Make Money Easy For You

Online Business – Managing Your Life When You Work From Home (Part 1 of 10)

Now that my system is set up, all I have to do is check that my affiliate partners are sending me cash, suggest the odd joint venture to a partner, and stay in touch with my customers. I rarely spend more than three hours in front of my computer each day.

But it wasn’t always like that. It took a lot of effort and a lot of work to get into the position I’m in now. When I first started, it was a bit of a struggle to organize myself. My first website took ages to launch and while the other ones went up quickly, my family went days without seeing me.

Let’s be frank, if you don’t set up your business properly right at the beginning, you’re going to make your life much harder–and your income much lower.

The problem is that until now, you’ve always thought of your home as a place to relax and the office as a place to focus and work. Now you’re going to have to focus at home–and that’s not an easy shift to make. You need to keep the same rhythm (without stopping to watch your favorite daytime soap!) and the same kind of discipline you had when you had to commute every morning.

The first thing to do is to give yourself an office. I’m not talking about a laptop on the coffee table or a corner in the library; I mean a proper room with a door you can close and a desk full of goodies: from a computer with broadband to a place to put your safety clips. If you don’t have a spare room to start with, then use your bedroom. But if you’re serious, think about finding an office once your business gets running.

The next thing you’re going to need is a schedule–a realistic one. This is one of the greatest challenges when you begin working for yourself. At the end of each day, I’d make a list of all the tasks I was going to do the next day. If I got half of them done, I was lucky. I spent weeks frustrated and grumpy.

Once you get a feel for how long each task takes you, whether it’s approving a new site design, planning a new marketing program or answering customers’ emails, set yourself a timetable and keep to it. Turn off the radio, shut the office door and get to work! And at the same time, don’t get annoyed if the day ends before your work does.

Read more: Online Business – Managing Your Life When You Work From Home (Part 1 of 10)

Do you have the right personality type to successfully run your own business?

It takes an entrepreneurial fire in your belly to start a business and make it succeed. Not everyone has it.

How do you know if you have what it takes to start a business? There’s really no way to know for sure. But I do find things in common among the emotional and family fabric of people ready to consider an entrepreneurial venture. You don’t have to fit all seven of these categories to be a good candidate for entrepreneurship. But it probably wouldn’t hurt. In general, the more you have in common with these characteristics, the closer you probably are to being ready to try going out on your own.

1. You come from a line of people who couldn’t work for someone else. I don’t mean that in a negative way. People who are successful at establishing their own business tend to have had parents who worked for themselves. It’s usually easier to get a job with a company than to start your own business; people who strike out on their own often have the direct example of a parent to look to.
2. You’re a lousy employee. No need to sugar-coat this one. People who start their own businesses tend to have been fired from or quit more than one job. I’m not saying you were laid off for lack of work or moved from one job to a better-paying one. You were asked to leave, or you quit before they could fire you. Think of it as the marketplace telling you that the only person who can effectively motivate and manage you is yourself.
3. You see more than one definition of “job security.” I am truly envious of the few people I know who have stayed with one employer for 25 or 30 years. They look very secure. But how many people do you know who are able to stay with one company for that long? In a rapidly changing economy, job security can be frighteningly fleeting.
4. You’ve gone as far as you can go, or you’re not going anywhere at all. Sometimes the motivation to start a new venture comes from having reached the top of the pile where you are, looking around, and saying, “What’s next?” Early success can be wonderful, but early retirement can sometimes drive energetic and motivated people totally crazy.
5. You’ve done the market research already. Don’t even talk to me about your great business idea if you haven’t put the time into figuring out if there’s a market for your product or service. As the people behind any number of failed Internet ventures will tell you, “cool” doesn’t necessarily translate into “profitable.” Don’t bother building it if you haven’t figured out whether there’s a good chance the customers will come.
6. You’ve got the support of your family. Starting a business is stressful under the best of circumstances. Trying to do it without the support of your spouse or other significant family members or friends would probably be unbearable.
7. You know you cannot do it alone. You might excel at promoting a business. Maybe you love running the financial end of the enterprise. You could be someone who starts a business because you have unique creative or technical know-how to create a product.

Any of the above is possible, but it’s unlikely that you are going to excel at all of these tasks — or at all of the tasks involved in running any business. Forget all that doing it alone stuff. You are going to need some help sometime.
The willingness to get that help — having employees, partners or consultants for those areas in which you are not an expert — is one indicator of likely future success. “No successful entrepreneur has ever succeeded alone,” development consultant Ernesto Sirolli writes in “Ripples From the Zambezi.” “The person who is most capable of enlisting the support of others is the most likely to succeed.”

Read more: Do you have the right personality type to successfully run your own business?

PRINCE2(TM) History and Overview

I am often asked questions about the Prince2 methodology, so I thought I should jot down a few notes about it.

The project Management methodology PRINCE2 started life in 1975 as PROMPT2 (Project, Resource, Organisation, Management and Planning Technique) developed by Simpact Systems Ltd, a UK company. Four years later in 1979 PROMPT2 was adopted by another UK Company CCTA (Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency), now part of the Office of Government Commerce (OGC), who modified and renamed the methodology to PRINCE (Projects In Controlled Environments) in 1989, following input from around 150 European organizations, and used it as the standard methodology for all government information systems projects.

In 1996 CCTA released PRINCE2, as the standard methodology for managing all projects in the UK government

2005 saw the release of a significant update of the PRINCE2 documentation. PRINCE2 itself is actually in the public domain, so it is not restricted to a particular vendor, however there are many training organisations around to world to assist with accreditation.

There are two accreditation levels, “Foundation”, a one-hour multiple-choice exam, and “Practitioner”, a three-hour written exam. The Practitioner exam is open-book. Whist preparation courses are available around the world; they are not mandatory for attempting the exams.

Project managers often ask what the difference is between PMBOK (a guide to the Project Management Body Of Knowledge, the ANSI standard for project management, produced by PMI) and PRINCE2. You can think of it this way, PMBOK tells you what a project manager should know to manage a project successfully, PRINCE2 tells you what you should do.

There is often a misconception that PRINCE2 is applicable only to IT projects. Although that was the case in the early days, that is no longer true.

PRINCE2 is a process-driven project management method, but pne of its weaknesses comes from its a high degree of scalability and applicability of modules that it can lead to a project becoming what has been dubbed a “PINO”, a PRINCE In Name Only.

PROCESSES

The PRINCE2 methodology comprises forty-five sub-processes organized into eight high level Processes. Each process has key inputs and outputs, together with the specific objectives, activities and documentation:

1.SU Starting Up a Project

2.PL Planning

3.IP Initiating a Project

4.DP Directing a Project

5.CS Controlling a Stage

6.MP Managing Product Delivery

7.SB Managing Stage Boundaries

8.CP Closing a Project

SU – Starting up a project ————————– The project brief (charter) is formulated, including the outline scope of the project (what will be/not be included in the project) and its justification. This phase also appoints the team, and lays out the project management approach to be taken. Once this stage has been signed off by the Board, the preliminary project officially exists, but is not yet initiated.

