Contributed Posts – Page 180 – The Big Words Blog Site

New Car Tech From CES 2019

A key focus of my blog is Technology. As our world continues to technologically evolve, the automotive industry is evolving right along with it. Many of the new automotive tech will be showcased for the first time at the Consumer Electronics Show. The following contributed post is thus entitled, New Car Tech From CES 2019.

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The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is almost upon us and, as a result, automakers all over the world are releasing teasers for what’s in store for 2019, a year when many expect to see big leaps forward in automotive tech.

Let’s take a look at what the various car makers are promising and what we can get excited about in the days to come.

Emotional Recognition Technology

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When face recognition technology first began to mature back in 2014, technologists predicted that it wouldn’t be long before it could start assessing our moods. And lo and behold, that’s precisely what happened. AI-powered technology soon learned what a stressed-out or happy human looked like and could theoretically be programmed to respond.

The market applications of this weren’t clear before, but now Kia has introduced what it calls an “emotional recognition system” that’s designed to pick up on cues from drivers and then adjust things like lighting automatically. No, the mood options are not yet installed on any Kia vehicles, but the company will be showcasing the technology using a pod at CES this year. Visitors can try the system, whether they’re feeling happy, sad, angry or pretty much indifferent. https://www.zigwheels.com/ gives more details.

A Modular Car

Mercedes-Benz has long been at the forefront of automotive technology, but at this year’s CES, the car company is looking for a way to outdo itself once again. It’s come up with such a wacky concept that it’s hard to imagine how it would work in practice, but the company wants to push the idea nonetheless.

The idea is for a modular car. The car would be small – perhaps only large enough for a single occupant – but would have an expandable bay at the rear so that people could take more luggage with them when they wanted to. The car would also run on batteries, making it one of the smallest cars in the world. It’s clear that the vehicle is inspired by Smart, a subsidiary of Mercedes that produces small, compact, eco-friendly city cars.

New Autonomous Tech

Flickr by Steve Jurvetson

No, we’re not likely to see fully self-driving cars from any of the major manufacturers anytime soon, but companies are looking at ways to make life safer. According to emrochandkilduff.com/fredericksburg/virginia-automobile-accident-lawyer/, car manufacturers still have a long way to go to protect drivers and pedestrians. But Audi says that it’s working on technology that will expand on the current array of autonomous driving options to help protect pedestrians too. Audi says that it will be introducing sensors that will help prevent an accident involving a collision with a pedestrian, as well as other road users.
The car company also wants to update its infotainment system to make it less demanding to use while on the road. Expect to see gesture technology as well as voice activation.

CES looks like it’s going to be another interesting year for the automotive sector as it plays catch up with the tech industry. Greater integration with tech products is leading to more opportunities to improve the driving experience.

How Can You Tell If Your Customers Like You

Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. No matter what you business is, your customers are you lifeblood. Sales are the ultimate indicator of whether or they like your products and services, but today there other ways to gauge this. The following contributed is thus entitled, How Can You Tell If Your Customers Like You.

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Businesses need to know whether what they’re doing is the right thing. But what actually constitutes “the right thing” can be difficult to ascertain. Customers are often mysterious creatures and won’t willingly write a report on company performance.

How your company performs in the eyes of customers, though, is paramount. It’s customers who ultimately decide whether the company lives or dies and whether you end up making money in the end. If they don’t like what you’re selling, your bottom line will suffer, and you could ultimately go out of business.

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Companies need to do marketing research to find out whether customers actually like their product, but that process itself is fraught with difficulties. For starters, people are getting tired of filling out endless surveys and reviews online for products that they buy. It’s hard enough finding the products you want and ordering them, let alone writing an in-depth article about their features and how they measured up (although some people do this).

Customers want easier options when it comes to writing reviews, and often just want to give a star-rating out of five. But that doesn’t tend to help companies all that much who need specific feedback about the features of their products. Yes, it gives an overall impression that customers are happy, but not much more than that.

Working out whether customers like something that you do can, therefore, be a challenge. But, as a business owner or manager, there are still plenty of pieces of information that you can use to tell you whether what you’ve created is remarkable or not. Take a look at the following.

Your Customers Keep Coming Back

Okay sure, your customers don’t give you direct, detailed feedback. But if they keep on coming back for more, then it’s sure sign that you’re doing the right thing.

