Business/Entrepreneurship – Page 49 – The Big Words Blog Site

In A World Of Competition, Here’s How To Make Your business Stand Out!

Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. Regardless of your business’ unique product or service, you always have to consider how to generate positive exposure for your business. The following contributed post is entitled, In A World Of Competition, Here’s How To Make Your business Stand Out!

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For most businesses, some healthy competition is a good thing. Indeed, it can encourage growth and challenge, and make sure they are operating in the most efficient way possible. However, as you might have already noticed, too much competition can make it hard for your business to stand out. Happily, there are some tactics you can use to resolve this. Keep reading to find out what they are.

Delight your customers

First, and more foremost if you want your company to stand out above the rest you have to go out of your way to delight your customers. This means going above and beyond the call of duty, not only delivering what you promised but even more!

One way you can do this is by offering amazing customer service, including follow up emails, the chance to rate and review your business, and by being easily contactable in case anyone has any problems they need resolving.

Additionally, you can delight your customers by making sure that any of the important touch points they use to interact with you, such as your website, has amazing UX. After all, the way the user (customer) experiences the process of engaging with your company will determine whether they come back to you to make a purchase or go to your closest competition.

Create unique branding and packaging

Another way you can ensure your product will stand out from the crowd is to invest some serious effort and money into the visuals. This means creating a strong visual brand that reflects your company’s values and is aesthetically pleasing to your target audience.

Of course, your brand should include a logo, as well as a company color palette and font. All of which should be used to create standout packaging so your product jumps off the shelf in stores and online.

Indeed, it is well worth considering high-end packaging finishes too, like the hot stamping and embossing you can visit https://universalengraving.com/lockup to find out more about. The reason being that packaging is more than just how your product is stored and transported, it’s also part of the experience of buying and owning it. Therefore, if you can impress at this stage, you are much more likely to get your product the attention it deserves.

Do some good

Finally, in today’s more eco and socially responsible consumer market you can help your product stand out by making sure you are doing good. Fortunately, there are several ways in which you can do this.

The first is by choosing ecologically sustainable ingredients when making your product. Something that, as you can see from this post https://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Article is becoming increasingly important to consumers.

Secondly, be sure to address social issues such as fair trade, modern slavery, and a living wage in the manufacture and distribution of your products. Then you can highlight this as part of your USP, therefore doing some good in the world as a business, and doing some good for your business too. Namely, that you will have the edge over any competition that is not yet doing these things.

Case Management Solutions: What are they and who needs them?

Three focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money, Business/Entrepreneurship and Technology. Depending what type of business you’re in, case management solutions my be valuable to your operations. The following contributed post is entitled, Case Management Solutions: What are they and who needs them?

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Financial Literacy, Business and Entrepreneurship are common themes throughout the Big Words Space so let us delve into a phrase that has cropped up multiple times quite recently: Case Management Solutions. Is this something you really need to consider for your business? Let’s find out what it is all about and if it could be a beneficial solution for many organizations.

First things first, what is a case management solution?

Case management solutions are applications or software systems that are designed to support a complex process and store a range of one’s data, consolidating this into a single database. Through using a system, case managers, whichever industry they may be concerned with, can regulate cases, allow for better record keeping and real-time updates, without the need for overwhelming amounts of spreadsheets and paper.

So, what are the benefits of a case management system?

As many companies move towards becoming paperless and reducing their carbon footprint, case management systems allow for a decrease in paperwork but ensuring that record-keeping is fully digital. By utilizing cloud-based storage systems, all content can be organized and managed via a single dashboard.

With many workers now working from home, along with many businesses being more global, there has never been a better time to have a remote system in place. All data can then be accessed securely by authorized persons, no matter where they are in the world.

Along with this, this is an ever-increasing need and desire to be able to access real-time and accurate information instantly. Therefore, using a case management solution with integrated cloud-based storage can be hugely beneficial to workers. In turn, this increases efficiency and accuracy across the workforce, potentially reducing the need to outsource.

Photo by Kari Shea on Unsplash

Combining the efficiency and accuracy of the cloud-based data, as opposed to plentiful paperwork or individual spreadsheets, resolutions can be met much more quickly and effectively through collaboration. With access being enabled for all relevant team members, individuals are able to access the relevant information and respond appropriately and speedily, communicating via a single interface. Seamless collaboration in this way also reduces the need for emails to be sent back and forth between various team members, saving confusion and time.

