse to back down, you can carve out your own version of success.

Did you know that the lighting in your company and home office can affect your productivity as well as your mental health? It’s probably not surprising then that the typically harsh overhead lighting doesn’t do you any favors.

If you want to create a more productive or upbeat work vibe, whether you’re in the office or working from home, this sleek corner floor lamp can help. It arrives with more than 16 million lighting colors, multicolor lighting effects, and a handy remote control for only $59.97 (reg. $149). This offer is only valid until the end of the day.

The easiest upgrade for your office

This floor lamp fits comfortably in the corner of your company office space, living room, and home office, taking up little floor space thanks to its minimalist design. It also arrives in a sleek black metal construction that blends in with the rest of your office or home decor, while its weighted rubber bottom provides a buffer between your floor.

Since it comes with more than 16 million colors to choose from and 300+ multicolor effects, what color will you select for your workday?

It utilizes soft-whtie integrated LEDs for more ambient lighting, but you can choose blue if you’re dealing with numerous administrative tasks and need complete focus. If you’re a solopreneur trying to develop a new business strategy, select yellow to get your creative juices flowing. When you’re ready to change the vibe, the included remote control lets you conveniently shuffle between all options to find the proper lighting for your workday needs.

Improve your daily productivity with a quick change in your lights.

Add this minimalist corner floor lamp with 16+ million light colors to your office for just $59.97. You have until the end of today, September 29 at 11:59 PM Pacific, to scoop up this deal.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

Some older audiences may hesitate to recognize the utility of marketing using newer platforms. While other sites like Facebook have been around longer and have proven their ability to reach widespread audiences, TikTok may seem, at first glance, like it’s only used for dancing or cat videos. While there certainly are many instances of that type of content, these apps also present an opportunity for real estate entrepreneurs to showcase their listings and properties.

TikTok and other apps like Instagram offer an opportunity for your business to build a brand identity. Building a brand is important for potential renters to trust the quality of your listings based on interactions with other pieces of content you’ve delivered — bonus points if your posts follow existing trends or get a chuckle from your audience.

Also, comment sections offer people an opportunity to share their experience with your business or communicate directly with you or your property managers. Real estate can be a business that is heavily dependent on reviews and the experience of previous renters or buyers within the neighborhood or complex. Comments can offer a route of easy communication between past, current and future tenants with both you and other renters or buyers.

Related: How to Integrate TikTok Into Your Video Marketing Strategy

TikTok strategies

TikTok, an app that started its exponential rise during the pandemic, is known for its dominant place in Gen Z humor, its proliferation of the renegade dance number and micro-trends that can last anywhere from hours to weeks to years.

However, TikTok can also give increased visibility to your real estate business. TikTok is used predominantly by younger audiences, with 68.8% of users falling below the age of 34 according to Statista. If you are a landlord who is looking for new tenants to rent your properties, TikTok real estate content can be an invaluable tool to gain more eyes on your units since this age group is more likely to rent than any other age demographic.

Don’t fret about your properties reaching beyond your target audience — TikTok uses location services to show users videos that are popular in their area. By this token, renters in your area who have viewed or interacted with other relevant real estate content are more likely to see your post than users who are not in your area or who are not interested in renting a property.

Be sure that your videos are short (less than 10 minutes) and showcase the best parts of your property. Does your unit boast stunning views or a short commute to popular shops and restaurants? Tell viewers any aspects that would be a positive to the audience you want to attract. TikTok marketing will be most viewable to Gen Z and millennial renters, so location and amenities like pools and gyms may be things to highlight in your post.

Related: How Brands Are Capitalizing TikTok to Win New Audiences

Trends

Engagement on TikTok is a great way to get on the For You Page (FYP), the scrollable “home page” where users can see posts from a range of creators, not just those they follow already. The FYP is where much of your new interest will come from.

Users’ FYPs push trending audio, users and posts that have active likes, comments or shares. One way to get users to interact with your post is to follow popular sounds or jokes that are big at the time.

Hashtags can also help users find your business. Caption your videos with relevant hashtags that include your location and property type. For example, if you specialize in Tampa apartments, hashtag your video with “#TampaApartments” and “#TampaRealEstate.” If your apartment is in a particular part of town, be sure to include the neighborhood either in a hashtag or simply by mentioning it in your caption.

