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How to Streamline Your Business and Reduce Expenses

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Streamline your Business|How to Streamline Your Business and Reduce ExpensesStreamlining is in every business’s best interest. Operating a clunky business is costly. You need to pay to keep all the essential components together and juggle with operations. It’s a nightmare both for outright costs and for time wasted. Despite what many businesses may think, there is a very good chance that they are inefficient in at least one way.

Audit Your Business

Any efforts you make before auditing your business have the potential to have been a complete waste of your time and resources. You might know of a problem, yes, but without that audit, you don’t know why it is a problem or what the best method is to go about fixing it. The best solution might be to improve a different area of your business entirely. Until you do an audit, you will never know.

Automate Your Business

Auditing your business will give you a clear idea of what needs to be done. In most cases, automating specific tasks will immensely improve your business and employee relations. You just need to know which tasks to automate to see the most significant improvements. Data management systems are incredibly clever and can help make steps that took minutes or even hours and days take seconds. HR, inventory, and data collection are three areas that often see the most significant improvement in productivity when automation is introduced.

Invest in Closed-Loop Systems

Waste is waste. If you manufacture items, you want to make use of the scraps and cut-offs just as much as the main bulk of the virgin material. If distilling is included in your process, then you will want a closed-loop system that will reduce loss and help you optimize your manufacturing process. Do try to choose items that work together. Your new pdx.gold extraction unit should work with the rest of your system, for example.

Make Money Out of Your Waste

Following on the closed-loop suggestion is to make money out of your waste. You won’t always be able to recapture raw materials in a closed-loop machine. Instead, you will want to look at creating a closed-loop business partnership. Find businesses that need your scrap and waste and are willing to pay for it. If your scraps are metal, paper, or other similar raw materials, then you can make money back on an item you used to have to pay to dispose of.

Invest in Regular Training

If you want your workplace to be efficient, your employees need to know the best way to do that. This applies to those working on a manufacturing floor and your office. Train on optimal data input, on how to operate machinery, and even make an efficient system so that all items and equipment have a place and can be easily located in seconds.

Go Paperless

Try to reduce the number of materials you need. Going paperless is just one of the most apparent routes you can take. Today, computers can handle important tasks like document comparison, redlining, and similar tasks. To put into perspective just how much you can save, consider that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is looking at savings in $1.5 billion in the next decade just by going paperless. Though your business likely isn’t cutting down 2 million trees each year to feed its paper habit, the savings are still there, and you can and will see a difference for your business.

The Best Marketing Strategies for Young Companies

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StrategyDriven Online Marketing and Website Development Article |Marketing Strategies|The Best Marketing Strategies for Young CompaniesYoung companies should have only one thing on their mind: growth. Growth is almost always achieved by getting new customers, and new customers are almost always achieved by reasonable, effective marketing. That’s why marketing is such an essential thing for startups to nail. When looking for funding at any stage, a strong customer base will make the whole process infinitely easier. Here are some strategies your company needs to be considering getting customers at that early stage.

PR

PR can be much cheaper than advertising and is perfect for establishing credibility and getting new potential customers to hear from you. Good PR needs to be creative and involve exploiting the brand niche that you occupy (if you haven’t identified your niche and done solid branding work do so before you do any marketing at all, it’s essential). Take the case of Patrick Finnegan. He was a 17-year-old who wanted to do venture capitalism in New York City, so he went to the PR and marketing company Big Machine Agency. They realized that they could position him as the business face of GEN Z, somebody who was young enough to know about all the youth trends that many consumer companies want to hop on. After spinning this, they paired him up with a celebrity photographer to build a story for him that caught attention in lifestyle and finance blogs.

Email Marketing

This is at the other end of the spectrum to an exciting PR campaign, but email marketing is still essential because it’s still so effective. It allows you to boost customer loyalty and attract customers to your startup for almost no money at all, especially if you’re a good writer. You can gather email addresses from people who visit your website by offering incentives or by directly asking potential customers you meet for their emails. It’s essential to offer more than just free advertising – offer free guides, infographics, content – whatever you think will bring potential or existing customers value. You should also make it easy to unsubscribe, as that way, only those who are genuinely interested in your niche will attend to the emails, becoming more loyal customers, and focusing your marketing efforts.