With this more concise communication and audit trail, there is increased transparency – one of the many benefits of digital record-keeping. All steps and communications in the process can be accessed and monitored, with risks being identified and problem areas being addressed. Transparency speeds up any reporting process or actions that need to follow and audit trails ensure that trends are able to be analyzed easily, with metrics and analytics being able to be retried easily.

Through the use of case management solutions, a personalized experience can be created for individual clients or consumers. Customer profiles are more streamlined, with all of the relevant information to hand, so responding to customer queries and questions is much more efficient and straightforward, expediting business productivity.

Startup Up Business Ideas

Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. If you have a business idea and want to start your own enterprise, there are some things you need to keep in mind that will really help you out. The following contributed post is entitled, Startup Up Business Ideas.

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Photo by bruce mars on Unsplash

So you have decided to start your own business, that’s great. However, it can be hard to know where to get started and figure out what your next steps should be. We have listed below a few tips to help you get started on your business venture.

Write A Business Plan

The first step that any business should take is writing up a business plan. Your business plan should include an overview of your business, what you are planning to sell or offer, what your targets and goals are and what makes you stand out from the rest. Set goes for one, five and ten year and check in with it every now and then to see if you are keeping on track and amend if necessary. If you are unsure on how to structure your business plan there are many templates online to help you.

Grow Your Online Presence

Being online is vital for any business to thrive and be successful. Start by creating a website, it doesn’t have to be over complicated, just ensure it showcases what your business does, contact information and T&Cs. You don’t have to break the bank by hiring a web agency there are a few platforms out there that allow you to create your own website for a fraction of the cost. Sites such as Wix, WordPress and Shopify are all great examples of diy websites. If you are not great with technology there are many videos, articles or professionals out there that can help guide you.

Once your website is all up and running, you will need to think about opening up a couple social media accounts. Social media is one of the best ways to get your business noticed. Most platforms will allow you to advertise to a selected target audience of your choice. The leading social media platforms are Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Tik Tok and Pinterest. Make sure you choose one or two platforms to focus on as having too many to focus on at once can become overwhelming.

Have The Right Equipment In place

When starting your business it can be hard knowing what equipment your office will need. Take a look at our must-have list below.
● Furniture – Whether you are setting up your business in an office or at home, you will need some furniture to get you going. You could start with a standard desk and chairs but for the long term we would recommend investing in some ergonomic furniture.
● Technology – You will need a computer that provides access to software such as word, powerpoint and spreadsheet. With everyone still having to keep their distance video calls are a popular way to communicate among customers, suppliers and work colleagues. Find the best software for your business, popular sites include Click4assistance, LiveHelpNow and Proficonf.

We hope these tips helped, it’s now down to you to put these tips in place and start growing your business. Whilst you are here take a look at our post on Should Your Small Business Look To Outsource?

Are You Setting The Right Standards For Your Business?

Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. You shouldn’t just hastily start your business. You should also have standards and guidelines for it. The following contributed post is entitled, Are You Setting The Right Standards For Your Business?

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The right standards within your business might be very different to the industry’s standard as a whole, but this doesn’t have to be a bad thing. After all, we all work in our own ways, and the market fosters and celebrates innovation. However, you need to make sure your thoughts and goals are shared by your company as an entity.

You need to be sure that your employees or team members all pitch in like you do, and that you’re committing to a standard that your customers enjoy. So, here are some of the best methods for staying on top of maintaining the standards you really want your company to have.

Pexels Image – CC0 Licence

Define Your Standards

The first thing to do is realise what you want out of your company, and the kind of actions you want everyone working for you to uphold. After all, you’ve got values, and you want your business to grow based on them, so make sure you’ve got a pen and paper, and write down all your thoughts about what you want to see in a working environment every day. Turn them into actionable goals based on these points.

Make Sure There’s a Controlled Measurement

Now, once you have some standards written out on paper, you’re going to need to come up with some ways to objectively measure them. Of course, the biggest mark of success is a bigger profit than the month or year before, but before you reach a stage like that, you’re going to have to get into the details.

So, set an example to your team, then make sure you assess their skills and delegate tasks out accordingly, and always congratulate people on a job well done. Give them targets to reach, and never let a completed goal go unrecognised.