Ideas for TikTok content

While this information is helpful, without prior knowledge of TikTok trends, it may be hard to adhere to trending content.

Trends are not the only way to garner interest in your property. Whether you’re looking for renters or buyers, simply showcasing your property with walkthrough videos or a series of photos can be enough for people to see themselves in your unit. What makes your property stand out? What would a potential renter/buyer want to see from their new home? Ask yourself these questions when figuring out what parts of your property to show online.

A video walkthrough showcasing amenities and attractive aspects of your property paired with a quality voiceover can be a great way to get new eyes on your listings. TikTok also offers you the option to upload a carousel of photos if you’re not ready to experiment with videos yet.

Related: Want to Blow Up on TikTok? Follow These 12 Rules for Business Success.

Social media is not confined to TikTok — experiment with Instagram or Facebook as well if you’re looking for new ways to market your listings. Instagram real estate marketing, especially, can offer a fantastic outlet.

TikTok for real estate is unique because of its relative ease in “going viral” compared to other platforms. Other popular social media apps, like Instagram, make it difficult for users who do not already follow you to see your posts. TikTok’s FYP feature makes it much easier for potential renters in your area to see your listings without already following you, making your reach much larger.

Play around with your TikTok account and remember that fun, lighthearted videos with trending, upbeat audio will go further than those that don’t share those aspects. Marketing on TikTok and other social media platforms can be a hugely helpful tool in getting new renters or buyers.

I am someone who has been working remotely myself for years, and also I have managed remote teams. The lessons I’ve learned from my experience have not only improved my own productivity but also strengthened the teams I’ve led, helping us thrive in the remote work environment.

About 22 million working adults in the U.S. are fully remote, representing roughly 14% of the adult workforce. As remote work continues to grow, my own experience offers valuable insights into its challenges and rewards. I’ll share those with you below.

Related: Remote Team Management: 7 Best Practices

1. Productivity suffers

A significant challenge for remote teams is maintaining productivity. According to recent surveys, 35% of agencies have experienced a drop in productivity since shifting to remote work. This decline highlights a critical issue: While remote work offers flexibility, it also introduces distractions and disrupts established workflows. As teams adapt to new ways of working, finding effective strategies to sustain productivity and engagement remains a major hurdle for many organizations.

To address productivity challenges in remote teams, set clear goals and encourage structured daily routines. This helps reduce distractions and keeps team members focused on their tasks. In some cases, I’ve noticed that productivity improves when remote teams work from co-working spaces, which are available worldwide.

2. Maintaining team cohesion

One of the key challenges of remote work is maintaining team cohesion. In industries like Information Technology, where 30.15% of job openings are remote, professionals often struggle to foster a sense of unity and collaboration among dispersed team members. Additionally, 40% of remote workers miss face-to-face interactions with their colleagues, which can lead to feelings of isolation and hinder spontaneous communication that usually strengthens team bonds.

To address this, organizations need to implement robust virtual team-building activities and establish regular, structured check-ins to ensure that remote employees remain engaged and connected, thereby preserving the collaborative spirit essential for effective teamwork.

3. Communication fatigue

While 78% of remote workers are highly engaged, reliance on video conferencing can cause disconnection and communication fatigue. Even though 67% find virtual meetings as productive as in-person ones, maintaining team cohesion remains difficult. Additionally, the flexibility of remote work can blur work-life boundaries, leading to potential burnout. Thus, balancing the advantages and challenges of remote work is crucial for both employees and employers.

To solve communication fatigue in remote work, use fewer video meetings and rely more on written communication. This gives employees more control over their time and reduces the need for constant real-time interaction.

4. Fostering employee engagement

Remote work can present challenges such as isolation and communication gaps, impacting productivity and job satisfaction. Training programs help address these issues by fostering connection and equipping employees with essential skills. Since 69% of unhappy employees don’t feel valued, focusing on training can significantly improve this aspect. By investing in tailored training, organizations can boost engagement, enhance performance and ensure employees feel valued and connected.

Related: Are Remote Workers Doomed to Feel Isolated and Sad? An HR Strategist Shares How to Overcome the Challenges of Working From Home.