Read more: PRINCE2(TM) History and Overview

Performance management assists lean manufacturing

This is a short introduction to how performance management can support the implementation and succes with lean manufacturing. The 5th principle of the 5 lean principles, is the concept of continuous improvements. But how do we handle this in a structured and controlled manner? One of the most important tools to drive continous improvements is performance management. In many organizations, working with performance management is natural, while this can be very difficult, and even scary for others. When working with goals in a lean organization it is essential to involve the employees in the proces. Also visualization of goals should be given attention together with a process for frequent meetings and follow up on goals.

But how do you define goals, that are effective and drive improvements?

First of all we need to define what we want to measure, but more importantly take into consideration on what level in the organization the goal shall be implemented.On the executive level, goals should be related to the strategy of the company, but when we move down in the organization we needto diversify the goals to achieve ownership. For example net operating margin, can be a relevant goal on executive level, while it doesn’t make much sense on the shop floor.So we need to define goals that will support the top-level goals, but can be influenced and are relevant by teams elsewhere in the organization. When implementing performance management in a lean organization we often need to define goals that are very close to the primarycore processes of the company. In general we can use the SMART model when defining goals. So what makes a goal SMART? S = Specific M = Measurable A = Accepted R = Realistic T = Time Specific, means that the goal must be defined accurately and simple enough to make sure that everyone understands what we measure.

Measurable, means that we need to define goals that can be quantified and expressed in a simple number Accepted, means that you need to build acceptance of the relevancy of the goal in the team Realistic, means that the target should be set at a reasonable level, while still stretched to drive improvement Time, means that it must be clear, and part of the definition of the goal, when we expect the target to be reached.

If you use the SMART check-list when defining goals you should be in pretty good shape.

When you start the process of using goals in the daily management process on the shop floor, management must be prepared to work closely with the team to ensure that goals are measured and that corrective and preventive actions are defined and implemented. This process is best driven by stand up meetings, preferably every day.When implemented correctly, performance management can be an extremly effective way to get ahead of your competition.

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Four Main Types of Team Building Activities

Quite a few corporate and retail employers enjoy looking for fun ways to bring employees together. One of those ways is to plan team building activities.Sometimes team building activities are held on the premises of an employer. However, quite often employers will provide unconventional team building opportunities off site. The following is a list of some of the most commonly planned types of team building activities:

1.Problem Solving Games One of the most popular team building activities that involves problem solving is “murder mysteries”. This particular game involves the solving of a mystery with given clues. Solving a murder mystery is an activity that requires players to use all of his or her finest problem-solving skills. While playing this type of game, some players may be able to exercise their management skills of delegation and organization. Likewise, other players will learn more about how to work well with a close-knit employee group. Treasure Hunts are also another type of problem solving game that calls for group activity. This usually involves finding some type of valuable gift or object with just the use of location or object description hints that are given. This particular type of activity is perfect for helping a group of people learn how to follow directions and to use time wisely.

2.Driving Sport Events Driving events are sometimes planned for employee groups. Quite often these are planned for pure enjoyment. However, one of the benefits of planning a driving sport event day is that employees learn how to get along even if they are competing against one another. Examples of driving sport events include quad racing (four wheeler racing), off road racing, buggy racing, and remote control car racing. For a very crazy (in a good way) adventure some corporate or employee teams may enjoy reverse steer car races. The reverse steer car race may deserve a little more explanation than the other types of car racing. The cars used in this type of race involve the use of a backwards type of steering wheel.

3.Communication Exercises Another type of activity involves playing games that require people that do not know each other well to talk to each other. These are typically called communication exercises, and are planned to help people improve interpersonal activities within the office. Sometimes employee groups who are involved in communication games will play “Twenty Questions” or “Get to Know You” games. For instance, one of the questions for the “Twenty Questions” game could be as follows:

“If you could have one new type of food in the office cafeteria what would it be?”

The type of direction involved in “Get to Know You” games could include something along the lines of the following:

“Find someone in the room who has the same hobby as you.”

Usually communication games not only require quite a bit of verbal communication, but they may also require non-verbal communication as well. For instance, most people know what “Charades” is, or “Pictionary”. Charades is a silent acting game and Pictionary is a drawing/word guessing game. Communication exercises are usually meant for resolving issues that are directly work-related. However, they may also be designed to help teach employees how to resolve personal issues between one another.

4.Social Events Sometimes entertainment such as music, dancing, or theatre productions may be planned for a corporate event. Moreover, employee events that are organized by employers and/or third party activity coordinators may involve themed parties. Two of the most popular themed parties include the Wild West theme or the Hawaiian themed party.

Read more: Four Main Types of Team Building Activities

How to Write a Business Plan

Do you want to start a business? Great. Have you got a plan? If not, your business is just a dream.

Banks and lending institutions look closely at your business plan when they decide whether to lend you money. A business plan contains the main criteria you and your employees use to determine success. In addition, it is what you need to help make decisions about what to do and when to do it as you run your business.
If your business is very small and home-based, some of these suggestions may be unnecessary. However, at least develop a plan that outlines goals, expected costs, a marketing plan and an exit strategy. A business plan shows how you expect to succeed and details how you will measure that success.
Here is a simple guide to the basics of a good business plan:

• An Outline of Goals and Objectives in an Executive Summary
The executive summary introduces your business strategy. This is the most important section for banks and lending institutions. You must persuade a loan officer in the first few pages that you have a viable business proposal.

This summary is also an important communication tool for employees and potential customers. They need to understand your ideas and your business before they can support it.
• A Brief Account of How You Started the Company
Clearly explain the origins of the company. Be sure to include how you or your business associate came up with the idea.
• Your Goals for the Company
Explain in a few paragraphs your short- and long-term goals for the company. How fast will it grow? Who are your main customers?
• Biographies of the Management Team
Include in the management section the names and backgrounds of management team members. Be sure to include their respective responsibilities.

• The Service or Product You Plan to Offer
An important aspect of the summary is a discussion of how your product or service is different from others currently available.
• The Potential Market for Your Service or Product
You must convince lenders, employees and others that your target market is relatively large and growing. You need to do some research for this section. For a local business, determine the demand for your product or service within a specified geographic radius. Base this on what you determine is a reasonable distance from your business.
If it’s a web-based business or a one that relies on both the Internet and local traffic for customers, evaluate demand on a local and/or national basis. A report from a professional research company can be expensive. You may be able to get basic information from the web’s many search engines and directories.
• A Strategy to Market Your Product or Service
How do you plan to tell the world you are open for business? Will you rely exclusively on word of mouth? Usually, this is not a good plan unless you already have established a good reputation. Will you advertise in print, television, on the web or all three? Will you use online marketing tools to get listed on search engines and advertised on other websites? Make sure you include how much money you plan to spend on marketing.