And don’t forget about the inhuman factor either. Run regular inspections on all office equipment, make sure guidelines are written out on how to deal with them – using LEM Products here is the easiest way to get the message across – and consistently update and maintain both software and hardware for a smooth working performance.

Get Ready To Coach Your Staff Through It

And then we come to the fact that some of your team members are going to perform under the standard you want. In situations like this, you need to put in a little more time and effort to really get the best out of them.

They might be finding it hard to adjust, or they might just need a little more coaching from the person who sets and maintains the goals. Simply put, if you really want your team to rally together on this, make sure you put in the work yourself and show them how it’s done!

The right standards in business are entirely up to you. Make sure your vision is shared by everyone else in your company, and always hold regular inspections to ensure your company’s infrastructure is performing as well as you are.

New Business Models Nobody Ever Expected Would Be So Successful

Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. Some of the most successful business models are those that no one sees coming. When this happens, they take the world by storm and only a select few experience the explosive profits from them, while the rest of the society benefits from their use. The following contributed post is entitled, New Business Models Nobody Ever Expected Would Be So Successful.

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Throughout history, we’ve seen a bunch of business models develop that have provided the average person with massive value – and made us all much wealthier. The nineteenth-century factory model, for instance, wasn’t pretty, but it was hugely effective, and it meant that the average person could begin living a semi-comfortable life.

In the 1920s, we saw the rise of the “bait and hook” model where manufacturers would lure customers with an initial low-cost product, and then upsell them. And in the 1950s, the franchise model was born, allowing businesses to grow very large while maintaining the incentive for excellence.

In the present decade, we’re likely to see the growth of some brand new and exciting business models, based on innovative technology.

There are already some seriously good examples of cutting-edge companies doing their best to change the way business works. Here’s what’s likely to emerge.

The Bluetooth Economy

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Imagine being able to confirm your identity wherever you went and gain access to facilities, garages, or your place of work 24-hours a day.

At the moment, seamless technologies are few and far between. But Bluetooth could offer companies an entirely different model.

Take the concept of storage smart entry, for instance. The idea here is that people just use their mobile devices to gain access to their storage areas instead of having to rely on keys or on-site personnel. But the same principle could apply across the economy. Stores, for instance, could allow trusted customers to let themselves in whenever they like, pay for products as they shop, and leave, without having to interact with an actual cashier. It sounds crazy, but it could happen.

The Transformation Economy

The more philosophical you become, the more you realize that material wealth isn’t the be-all-and-end-all to personal satisfaction. But that’s creating a problem in the wider economy. Most people don’t know what to do other than chase money. And it’s leading to a kind of existential anxiety where individuals aren’t quite sure why they’re here or what they’re doing.

The so-called “transformation” economy is trying to change that. Here, gurus in various fields are offering their services to help people navigate the strangeness and infinite complexity of life. Now that most people are wealthy (at least by historical standards), the hope is that they can use their money to derive a little more meaning from life. Once you’ve got all the trappings of luxury, what else is there to spend your money on than improving your lived experiences?

The Decentralised Economy

Pexels – CC0 License

Imagine a world in which each person sells their services to a range of companies but isn’t an employee of any.

It sounds a little dystopian, but the reality will be different. It’ll feel way more empowering than having to slog it out with a single employer, year after year. Instead, you’ll be able to dip into different kinds of work, face new challenges, and, hopefully, increase your pay at the same time.

The decentralized economy will hopefully allow anyone to earn money from anywhere, potentially solving the problem of unemployment.

A Blogger’s Tale: Cyberattacks, Lost Metadata, Social Media Plugins and SSL-Certificates

Starting My Own Blog

As described in the story of my blog, I wrote for the Examiner prior to starting the Big Words Blog Site. One of the things I realized when starting my own blog was that I now had to do everything myself besides just the writing. The Examiner was a massive operation in itself, and a business that had systems in place for everything, i.e., quality assurance, technical support, and advertising/promotion/monetization of its content. Starting my own blog meant that I had to do all of that which also involved managing unforeseen challenges. Some of the major challenges involved cyberattacks, promotion of my content, and managing my social media’s ‘metadata’.