5. Pay equity

A significant challenge in remote work is ensuring pay equity across geographic locations and between genders. Additionally, the shift to remote work has highlighted ongoing gender pay gaps. According to research from the Pew Research Center, in 2022, American women typically earned 82 cents for every dollar earned by men. This disparity extends beyond salaries, even affecting business ownership. Female founders often face significant challenges in achieving fair valuation when selling their businesses. For every $1 million a female founder receives in a business sale, a male founder might receive $1.5 million for a similar business, reflecting a significant disparity in exit outcomes.

These inequities can lead to feelings of demotivation and a sense of being undervalued among remote workers and entrepreneurs alike. To foster a fair and inclusive remote workplace, companies need to ensure that compensation and business opportunities are equitable across all employees, regardless of their location or gender, by focusing on the quality and impact of their work.

6. Time zone differences

Managing time zone differences is a significant challenge in remote work, often impacting communication and productivity. With 31% of remote employees reporting a mix of asynchronous and synchronous work, aligning schedules across different time zones can be complex. In fact, 19% of remote workers face time zone challenges, which can lead to delays in responses and hinder collaboration. To mitigate these issues, companies can implement strategies like rotating meeting times and using asynchronous communication tools to ensure that all team members remain engaged and informed, regardless of their location.

7. Ensuring cleanliness in remote workspaces — the hidden challenge

Remote work often extends beyond the home office to shared spaces like coffee shops or co-working environments, where cleanliness can be a significant issue. Many remote workers find themselves working in less-than-ideal conditions, with inadequate hygiene standards in public or shared areas. This lack of cleanliness can lead to increased health issues, such as frequent illnesses, which in turn result in more sick days and reduced productivity.

A study found that employees in clean workplaces took 24% fewer sick days on average compared to those in less clean environments. Addressing these cleanliness concerns is crucial for maintaining a healthy and efficient remote work routine, as the cleanliness of one’s workspace directly impacts overall job performance and well-being.

8. The crucial role of temperature in remote work productivity

As someone who’s been working remotely for several years, I’ve learned that the right environment is crucial for productivity. Despite trying various settings — from home offices to beachside co-working spaces — one factor that consistently impacted my work was temperature. In 2018, I decided to explore a co-working space in Ko Lanta, Thailand. While I worked in a coastal co-working space with enticing ocean views, I found that fluctuating temperatures were a significant distraction. The heat caused my productivity to plummet, as my focus wavered and tasks took longer to complete.

According to research carried out by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the ideal workplace temperature ranges between 70°F and 73°F — that is, between 21°C and 23°C. When the temperature rises above this range, cognitive performance can decline significantly. By addressing the temperature issue with adjustments and scheduling changes, I was able to restore my productivity and enjoy the coastal setting without compromising my work. This experience underscores the importance of maintaining a comfortable temperature to enhance focus and efficiency in any remote work environment.

Related: 7 Hidden Challenges of Remote Work — and What Leaders Can Do to Solve Each One

In conclusion, remote work offers flexibility and new opportunities but also brings challenges that require thoughtful solutions. By addressing issues like productivity, team cohesion, communication fatigue and fair compensation, organizations can create a more effective and supportive remote work environment.

Written by Amanda Eiden

I used to dread booking business trips. I’d spend hours hunched over my laptop, scouring the web for airfare that didn’t send my little art shop into the red. Needless to say, consistently high airfare costs drained the fun of touring brick-and-mortar stores and meeting with investors interested in my brand.

Matt’s Flights changed everything. This flight alert service constantly sends me affordable airfare deals. I haven’t stressed about booking in months. I only paid $79.97, and I’ll get offers emailed to me for life.

You won’t believe how affordable my flight to JFK was

These deals have already saved my business hundreds of dollars. A hobby shop in Brooklyn wanted me to visit in November, and my heart started racing—I figured flight costs would be off the charts with the upcoming holiday season.

I didn’t even want to look at Delta’s website. So, I went to Matt’s Flights and entered a custom search request that included the airports and my travel dates. I was already getting emails with deals for locations like Orlando, Houston, and Charlotte, but I didn’t have time to wait until deals for New York City hit my inbox.

Matt got back to me the next day with a flight from BOS to JFK for only $34. I literally couldn’t believe it, but I booked it anyway. And, yes, that was a roundtrip flight.

The prices I found on my own were closer to $200, so I’m not sure how Matt could find flights for so cheap. I won’t question his methods because me and my little sticker shop are grateful. With prices like these, I’ll get more opportunities to travel and grow my business into something huge. Well, I can hope.