You can see this “coming back for more” effect playing out in some of the world’s most successful companies. Apple, for instance, has seen customers returning year after year each time it releases a new iPhone. For many years after the release of the original iPhone back in 2007, news outlets reported on how Apple was attracting queues of people at midnight for the launch of its new product. Although this has come down from the fever-pitch levels of a few years back, Apple is still riding the same wave. People just love its products and keep coming back for more.

What’s so surprising about companies like Apple is that customers don’t keep coming back because of low prices – the logic of many business leaders today. Instead, they come back because they know that they’re going to get a service that they can’t get anywhere else. Only Apple can do Apple.

In some ways, it’s almost like people can’t live without their Apple products. Life without an iPhone or Mac seems so far removed from how life should be that customers don’t even entertain the possibility of not having one of the company’s products. Regular businesses can take advantage of this idea too: they can harp on about how critical their products are to their customers’ worlds, and how living without them would be a nightmare.

The final thing that keeps customers coming back is usually the uniqueness of the product or customer experience. Obviously, if you’re an online retailer, it’s not as easy to differentiate your product as it would be if you were a product manufacturer, like Apple, but you can still focus on the customer experience elements that keep people coming back. One of the reasons Walmart has been so successful over the years has been its strategy of always welcoming customers in its stores and trying to serve them on an individual basis, even though it is going for the mass market. People will come back if they enjoy the overall experience and will weigh this against the prices on offer.

Your Customers Talk About What You Do

How can you tell that customers like Tesla Motors? Because they talk about the company of their own volition. People love the products and the ethos of the company, and they’re more than willing to spread the word about the firm’s products on Tesla’s behalf with no direction from the company itself.

Tesla is an unusual business in so many ways. But perhaps the most remarkable thing about it is that it has hardly spent any money on marketing at all. All its spare cash has gone into expanding its production and paying off debts, and it relies almost exclusively on the work of the community to promote its products.

Companies who can delight customers so much that they go out and start spreading the word themselves always win. People are far more likely to believe the claims of their peers than they are the company, and so customer marketing is usually a lot more effective. If you can get your customers to form a community around your business and get them to spread the word about your products, then you’re likely to win big.

Keep an eye on social media sites like YouTube which have high engagement. See whether there are any opportunities for you to reach out to influencers who would be willing to make videos extolling the virtues of your products.

Happy Customers Will Tell You They Like You

It’s hard to know what silent customers are thinking. Sure, they might love your business, or they might hate it, but it’s more likely to be that they are indifferent to it. Although that’s not a disaster, it’s also not the best possible situation.

Customers who are enthralled by your products will tell you about it. Unsolicited positive feedback is a sure sign that you’re doing something right and that you’ve adopted an approach customers like. People aren’t used to receiving impeccable service from companies most of the time, and so if you can deliver, you’re likely to find out about it. Keep track of individual customer stories and see whether a pattern emerges. Ask yourself what they like and what they don’t.

How to Create a Cheap But Effective Website

One of the focuses of my blog is Technology. Whether you’re a business owner, or you’re a blogger, you’ll need to set up a website of some sort. Either you’re going to want something high-tech with all the bells and whistles, or you’re going to want something more on the simple side. Either way you was something effective and the following contributed post is entitled, How to Create a Cheap But Effective Website.

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If you’re looking to create a cheap but effective website, you are not alone, indeed the proliferation of low cost website builders designed for amateurs with no technical experience to build a functional site without the overwhelm of having to learn coding is testament to how many people are looking to create a cheap but effective website that they can create on their own.

The reality is that if you are looking for an “effective website” we need to dig a little deeper to work out what is meant by the term effective, as when it comes to professional website development, the first step in the process is often referred to as requirements analysis – meaning a specification can be created.

You may think you know what you want, but sometimes, we don’t fully know what we want even though we think we do – because we don’t know what we don’t know. For instance, if you aren’t aware of the negative effect a website that loads in over 3 seconds will have on user engagement, then you won’t define site speed as a requirement within your specification. In fact, when it comes to creating a website on your own, you might not even think you need a specification.

In this article, therefore, we’re going to take a look at four different ways to go about creating a cheap but effective website.

1. DIY WEBSITE EDITOR
You can use a WYSIWYG editor (what you see if what you get) such as Wix.com to create a basic website that is simple to design as it uses drag and drop technology. This way, the clever code that runs in the background is none of your concern – you literally build your website up from a blank canvas, importing objects such as videos, text and images or you could even use a predefined template that you can customise to your requirements.

This approach is best suited to small business owners that are looking for a simple site that can be easily managed and adjusted.