When writing for the Examiner, even if we, the writers, didn’t promote our own work, the publication did it in the form of grouping and promoting the popular pieces of the week in mass email correspondences (email blasts). I also noticed that all over the Examiner’s site there were advertisements from marketers, which is in large part how the Examiner and other publications made money. They tossed some of the ‘crumbs’ to us which was in large part driven by the clicks and views our writings generated. Through writing for the Examiner one of the biggest lessons I learned among other things, was that while much of our population wastes time on it and in some instances misuses it, social media is an important tool for writers who want to grow their audiences in modern times.

Metadata and Social Media Plugins

When I set out to create my own blog, I needed to understand the conceptual and technical aspects of doing it and thus purchased a copy of Blogging for Dummies. Unfortunately, I only got halfway through it before purchasing my webhosting services from ‘GoDaddy’, my ‘Word Press’ site, and my unique web domain name/URL (Uniform Resource Locator). When initially setting up the Big Words Blog Site, I realized that none of the social media buttons that were available on the Examiner and other websites were visible on my site. After going to back into Blogging for Dummies, I learned that these were called ‘plugins’, and there were multiple free options to choose from in the Word Press store.

I chose the Word Press Social Sharing Optimization plugin because it gave me and my readers the buttons for the social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, Tumbler, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Reddit, Buffer and others. Though I didn’t understand it at the time, I also read that the information captured by these buttons – the ‘likes/shares’ were called the ‘metadata’ described above which updates in real time whenever someone likes or shares your work.

As a writer, until you’ve built up your audience in the way of a Twitter following or through subscribership, your metadata is critical in terms of knowing the popularity of your content. It also tells new visitors to your site how others have reacted to your work. Many readers click on your content and read it, but don’t necessarily comment. Ideally, you’ll get clicks, likes/shares and comments from each reader, but that’s not always the case.

My Blog’s First Cyberattack

Up until early February of 2018, I didn’t really have any significant issues with my Word Press site. Well actually, there was one instance where I temporarily broke it by continuously adding and removing one of the plugins, probably for something cosmetic. Afterwards, the site wouldn’t load, but fortunately my webhost, GoDaddy, restored its settings from the previous day as they were continuously backing it up; something I recommend for all bloggers and website owners.

My first cyberattack came on a Saturday morning (or probably the night before). I had just published my interview with Dr. Cedric Bright, and it was getting lots of clicks and views based upon support from people in his network. I woke up that Saturday morning to an unfortunate surprise. My site, which I had opened and logged into hundreds and maybe thousands of times, was now ‘redirecting’ to a site I was unfamiliar with in the United Kingdom. After contacting my webhost, GoDaddy, it was determined that some form of ‘malware’ had infiltrated my site causing it to redirect. I hadn’t significantly invested in any security measures up to that point and to make a long story short, there were numerous entry points that the malware could have entered. In the meantime, all my operations had ground to a screeching halt.

As GoDaddy set out to fix my site, days went on and I pondered whether I might have to start the Big Words Blog Site all over from scratch, which would have taken a little bit of work because all the pieces were saved in various folders. And all of the comments I received on some of my most popular pieces would have been gone, as well as all of my metadata from the previous two years. It took about almost two weeks, but GoDaddy was able to remove the malware and I could use my site again. There was yet another surprise though.

SSL Certificates and Losing My Metadata

Once my site had been salvaged, I realized something was missing – the metadata for my social media plugins. My cover page, for example, had approximately 8,500 Facebook likes/shares prior to the cyberattack and now the number was zero. When I called GoDaddy initially to inquire about why my site was redirecting, the associate kindly pointed out that Saturday morning that my site didn’t have an ‘SSL Certificate’, something I hadn’t paid attention to out of the thousands of websites I’d visited in my lifetime.

SSL is an acronym for ‘Secure Sockets Layer’, a global standard security technology that enables encrypted communication between a web browser and a web server. My URL (Uniform Resource Locator) was an http and not an https, where the ‘s’ designates the possession of an SSL Certificate. I was informed that I would need the SSL Certificate for my site to gain a much better standing in Google’s search algorithm. Hearing this, I bought the certificate, and my site was likewise converted to an https from an http.

Restoring My Metadata

The reason all of my social media likes and shares disappeared was because of the very thing I had just paid for, my SSL Certificate which converted my site to an https instead of http. The problem is that the Facebook plugin on my site was created under the http. When I converted to the https, Facebook no longer recognized the 8,500 likes/shares from my plugin because it was now essentially a different URL. From a technical standpoint, the “Application Programming Interface” (API) between my blogging platform and the social media sites was altered.