If you want to find discounted flights for business travel, I couldn’t recommend Matt’s Flights more. Get a lifetime subscription for $79.97 (reg. $1,800) for a limited time.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

Are you like 62% of Americans who, according to HubSpot, say they check their email outside of working hours? We get it. Whether you’re at the bottom of the corporate ladder trying to climb up or the boss whose job never ends, it can be hard to separate work from your personal life—especially when they both live on your phone.

That’s why some business professionals are getting a second phone for work. Consider this credit-card-size smartphone as a reliable option. It’s way more compact than the new iPhones and far more affordable at only $99.97 (reg. $199.99) for a limited time. And it ships free.

Why get a second phone?

The NanoPhone will help you separate your work and personal lives. Your existing smartphone can be only for your messages, calls, and apps, while the NanoPhone can be a space to download everything you need for work—Gmail, Slack, authenticator apps, and more.

The phone runs on Android 10 OS, so you can download basically any app you need. It also has dual cameras for taking video calls on the go, should you need to do any business correspondence while traveling.

With two separate phones, the odds of refreshing your work email or checking Slack on your day off (or before you go to bed) are far lower. Simply tuck the NanoPhone into your briefcase or purse and try your hardest to forget about it.

Will I need another phone plan?

If you hope to use it independently from your existing phone, yes. You’ll have to purchase a SIM card and a mobile carrier plan.

However, some people use the NanoPhone with their phone’s current SIM card and data plan. This is an excellent option for emergencies, like if you damage your phone and need a backup.

Order your mini smartphone while they’re on sale for $99.97 with free shipping (reg. $199.99). No coupon is needed for this limited-time offer.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

Hurricane Helene hit Florida’s Big Bend region as a Category 4 hurricane with 140 mph winds. So far, 33 fatalities have been reported. And while there has been widespread flooding, including the heavily populated cities of Tampa and St. Petersburg, Tampa General Hospital, situated right along Tampa Bay, has managed to stay dry.

That’s due to a 5- to 10-foot high barrier known as an AquaFence, which is going viral on several platforms because of how it seems to have protected the region’s only Level 1 trauma center.

As #HurricaneHelene continues, the AquaFence at TGH stands firm. The water-impermeable barrier is designed to withstand storm surge up to 15 feet. It has worked through multiple rain events to prevent storm waters from impacting hospital operations. #WeAreTGH #StormWatch pic.twitter.com/papsd6oPg2

— Tampa General Hospital (@TGHCares) September 27, 2024

AquaFence was founded in 1999 and has offices in Norway and New Jersey. According to the company’s website, its systems are “protecting more than $30 billion worth of real estate in the United States alone,” including everything from hotels to gas stations to a Shake Shack.

The product is designed to be installed quickly and (fairly) easily. In 2023, AquaFence USA President Thomas Briedis told local outlet, WTSP Tampa 10, that 100 feet of AquaFence can be installed in 30 minutes.

“They come folded together, kind of like a laptop,” he said. “You take them out of the crate, put them down and they fold open.”

Briedis also said that the company is working on a line of residential AquaFences, which would cost around $20,000. The barriers are designed to protect in a Category 5 hurricane.

“We are very confident in the system. It was been thoroughly tested,” Briedis told the outlet.

The Jetsons, a popular TV show from the 1960s, foreshadowed the rise of AI chatbots, video calls, robotic vacuum cleaners — and now holograms.

U.S. startup Proto is making waves as the first platform to allow for communication through holograms. The company’s products are physical boxes that display 3D images from pre-recorded videos, live feeds, phones, and cameras. They can also be used for video calls and interviews. The images appear to be 3D because of shadowing and reflective effects.

^{Comedian Howie Mandel in a Proto device talking to a reporter. Photo Credit: Bizuayehu Tesfaye/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Tribune News Service via Getty Images}

Proto has two real-size hologram boxes available that cost anywhere from $29,000 to $65,000: the Proto Epic, which over 100 companies are using, and the Proto Luma, which the company has newly introduced, according to a Friday CNN Business report.

Related: What You Need to Know About ‘AI Agents’ and Why We Are One Step Closer to The Jetsons

The cheapest option is the $5,900 Proto M, a tabletop version less than 3 feet tall.

