Kids Eat Free

Thanks for the post, Vernon Lowe

I really want to go out to eat dinner somewhere tonight with the family. I really do not feel like cooking dinner right now at all, and it is time to get it started soon. I’m going to search on olathe 4g wireless internet for the local restaurants that are having kids eat free night tonight and send my husband a text with those places. That will help me convince my husband that we should go spend money out to eat tonight at a restaurant. Our money budget is pretty tight right now, and I did just spend a lot at the grocery store a few days ago. If I can find a place that will allow for kids to eat free tonight, then it won’t be too much money at all. If we all just get water instead of sodas, which will really save us some money as well. I’m hoping he is down with going out tonight for dinner; either that or he needs to be the one to cook tonight. LOL!

Summer Life

It’s been said that your home is your castle.  You work hard, and what better way to enjoy yourself than ensuring your home is functional and appealing? I’ve been working on my yard this past month, in preparation for the summer life: some summer friend and family activities (portable bleachers, anyone?).  I added a hammock this past weekend and am looking forward to adding some Adirondack chairs.

The Adirondack chair  is an American classic in terms of exterior decoration. This is a chair that Thomas Lee designed for a for his summer getaway near Lake Champlain in Westport, New York (USA).

The Adirondack chair is an iconic home design accessory. Thomas Lee conceived it in 1903, envisioning  a chair suitable for indoor and outdoor use  and one that could fill a need in his summer house.

His primary goal was comfort. At 1^st glance it looked like he missed the mark, but his friends and relatives were very happily surprised when they sat on it.

The hallmarks of this legendary chair are the unusual width of the armrests, which can accommodate a beverage or two (a key feature to it’s success) and the comfort gained with the reclining his back rest – ideal for resting, relaxing and small talk.

This chair is synonymous  with traditional porches in many homes of North America. Traditionally  these chairs were built from natural wood and painted white, but today it’s available in many colors.

The Adirondack chair has become an indisputable icon in regard to garden furniture outdoors (forget Aluminum Bleachers, they get too hot). If your home has a garden or porch, this chair will provide years of visual pizazz and real comfort. I can’t wait to see mine in the yard…

 

Death And Taxes

It’s been said there are two certainties: death and taxes.  Well I’m not dead (yet) but I do owe taxes this year  - again.  Maybe I should become an enrolled agent and go work for the IRS.  In any case, if you find yourself in a similar pickle, here’s what to do:

The first thing to do is fill out a tax return so you know exactly how much you owe. Once your accountant  (or you if you do it on your own) verifies the amount,  prepare your return and submit it.  Bear in mind that there are penalties and monthly interest charges monthly the IRS charges if you pay after the deadline. The longer you wait the higher your debt. Once you know your current balance, there are several payment options.

1. Full payment If you are within your means to pay the total of your debt, you will avoid most penalties and interest. You can do this in several ways: by sending a check or money order payable to the Internal Revenue Service at the address listed in the letter received, or by bank transfer from your bank account.  If you want to make your payment with a debit or credit card, you can use a third party site for that too – Official Payments Corporation at 888-872-9829, WorldPay, Inc. at 888-972-9829.These companies usually charge a fee for card payments.
2. Payment terms If you need more time to pay, the IRS gives you a period of 120 days to pay your debt without charge, but interest will continue to accrue until the balance is paid in full.
3. Installment Payment Agreement If you can not pay your entire debt immediately or within 120 days, you can make a payment agreement. You must determine the amount you can pay monthly. Once the agreement is made, payments can be sent in several ways: as a bank transfer from your bank account each month, automatic deduction from your paycheck, online payment or by telephone using your debit or credit card. You can also make your payment arrangement by calling the telephone number included on your bill.
4. Settlement If you feel your financial situation does not allow you to pay your total debt and you do not think that will change to allow so in the future, you have the option to make an offer to the IRS. This offer will allow you to decide how much you can pay the total of your debt. An offer in compromise does not automatically mean your debt is reduced to the amount offered. The IRS will review your offer and decide if it is approved or rejected. The fee for processing your offer is $ 150, which is not refundable.

So there you have it – your options if you owe the IRS.  Or  go take an enrolled agent course and go work for the IRS

Don’t Just Watch TV

King Kong verses Godzilla – you know the scene. It aptly applies to two big monsters in the satellite TV space, namely Direct TV and DISH Network.  Which is better?  Many people often find themselves in a predicament because they are ready switch to Sat TV, but are unable to make the choice between the two, including me. When I bought my house last year, the only cable provider available was/is Bright House, and they are horrible.  So it’s off to shopping for a better offering. So which monster is the winner?