2. WORDPRESS
WordPress is a CMS (content management system) that many business websites are powered by. WordPress is more complicated than something like Wix, yet it allows a lot more functionality. The reality is that if you are completely new to website design and are looking for something cheap but effective, Wix might be the best option, yet if you are looking for something with greater functionality then wordpress will be your go-to solution.

3. HIRE A FREELANCER
The next step up, is a little more costly yet will save a lot of headaches and time. You can head to places like Fiverr or freelancer.com and find a cheap freelance developer to outsource the design of your website. This is the best solution for those with a slightly larger budget that have less time, or less inclination to sit and design something themselves.

4. HIRE A WEB DEVELOPMENT COMPANY
The best bet if you’re looking for a decent website is to work with a web development company, yet, this can be an expensive option. That said, it can save a lot of time, money and frustration in the long run – as the frustration many people experience in working with a remote freelancer makes many wish they had just gone to a well established web development company and paid a little extra to avoid all the hassle.

A Teaching Moment: Boosting Your Career In Education

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“If you’ve chosen a career in the development and education of young minds; you’ll understand how rewarding a job in teaching can be.”

Buffer

Two focuses of my blog are Career Discussions and General Education. While very important and rewarding, a career in education can be very, very challenging at times. Some teachers burn out and leave the field altogether, while others ascend into administration. No matter what your aspirations are as an educator, it’s important to think about your career in depth and set yourself up to succeed. The following contributed post is therefore entitled, A Teaching Moment: Boosting Your Career In Education.

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If you’ve chosen a career in the development and education of young minds; you’ll understand how rewarding a job in teaching can be. However, education also brings its challenges, and sometimes, you’ll have to deal with stressful situations. If you’re keen to work through the various highs and lows of your job role; you have longevity in teaching and enjoy your career until retirement. Some people find themselves wondering how to boost their career further, due to job dissatisfaction and lack of prospects. There are ways to push ahead with your career in education; you just have to know where to look and what to do. The following are some tips and ideas for those who want to give their job role a helping hand for a long and rewarding career in the educational field.

Image source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/people-notes-meeting-team-7095/

More Learning

The more adept you are to handle your class; the better you’ll be able to gain their respect and influence their educational choices, and you’ll be an appealing candidate for an academic recruitment firm. Therefore, if you’re feeling a little stagnant in your teaching role; consider furthering your qualifications, utilizing those skills, and start the next step in your job journey. Take a look at the information available online to understand how specialized courses and qualifications will help to open all sorts of career doors for you. The more strings to your bow you obtain; the better chance you have at a promotion or a fresh job placement altogether.

Perhaps there are certain areas of your job that you do not feel as strong as you’d like to; research into courses you can complete and all the avenues that are in place aimed to strengthen those elements of your career. You’ll be able to walk into the classroom with confidence, and your head held high, knowing that you’ve worked hard to get where you are and to have the knowledge and expertise that will benefit your class of students.

Another great way to continue your learning is to learn from others who have experience in teaching. Christopher M Hardin is someone who has decades of teaching experience that he wants to share with others.

New Methods

If you’re struggling with your current teaching methods, and the information isn’t sinking in with your class; don’t be afraid to try something new. As long as you are teaching the required lesson, and sticking to school guidelines; you should experiment with tried and tested techniques that may seem unconventional. Do your research so that you can look for some innovative ways to teach kids, and get some inspiration to take into your own classroom. Everything from role play, to playing classical music during lessons has been utilized in the education of young minds; so be the teacher that people remember and start seeing the improvements to your pupil’s education and grades that can happen as a result.

Social Connections

If you’re struggling with one particular individual, that doesn’t seem to want to learn or be there; it’s worth investigating into their life outside the classroom. Look for significant behavioral changes and issues that may have arisen that has led to difficulties, and let them know that you’re a friendly ear if they need help, or simply to talk. The more time you put into your lessons and the welfare of your students, the better your relationship with them will be, and the quicker they’ll learn what’s needed.

Big Tech Wants To Create Software To Keep You Safe. But Will It?

A major focus of my blog is Technology. Today there are numerous new technological advances which were designed with the intent of increasing safety. What are some of these new technologies? The following contributed post is entitled, Big Tech Wants To Create Software To Keep You Safe. But Will It?

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Although the news around big tech, especially the Facebook scandal, is overwhelmingly negative, there’s no denying the fact that software has the potential to keep us safe. But exactly how companies intend to do this remains a mystery for many people, so here are some of the applications of software that are already keeping you safer and doing a good job of it.