How was I going to get my 8,500 likes and shares back? Could I get them back? Needless to say, I was very frustrated and didn’t know how I’d solve this problem. At some point I had a ‘lightbulb moment’ and decided to simply ask Google. It turned out that I wasn’t the only blogger to encounter this quagmire, and another quick Google search led me to an article with a bunch comments which ultimately led me a company called Social Warfare. Social Warfare sold their own social media plugins and had a feature through their ‘pro package’ which allowed metadata to be retrieved when bloggers like myself unknowingly converted from an http to an https designation.

By purchasing the new Social Warfare Pro Plugins package I now had a plan for restoring my metadata. After uploading the pro plan’s Zip file, I activated the function to retrieve my data and anxiously watched as the numbers gradually ticked upwards, which they did for the most part over a series of days. All throughout my site, the Facebook likes were restored, and I was at ease for a little while until the next set of challenges emerged.

Conclusions

In closing, I think it’s worth noting that while I approached starting my blog as a personal project, you can also hire someone to do it who has all the expertise, assuming you have funds to invest in those services. That may save you some of the ups and downs I described in this piece. You may save some time, but you also won’t learn those valuable lessons. It’s essentially one of life’s many tradeoffs. I think it’s also worth noting that based upon my science training, which was technology intensive and involved learning new methods and techniques on the fly, I felt equipped to build my platform myself once I learned about the available applications and tools.

I was fortunate to be able to monetize my blogging platform in 2017 and build a business around it. I’ve learned that, as a business owner, one has to problem solve and think of creative solutions when disaster strikes without warning (which is usually how it strikes). Sometimes it is creating the solution on your own, and sometimes the solution is out there, and you only need the intellectual curiosity to find it.

The other thing is that you’re forced to learn and evolve when things go wrong unexpectedly, and it did in this instance with my blogging platform. In addition to some of these technical aspects I learned about running a blogging platform in this post (an ongoing process), I also wanted to communicate these general lessons I learned about running a business, and I hope you were able to get something out of this blogger’s tale. Look for more in the future and thank you for reading this.

If you’ve found value here and think it would benefit others, please share it and/or leave a comment. To receive all the most up to date content from the Big Words Blog Site, subscribe using the subscription box in the right-hand column in this post and throughout the site. You can follow me now on YouTube on any of my Big Discussions76 channels, the Big Words Blog Site Facebook page, and Twitter at @BWArePowerful. Lastly you can follow me on Instagram at @anwaryusef76.

Should Your Small Business Look To Outsource?

Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. While a business may be started with specific products and services in mind, seldom is it equipped to have everything it needs to complete its mission, hence the need for outsourcing. The following contributed post is entitled, Should Your Small Business Look To Outsource?

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When it comes to setting up a business and ensuring success, then there will be a time when hiring really is critical. Even if you start small, as a one-person operation, hiring is inevitable. To do well in business, you need to have teams that are going to help and support. The whole hiring process, no matter if you choose full-time or part-time employees is really important, as you want to have the right person for the job.

Although the process is important, it is not something that is easy. If you want to expand and grow what you do, then you will need to have more and more people on-board. Of course, this can help to grow the business, but it also means more costs for wages, as well as additional things like insurance for employees and sick pay, and so on. As this is a consideration, you could also look to hire people to do work for you that are not part of an in-house team. When you outsource to a company or an individual, you just pay for the task that is required, and there is no more commitment. If they do a good job, then you know who to use again. If they don’t, then you know to not hire them again, making it much simpler in many ways than having a full-time employee.

If your business has not thought about outsourcing before, then here are some of the things that you could outsource for, and when you should outsource. Getting it right will help to save the business money in the long-term, as well as help to keep the business thriving.

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Tasks where you lack expertise

Businesses can vary so much, and as a small business owner, you might not have any previous experience in this area. So there may be some aspects of business that you have no idea about. Areas like social media are a good idea for small business, especially from a digital marketing point of view. However, if you have a small team, then you’re likely to not have the time or expertise to run it successfully, as an example. In the same way, you will need bookkeeping and accounts for your business, but if no one is experienced in this, then outsourcing this will help massively, and be something that you no longer need to think about. If you hired a full-time accountant to do this for you, there wouldn’t be enough work to fill a full-time role, and it would cost a lot more than using a separate company or person to do this for you.