My advice is to have a close look at the programming packages both providers offer.  I found a website that compares the two for you: DX3. Although both have similar packages and technology, the difference lies in the program options. Both offer regional sports packages.  But are you a football fan? Well DirecTV is the exclusive provider of NFL Sunday Ticket. Both offer free HD  and music channels.   but it seems as if DirecTV offers more sports in HD, your local channels in HD and provides HD in 1080p.

According to statistics, DirecTV has been No. 1 in consumer satisfaction and on average provides about 30% more channels over Dish. And I must admit, I’m a sucker for DirectTV’s commercial and new tag line: Don’t just watch TV, DirecTV.

If you want the best entertainment experience for your money, you won’t get it from DISH or cable. I guess I need DX3 DIRECT TV.

 

Nichey Niche

A niche by any other name, is a niche…

We get a lot of inquiries on niche marketing.  So lets review: A niche market is quite simply a segment of a more general market that you can offer a product or a service to. For instance, a subset of  the literal mailbox market could be cluster mailboxes or cbu mailboxes, for residential, industrial and commercial use.  Since these are specific type of mailboxes, a company selling these has chosen a unique niche.

The question usually follows is: Do I have to choose a niche market?  The answers is – it’s highly recommended, mainly for three reasons.

1. All virtual businesses should focus on servicing a particular market niche. If you don’t focus on one or two things, you run the risk of trying to many things and none of them well.

2. The second reason is communication.  With your online business, you will be communicating across the web to a specific market that you have solutions to their specific problems. That communication must be accurate so they can understand what you are offering and feel your product or service will provide the needed solution. If your communication is very generic and/or not relevant, it will be hard for your prospecta to trust your offerings.

3. Finally, another reason why you should choose a niche market is  that doing so can pave the way to expanding your offerings and grow your business.  As an example, you discover a niche, say approved cluster mailboxes,  you begin to study that niche and when you know it’s inherent problems, you begin to find or create multiple solutions for these problems.

The internet as a whole is not a mass market. It needs to be broken down into chunks or segments for the small marketer to tackle (unless you have millions of dollars to create a universal brand).  Your virtual business will be built on the desires and solutions that a select group of people have. You need to speak to your prospect as if he were right in front of you, concise and direct, and the only way to do that effectively is by choosing a niche.

Hungry, Hungry HIPAA

Congratulations!  Your one man operation has grown into a multi-employee business.  You even offer benefits (albeit small one). However, there some big guidelines you will need to comply with, especially when it comes down to insurance.

In recent years, the federal government has developed standards to ensure safety and efficiency of transmission of information related to health care and to protect privacy in the use and disclosure, pursuant to a statute commonly known as HIPAA, the law of Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. It’s two main objectives are to protect health insurance for workers if they change jobs and to protect your private health information, while at work. If thats the case, employers need to set up some security measures to ensure the confidentiality of employee records.  Some of this must be learned.  I did a HIPAA training search and here are some of the things gleaned:

High Level Overview

HIPAA requires employers to maintain employee health information secure and confidential. Personal Health Information (PHI) regulations apply mainly to providers of health care, but in certain circumstances, could be applied to employers. For example, if an employee has a disability, employers can access their PHI to make reasonable accommodations for him. Employers must notify employees in writing of the circumstances in which third parties will have access to and what they will do with the PHI they receive.

Group Health Insurance

If an employer decides to offer health insurance, be aware of HIPAA regulations on privacy and health insurance. View HIPAA health insurance providers as separate from the company. With any health plan a company offers, employers must follow the privacy rules, such as not disclosing patient PHI without consent.

Exceptions

Are small businesses exempt from complying with HIPAA? No. There are no “small employer” exceptions under HIPAA. HIPAA’s definition of  covered healthcare plans  have either a) 50 or more eligible participants or b) have a third party administrator. This would mean that the only exception to the privacy rules is for small, self-administered group health plans. Since most small group health plans are not self-administered, most small business employers are subject to HIPAA privacy rules, even if they have less than 50 employees.

Penalties

If an employer violates any aspect of HIPAA, the employer may be subject to federal penalties. The federal government may impose a fine up to $100 per person per year to a max of $25,000 per year. Therefore, if an employer has 50 employees and gives access to each persons info once PHI without written authorization, the employer can be fined $ 500 for these violations, up to $25K.

Complying with HIPAA’s can be both expensive and complex. Noncompliance, however, can result in significant monetary sanctions. It behooves any employer then to thoroughly review its health plan practices and become educated on the practical requirements of the regulations.

Recipe For Success

Discounting Your Way to Profits

According to recent statistics, the use of coupons has reached an all time high.  In fact, coupon distributing sites have popped up everywhere. Why? Because coupons create interest and generate traffic and have high redemption rates. Or, in plain English: millions of consumers are using them. And there are no short order of companies offering them: from discount codes for Abercrombie to coupons for walgreens, you’d be hard pressed not to find companies offering them,  meaning  your competition is offering them as part of their marketing mix too and you should probably start thinking about developing one for your business. Let’s discuss some basics.