• A Three to Five Year Financial Projection
This should include a summary of your financial forecasts, with the spreadsheets you used to reach your projections. Show your balance sheets, income statements and cash-flow projections for the entire forecast period. This is where you tell lenders how much money you want to borrow to cover your start-up costs. The assumptions that you make here can make or break your company’s success. If you are unfamiliar with this kind of financial modelling, seek a professional for help. It is definitely worth the money.
Learn about spreadsheet software
• An Exit Strategy
This is one of the most important aspects of a good business plan. Many small business owners look to sell their company as part of an exit strategy. You might pass the company to someone else or take it public. You can base your exit strategy on a monetary figure, revenue growth, the market’s reception to your idea or an agreement between the top officers. Whatever you decide, you need to plan so you and your investors recover your
investments.

Read more: How to Write a Business Plan

Contract Management Made Simple

Yes, contract management can be simple. There are a few things that you can do that will make the contract management process bearable and easy to work with. This article covers three key points to help you simplify this task.

What is a contract? A contract is simply a legal agreement between two entities or parties. These entities can be corporations, small businesses, and even individuals. So why do companies need to manage contracts and agreements? They need to be managed to make sure what is agreed upon in the contract is completed and that all the provisions of the contract are adhered to. These provisions include, but are not limited to, the contract budget, work specifications, the quality of the work to be accomplished, and the due dates. Some provisions can be extremely complex, such as in meeting government compliance requirements. Contract Management is very similar to Project Management. Just like in project management, you need to make sure all items are done correctly, done on time, and within budget. Thus, the need for managing contracts.

As previously mentioned, a contract is simply an agreement between two parties. Party A agrees to build an addition onto an office building for Party B. They agree that this will be completed in three months for $75,000. They also agree that the new addition will be able to hold ten office worker cubicles and have a supply closet and bathroom. The new office must match the interior and exterior colors and materials of the existing building, and it must meet all government-building codes. So how do we make contract management simple?

First, the contract itself needs to spell out exactly what is to be accomplished and detail all the provisions and specifications of the work. In contracting terms these are known as “deliverables”. You should be able to easily go through a contract and identify all of the deliverables within the contract. A deliverable is what needs to be tracked and managed. You then make a detailed list of all the deliverables in the contract. At a minimum, this list should contain each deliverable, the specific requirements and provisions of the deliverable, and the date the deliverable is required to be completed. Once you have this list put together, you can simply monitor the items on list to make sure they are completed by the specified due dates as well as meet all the requirements and specifications. Once the work is completed, the deliverables are inspected, and if acceptable, are accepted by the party who issued the contract. The contractor is paid and the contract is closed. It really is that simple.

Now I have done a lot of consulting in my career, to include contract management organizations, and I have seen many organizations make the contract management process more complex than it really needs to be. In many cases this comes from the “over complexity” of the contracts themselves. In many cases, the people who write contracts, usually lawyers, tend to be extremely verbose. Instead of spelling it out in simple terms, they dig out the dictionary and attempt to use every word that has fifteen letters or more in it. This, also, is a reason why there are so many lawsuits over contracts. Over complex contracts make it very easy to find things to go to court on. So the point I am trying to make here is to keep the contract simple. This will help you to keep the contract management process simple. My rule-of-thumb is to follow the “KISS” principle: Keep It Short and Simple!

Read more: Contract Management Made Simple

The Money Making Power of Keeping Good Business Records

Many people in business and in sales positions are missing out on huge profits simply become they don’t know how to profit from keeping good records. In this article I will show you are few tricks that made me a lot of money.

I am going to outline three applications of just one way in which you can profit from good record keeping. Of course there are many others that you should investigate as well.

Knowing Where Your Profits Come From

You may be familiar with the 80/20 rule, proposed by economist Joseph Juran in 1941 and named by him the Pareto Principle in honor of how his study of the works of Vilfredo Pareto (who died in 1923) had contributed to his thinking.

The basic premise is that for many phenomena 80% of the consequences result from only 20% of the causes. In selling, for example, it is typical to find that 80% of your sales will come from 20% of their clients. This also hold in human resources where you generally find that 80% of the valuable results from any team of workers will come from 20% of their activity.

The trick, of course, is to know in advance what those 20% activities are. If you can do this then you can concentrate on doing more of those types of activities and gain much greater rewards for your efforts.

There are three areas where good record keeping can allow you to increase your profits as a result of basing your energy output on a sound 80/20 analysis.

Area1: Identifying Which Customers You Should Be Focusing On.

If you keep a good records of your clients and their buying habits then you can determine which of those clients are in the 20%, high value category and which are in the 80%, low value category. Further to that you can identify the buying trends in your high value group relative to the buying trends in your low value group. By knowing these you will quickly be able to identify whether or not a relatively new client is likely to become a high value or low value client.

With the ability to quickly identify potentially high value clients you can allocate more, and higher quality, resources (e.g. your best salesperson) to servicing such clients. In this way you can substantially increase your bottom line return on efforts.

Your should also be willing to let go of your low value clients as you replace them with high value clients. Imaging the profits from a business that only had high value clients.

If you find it difficult emotionally to let go of low value clients then at least put in place a system that services their needs with minimal expenditure of time and money from your business budget.

Area 2: Identifying Which Of Your Efforts Are Producing The Results.

By keeping good records of how your workforce spends its time and what results from those activities you can determine which activities fall into the 20% high value group and which fall into the 80% low value group.

Say, for example, that you found that your high paid sales force was spending most of their time prospecting and doing admin work, but that the profits came from the relatively small amount of time they spent in front of the client, then you could delegate that prospecting and admin to competent, but lower paid people, and keep your sales person busy in front of clients as often as possible. This could substantially increase your bottom line profits, as well as helping you retain your best sales people.

By the way, when you are assessing the productively of your staff’s activities don’t forget to include your own activities in the analysis. You may be surprised at how much more efficiently you could be performing.

Area 3: Identifying Which Of Your Marketing Activities Is Producing Your Profits.

Most companies spend a considerable amount of their budget on marketing, yet when you talk to them very few can tell you specifically which marketing activities are generating the most profits.

You must have a system in place for determining the results of each marketing dollar spent. If you don’t then you are throwing away a lot of your money.

Marketing companies and marketing departments typically resist attempts to measure their results. That in itself should tell you that much of your marketing dollar is being wasted. According to the 80/20 rule you are probably getting poor results from 80% of what you are spending.

