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Ship from Maldives with about 700 stranded Indians to arrive on May 10

INS Jalashwa, participating in Indian Navy#39;s "Operation Samudra Setu" to bring home Indians stuck in foreign countries due to COVID-19 pandemic, has departed from Male port for Kochi with 698 Indian nationals on board on Friday night. It is expected to reach here on Sunday.




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Natural gas at 3½ month peak, but higher US gas stocks may challenge any sustained gains

US gas stocks stand at 2210 billion cubic feet which is 19.5 percent higher than 5-year average stocks for this time of the year.




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Petrol, diesel under GST unlikely in near future, say BJP, Congress leaders

Indian industry is raising the pitch to bring petrol and diesel under the GST for sure, but BJP and Congress leaders indicated on Wednesday that it is unlikely




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ICICI Bank to announce Q4 numbers today: Here#39;s what to watch out for

ICICI Bank#39;s asset quality is also expected to improve in the March quarter on account of write-offs.




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Franklin debacle| Investors need not panic, but regulator needs to step in to instil investor confidence

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RBI lifeline to mutual funds will calm investors

The liquidity facility will help avoid a one-off event snowballing into systemic risk




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Exclusive | LT Mutual Fund: GA-backed IIFL Wealth, HDFC AMC, Blackstone and DSP Group in the fray

The engineering to software conglomerate, which houses LT Mutual Fund under listed arm LT Finance, had put the mutual fund business on the block earlier in a renewed attempt to find a suitable buyer




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Mutual fund flows in April hold up despite redemptions in credit risk funds

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Google announces company holiday on May 22 to stem virus burnout

Alphabet Inc's Google said on Friday it has asked employees to take a day off on May 22, to address work-from-home-related burnout during the coronavirus pandemic.




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Explainer: Fed funds futures market sees negative rates by next April

The fed funds futures market is pricing in negative U.S. interest rates next year, a scenario the Federal Reserve has said it wants to avoid as many doubt that it would be an effective tool to stimulate growth.




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Farm Inputs एप से बुक करा पीएयू के बिक्री केंद्र से हासिल करें बीज

(रागिनी कौशल)पंजाब एग्रीकल्चरल यूनिवर्सिटी (पीएयू) द्वारा लॉकडाउन के दौरान किसानों को बीजों लेने में आ रही समस्याओं को हल करने के लिए एक मोबाइल एप्लीकेशन तैयार की है। जिसके माध्यम से किसान पीएयू के बीज बिक्री केंद्रों से जुड़ कर अपनी ज़रुरत के मुताबिक बीज हासिल कर सकते हैं। पीएयू के डायरेक्टर एक्सटेंशन एजुकेशन के कुशल निर्देशन में फार्म इनपुट्स (Farm Inputs) नाम से मोबाइल एप्लीकेशन तैयार की गई है। जिसे मोबाइल पर डाउनलोड कर जानकारी हासिल की जा सकती है।

पीएयू बीज बिक्री केंद्र व किसानों को मिलाने का काम करेगा। जिससे कि किसानों को घर बैठे जानकारी मिल सके कि कौन सा बीज किस केंद्र में उपलब्ध है। बुकिंग करने के बाद किसान को तय समय दिया जाएगा जिससे कि किसान बीज बिक्री केंद्र में जाकर बीज ला सकें। पीएयू की इस मोबाइल एप को विभिन्न दफ्तरों के जरिए किसानों तक पहुंचाया जा रहा है। वहीं, जल्द ही इसे औपचारिक तौर पर रिलीज भी किया जाएगा। जानकारी के मुताबिक अब तक 700 से ज्यादा किसानों द्वारा इसे डाउनलोड भी कर लिया गया है।