Time consuming tasks

Likewise, outsourcing tasks to someone else can be a good idea, especially for any tasks that are time consuming. There are a number of tasks in business that can take up a lot of time, but that aren’t too taxing or vital to business, they just need to be done. Your expertise should be doing the tasks that are the things helping to grow the business, rather than the smaller and more time consuming tasks. For example, you might take a lot of phone orders or customer service calls. These calls could be taken by a business answering service, rather than paying for a full-time employee to do it all. There are a range of tasks, and it will vary from business to business, but it is worth looking into if you are hoping to propel your business forward.

If you are deciding whether or not to outsource or to hire someone to your team, then there are a number of things to think about. It starts by taking a look at your business needs, as there are a number of advantages to both options, as well as disadvantages of both options. It is important to not get too caught up in the different activities that could happen, and which of those you should or shouldn’t hire or outsource too. You could have some expertise in a particular area, such as accounting, for example. But if you take on a lot of other roles, being the accountant as well might be too much. So even if you have a team of people with experience in something in particular, you might still choose to outsource.

Look at your business and the people in it specifically. Look at the needs and then decide what areas will be a benefit to you if you outsource, or which really do need to have an in-house team member. Assess the tasks, weigh up the costs, and your options, and then go from there.

4 Ways To Advance Your Business Career & Get Ahead

Three focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money, Business/Entrepreneurship and Career Discussions. If you’re in a business career, there nuances to it and there are unique aspects to advancing. Not everyone entering this career knows what those keys are. The following contributed post is entitled, 4 Ways To Advance Your Business Career & Get Ahead.

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Working in the business world, no matter the industry, is a tough but also rewarding job. You likely have a lot of responsibilities to handle on any given day but are learning a lot and trying to make a name for yourself, so it’s all worth it.

The truth is that it’s only worth it if you’re getting better each day and learning and growing as an individual and professional. You must find ways to advance your business career if you want to get ahead and find long-term success. The following ideas and tips will help guide you to knowing where to focus your time and energy to ensure you’re rewarded for your hard work.

1. Focus on Professional Development

One way to advance your business career and get ahead is to focus on your own professional development. Figure out ways to advance your skills and knowledge such as taking Business analytics certification courses that will allow you to learn new information and set yourself apart from the competition. With this knowledge, you’ll be able to take on additional projects and tasks at work and prove to others that you have what it takes to succeed in business.

2. Find A Mentor

It’s also a wise move to find a mentor who can guide you to making good decisions about your business career and in your current job. Advance your business career and get ahead by bouncing ideas off your mentor about how to proceed and what to focus on that will have a real impact on your professional path. Learn from this person and ask about what mistakes they made so you can avoid doing the same.

3. Discuss Your Goals & Performance with Your Boss

It may be that you’re doing well at work but are feeling a bit lost. To get ahead and advance your career, you must know where you’re heading and have a clear path to success. Therefore, sit down and discuss your goals and performance thus far with your boss. Let them know that you’re serious about your job and career and what you’re doing to ensure that you continue to progress and get better in your role. Ask about the possibility of a promotion in the future and what you need to do to get it or be in the running for it.

4. Always be Networking

Another way to advance your business career and get ahead is to always be networking. It’s a line of work where who you know matters a great deal. It’s beneficial for you to know as many people as possible and make sure they know who you are and about your talents. Update your online professional profiles and reach out and introduce yourself to those who you find interesting and you believe can offer you some good advice. Attend conferences and events outside of your workplace and get to know those in the business so they think of you when career opportunities arise that may be the right fit for you.

These Tips will Help you to Make your Very First Investment

Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. If you haven’t started, learning to invest your money is a smart, but also a potentially perilous undertaking if you don’t know what you’re doing. There are lots of books, teachers and programs out there encouraging us to invest but many people don’t know where to start. The following contributed post is entitled, These Tips will Help you to Make your Very First Investment.

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Making your very first investment can be a daunting task to say the least. You may find that your mind flashes back to the very first global crises and market dips. This is understandable, but at the end of the day, you have to make sure that you do everything you can to move past this or you may end up stunting your own potential. If you want to make a positive change then this guide will tell you everything you need to know.