Keeping good records in this area can allow you to stop spending money in low productivity marketing efforts and redirect that spending into high productivity efforts. This is not an attempt to reduce your marketing budget it is a strategy for increasing the bottom line returns gained from your marketing budget.

If your marketing people can’t come up with ways for measuring the difference in results for their various activities then tell them that you are going to get rid of them and replace them with marketers who can measure results effectiveness. You may be surprised at how quickly they discover that there is a good measuring system after all.

Conclusion

If you keep good records of the buying patterns of your clients, the return for effort of your staff’s activities, and the return for dollars of your marketing strategies then you will be in a position to substantially increase your bottom line profits by reallocating your resources to higher profit producing uses.

Read more: The Money Making Power of Keeping Good Business Records

15 Ways to Improve Your Cash Flow Now

15 Ways to Improve Your Cash Flow Now

Cash management theory and techniques are well understood and practiced by treasury managers in large corporations. They use sophisticated models and cash management tools that allow them to predict and manage cash. Many of these are beyond the reach or need of small companies. But there are many things even small companies can do at minimal cost to improve cash flow. Below are fifteen ways companies can improve their cash flow quickly.

1. Cash budget and forecast – Prepare a cash budget and weekly cash forecast to track actual cash in and out against projected cash in and out. These tools will enable you to better control where the cash is going and prioritize future cash expenditures.

2. Purchasing – Centralize purchasing for the firm or at least within major business units. This reduces administrative costs. Standardized purchasing policies and procedures promote efficiency and help prevent duplicate purchase orders. Purchase order forms should be standardized. Copies of all purchase orders should be forwarded to Accounts Payable and Receiving Departments immediately upon creation. When negotiating with vendors negotiate price first, then terms. The purchasing department should coordinate with accounts payable to maximize leverage on vendor.

3. Vendors – Prevent costly supply disruptions which can bring sales and cash flow to a halt. Use multiple suppliers for key items when possible. Know the suppliers’ financial condition so you can anticipate potential disruptions due to financial stress. Signs of supplier financial trouble include calls to the supplier not being returned, consistent order errors or deterioration in quality of merchandise, late delivery of merchandise and supplier employees inquiring about job openings.

4. Receiving – Ensure Receiving has a copy of the purchase order at the time goods are received. Use standardized processes to minimize paperwork errors in the receiving department. All goods should be examined immediately upon arrival and checked against the purchase order. Received goods should immediately be committed to inventory and entered into accounting system. Shipping documents should be forwarded to Accounts Payable immediately upon receipt and inspection of the goods.

5. Inventory – Turn stale or slow moving inventory into cash by discounting to move quickly, having a warehouse sale or returning the inventory to the vendor. Simply writing down impaired inventory can save cash even if it is not sold because a book loss is created that will reduce income taxes now or in the future.

6. Just-In-Time Inventory – Employ to the extent practical a just-in-time inventory system. Such systems can free up cash that otherwise would be tied up in inventory. The benefits include reduced inventory levels and increased turnover, reduced purchasing lead time and safety stocks, increased scheduling flexibility, lower investment in factory and warehouse space, reduced obsolescence, reduced scrap and rework, and reduced operating expense. Potential negatives of using such systems include accurate order lead time planning, inflexible suppliers in terms of changes in amounts and delivery dates, and additional costs as a result of inventory overages or shortages caused by inflexible suppliers. Overages tie up cash while shortages reduce sales, profits and cash flow

Read more: 15 Ways to Improve Your Cash Flow Now

Making Time for Time Management

How often do you find yourself wishing there were 48 hours in a day? Do you find that your to-do list is frequently left untouched? Managing time effectively is one of the key challenges for a successful entrepreneur.

As an entrepreneur, you don’t usually have the luxury of a large army of employees, focused on clear-cut tasks. You probably juggle numerous roles and find it near impossible to do justice to all of them. Time is one of your most important resources and there are ways of stretching it. Time management will teach you how.

Break it up: Break up your large tasks into small and manageable ones. Start by estimating the effort needed to accomplish a particular job. Write out a sequence of activities that are needed in order to complete it, along with an estimate of how long each will take. Now take them on one at a time, and periodically monitor how much time you’re actually taking, compared to the plan. This is a very important part of time management, and with practice you’ll be able to get it right!

Prioritize your work: List out all the tasks you must carry out to achieve your goal and put them in order of importance. This enables you to tackle the most important and beneficial jobs first. If there are too many high priority jobs, you’ll either have to rearrange your schedule or delegate some of the work. This helps you focus on doing things that are really critical.

The 80:20 rule says that 80% of unfocused effort generates only 20% of results and the remaining 80% of results are achieved with only 20% of the effort!

Plan the unplanned: Things rarely turn out the way we intend them to. Time management teaches you to keep aside some time for those inevitable crises. Often not budgeting for those extra hours might itself create a crisis!

Keep an activity log: We already talked about the need to monitor progress. You can do this by maintaining an activity log, which helps you track the way you use your time – how much time are you actually spending in productive work and how much are you wasting? Are there some tasks that could be done in a more efficient manner? The goal of time management is to answer such questions. Analyze the log at the end of each project to identify possible areas of improvement.

Make reminder lists: Unless you have the memory of an elephant, it’s not likely that you’ll remember everything that you need to do. Make a to-do list for the day or week. This will ensure that you don’t forget to do something, or worse, miss that all important customer appointment!

Do the unpleasant bit first: Procrastination is our biggest obstacle to effective time management. We all have our pain points, and it’s only natural to put-off those jobs for as long as possible… or when they’ll probably blow up in our faces. Discipline yourself to do at least one “unpleasant” task each day, and watch the results.

Ease your work plan: Hey, good time management isn’t only about work. Make sure you’ve set some time aside for your personal life as well. It’s amazing how you can improve your effectiveness at work by striking the right balance.

Read more: Making Time for Time Management

Learn To Focus On What’s Important and Farm Out The Rest

How many times have you looked around your small business and said, “There just isn’t enough time in the day to get everything done!” Welcome to the biggest realization you will ever make as a small business owner, my friend: there are only so many hours in the day and there isn’t a darn thing you can do about it.

So, instead of beating yourself up at the end of the day over how much you didn’t get done, you should learn to make better use of the time you have. Your time should be spent doing only those things that help build your business and increase revenue, not mundane tasks that could be handled by someone else. It’s called “working on your business instead of working in it.”

We entrepreneurs often feel like we have to do everything ourselves or things won’t get done. It’s a more accurate statement to say that things might get done, but they wouldn’t get done to the high standards we set for ourselves.

I feel your pain. It wasn’t that long ago when I thought that I had to have my nose in every detail of my business. I was personally involved in everything from designing the website to sales and marketing to product design and project management to customer support and beyond.