किस केंद्र में कौन सा बीज उपलब्ध मिल जाएगी जानकारी
डायरेक्टर एक्सटेंशन एजुकेशन डॉ. जसकरन सिंह माहल ने बताया कि इस मोबाइल एप्लीकेशन को डाउनलोड करने के बाद किसान को अपनी रजिस्ट्रेशन करवानी होगी। किसान ये देख सकेगा कि किस जिले में कौन से बीज उपलब्ध हैं। घर बैठे बीज की बुकिंग हो जाएगी। लेकिन किसान को बीज स्टोर पर जाकर बीज लाना होगा और पेमेंट इत्यादि भी वहीं होगी। इसमें पीएयू का रोल नहीं होगा। अभी हमने होम डिलीवरी का सिस्टम शुरू नहीं किया है। किसानों को रियल टाइम इंफॉर्मेशन मिलेगी। किसान अपने जिले के अलावा अन्य जिलों में भी बीजों की उपलब्धता देख सकेंगे। इसमें वैरायटी के मुताबिक बीज का रेट भी मालूम हो जाएगा। फसलों में सभी अहम फसलों के बीजों की उपलब्धता की जानकारी मिलेगी। इसी तरह सब्जियों में भी बीजों की जानकारी हासिल की जा सकती है।

प्राइवेट फर्म के साथ भी होगा लिंक

डॉ. माहल ने बताया कि पहले फेज में हमने पीएयू से संबंधित बीज बिक्री केंद्रों को ही इस एप में जोड़ा है। दूसरे फेज में हम प्राइवेट फर्म के साथ जोड़ेंगे। जिससे कि किसान ये चुनाव कर सकेंगे कि उन्हें पीएयू रिकमंडेड बीज लेने हैं या प्राइवेट फर्म के। लेकिन इसके लिए प्राइवेट फर्मों को रजिस्ट्रेशन करवानी होगी। जिसके बाद किसान अपनी ज़रुरत के मुताबिक दोनों में से किसी भी जगह से बीज की जानकारी लेने के अलावा बुकिंग कर सकेंगे।



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Break Free B2B Marketing: Gary Gerber on Scaling ABM without Losing Focus

When people think of account-based marketing (ABM), they tend to think of it as a smaller-scale practice. Since ABM is fundamentally built around focus in the aligned pursuit of high-value accounts, it’s often associated with a significant reduction in target market scope (i.e., “Let’s narrow down to our 20-30 most promising accounts).

This itself is a constraint from which B2B marketers need to break free, which is why Gary Gerber stood out as a fitting guest for the first interview in our second season of Break Free B2B. At B2B Marketing Exchange in February, he sat with TopRank Marketing President Susan Misukanis to unpack what’s needed to bring ABM to the next level.

Gary and his team at Folloze helped Cisco develop a sophisticated and highly effective ABM program that targeted 20,000 customers through one-on-one, personalized content and messaging.

How can other B2B marketers achieve this level of scalability in their ABM efforts, overcoming one of the biggest remaining hurdles holding back this fast-growing approach? In large part it’s about rethinking our tools, Gary suggests, while leaning on a rather literal metaphor.

“You have to focus away from blunt instrument tools,” he says. “I’m not bashing blunt instruments, by the way, because a hammer is one of the most useful tools in your toolkit, but you wouldn’t use it to repair a watch. So you need to migrate to tools that let you [achieve] that kind of precision, because that’s the only way you’re going to build trust with your customers.”

[bctt tweet="“A hammer is one of the most useful tools in your toolkit, but you wouldn’t use it to repair a watch.” @Gary_Gerber of @Folloze on the need for more precision in #ABM. #BreakFreeB2B" username="toprank"]

Solutions like Folloze’s platform, which enables the delivery of personalized experiences at scale, are helping pave the way. But it’s not just about technology. Reaching a state of advanced ABM also requires shifts in organizational mindset, philosophy, and operation.

Gary and Susan cover the gamut in their 18-minute conversation. You can watch, listen, or find key excerpts and takeaways below.

Break Free B2B Interview with Gary Gerber

If you’re interested in checking out a particular portion of the discussion, you can find a quick general outline below, as well as a few excerpts that stood out to us.