Set some Goals

Before you even begin thinking about making your first investment, you need to figure out why you are investing. You need to start out with a specific life goal, whether it’s your wedding or even your retirement. Don’t throw up a number, do your research and try to be a bit specific about it if you can. Online calculators can easily help you to figure out your investment strategy and it can also help you to really make the most out of your finances overall. Your goals may well change over time and there is nothing wrong with this, but at least you have a tangible reward that you can try and push for.

Source: Pexels (CC0 License)

Work Out a Timeline

Next up, you have to figure out what timeline you are going to have to reach your goal. This will help you to figure out how much you need to put away. As a general rule, it helps to follow the 50-30-20 strategy. This is where 50% of your income goes towards your living expenses. 30% of your money will be for discretionary spending and 20% will then go away for your savings. This amount may vary of course, depending on your goal and your overall time horizon. Often, the more money you can put into your investment, the better. This is all because of compound interest. This will enable you to earn way more interest on your returns. That being said, you have to make sure that you understand what you can afford. If you start baking into your plan that you are eventually going to have a great career and can therefore put away more, then you will end up being disappointed. Start with what you know you have right now and adjust it later on. If you do this, then you will soon find that you can come out on top with ease.

Understand your Risk Tolerance

Alongside your timeline, you need to put in the work to increase your risk tolerance. This is especially the case for medical device investors. If you are a millennial, your objectives will be quite long-term in the overall nature. There isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach here, so if you are an investor, you have to make sure that you are true to yourself where possible. If you know that you are not comfortable with what you are doing so far then you will end up making the wrong investment.

Diversify

When you have managed to pin down your goal and your strategy overall, it’s then time for you to work out the best vehicle for your investment needs. For a lot of first-time investors, this will be an index fund which is passively managed. This will give you access to a lot of market indices or even a low-cost digital manager who will go ahead and make your portfolio for you on your behalf. The most important element that you have to look for however is diversification. You need to try and get exposure to a lot of different asset classes, whether they are equities, bonds or even property. You need to have a portfolio that is diversified enough so you don’t lose sleep if something was to happen.

Remember about Fees

Digital wealth platforms have really helped to lower the entry barriers to the investment world. That being said, you will still need to pay fees. If you go for a wealth managing platform, then you will end up paying more as well. If you want to get the best result out of your investing experience, then you need to try and opt for a platform where you don’t have to pay an exit fee. If you can do this, then you will soon find that you have way more flexibility over your investment and that you can also really help yourself to take things to that next level in terms of your overall profit margin. If you have never invested before or if you want to try and experiment a little before you lock yourself in, then it is a good idea for you to start up a demo account. When you do this, you will soon find that you can experiment with a virtual currency, so you don’t have to worry about a thing at all there.

Forget about It

The last step for investors would be for you to forget about your investment. A lot of platforms that can be used to invest now give you some kind of on-demand performance overview. Observing your portfolio is a good way for you to monitor the amount of risk you are facing, but that being said, it’s important to ensure that it does not disrupt your strategy overall. You need to check your investments on a quarterly rota if possible. If you can do this, then you will ensure that you are not making any mistakes by leaving your investment for too long and you also eliminate the risk of pulling out of an investment impatiently. Of course, there are many benefits to investing, but at the end of the day, you also have to make sure that you are exploring the right options and that you are also taking the right steps to safeguard yourself against any risk. If you can ensure that this is the case, then you can easily hire an advisor. When you do, they can help you to stay on top of anything you might need to know, and
they can also work with you to ensure that you are taking the right steps to protect your portfolio.

How Owning A Corporation Massively Adds To Your Wealth

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“Corporations aren’t just nice titles that companies have. They have real legal status and can have a massive impact on the amount of tax that you wind up paying.”

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Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. Becoming wealthy doesn’t come of out of nowhere. There is a lot of planning and strategizing involved and a part of that involves creating business structures such as corporations. The following contributed post is entitled, How Owning A Corporation Massively Adds To Your Wealth.

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What’s the secret of the rich?

It’s not (usually) meeting in darkened rooms and plotting how to take over the world. And it’s (usually) not exploiting people endlessly.

Instead, it’s using a legal tool called a corporation.

Corporations aren’t just nice titles that companies have. They have real legal status and can have a massive impact on the amount of tax that you wind up paying.