I spent so much time doing everyone else’s job that I didn’t have time to do my own, and the business suffered for it. It took a conscious effort on my part to stop micromanaging and start delegating. Not only that, I found that I had to change my habits regarding even the simplest things like checking email and taking calls; two things that were eating up several hours of my average day.

Here’s how I did it and you can, too.

Before you can figure out the best use of your time you need to have a clear understanding of what you’re spending your time on now. Create a diary that details your average day and include every task you perform and how much time it took. If you spent 30 minutes answering email, jot that down. If you spent 2 hours at lunch, jot that down. If you spend 30 minutes on the phone talking to someone who’s trying to sell you toner ink, jot it down. Account for every minute you spent working for the entire week.

At the end of the week list out all the tasks and the times spent on them. I think you’ll be amazed at how much time you’re spending on things that really aren’t the best use of your time. Now divide the list into tasks that you yourself must absolutely, positively handle and tasks that you could hand off to someone else. Yes, I said hand off to someone else. You’re about to learn to delegate, Heaven help you.

Here’s the whole point of this exercise: if you’re wasting time on tasks that can be done by someone else, then you need to stop doing them. Even making small changes in the way you use email or answer the phone can save you hours every day.

In my opinion email is the greatest killer of focus and productivity on the planet. It’s a terrific communications medium and if used wisely can be a highly productive business tool, but more often than not email is used to share funny pictures of animals in compromising positions and videos of Britney Spears. If you keep up with how much time you’re spending every day on non-essential email I think you’ll get my point.

Many of us have become so addicted to email that we check it every 2 minutes whether we need to or not. If you’re like me you spend more time plowing through spam than actually reading email of importance. So unless your business hinges on every email that comes in, I suggest you turn off the email program completely and only check it two to three times a day. Better still, farm out the email checking to someone else and instruct them to only forward email to you that requires your personal attention. You’ll be amazed at how many hours a day you’ll save.

I’d bet that you also get dozens of calls every week from people that you don’t really need to talk to. I’ve stopped answering the phone at my office altogether and I highly recommend you do the same. I let someone else answer the phone and they have implicit instructions not to bother me unless the call is from someone they know I’ll want to speak to, like my Mama. Otherwise, they take a message and if the call merits my attention, I’ll return it personally or assign it to someone else to handle.

If you’re new in business you may not yet have the luxury of farming out every task that is eating up your precious time, but once you’re in a position to do so outsourcing these tasks will free you up to work on more important things, like building your business and increasing revenue.

Read more: Learn To Focus On What’s Important and Farm Out The Rest

Themed Party Ideas for a Team Building Day

Team building days are events that are usually planned by employers. These types of days usually involve different types of cooperative activities and social designed to unify groups of employees.

Theme parties are one type of event that is usually planned towards the end of a team building day. These types of activities usually involve bringing out more of the fun and creative side of most people.Different types of themed party days that have been planned include Wild West, James Bond, and Tropical Island themed parties. A variety of activities are planned at one of social events.A Wild West party could include one or more of the following events: dressing up as a cowboy/cowgirl, participating in a Wild West shootout (a duel), and riding a simulated bull. Other activities may include participating in a saloon poker game (and perhaps even real or fake cigars will be provided for extra effect).

Of course a party with a Wild West theme will be set in a location that is very indicative of the old west (i.e. the swinging saloon doors, American flags, and cacti plants). Furthermore, usually old west music will be played, and entertainment such as gun slinging, lasso rope throwing, and knife throwing.At a James Bond themed party all the guests will be a different James Bond character. Professional or experienced amateur James Bond leading actors will guide the evening of mystery solving. One of the most important James Bond missions is to overpower Dr. Evil, and the other would be to help free hostages.

Other miscellaneous activities that may take place at a James Bond party include casino gaming, dancing, and watching movies (James Bond series and movies). Sometimes a bar is served with the appropriate cocktails and drinks as well.The Tropical Island themed party would include dressing up in beach clothing, sipping on pre-dinner cocktails, and listening to a live music. Two of the most commonly planned island theme parties include those that represent either the Caribbean or Hawaii-or a combination of both areas.Events and activities that may be included in a Hawaiian or Caribbean themed party could include belly dancing (and regular types of dancing), “tanning” on the beach, and lei making. For those who want to learn what a “lei” is the next paragraph would explain.

A lei is basically a flower necklace that is usually made from loose orchids or similar-shaped flowers. These flowers can be fake or real. Sometimes leis are made for the waste wrist or bracelet as well. These crafts can be accented with a variety of other items as well, such as dried bamboo pieces, miniature pineapple and/or coconut ornaments. Grass skirts may also be a craft that is made at an island party.The backdrop of the indoor location of a Caribbean Tropical Island party would represent the beach scenery of islands such as the Bahamas, Jamaica, Cuba, or otherwise. On the contrary, a Hawaiian party may include decoration themes of one or more of Hawaii’s favorite island volcanic beach spots or beaches.Usually the purpose of a themed party is to help open the minds of groups of employees. More importantly, these parties provide a way for new groups of employees to get better acquainted.

Read more: Themed Party Ideas for a Team Building Day

Supplements For Pregnant Dogs

It is imperative that you give your dog the best for its diet while it is pregnant and maintaining the supplements even after it is whelping. There is an assumption in dog owners that you should not ad vitamins or minerals to a dog unless it is sick or pregnant. That is not true. Your dog should always be supplied with nutrients for good health.

You should provide your pregnant dog with the sufficient supplements for its pregnancy. Being pregnant it should be receiving as much nutrition as its body needs to stay healthy. Why should you start preparing your dog for this nutrition even before it is pregnant? Dogs usually do not show signs if being pregnant until the pregnancy is about 5 weeks or so. By starting it on supplements a standard practice, you would be making sure that your pet is receiving enough nutrients while it is pregnant, although you do not realize that yet. During these 4-5 weeks, the nutrients will provide good nutrition to the unborn pups.

Adding vitamins and minerals your dog is missing from her hunger fasts may help maintain its health, although you should not resort to replacing its meals with pills and powders. There are times where she will refuse to eat, and you can give her something that she will look forward to such as treats and mix the supplementation powder into it to ensure she remains healthy.

Although this may seem like a strange idea, you should consider feeding your dogs raspberry leaves. It seemed like a new supplement idea, but this is actually an old practice some successful dog breeders use. They will chop up the leaves and put it into their food for them to eat.

You might wonder at the effects of raspberry leaves. It is said that the leaves will help your dog with the contractions for delivery, and it enables it to keep up with the amount of contractions. If may not be 100% proven that it truly helps your dog, but there is no harm adding it to her diet. Raspberry leaves are available at most health food stores.