StrategyDriven Online Marketer & Website Developer Magazine


Online Content

Start a blog. If you are dealing with customers and 99% of businesses (unless you’re sure they won’t find you online), you need to start a blog or offer some form of content regularly. Bill Gates said it in the 90s – content is king. It’s the reason that most people use the internet if not to look for a solution to a problem. Make sure that those interested in your niche have access to both by making your site as valuable as possible to them. Regularly posting fresh, engaging, and original content is essential for modern SEO, too, as Google is changing its algorithms frequently with the end-goal of delivering valuable content to customers. That means relying on keywords and SEO ‘tricks won’t last you very long and will have an opportunity cost as instead of bothering with those, you could be attracting real readers with good content.

How to Improve Your Entrepreneurial Skills

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StrategyDriven Entrepreneurship Article |Entrepreneurial Skills|How to Improve Your Entrepreneurial SkillsBeing your own boss may sound like a novelty, but it can be a challenging career path. Although aspiring entrepreneurs may have a concrete vision and idea for a potential business, there are vital skills needed to turn that concept into a reality. Unless you have worked in business before, it can be difficult to know how to become a successful entrepreneur; this is because there is no-one to support you from higher ranks, unlike typical employment.

If you require some advice on which skills are essential to become a successful entrepreneur, this blog will come in useful:

Attend business training and seminars

Unless you have carried out formal training, it is impossible to understand the basics of business. Enrolling onto a training program will give you an insight into theories and methods which could be applied to your personal business development. It will allow you to gain more in-depth knowledge into the responsibilities of becoming a business owner and how to enhance your productivity and performance.

Find a business mentor

In the early days of becoming an entrepreneur, you may feel as though you need a helping hand to make crucial decisions when it comes to your business growth. You can only learn so much from books and websites; however, a business mentor will be able to share first-hand advice of their own experiences and provide guidance when it comes to making crucial decisions. According to a survey by Sage, 93% of entrepreneurs believe that having a business mentor was the key reason for their success.

Travel far

If you have the determination to expand your business globally, it would be wise to travel to different countries to get an insight into which countries may be best suited to your business niche. Popular countries for business expansion include the likes of China, Japan, and India. Once you have decided which country will benefit your business, it would be wise to hire translators from globalcitizenstranslation.com to communicate with professionals abroad in the native language for effective communication.

Practice communication skills

If you’re not much of a social butterfly and find it difficult to communicate on a personal and professional level, you must work on your communication skills to succeed in business. You’ll be expected to deal with customers and clients both face-to-face, via phone call, video call, and email, to name just a few. However, being a poor communicator as an entrepreneur can result in misinterpretation of information and potentially even catastrophe. There are different ways you can develop your communication skills, such as:

Learn from your mistakes

Upon starting out in business, you’re bound to make mistakes along the way; however, you should turn the negative thinking into positive by learning from what went wrong and how to avoid these errors future. Ask yourself, ‘what could I have improved on?’ and make a list of pointers that you can refer to if you’re ever in the same position again.

How to Find the Best Prices for Your Old Gadgets

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Old Gadgets|How to Find the Best Prices for Your Old GadgetsWith so many of us holding on to several devices all at once, this is a little bit of extra money that you can make by selling your items with an online retailer. With several older gadgets still holding value, it is an opportunity to make money as a result. In this article, we will be providing you with insight into how you can go about finding the best price for your older gadgets.

Compare The Price Before Hand

When looking at your old devices, it is important to look at the price beforehand. This will not only give you insight into how much it can sell for, but it can also provide you with the knowledge you need about the specifications such as storage and overall screen size that can lead to an increase in price when selling the device as a result making it stand out.

Get Quotes From Multiple Places.

In addition to getting insight into the specifications of the gadget, it is important to get a quote from several different places at once. By using one of the many sell my gadget services, you can then get a quote from several different services. This will ensure that you are getting the best possible price for the devices that you have from multiple places at once. When you have the quotes from multiple places, you can then decide who you want to sell them to for the best possible price regardless of the specifications that you have for the mobile devices.

Look at Quotes For Multiple Devices

In addition to getting quotes for one device, there are a number of shops that allow you access to numerous quotes for several devices at one time. This is great for those that are looking to sell numerous devices as there are several bulk purchasing options. Though this can take time, this is a simple solution to get rid of all the old devices in your home and make a small amount of cash. With the internet, it is as simple as packing it in a bag and sending it off to receive a check just a few weeks.