  • 1:30 - Recognizing that change is inevitable
  • 2:30 - Where is ABM in terms of market maturity?
  • 4:45 - Helping clients recognize shortcomings and make incremental progress
  • 6:30 - Approaching the marketing funnel from an ABM standpoint
  • 9:30 - Re-centering on the fundamentals of ABM targeting
  • 11:15 - Where are you seeing successes in ABM?
  • 13:15 - Optimizing for the future by taking the right steps right now
  • 16:00 - Gary's personal hobbies and philosophies
  • 17:15 - How can modern digital marketers break free?

Susan: What's your consulting approach? As marketers, we can't just tell our clients, "You're wrong, do it my way." How do you inch them toward making incremental progress?

Gary: It's an interesting question because when we talk to people, the tools that people are using are the same ones that worked well 10 or 15 years ago. People built their careers on tools like marketing automation and things like that. So it is challenging to tell them, "Those tools are blunt instruments by today's standards."

You have to focus the other way, on what's not working, on the pain. Because there is pain there, especially if they're under the gun for an account-based program, and for pushing things through the funnel, right? We like to talk about the three symptoms that marketers today are subject to: funnel starvation, pipeline constipation, and sales frustration. They can't get stuff into the top of the funnel anymore, whatever they get in the funnel doesn't come out, and they're under the gun there because sales and the entire organization is looking to them to move opportunities and it's not happening. So if you can put it in terms along those lines most marketers will eventually have to concede. 'Cause everyone's feeling that pain in B2B.

[bctt tweet="“We like to talk about the three symptoms that marketers today are subject to: funnel starvation, pipeline constipation, and sales frustration.” @Gary_Gerber @Folloze #BreakFreeB2B #ABM" username="toprank"]

Susan: Do you counsel equal focus on the top, middle, and bottom of the funnel to try to get things moving? Or is the first thing, you gotta fix the top of the funnel? What's your methodology?

Gary: Well, if you think about what ABM is, especially if you're doing it right, it's almost not a funnel mentality at all anymore, right? We refer to it as full cycle personalization, or some people are saying bow tie. If you're approaching it with that funnel mentality, you've almost doomed yourself to failure right from the start in 2020.

[bctt tweet="“If you're approaching #ABM with that funnel mentality, you've almost doomed yourself to failure right from the start in 2020.” @Gary_Gerber @Folloze #BreakFreeB2B" username="toprank"]

There’s an analogy others are using and I agree with it: it’s like a football team or a soccer team running down the field together. So the focus isn't on top of funnel or middle of funnel, it's on -- by definition -- the accounts themselves. And as sales and marketing are running down the field, they're bringing the account and the individuals together along with them. It's a journey.

And so how do you do that? You can't do that by sending them mass emails because everybody's getting that. Ultimately what it's about, and I've said this to other people, it's about building that relationship with them. More importantly, it's about building a relationship that's built on trust, not on hype. Because if you've built that trust and you're adding that value to them that they trust you're interested in their success, and you're providing information and content and messaging and whatever it is, that will help them be successful. They'll happily march down the field with you because you're adding to their success.

Susan: So let's talk about what's working in ABM these days. Where are smart modern marketers really experiencing some great progress from your perspective?

Gary: Most people think of ABM, as you mentioned before, as, "Well, I'm going to pick my top 20 accounts and I'm going to focus everything I got on them, and the rest of the 88,000 or whatever, oh well too bad, them we'll just spray and pray with a nurture campaign or something like that." And it's interesting because when you stop and think about it logically, limiting it to your 20 or 25 or whatever, that's a technical limitation, right? It's because I can't do what I want to do -- create a deeply personalized, individualized, valuable, trust building experience -- with more than those 20 people because there's me and this person, that's all that we can do.