Read more: Supplements For Pregnant Dogs

A great Manager is a Great Communicator

Who is a great manager? Well, this question can have many answers but anyone running a management training program or management training course will tell you that – A great manager is a great communicator. This does not mean however, that all the other skills that a manager possesses are redundant. That is not what it means. But, unless you are a good communicator you cannot be a good manager.

Management training programs and management training courses will point out that good communication skills are of paramount importance to a manager. A manager has to be a great communicator if he wants to become a great manager. A great manager is one who has a vision. But, this vision will stay just that unless you communicate it properly. Communicating a vision doesn’t mean you have large message boards with your vision written on them placed at strategic locations. It might be effective to catch attention but to retain that attention you are going to have to do something else. You have to make sure that your team understands your vision and shares your vision with you. Apart from articulating your vision good communication is essential to conducting business on a day to day basis.

Most management training programs and management training courses will focus on the communication skill. It is important to understand that conversation is not communication. A good communication through conversation takes place when


• You ensure that your message is understood


• You must receive and understand the message sent to you


• You have some control over the flow of the conversation.


So, communication skill is not just about speaking but listening as well. Good communication should avoid ambiguity. If there is a chance that a message might be misunderstood then it should be clarified. Remember, that words often have different meanings in different context and cultures. For instance dry country can mean without water or without alcohol; suspenders can keep up pants as well as stockings. So, it depends on the context and the culture. How can you avoid this? Here are some tips to do that


• Repeat the message for confirmation


• If necessary write back the message


• Give proper background before speaking. This will make people aware as to which context you are going to speak about.


• Similarly, ask others about the context in which they are speaking


If you have attended management training classes then you would have had a session on management training. Here you would have been told that just like any other activity you have to plan and prepare for your conversation. State clearly and firmly; whatever it is that you are going to say. Do not lose your temper if someone else does. Be assertive. When asking question assess the situation carefully and depending on the kind of information that you want ask either open ended or close ended questions. If all you need is confirmation, then close ended questions are enough. But, if you need more information then you have to go in for open ended questions.

Read more: A great Manager is a Great Communicator

Small Business Can Benefit from Sales Training and Customer Service Coaching

When you are trying to grow your business during those first few years, the ability to turn prospects into customers and to keep customers satisfied with your products and services is MISSION CRITICAL.

However, some entreprenurs and small business owners make a common mistake of thinking that the sales and service staffs they emply also possess the same abilities and desires that they have in keeping the business running and growing.

I have heard the “not in the budget” “we are not big enough for training and coaching” and “I am the sales manager-trainer” answers before and that only makes me more committed to help them see the importance of investing a little money and allowing me to invest the time and resources necessary to turn their operation into a successful and cohesive sales and service organization.

I have first hand experience with not thinking it was a necessary investment – I thought I had all the answers and could train and coach my own teams over 15 years ago. Through a major business crisis for my organization in the mid-90s, I became convinced that sales and service training (we really didn’t have coaches that didn’t wear jerseys during that time) saved the company. After finding that I needed to retool and retrain my staffs, I had no alternative but to make a necessary monetary investment in trying to save my business. Looking at the results in the late 90s through the sale of the company in 2004, I see that I had made a HUGE mistake and probably had lost sucess momentum by not taking that step 5-8 years earlier.

The sales training that I chose was actually not appropriate for my team of “inside sales” account managers, but it was all I could find. This is early in the internet world and it was a referral from a business associate who gave me the name of the trainer and the program. It was not the best choice, but it did help me to retool the entire sales and customer service team.

It was in 1995 that I decided that in my “next and final career” I would develop and teach a personally written Sales Training System for small sales organizations (2 to 20 Inside Sales executives) and a complimentary coaching system for Customer Service Departments (3-10 CSRs) that would help business owners and staff members reap the benefits of the systems that I had honed over those 10 years.

Over the next 10 years, I did just that and I tried out many variations on my own sales and customer service orientation. Unlike some of the high-ticket sales training, the NuVo Partner Training is individualized and tailored to the needs of the client. The Customer Service Module is cohesive with the Sales Training program. The “named training programs” demands months of training. Our program helps to assess if the sales and service teams are really well-suited for the job. If they are – the training will be completed in less than 3 months. If they are not, recommendations will be made about replacing or reassigning employees in the wrong jobs.

Results are almost immediate. We provide a way to set goals, develop a process, overcome fear of cold calling, a method of improving their Vocal Skill to make a greater first impression on those critical calls. We can add on modules as needed for more advanced training. The basis of our programs are very simple: If you have a passion for sales, or the emotional empathy to be a great customer service representative, then we provide the training and coaching to make you excel and be professionally and personally fulfilled in your CAREER while allowing you to make the necessary impact and deliver the needed results to help your company grow.

For Business Owners, it is an opportunity to insure results and growth in revenue and satisfaction with customer service and support.

Read more: Small Business Can Benefit from Sales Training and Customer Service Coaching

How to Get Your Staff to Bend Over Backwards for You No Matter What

The constant struggle to get people to want to work for you is an enigma most business owners wrestle with. I have isolated successful methods through growing my multi-million dollar company from the ground up. In my experience it all comes down to how you want to be treated. I was raised in a lovey-dovey family where my parents wanted me to feel great about myself. Maybe it is because I was raised Jewish and all Jewish mothers think their children are superior – who knows… Whatever the reason, I grew up hearing and believing I could do anything.

That kind of confidence instilled in me led me to believe that I could instill that confidence in others. When I first started out I could not afford to hire expensive help and found the most successful type of personnel for my business were young, inexperienced adults in their late teens that had an abundance of willingness. And I do mean an abundance of it – in my viewpoint, there is no better commodity.

A Little Bit Goes a Long Way

My Senior Vice President over Operations and Quality Control who now manages six other executives and a colossal number of employees was only 19 years old when she started with me. Now she is 27. She had that willingness, but virtually no experience. I recall then that she wanted $10.00 per hour. I would only give her $9.00 but I gave her an incentive – to prove to me she was worth it before I consented to that kind of pay (which was a lot of money to me at the time). She did so well that I gave her $11.50 per hour within two weeks of her hire date.

That little bit extra that I did went a long way. She took notice and she consistently proved to me that she could do even more. That was the first time I noticed that rewarding your employees for hard work really paid off. Today, she makes a six-figure income and earns every penny.

I love to validate and reward the staff – it is a driving force of mine in my company. We have an “employee of the month” that gets company recognition and a designated parking space as well as an “employee of the year” that gets a three-day trip to the Big Apple, plus spending money. Not to mention the runner up gets no short shrift. And my employees work their tails off for those coveted prizes, but mainly for the pride they feel after doing so well. The stipulations are that they go above and beyond the call of duty and really set great examples for the rest of the group. I’ve never seen such stellar work from staff at other companies that don’t acknowledge and don’t reward – I know because I used to work at them.