Design – does the coupon flow with your overall branding strategy? A good design focuses not only on the discount received for the product or service, but should also create brand recognition. Secondly, does the promo make sense? Not all promos are good promos.  The last thing you want to do is have so many awesome deals that you lose your shirt on all of them.  Many companies have complained about market and profitability erosion by using those Daily Deal sites. So use due diligence and make sure your coupon doesn’t dilute your brand or your revenue stream.

Distribution – There are many ways to get them into your customers hands.  Create coupon codes and syndicate these via social networks, create an email blast, use Google offers, etc. Get them out, track where they came from, and how much they converted for.

Some final words.  Redemption rates go down you if have too many offers being distributed simultaneously. To overcome analysis paralysis, provide a clear detailed objective, include a product image, use your logo, make sure you have some sort of tracking, and a expiration date. Do this and you will increase your paying client base, your branding and repeat business.   And those aren’t bad results when you figure you are now discounting your way to profits.

The ABC’s of CRM

Customer Relationship Marketing (CRM) implies building relationships with your prospects and customers. It is a proven way to close deals both pre and post sales. So how does this work? There are many ways in which you can build relationships with your prospects and customers. Let’s discuss a few of them.

One of the most effective marketing tools to build relationships is ‘correspondence exchange’. These are predefined messages that are  sequentially sent via your autoresponder. Your audience clicks on a link for more information, which will initiate a sequence of messages. This link can be placed in your website or in your newsletter. This can be setup to work before a sale, and after the sale (i.e.: “Thanks for your order” and then continues with the intent of offering additional products or services). Additionally newsletters are a very powerful tool to build relationships with your subscriber list. Each subscriber to your publication is a potential customer. If they continue to read your newsletter,  a relationship is created. Over time they will trust you and your offerings and become customers.

How’s your Customer Service? This area is crucial to your CRM. No matter how good a deal they got from you, if your customer service skills are lacking, kiss that customer and any future purchases goodbye. Gaining trust is hard.  Losing trust is easy. Treat all your customers as VIP (within reason) and they will remain trusting (and paying) customers for life! Speaking of trust, go through your landing page as if you were a potential client. Your content can help you build rapport with your visitors. When you create professional looking and sounding content, your credibility starts to increase, which leads to trust and ultimately, a sale.

Lastly, consider this bit of advice giving to me years ago: the IM space is not about money, it’s about people. Get the people and they will bring the money. So build solid relationships and reap the financial rewards.

Are You a Doctor In Your Profession?

I was pondering over something recently.  It was triggered by this comment someone made about why they entered the medical field to become a doctor:

“For 7 years I studied general medicine.  I filled out the gp application and finally passed my gp exam and then got my degree and professional credentials. But for 5 of those years I went without going to parties, sacrificing family time, studying 5 to 8 hours a day, even though I spent 7 hours in class. In the later years of my studies, there were the 12 hours shifts, many of them without sleeping, and then more schooling later in the day. After a year of residency in a hospital with 36 hr, sleep-deprived, mal-nourished shifts, I spent a year in social service, alone in a community hospital seeing over 800 patients. But to succeed in today’s world you have to specialize. I competed against 15,000 physicians in a national exam and my specialty only approves 545 doctors.  For the record, I got 135th place and I won a scholarship to study a postgraduate degree which I did in a highly specialized hospital for 4 years, and again, 36 to 48 hours shifts with little sleep, eating poorly, and sacrificing friends and family because of the commitment I made ​​to all of the hospitalized patients of a 11-story hospital.  The responsibility was immense but I did it – I graduated with 7 other colleagues.  I am board certified in internal medicine and have a sub specialty in Geriatrics.

At 30 years old I got married, and now at 32 years and I just became a Dad.  Do I have any regrets?  I strive to be a good doctor (a knowledgeable physician) and a good health care practictioner (a good person who treats his patients well) and I’m very satisfied . I devoted 13 years to the most jealous girlfriend (MEDICINE) and sacrificed many things.  Many started this path with me, but didn’t stick it out and aren’t as satisfied as I am. But it’s never too late, you just need discipline, perseverance, dedication, organization”.

So why did I bring this up? Doctors don’t become doctors overnight. As online marketers, we tend to be conditioned to look right away for the pot of gold on the other side of the rainbow, only to realize it takes a lot of time, work, “discipline, perseverance, dedication, organization” to get to that other side. Are you a “Doctor” in your profession?  Most will not be willing to make sacrifices.  But a small few, will crawl on, sometimes in agony, and will make their goals a reality.  If you haven’t already, I hope that is your outcome.

Upward and onward…

 

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