Door Alarm Software

Over the last few years, specific IoT applications have gained traction in the market, including door alarms. Rather than just having an alarm next to the door which sounds if somebody tries to break and enter, new technology now allows homeowners to get alerts direct to their phone telling them that somebody is trying to gain access to their home.

Companies, like Ring, take this one step further by integrating camera technology. People can see the person at their front door and talk to them through their devices, no matter where they happen to be. Not only does this discourage burglary, but it also creates a record of people that have been to the front door: helpful in a possible investigation.

Blind-Spot Sensing

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Data from Aitken Aitken Cohn trial lawyers suggests that there were more than 3,100 fatal accidents in California alone last year. What’s more, around nine out of ten of those was the result of driver error.

Perhaps the most critical application of software technology, therefore, is in the realm of motor vehicles. New technologies are coming on board all the time which promise to keep drivers safer than they’ve ever been before. One of the most promising of these is the so-called blind-spot sensing technology. This is a kind of technology that will keep the car in a lane if it can sense a vehicle in the driver’s blind spot, even if the driver turns the steering wheel.

Facial Recognition

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In the modern world, keeping your data safe is just as important as keeping your property secure. Software is helping people to achieve this by reducing the traditional reliance on passwords and using alternative authentication methods instead.

Perhaps the most interesting of these is facial recognition. Already companies like Intel are using facial recognition (Intel uses an app called Security True Key) to unlock mobile devices if and only if they detect a person’s face. Although the technology sounds futuristic, advanced AI is enabling devices to recognize one person’s face from another based on a set of important input characteristics. Even small changes in the distance between the eyes can make a difference to whether the software decides that it is looking at the owner of the device or not. Expect this technology to make a big splash in the coming year.

Device Tracking

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The cloud opened up a whole new bunch of possibilities for people to protect their devices using their other devices. There are now apps like LoJack and Prey, which allow you to remotely secure devices that you may have misplaced. All you have to do is log onto the app on a trusted device and then instruct it to lock all linked devices – great if you ever leave your laptop on the train.

Moving Your Marketing Methods into the Modern World

Three of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money, Business/Entrepreneurship and Technology. In today’s digital world, it’s critical to understand how to use the modern technologies to market your brand and business. Not understanding how to do so could be life or death for your operations. The following contributed post is therefore entitled, Moving Your Marketing Methods into the Modern World.

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Nowadays marketing is way more than putting your business advert into a local newspaper or stocking up a sign in the post office. There are so many up and coming methods in the business world that it can be very difficult to keep up with the trends. When it comes to marketing there are so many ways in which your business could succeed or fail. Spending too much money or not being open minded might just be a few of your fall backs that could hinder your business success. Start considering some of the following modern day marketing methods and your business will be set up to thrive, even in the most crowded of industries.

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SEO Savviness

If you’re not already hot on SEO then now is the right time to start doing your research. There are many different ways that you can incorporate the SEO technique into your marketing strategies, one of which is Local SEO Citations. This will involve liaising with a dedicated account manager who will help you to launch your local SEO campaign, which will include everything from your location and phone number to the services you are offering. Getting your SEO on point will help people to find you more easily, so that you stand out from your competitors.

Brand Collaborations via Social Media

Finding a celebrity or blogger who can collaborate with your product and advertise it on the their social media is like gold dust. This is the type of marketing that is becoming hotter than ever right now, so it’s important that you take the right steps to get as involved as you can. Choose someone who is trustworthy and professional to market your product. You will need to negotiate a decent fee for each post and you will provide them with free products and services too. Getting this element of marketing just right will always give you the edge over your competition.

Reviews Mean Everything

It’s true that marketing can be overwhelming at times, so keeping mistakes to a minimum will always be your best bet. As well as minimizing your mistakes you might also want to call upon your previous happy customers to leave positive reviews about you. You can implement these wonderful words into your future marketing strategies and make sure that everybody who might be interesting in spending their money on your products or services can read them loud and proud.

Try to think outside the box when it comes to marketing your business. Whether you have been in this domain for years or you are just starting out, there are so many ways to capitalize on the online marketing world. Make sure you explore all of the options available to you, so that you aren’t leaving anything out. Take to social media and find some worthwhile brand ambassadors or ask your previous clients to leave roaring reviews of your products or services. There are so many ways for you to achieve greatness for your business so grab every marketing opportunity you can and run with it confidently.