More Freedom = More Responsibility

A major factor in increasing the responsibility level of the employees is giving them more freedom and responsibility. If you do, they will own their position. The best employees are those that really take ownership of their position and run it like it was their very own company. You may think that it is a bit precarious to let someone run their area like it was their own company because what if they took it way off course from what you had designed where that organization would go? Well, I found that the more freedom I gave my executives to do the job the way they thought it should be done based on their understanding of the company’s goals, they became even better at what they did. That really opened my eyes. It was like the circle of life – they would do better and better to warrant the responsibility I had given them.

Another manager of mine is a great example of this. When she first came to work for me, she didn’t necessarily make me feel confident that she could do the job – but she sure was willing. And I have a philosophy about just throwing them in and seeing if they can make it go right or die trying.

She impressed me. She did a great job over and over again. I couldn’t help but acknowledge and validate her. She was only 18 years old when she started working for me and I was so amazed how well she did her job – she was neat, tidy, systematic and never made mistakes – so I told her how great she was all the time. The end result? This shy girl just blossomed into one of my fifteen executives who has several subordinates and runs a tight ship.

So, I learned that the way I should treat people is the way I like being and have been treated. I know it’s the Golden Rule that many of us have heard or read, but I learned to apply this in regards to staff and it works well for me. I grew up knowing that it works from the recipient end. I used it later in business and learned how much it really empowers others when you tell them they can – it becomes instinctive. Application of that in the corporate world brings out the natural abilities of the people you bestow that confidence in. Their abilities really start to shine through.

I remember another girl that worked in my company in the early days. We’ll call her “American Mary” (she chose that nickname herself) even though that’s not her name. She wasn’t a real fast duplicator or speedy at comprehending; but I learned that if I wanted to work with her, I had to, in essence, “Be” her. Incidentally, a marketing principle that helps a graphic designer attain a better idea of what kind of design will “pull” (get responses) for a totally alien industry to that said designer is to learn to “Be” the recipient of the direct mail piece. Once someone learns to assume the views and ideas of the recipient, then he can design something that will elicit a reach – a call or an order, etc. This principle also applies to employees. “American Mary” could not work with a certain person in my company because he would not tolerate her slowness. He couldn’t or wouldn’t understand what it was like to be her. So, he barked his orders as fast as he usually did and he got nowhere. On the other hand, I would just “Be” her. I’d slow it down, be really kind, maybe draw a map for her even if she had been there five times before…and she would do anything for me. And she’d make sure she’d do a perfect job if she knew it was for me. Even today, she still calls me from Europe every now and then just to say hello.

Ask Not What I Can Do For You…

It all comes down to the point of exchanging properly with an employee; and that’s a tough one to balance. The person has to bring in a return to the company. With my employees and my executives, I start at what I can afford to pay them. I provide them an atmosphere where they can prosper by giving them the freedom to do the job themselves – always observing that they have the willingness as the biggest factor. In the initial interview process, I tell them the truth: “I expect the world. You are expected to give 110% and take pride in a job well done. You give to me first and then I’ll exchange back with you.” And I do. I demand a lot. And when they deliver and go above and beyond what I expect, I give back to them over and above what they expect. It’s that circle of life concept I was talking about earlier.

Another example of how to apply this is to spread their accolades through word of mouth. I don’t ever plan this; I just may be talking to my PR about one of my designers and I just say how great that designer is doing – and guess what? Next thing you know that designer has heard about it. That really does something for the person you are praising. They know you think they are great at their job and that really makes them want to work even harder for you.

Loyalty Pays Off

The President of my company, Jennifer Custer, is a gem. I recall one day her mother asking me what the gross income was for the week. She said she wanted to know so she could predict what kind of weekend she was going to have. I didn’t understand – what did this have to do with her weekend? I found out; Jenn was not fun to be around when the company’s revenue was down. I learned from her mother that she wanted so badly to make it, for me and the company, that when she did not, she really felt down. I never thought that she wore her duties that personally.

To instill that kind of loyalty you have to be loyal. When somebody flows me a lot of help in a particular area, I never forget it, I never disconnect from that. I have someone that was with me that has been with me from the beginning. She was a “Doubting Thomas” and would comment behind my back that I “sure had a big pipe dream in regards to growing the company.” But she was really good at her post – her division does a lot of production in that area and she runs it well. They are result driven and have deadlines that would even try the patience of Job. It would have been hard to replace her, plus she had been with me so long.

Once my President found out that she was negating my dreams to others, she addressed it and that person never did it again. But I never held onto that as a grudge. In fact, I ended up giving her a raise above what her position was worth in our geographical area. In my opinion, she had warranted it – the good she constantly did surely outweighed her verbal negativity. She was with me a long time and truly developed her area.

I never disconnected from her because she helped me, despite her verbal transgression. Not only did she make amends for what she has ever said about me, she would never naysay me or my company again, and now she’ll probably never leave me. So always take a look at what the staff member DOES (as opposed to says), regardless of the apparency.

Lastly, I think it’s important and warrants mentioning that I want my employees to enjoy their time here at work. I’ve had a few jobs where I hated going in to work in the morning and couldn’t wait until the end of the day. Although I’ve learned that ultimately I am responsible for my condition in life – at work and at home – I could also notice things that existed in the workplace that were surely less than optimum. I wished that there was some person to tell, someone that would listen and be able to do something about it. You need to make sure that your executives and employees know you are their friend and know that you genuinely care about them. You will build a juggernaut like I have and your executives will carry forward your ideals to the rest of your crew.

Read more: How to Get Your Staff to Bend Over Backwards for You No Matter What

The Difference Between Busy Work and Profit Work

Everyone complains these days about how busy they are, but how productively are they using their time. Anyone who has ever worked in commission sales soon discovers that there are two kinds of work; busy-work and profit-work.

Pareto’s Principle says that 80% of our results come from 20% of our efforts. It’s been my observation that when it comes to modern work practices Pareto’s Principle is optimistic.

Here are 5 questions to ask yourself during your working day.

Question 1: Is what I am doing now the best choice of activity to help me achieve my objectives.

The first step to answering this question well is to know what your objectives are. Most people have not given much thought to what the real objectives of their job are. They are too occupied with the busy-work to ask “what is the bottom line profit reason why I am here?”

The role of every employee, and self employed person, is to enhance the business’s ability to make net profit. No matter how far you are from the money making coal face, if you give some thought to your role in helping the business profit then you will be able to determine what is busy-work and what is profit-work.

Question 2: Who can I delegate this to?

The basic business concept of employment is that the employee should be providing the most valuable service possible for the money that they are being paid. If you are spending time doing tasks that someone further down the food chain could be doing then you are not providing the most valuable service for what you are being paid.

Question 3: What would be the consequence of not do what I am doing now?