But there is no procedural reason for that. If you could do [personalization] for everybody, then you would, but you can't. And so, Cisco is a really awesome example. What they've been able to do is actually automate a lot of what's manual to create these very individualized experiences where they’re getting content, and imagery, and messaging, and information, and everything that is very salient to them, that they used to have to build by hand, so it took hours for each … it’s automated, so they kind of wind it up once and this goes out. So Cisco is actually doing one of the largest ABM programs in the country.

Stay tuned to the TopRank Marketing Blog and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more Break Free B2B interviews. Here are a few interviews to whet your appetite:

The post Break Free B2B Marketing: Gary Gerber on Scaling ABM without Losing Focus appeared first on Online Marketing Blog - TopRank®.




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What B2B Marketers Need to Know about Optimizing Content with Video Analytics

Between stay-at-home orders and the manic Minnesota weather, I’ve found myself at home for the last four weeks looking for something, really anything, to occupy time. One can only take so many walks in a day. Naturally, I turn to YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, Disney+ and all of the other video streaming sites for entertainment.

As a marketer, this makes me wonder what those streaming sites are seeing in their analytics. Obviously, views must be up by an unbelievable amount. But, what about engagement? How many people are completing the videos they start? Are they watching more? Unless it’s Tiger King, the answer is unknown (it’s impossible to look away from Tiger King). But those streaming sites aren’t the only ones that might have some fascinating new data to look at.

Social sites and YouTube provide a host of different metrics and analytics options. While each data point serves a purpose, there are a few key performance indicators (KPIs) that are more important to track to better understand your audience and improve content performance.

Video Analytics and Content Benchmarks

A recent study from video streaming site Vidyard established some useful benchmarks for video content:

  • 52% of viewers watch a video all the way through
  • 68% will watch the entire video if it’s less than 60 seconds
  • 25% will finish a video if it’s more than 20 minutes

The same study found that the most common business-created videos are webinars, demos and social media videos, and are most likely to be published on websites, social media and YouTube.

Of course, these benchmarks will vary by audience, by industry, by the light of the silvery moon — basically, take them as a starting point and customize from there. Here’s the process we recommend.

Using Video Analytics to Optimize Your Video Content

1 — Use Demographics to Understand Your Audience

The first step to increasing content engagement and effectiveness is to gain a better understanding of your audience. To do that, it’s critical to monitor demographic data in your video analytics platform. Most will give you basic demographic data, like location, age, language and device use. Some will give you user interest data, income estimates and even company data.

Knowing this information helps you create more relevant content. For example, if you find that your audience primarily speaks English, but there is a growing subset of French speakers accessing your videos on mobile devices, you might want to consider adding French caption options for mobile users.

If you see an increase in viewers from a specific geographic area, you will want to look at the analytics for that region to determine what content is attracting the new audience and how they are engaging while they’re watching and immediately afterward.

2 — Use Awareness and Engagement Metrics to Understand Audience Demand

Understanding your audience is important at a strategic level, but understanding audience demand is tactical gold. Of course, this data will drive your go-forward strategy, but it will also help you improve performance right away by adjusting promotion tactics and featured content.

For example, if you see an uptick in video views week over week for a particular video, that indicates that the topic is becoming increasingly popular. To prove that, you will want to look at engagement metrics like watch time, clicks on your call to action (CTA), and subscribers gained or lost. If you see an uptick in views and a corresponding uptick in engagement, you’re going to want to feature that video more prominently. If you see an increase in negative engagement —  a loss of subscribers — or if viewers are dropping off right away, that might indicate your video doesn’t quite match the intent for that topic.

This granular view of data can help you improve and optimize your existing content, create more strategic video content roadmaps, and provide viewers with content they want and need to make critical decisions later in the funnel.

[bctt tweet="“Understanding your audience is important at a strategic level, but understanding audience demand is tactical gold.” @Tiffani_Allen" username="toprank"]

3 — Audit Your Video Library for Optimization Opportunities

Following the best practices for whichever video hosting platform you’re using can result in increased video visibility and better user experience. A great first step is to optimize video titles, descriptions, and tags. Then you can organize  your videos into different sections, playlists, or even channels to help the right audience find your content faster.