The Value Of Corporations

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Let’s say that you sell lifestyle coaching services online.

If you operate as a sole trader, you have to pay full income taxes – regardless of what you do with the money you receive.

However, when you own a corporation, it’s a different story. You only pay taxes on earnings net of your expenses. And there are many accepted accounting practices you can use to reduce your liabilities.

The wealthy use corporations as a kind of shield from high rates of taxation to protect themselves from income taxes and to increase the amount of money they can invest.

When a person owns a corporation, they pay a lower rate of tax on any money they make within the business. They can then plow this money into investments and draw down on their returns later, without having to pay tax on income first.

Yes – corporation owners still have to pay tax when taking dividends. But they often only do this once interest accumulates on their investments held within the company. And that means that the burden of taxation is actually a lot less than it would have been otherwise.

Corporation taxes are a big deal. Upper rate taxpayers usually pay around 50 percent of their income in various types of income taxes. But corporations only pay corporation tax rates on their earnings – usually a much more reasonable 20 percent or so.

Can you see the difference here? If you earn money outside of a corporation, your tax rate is much higher, and more of your income winds up going to the government. But when you protect your labor inside limited liability companies, you massively reduce your tax bills.

Wealth Is A Mindset

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Most workers don’t know about the benefits of corporations. And to the cynical observer, this seems deliberate. If everyone used these corporate vehicles, the state would have to find other ways to raise taxes, probably by increasing rates on companies.

But a lot of it has to do with mindset. People don’t see themselves as companies, and they don’t understand the advantage of using them for tax purposes.

In many ways, this is a reflection of mindset. A lot of individuals can’t imagine themselves as anything other than poor. And so they spend their entire lives working, instead of taking the steps necessary to improve their situation.

Acquiring a wealth mindset is all about seeing yourself in a different light.

If you’re the type of person who says things like “I’ll never earn more than X amount during my life,” then you probably have a scarcity mindset. You’re putting limits on what you can achieve.

Mostly, people who are victims of this mentality aren’t even aware they’re doing it. It’s all unconscious, but it informs the decisions they make daily.

The good news is that you can often change this inner belief to something more positive, even if you’re living in a state of literal poverty right now. It requires identifying the false beliefs that you hold and consciously disregarding them.

Once you change your mindset, the prospect of owning a company makes a lot of sense, even if you’re the only person in it. Before long, you’ll be building your company, your finances will be thriving, and you’ll be signing up with a private bank to grow your wealth. But you won’t be able to get there without believing that it’s possible.

Growth Is Also A Mindset

Owning a company also changes your mindset regarding growth too.

When you’re a sole trader, you come to believe that it’s you against the world. You’re by yourself.

But when you own a company, the psychology changes enormously. All of a sudden, you see opportunities to grow and expand, increasing your overall earnings significantly.

Remember, when you have a company, you limit your personal liabilities. Thus, you can take risks that would seem unthinkable as a sole trader. If things go wrong, your house and car are not on the line.

That’s another reason the rich absolutely love limited companies. They allow them to privatize the gains from enterprise while socializing the losses.

If a company doesn’t make money, it’s no big deal. Administrators come in and liquidate all the assets the company owns, and the entrepreneur walks away with their house, car, and private investments intact.

It seems like a crazy setup – and it is – but again, most people don’t know about it. They’re still going about their lives, believing that working for a corporation is the only option. That’s not true. Being a corporation is a much better strategy.

Think about how your attitude toward growth would change if your investments were less risky. All of a sudden, you’d start thinking of ways to expand your services and hire more people. Ultimately, you’d look for ways to make more money and get ahead of the curve.

Plot Your Own Path

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Another reason people struggle with their finances and don’t set up corporations is that they’re following the path other people have laid out for them.

Again, this is a big no-no.

Most wealthy people do not follow the advice of others. Instead, they rely on their own judgment and use it to chart a new course that nobody has tried before.

And, for the most part, that involves owning a corporation in one form or another.

Remember, corporations offer so many advantages over traditional sole trader status or partnerships. And that makes them incredibly flexible. You can, for instance, sell goods in multiple countries but only pay taxes in one. Or take out loans in your company’s name, not your own, to get the equipment you need to thrive.

So, in summary, corporations are tools that you can use to massively add to your wealth. They protect you against risk and tax while allowing you to build wealth and expand.