Holograms aren’t just science fiction anymore. Jetsons promised it and Proto delivered it. pic.twitter.com/A2NHfVhThk

— Proto Hologram (@ProtoHologram) September 22, 2024

Since launching in 2018, Proto has sold close to 1,000 hologram boxes, founder David Nussbaum told CNN Business. The company’s technology appeared on America’s Got Talent in 2022. Jon Bon Jovi’s bar in Nashville, Tennessee added a permanent Proto hologram unit to the premises in June.

Proto is steadily making its mark on communication with Amazon using it in an AI hub in San Francisco in August. Also last month, a healthcare facility in West Tennessee became the first to use Proto holograms to bring cancer specialists to patients, so they don’t have to travel far for specialized care.

I visited @west_cancer in Henry County to see their new telemedicine device, the Proto Epic, which is the first of its kind in the US. This device projects a realistic life-sized image that allows patients to meet with cancer specialists in Memphis or any other location without… pic.twitter.com/JFOb8lT97O

— Rep. David Kustoff (@RepDavidKustoff) September 3, 2024

Proto exists at a time when big tech companies are taking an interest in hologram technology. Earlier this week, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg offered a first glance at Orion, Meta’s holographic glasses. The glasses overlap holograms and digital communication with the physical world.

Zuckerberg said the glasses were best thought of as “a time machine” and that they needed some fine-tuning before being released to the public.

Related: ‘The Jetsons’ World Is Becoming Reality. Innovators, Start Your Engines.

You may now see AI-generated images of yourself on your Facebook or Instagram feeds as Meta tests new content.

Meta told Axios on Friday that users can opt out of a new “Imagined for You” test that creates AI content based on a user’s interests, even incorporating their likenesses. For example, users can imagine themselves in new settings, as royalty, or as an astronaut, and share the images that Meta AI creates of them with their network.

You “can be the star of your own story,” Meta stated.

The generated images seem to rely on photos uploaded by users, noted The Verge.

^{Credit: Meta}

Meta is also testing adding other AI images on newsfeeds that may not feature users’ faces but are still personalized to them. One example image Meta shared shows an enchanted realm with moonbeams.

Meta is experimenting with the changes across Facebook and Instagram. The new feature is in its testing stages and it’s unclear how many accounts it affects.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg spoke about its AI efforts earlier this week at Connect, stating that Meta AI has 500 million monthly active users and is slated to become the most-used AI assistant by the end of the year.

^{Meta AI moonbeams. Credit: Meta}

Related: Mark Zuckerberg Revealed His Vision for Smart Glasses at Meta Connect — and It Involves Holograms: ‘Beginning of a Big Thing’

I have had the pleasure of working with many leading search engine optimization (SEO) specialists in my nearly decade-long career as an SEO expert. But one stood out for her ambitious goal to think like a human and a bot at the same time.

Sharing this philosophy, this is something I admit to doing myself. Why? Because advances in natural language processing (NLP) require a forward-thinking approach to content optimization.

In this article, I dive into some of the key fundamentals of NLP, offering a simple analogy to how it works. I then focus on optimizing content using NLP in a way that both bots and your readers will love. Let’s get started.

Related: How to Leverage AI to Boost Your SEO Efforts and Stay Ahead of the Competition

Fundamentals of NLP

At the risk of oversimplifying, imagine a bridge over a river connecting two pieces of land. On the left side are people with literally thousands of search queries. And on the right side are search engines like Google, containing possibly the world’s largest library of information accessible at one’s fingertips.

So, how do people get their searches answered? The answer lies in algorithms. For example, Google’s algorithms crawl millions of content pieces each day and organize and structure them to meet search queries.

But where does NLP fit into the picture? As part of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, it bridges the gap between real people’s search queries and what search engines have to offer.

Wondering how this is done? Basically, highly sophisticated computer systems take language found in sentences and break them down into words, phrases, symbols and other meaningful elements. This process is called tokenization.

There is also “stemming,” which reduces words to their root form. Lemmatization, on the other hand, groups together different forms of a word that are then analyzed as a single unit. But there’s more.

Other ways NLP kicks into high gear include through syntax analysis, named entity recognition, sentiment analysis, topic segmentation and others. And to add a cherry on top, NLP also carries out tasks that include speech-to-text recognition, grammatical tagging, disambiguation, coreference resolution and others.