To determine your next steps, audit your existing video channels. Do you know at a glance what the video is about? Does the thumbnail image inspire a click? Does your channel, landing page or resource center adequately convey the type, purpose and content of your videos in a way that compels action?

If the answer is yes, go take a break. I recommend a few hours of Animal Crossing: New Horizons. It’s very soothing. But if the answer’s no, you’re not alone. And you do have the tools you need to create better video content. It’s all in your analytics.

As a quick disclaimer, if your videos are hosted on your website and you notice some odd user behavior patterns over the last month or so — increases in direct traffic, crazy long time on page — you might want to look into whether or not IPs are blocked for your team’s home IP addresses. Determine if the patterns are happening on a more global level, or if they’re localized to the geographic area surrounding your physical office.

If you want help with an audit, or just want to bounce some ideas around, we’re here to help. Tweet us @toprank or contact us to get started.

The post What B2B Marketers Need to Know about Optimizing Content with Video Analytics appeared first on Online Marketing Blog - TopRank®.




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Break Free B2B Marketing: Sruthi Kumar on Creating Memorable Experiences

Marketers are in the business of attracting attention. All of our tactics, our strategies, our goals boil down to: Did we get someone’s attention and inspire them to take action?

The key to modern marketing is that we have to earn that attention. There will always be someone on who is louder, funnier, more talented, or just less shameless than your brand is willing to be. The only way to truly capture and sustain someone’s focus is to earn the right to their time. 

How do you earn attention? By providing remarkable experiences. By showing you care about your audience, you know who they are, and that your brand is here to help and to entertain them. 

For our latest Break Free video, we talked to a marketer who is helping marketers offer more memorable experiences. Sruthi Kumar is the Senior Marketing Manager at Sendoso, a platform that coordinates direct mail and gifting campaigns for personalization at scale.

Sruthi and I sat down to talk about experiential marketing in all its forms: Event marketing, direct mail, content and beyond. We also dig deeper into the philosophy of marketing. Should marketers specialize in a certain aspect of marketing, or should we be taking a more holistic approach? Can left-brained content folks and right-brained strategy folks get along… and really, is it that simple of a divide? Sruthi has some inspiring thoughts on all of the above.

Oh, and along the way, Sruthi shares how she built a marketing department from the ground up, taking Sendoso from a small start-up to competing with the big brands.

 [bctt tweet="I think what we’re really trying to do is bridge that online and offline experience. @sruthikkumar" username="toprank"]

 

Highlights:

1:00: Direct mail plus digital marketing for unforgettable experiences

5:45: Marketing to delight your audience

7:40: Building a marketing department from the ground up

11:05: Tactics for earning attention at marketing events

18:15: Marketing requires creative and analytical thinking 

 

Josh:

So tell me a little bit about Sendoso. What is it? What do you do?

Sruthi:

We're a sending platform, so we really help our customers reach their customers and prospects in a meaningful way by sending company swag, direct mail, sweets and treats, handwritten notes, the whole nine yards, in order to make really human connections with their prospects and customers.

Josh: 

Do you feel like this going back to a more simpler form of marketing compared to digital marketing? Do you feel like that’s more effective as our world gets more digital?

Sruthi:

So I actually think they go hand in hand. What we're trying to do is really bridge that online and offline experience. So not to say that digital marketing does not work. I'm a marketer. I run our field marketing team, we use digital heavily, but it's just about bringing all the channels together to create that seamless experience for the end user, and that person that you want to book a meeting with or have a signed contract with or whatever else you need from them.

[bctt tweet="It’s about bringing all the channels together to create that seamless experience for the end user, that person who you want to book a meeting with or have a signed contract with. @sruthikkumar" username="toprank"]

We are moving to an ABM approach when we are doing our events, because sometimes you get to large audiences and it's hard to really get in contact with anyone. The beautiful thing about our product is that anyone can use it in any vertical. It's direct mail: If you're selling, you can use it. If you're trying to reach an audience, you can use it. 