Make Use Of Online Shops

The final way that you can do this is to make the use of online shops when it comes to selling your items. With shops on the highstreets and many online websites out there allowing you to sell your devices with ease. With so many of us holding on to multiple older games consoles as well as mobile phones and laptops, making the use of these shops can help to make some extra money. There are also several ways that you can sell CDs and other devices to ensure that they are disposed of correctly.

With this in mind, there are several ways that you can make use of online shops to sell the old devices that you have lying around your home and ensure that electronics are disposed of of properly.

Why You Should Start Estate Planning Today

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StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article | Why You Should Start Estate Planning TodayAt some point in your life, you’ve likely thought about what would happen to everything you own should you become incapacitated or experience death. These are not easy thoughts to have, but they are natural as death eventually impacts everyone. Planning ahead is important in order to make sure your assets are dispersed in the way you intended. You’ll want to make sure your legacy lives on through the people and charitable organizations that are important to you. An estate plan is an important plan to have at any stage in life. The more likely it is you have people in your life that may contest your wishes, the more important it is to work with an attorney to make sure your estate plan WORKS.

The Importance of an Estate Plan

A recent survey revealed only 4 in 10 Americans have an estate plan or will. As people get older, they are more likely to have a plan in place, but it still hovers around half. This is surprising given estate planning is important even when you’re young, especially if you have equity in cash accounts or real estate, or if you have young children. Accidents cannot be predicted and nobody knows how long their lives will be. If you were gone tomorrow, what would happen to your home, your bank accounts, and even your children?

Without an estate plan, upon your passing, your possessions would be dispersed based on the laws of your state. If you have young children but no spouse, or if you and your spouse should become deceased at the same time, the state would have to decide who cares for them. And if you were to become too ill to manage your money or make decisions regarding your care, a judge could be required to make the decision of who manages your bills and estate on your behalf. Not having an estate plan could leave your estate in chaos, vulnerable to claims by any blood relatives, some of whom you may not have been in contact with for years. Is that how you want to be remembered?

Not only is it costly to let the courts determine how your estate will be divided, it is time consuming and very public. It could take years for your rightful heirs to be identified and by then close relationships could be damaged forever. Creditors would also be able to access information related to the courts probate and could challenge it as well. As your estate remains in probate and creditors stake claim to pieces of it, the value of your estate dwindles.

An estate plan protects the people you love, who are the rightful heirs, and it allows your estate to pass on in private. Having a plan in place will also ensure your gift of inheritance is taxed as little as possible. The IRS will be more than happy to stake claim to part of your estate if no heirs have been identified by you personally.

The Pieces of Your Estate Plan

A solid estate plan is not an easy task to complete. It will require thoughtfulness on your part, and the assistance of an attorney to ensure it cannot be challenged later. Your estate plan should consist of the following important pieces:

  • A trust will hold property so that probate is avoided. That is, if it is set up correctly.
  • Your will will designate your heirs and how your estate is dispersed. If your estate is large, this could also include charitable beneficiaries.
  • A letter detailing your funerary wishes and disbursement of any smaller personal items of sentimental value.
  • A designated durable power of attorney should be someone you trust to take care of your estate and health decisions should you become incapacitated. This person should have knowledge of your health care wishes related to life and death decisions, which should also be included in a living will.
  • Keep a list of your assets and make sure your executor knows where to find it. This list should include any investment accounts, bank accounts, insurance policies and physical assets and real estate.

Who Should You Choose as a Durable Power of Attorney?

The person you choose to manage your estate does not have to be a relative. It can be a trusted friend. If you’re afraid of one person abusing your monetary accounts, a good idea is to designate a joint durable power of attorney. This way, two people you trust can ensure everything is managed honestly and as you would have wished.

Make sure that not only your attorney has a copy of your DPA, but also your financial institutions. Your bank may even have their own forms you’ll need to complete, so be sure to talk with your bank manager in advance regarding what they might require.

It’s important to know as much as possible about laws in your state as you plan your estate. For more estate planning information visit finitylaw.com’s resource hub.

The components of your estate planning are important pieces of your portfolio. You may change your plan through the years, as many people do and that’s fine, but it’s better to have a plan than no plan. Work through the process with your attorney and let your loved ones know when your estate planning has been completed. Having this knowledge beforehand will ease any panic should you pass and allow your heirs to focus on celebrating the life you lived rather than feeling overwhelmed with questions regarding what happens next.