Things You Should Consider Outsourcing In Your Business

Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. When running a business of any kind, no one can possibly know everything, and no can has the time to do everything. This underscores the importance of outsourcing. The following contributed post is thus entitled, Things You Should Consider Outsourcing In Your Business.

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When it comes to your business, if you’re like most business owners, outsourcing, although something you know is necessary, is often easier said than done. We business owners will make every excuse in the book, from not wanting to hand things off to someone who may do a bad job, to not being able to afford to hire someone when it comes to outsourcing, but the fact is, that in order to grow and scale your business, learning to let go and outsource the things that in your zone of genius are things that really need to be done.

The thing is about outsourcing is, that it will also free up your time to work on the things you’re good at and that make you money, but it will also help you make more money because even though you’ll be paying someone to do certain things, they’re going to be experts in these things so it will take them less time than it would take you, so you’ll be able to make money doing the things that are actually within your zone of expertise and genius.

If you know you have to outsource, but are struggling to decide which things you should start with, then in this post we’re going to share with you just what things you may want to consider outsourcing in your business.

Copywriting:

As much as business owners would like to believe that they’re great copywriters, it’s just not the case for most. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, because business owners aren’t supposed to be great at everything in their business. However, good copy is essential for your businesses marketing – especially if you want to stand out online, so this is definitely one of the things you should consider outsourcing. Whether it’s the website copy, or your newsletter, copywriters will know what to write to get you noticed as well as the best tools to use, such as plugins for tracking conversions, and newsletter templates from Postman, etc.

Graphic Design:

Like copywriting, graphic design is a certain skill that just not everyone has, but when done right it’s going to make a big difference in your business, so it’s also a good thing to outsource as soon you as you’re able to since it will be able to help make your business stand out by representing it in a good, positive way.

Admin:

Admin is not something that’s considered a money-making task in most businesses, yet it’s still a crucial part of the overall business to ensure it stays running as smoothly and efficiently as possible, so having good systems in place for your admin to keep things organized and running well is essential. Since this is likely not going to be your zone of genius or where your efforts are best spent, then outsourcing your admin tasks like replying to emails, setting up appointments and even creating filing systems and templates is definitely something that a good virtual assistant will be able to do for you and will complete in a fraction of the time that you’d be able to.

Make More Money in Less Time

A key focus of my blog is Financial Literacy/Money. If it interests you, growing your wealth typically involves leveraging the skill sets and time of others as opposed to doing everything yourself. The following contributed post is therefore entitled, Make More Money in Less Time.

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If you’re wanting to make more money in less time, then the first thing you are likely going to need to change is your paradigm around making money.

See, the majority of people trade their time for money in a very direct and linear way… for instance, if you consider the majority of jobs, they pay based on time input, whether that’s an hourly rate or an annual salary it is fundamentally calculated on the basis of the amount of hours you work.

The challenge with this, however, is that there are only so many hours in the day and there’s a cap to how much anyone can charge for each hour they work. Of course, you can upskill and gain greater expertise in order to charge more for each unit of time you offer – but even a highly skilled brain surgeon is capped to the number of operations they can physically do each day, week, month or year.

The brain surgeon and the janitor both have the same problem – they are trading their time for money, admittedly at different rates, but their problem is the same. If they want to make more money then they need to input more time.

Similarly, if you have a business that ships physical products the more products you sell the more time you will require putting things into cardboard shipping boxes – meaning, the more money you make the more time it takes, which is a recipe for not much of a lifestyle.

Therefore, many business owners find themselves working way too many hours – creating a business that might be turning over a decent profit, but is eating into their lives and the lifestyle they dream of.

The way to make more money in less time is very simple. You need to start leveraging assets; be that a financial asset such as a property that you rent out, a digital asset such as a blog that you sell advertising space on, an intellectual asset such as an invention or even an online course, or a business system where you leverage effort (e.g. own a big business with employees).

We’re now going to take a brief look at an example of how to make money via this model of leverage, as the most important thing to bear in mind throughout the examples above is the commonality they all share in that they leverage effort rather than your own time.

Let’s look at the example of property; here you simply find a property and you rent it out. Let’s say your mortgage is $1,000 a month and you rent it out for $1,250. You make $250 profit per month without having to do much at all… then, if you want to expand your income you simply expand your property portfolio – and in this sense you can have ten properties or one hundred; you don’t have to work any more hours to manage ten properties or a hundred… because you outsource the property management to a specialist company.

Meanwhile, it’s likely that your property will appreciate in value – so, whilst you are making your profit on each property, you’re also increasing your overall capital as the value of the house increases as does your net worth.