We do the double funnel approach at Sendoso. We do have demand gen tactics while we also have ABM tactics as well. 

I had an interview that was my first internship as a marketer. The CMO asked me, ‘Are you analytical? Or are you creative?’ And I was like, ‘I don't know, I feel like I'm a little bit of both.’ 

And she said, ‘You can't be both.’ And I just want to call her now, because you have to be both. I may not be the most analytical person on my team. But I get to work with this marketing ops manager. We built our team together, and she's very analytical. I get to learn from her and understand how would my MOPS person do this. And that's the cool stuff that you get to take with you. 

As a marketer, you should be well rounded — you're a content marketer, but you could put a demand gen campaign together.

Josh:

 We just love this binary of left brain versus right brain. But then you get this idea that oh, well, the creative types are just sitting up there in their beanbag chairs with the lava lamps going, ‘Oh, wouldn't it be cool if we did this?’ And then on the other hand is a bunch of robots who are crunching numbers. For some people, those things are going to overlap into a circle and some are somewhere on the continuum, but you can’t be just one or the other. 

[bctt tweet="People ask, 'Are you analytical or are you creative?' But you have to be both... As a marketer, you should be well rounded: You're a #contentmarketer, but you could put a demand gen campaign together. You're not just writing. @sruthikkumar" username="toprank"]

Sruthi:

With all those marketing activities that we're supposed to do, some people are just doing the check-boxes. That's totally fine, but I think you should bring your personality into it. I think so many of us are so scared. Like having our corporate voice, but I think our personal voice should be in there too. 

I think the only reason why Sendoso did stand out in the early days is because we got to incorporate so many of our early founders’ and members’ own personalities into the brand. And even the way we pitch our product today is by the voices of our sales team and our marketing team, our co-founders and c-suite. So I think it's just about being okay with being yourself and incorporating that into your whole corporate brand.

[bctt tweet="I think the reason Sendoso did stand out in the early days is we got to incorporate so many of our early founders’ own personalities. It's about being okay with being yourself and incorporating that into your corporate brand. @sruthikkumar" username="toprank"]

 

Stay tuned to the TopRank Marketing Blog and subscribe to our YouTube channel and podcast for more Break Free B2B interviews. Here are a few to whet your appetite:

The post Break Free B2B Marketing: Sruthi Kumar on Creating Memorable Experiences appeared first on Online Marketing Blog - TopRank®.




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Sri Lanka's central bank cut its benchmark interest rates by a further 50 basis points on Wednesday, its third reduction since the coronavirus crisis struck there in March.




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Pakistan coronavirus cases surge past 25,000, pace quickens: Reuters tally

Coronavirus cases in Pakistan surged past 25,000 on Friday, just hours before the government was due to lift lockdown measures, with the country reporting some of the biggest daily increases in new infections in the world.




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Seven killed in protests over food distribution in Afghanistan, local MP says

Seven people were killed when protesters angry over what they see as unfair food aid distribution during the coronavirus pandemic clashed with police in Afghanistan's western Ghor province on Saturday, according to a local member of parliament.




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South Korean artist crafts cornstarch furniture

Artist Ryu Jong-dae experiments with various cornstarch-based bioplastic in the bid to protect the Earth. Rosanna Philpott reports.




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German youth jazz-up social distancing for climate demo

Young German climate-strikers on Friday (April 24) got creative with their social distancing, set up hundreds of cardboard cutouts to represent protesters taking part in the Fridays for Future demonstration.




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BMW cuts outlook, sees coronavirus pain lasting all year

BMW expects the coronavirus pandemic to hit demand and earnings throughout this year, while Volkswagen sees some green shoots with higher Chinese demand. Francis Maguire reports.




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Avoid small caps but bet on REITs: advisor

Wealth Enhancement Group's Nicole Webb says small cap stocks make good bets emerging from a recession but not amid the current market volatility.