With so much intelligence and sophistication in NLP, it’s becoming clearer that SEO experts need to rethink their strategies for optimizing content. Today, this task is as much about enabling bots to semantically understand content as it is about understanding the user’s intent behind a search query.

While I won’t go into the complexities of the BERT algorithm rollout or the statistical measure called frequency-inverse document frequency (TF-IDF), if there’s one thing you will want to walk away from knowing, it is that catering to user intent on Google has never been this important.

Gone are the days of happily stuffing keywords to get a high keyword density score just to boost the rankings of your content. Today, Google is much smarter and is prioritizing the user experience over anything else.

That’s why its NLP technology is so sophisticated and is worth paying attention to. Therefore, whether you’re aiming to revive your content strategy or embark on a totally new route, you can’t afford to ignore NLP.

Applying NLP to keyword research

Having covered the importance of NLP, let’s explore some ways in which you can apply it to keyword research. Firstly, I need to mention that comprehensive keyword research should be the backbone of your content optimization efforts.

Without quality keywords, you risk your content piece never seeing daylight on the first page of the search engine results. Secondly, you need to identify relevant, high-traffic keywords which are accompanied by an in-depth user intent analysis.

To achieve all this, you need NLP-powered tools to streamline your keyword research process. While the choice of tool is up to you, ensure you make the right investment because this will pay off in the long run.

Related: How AI Is Transforming Keyword Research (and Why You Can’t Afford to Ignore It)

Optimizing content with NLP

A few tips worth sharing when optimizing content with NLP tools include the following:

• Use it for both content ideation and generation

• Optimize your content structure and flow based on NLP insights

• Refine content for improved readability and engagement

To do this, focus on creating keyword-rich but not keyword-stuffed metadata. Use the right structuring in your content with appropriate H1s, H2s, H3s and bullet points or numbering to match the user’s journey. Add semantically related keywords in your text, ensuring they flow naturally. However, keep the use of stop words in SEO to a minimum.

Write short and unambiguous sentences with each sentence conveying one main idea. Avoid jargon and colloquial language. Lastly, get to the point by providing answers to questions quickly, followed by indicating the subtle nuances in your answers in more detail later.

Measuring NLP-driven content performance

Every SEO expert worth their salt knows that measuring content performance is a big deal. Ignoring the metrics is done at your own peril. Constantly monitoring your metrics is critical for your content optimization success.

That’s because they allow you to refine and tweak the content based on user engagement and data for even better results. To better understand and improve your users’ experience with your content after applying NLP strategies to it, a couple of metrics you will want to keep an eye on are:

• Search engine results rankings

• Website traffic

• User behavior data such as time on page, conversions, etc.

Related: Revive Your Content Strategy With These 7 Powerful Techniques

Case study — boosting SEO with NLP

At InBound Blogging, we use NeuronWriter to assist us with our content optimization through the power of NLP. It’s as simple as creating a new project and typing in your primary keyword. Once you’ve done this, you can select a list of top-ranking competitors whose keywords will be extracted and which you can use in your article.

There are options to optimize your meta title and description, either manually or through the help of AI magic. Once you’ve taken these steps, you’ll be taken to a screen where you can paste in your blog article. You’ll get a numerical score for your article’s current performance.

You’ll also see which keywords you should include naturally in your text so that you boost your score, outperforming the highest-performing article for this keyword. By using NeuronWriter, we managed to drive organic traffic up to 49,000 in the space of just six months, while incorporating 1,623 keywords.

Another article that performed well during the same period saw traffic of 16,020 with 8,082 keywords.

Future trends in NLP-powered content optimization

A few trends that I foresee taking center stage with NLP in the near future must be mentioned, too. Among the prominent ones that will make a splash in the world of SEO are:

• Optimization for mobile searches

• Catering to voice search queries which usually use long-tail keywords

• Using generative AI

• Data and insight-driven strategies

• Hyper-personalized content

Ultimately, if you’re in SEO, you constantly need to stay ahead of the curve with NLP adoption and refinement.

If you haven’t tried using NLP-driven tools and techniques to optimize your content, I strongly encourage you to do so. NLP is powerful, and as Google’s algorithms get smarter and more effective at understanding the nuances of human language, you’ll need to stay at the very top of your SEO and content game to make a mark in the industry.