Advice For Starting Your Business

Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. If you only trained to work for someone else, then chances are you’re unaware of many of the skills necessary to start a business. The world of entrepreneurship is a world all its own with it’s own nuances. The following contributed post is thus entitled, Advice For Starting Your Business.

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Photo by rawpixel from Pixabay

Running a business can come with a number of issues that you are not familiar with before starting your company. At the end of the day, as a business owner your main priority will be your profit margins, but that doesn’t mean you should let the other things pass you by. Here is a look at some of the intricacies of running a company that might help you further down the line.

Starting Your Business

When starting your business, you need to ensure that a number of important details are ticked off your checklist. Firstly you must decide what your business name is going to be and under which of the four possible legal structures you are going to set up under. They are as follows:

● Sole Proprietor
● Partnership
● Limited Liability Company (LLC)
● Corporation

Once you are familiar with these types of structures and know which one is the right option for you, then it is time to start writing your business plan and opening a company bank account. However, before you open a bank account you should register your company with your government in order to get an identification number. It is vital that you follow the rules when it comes to registering your company because an incorrect registration or none at all will cause your business severe problems in the future.

In addition to making sure your company is registered, you should also start looking into and obtaining any permits that you require to start work. Once again these depend on your structure and type of business, so research your needs before pursuing permits. These might need to be obtained at a nation or federal level and a state level so be prepared for plenty of paperwork. The same applies to obtaining your business license which is a requirement in most cities.

Photo by geralt from Pixabay

Employees

Should you require them then the next logical step is to start hiring employees so that you can start production in your chosen field. There are several things to remember when hiring staff, many of them to do with tax and payments. Motivating your staff is one thing to consider in the future, but there is no greater demotivation than not being paid.

Once again there are a number of legal hoops for you to jump through, this time you only have to get these licenses if you intend on hiring staff, do make sure you are doing the right thing. You should also look into what your business can do at a local level when it comes to things like taxes and healthcare. There are usually many different types of initiatives on offer but you must find them for yourself, such as in the UK they offer a Construction Industry Scheme that assists contractors ensure the tax of their subcontractors is paid. There are similar schemes in other parts of the world and taking the time to find them will be a great assistant to you.

Starting A Restaurant: The Short Guide

Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. Food is something we all enjoy and if you have a niche in the restaurant business, you can make a lot of money. That said, there are certain important considerations for this class of business. The following contributed post is thus entitled, Starting A Restaurant: The Short Guide.

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There are always guides out there about starting a business, and the steps are largely the same: write a business plan, get funding, market your business and open to the public. These are the core steps that every business in every industry needs to follow. When it comes to starting a restaurant, you have all of those steps plus more.

The way that we enjoy our meals out has changed massively in the last ten years. We want new cuisines and quirkier ways to eat it. From fine dining in restaurants with a dress code, to the delicious burgers from a street food van, customers want something new. If you have the right restaurant idea and the funding, then you can bring your service to the high street, but you need to consider your time, money, legalities and the commitment that is required to be successful in this industry.

After you have decided on your concept, gained your funding and started your market research, you next need to think about the premises that you need for your business idea. This is largely down to the fact that you need to fit in people, plus a kitchen area and commercial refrigeration installation alongside dishwashers, ovens and sinks. So, while you need to consider what your restaurant looks like from the outside, none of that is any good if you have no room for what you need where the customers won’t be allowed. Your premises has to meet the expectations of your customers, your staff, your energy consumption, your ability to provide good, well-cooked food and it has to be clean, too.

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Once you have your location locked in, you need to go back to the start. Your funding has to cover everything from premises rental costs to the utilities that you pay out for. These are a huge contribution to rising business costs, and the running costs of the restaurant or food service truck are the biggest overheads for your business. Do your research properly into all of the various energy companies out there and make sure that you compare the prices across the board. You want to work well with your suppliers, and that includes your utilities suppliers, too.

An efficient food service business needs the right equipment, and we’ve already mentioned refrigeration installation, but you also have to think about the smaller apparatus that will keep your business going. You need to start researching suppliers of this equipment when you are setting out your budgets for your finances, because without the right budget in mind, you have no idea which suppliers will work for you. Customer service has to be a hugely deciding factor in choosing your suppliers. You need to know that you can work closely with them and that your restaurant is a priority for them.

Starting a restaurant isn’t going to be something that is easy, but it’s going to be so worth it if you manage to keep on top of it.