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Air France-KLM and Rolls-Royce eye job cuts

Air France-KLM and jet engine maker Rolls-Royce are considering job cuts as lockdowns take a toll on first-quarter earnings. Francis Maguire reports.




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Top brewer AB InBev sees worse ahead, but hope in China

The world's biggest brewer, AB InBev, says it sees signs of a rebound in China, but warns the next quarter will still be worse overall. Julian Satterthwaite reports.




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Breakingviews TV: Cord cutting

U.S. cable firms are in for pain even after the pandemic starts to fade. Sports rights to air football games and other matchups are expected to soar and so will monthly bills. Jennifer Saba explains why non-sports lovers will choose Netflix and Disney+ and ditch their cable.




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Waiter, there's a fly in my waffle: Belgian researchers try out insect butter

Belgian waffles may be about to become more environmentally friendly.




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Who let the dogs out? A few Spaniards defy coronavirus lockdown

Under partial lockdown due to the spiraling coronavirus pandemic, Spaniards are allowed to leave home only for essential outings, walking a dog being one of them.




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Clawing back normality: Bangkok cat cafe reopens after virus shutdown

As Thailand's capital cautiously reopens many restaurants shuttered over coronavirus fears, the feline "employees" of the Caturday Cafe are back at work.




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UK observes two-minute silence to commemorate VE Day 75th anniversary

Along with millions around the nation, Prince Charles held a two-minute silence outside his family's Balmoral estate, while military jets flew over the United Kingdom's four capitals, and 1940s-style tea parties plus singalongs were planned in homes.




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Austrian ski resort covers glacier after coronavirus cuts season short

With its season cut short by the coronavirus pandemic, one of Austria's most popular glacial ski resorts covered its glacier in protective fabric earlier than usual this year to help preserve it for a still uncertain reopening.




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We had to put a 'stop' to the economy to save lives: WH

White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany on Friday was asked about the U.S. economy that lost a staggering 20.5 million jobs in April, the steepest plunge in payrolls since the Great Depression, and she responded saying it was 'decided' by the president to 'stop the economy' to save lives.




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Youth recreate Iraq's ancient Nineveh in VR technology

Stone by stone, digital artists and game developers from Mosul are rebuilding Nineveh's heritage sites in the digital world. Francis Maguire reports.




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Putin attends slimmed down Victory Day celebrations

Russia marked 75 years since the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two on Saturday, but the coronavirus outbreak forced it to scale back celebrations. Olivia Chan reports.




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Schumer: Reopening states without more tests is 'dangerous'

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer on Thursday said it was 'dangerous' for the Trump administration to pressure states and businesses to 'reopen without a plan for a dramatic increase in testing'.




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UK observes two-minute silence to commemorate VE Day 75th anniversary

Along with millions around the nation, Prince Charles held a two-minute silence outside his family's Balmoral estate, while military jets flew over the United Kingdom's four capitals, and 1940s-style tea parties plus singalongs were planned in homes.




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Austrian ski resort covers glacier after coronavirus cuts season short

With its season cut short by the coronavirus pandemic, one of Austria's most popular glacial ski resorts covered its glacier in protective fabric earlier than usual this year to help preserve it for a still uncertain reopening.




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We had to put a 'stop' to the economy to save lives: WH

White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany on Friday was asked about the U.S. economy that lost a staggering 20.5 million jobs in April, the steepest plunge in payrolls since the Great Depression, and she responded saying it was 'decided' by the president to 'stop the economy' to save lives.




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Dutch restaurant trials glass booths for dining amid coronavirus

A Dutch restaurant has come up with an idea on how to offer classy outdoor dining in the age of coronavirus: small glass cabins built for two or three people, creating intimate cocoons on a public patio.




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Clawing back normality: Bangkok cat cafe reopens after virus shutdown

As Thailand's capital cautiously reopens many restaurants shuttered over coronavirus fears, the feline "employees" of the Caturday Cafe are back at work.