This is an enlightening question. The human being is a great time waster. They spend too long on phone calls, too much time searching on the internet, too much time at the coffee machine, too much time in idle chatter and so on.

If you regularly mentally ask yourself what the consequence would be if you didn’t do what you are doing in this very moment then you would quite often discover that there would be no consequence, because what you are doing is busy-work.

Question 4: Can I put a system in place to make this task faster?

Are there ways to make some, or all, of your regular tasks more efficient? Over your lunch break, or while traveling to or from the office, give some thought to what systems you may be able to put into place that will help you complete tasks faster or more efficiently. A good assumption to work by is that there is always a way to do anything that is ten times better than the current way.

Question 5: If I was hiring and paying a person to do my job would I be happy if they were doing what I am doing now?

What is good use of your time and what is poor use is all a matter of perspective. If you can change the perspective then you can often gain an insight that you hadn’t taken notice of before. The best perspective for assessing whether what you are doing is busy work or profit work is to stand in the shoes of an employer and imagine that you are paying someone, out of your own pocket, for the work being done.

You may think that you are under paid but if you had to personally pay that salary then you would probably think that it was a large amount of money. You would also be very keen to get value for the money that you are spending. Your assessment, from that new perspective, is likely to be very profit-work focused.

Final Words

Even the best workers can use their time more efficiently. Most workers could at least double their profitable output. Make a daily habit of asking yourself the above five questions and your will not only increase your profitable output but you will also gain more job satisfaction.

Read more: The Difference Between Busy Work and Profit Work

Multicultural Management

The values structure is represented through the motivational domains. Further, while we anticipate universality in the values structure, i.e. the set of values reflecting a particular motivational domain will remain constant, the relative importance of different domains to specific cultural groups is expected to vary. Cultural variation is reflected through these differences. The central question then concerns the appropriate cultural grouping or layer to reflect these motivational domain differences as they relate to business practices and outcomes.

Cultural differences present themselves in the very basics of everyday lives. Cultural opacity takes place when a cultural concept is unique to a culture. This may occur when some culturally defined concepts are transposed from one cultural setting to another. For instance, the American concept of “privacy” sounds more like an alien notion than an individual right to many Chinese, whose culture lacks a similar social norm. And “program,” a popular term in the U.S., may not translate into an exact Chinese equivalent because the English word has different meanings in different contexts, some of which do not exist in China. Regarding business management, American culture has nurtured a series of methodologies designated as classical, behavioral, and modelling, while Chinese management, to some extent, absorbs nutrition from ancient Chinese cultural wisdom.

Chinese firms have drawn insights from a horse racing legend in which a commoner, whose three horses (the best, the middling, and the slowest) were all a bit slower than the three horses belonging to the king, won two out of the three races because he raced his slowest horse against the king’s fastest (resulting in a loss), his middling horse against the king’s worst, and his best against the king’s middling horse.

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Online Horse Classifieds great for Horse Buying Research

Buying a horse can be a very time consuming endeavor, with all the different horse breeds and skills to choose from. The more you become familiar with the process of buying and selling horses, the better your chances will be to end up with the horse to fit your needs. There are many avenues to look for the horse you want, like a local barn, tack shops, newspaper classifieds, and now you can go online and look through thousands of horse for sale classifieds. Take your time and don’t get to overwhelmed. If you make the selection process in a hurry, you might make an unwise purchase. Plan to take from one month to one year to find your ideal horse. Understandably, if you are without a horse, one year mite sound like a very long time, but you can use this time to become more knowledgeable about what you want by taking lessons.

The first thing you must determine is what you really want from a horse, and to what extent you will be using him/her. Will the horse be a trustworthy companion or wonderful Dressage prospect? Buy taking the time and comparing the different classified ads presented to you, will help determine your priorities. Be sure to use the advanced search features each online classified horse website has to offer, this will help you to narrow down your search results.

Once you have found the horse you want, its always a good idea to get a professional opinion when you are buying a horse. Whether or not you use an agent to help you select your horse, you should always have a basic veterinary pre-purchase exam performed. When you seek out professional advice, pay for it and then listen to it! When your instructor or veterinarian cautions you about a horse, it is for a reason. When seeking advice, it is best to a well-respected professional that has no vested interest in the horse sale.

Here is a breakdown of what to look for when a horse is for sale:

* does the horse fit your needs * what skills does the horse possess * does the horse have a good temperament * do comparisons of other similar horses * does the horse fit the selling price * get professional advice * are there any lessons with the sale * make sure to have pre-purchase vet exam * can you afford the upkeep on a horse (such as boarding, feed, and veterinary care.)

Stay focused. Keep in mind that you are selecting a horse for a particular reason or desired skill. There are many decisions and compromises lying ahead, so it helps if you set your priorities clearly at the outset.

If the overall purpose of the horse is to teach you how to ride rather than to carry you to the winner’s circle, then the selection process will emphasize different traits to fit your needs. If the horse is intended to be a long-term project rather than a stepping stone, you may need to invest more time, effort, and money in your purchase. Remember to take your time and use the tools at your disposal, such as online horse classifieds, you will thank yourself in the end.

Read more: Online Horse Classifieds great for Horse Buying Research

Online Business – Setting Up Your Own Affiliate Program

Joining an affiliate program is a neat way to make money from your users. But just as you can join someone else’s affiliate program, so you can set up your own program and invite webmasters to sign up.

What would that bring you? The same as you’re bringing your affiliate partners: deals. Every time someone sends you a user who gives you money, you give a portion of that money to your affiliate. It’s an easy way to generate traffic and earn cash.

And you don’t need to be a programming genius to set up an affiliate program. There are a whole bunch of companies out there that offer entire affiliate kits right off the shelf.

Ultimate Affiliate lets you run a fully featured affiliate program from your website. It integrates with virtually every payment method, awards down-line commissions, and can handle high-traffic websites. You can edit the sign-up form to match the “look and feel” of your site as well as delete some of the optional fields. The administration area allows you to edit affiliates and commissions, create printable reports of money due, export the data to a text file, view the traffic through your affiliate program, and much more. Your affiliates can log in at any time and see their traffic and commission statistics as well as change their information and get links and banner code.

Once the program is set up you’ll only need to log in once a month to print out a list of the affiliates, their addresses, and the money owed. You can do this quarterly if you wish. You can export the payments owed to a text file in PayPal’s “mass pay” format and then just upload it to your PayPal account to pay everyone automatically. Or, you can simply write your own checks. If you have to pay a lot of commissions, there is a check printing service called qchex.com. Upload the file and they’ll print and mail your checks for a fee of about 80 cents each.

Alternatively, Locked Area Pro is an advanced member’s area management system offering very good security that’s easy to maintain. The system provides a huge list of useful features including automated sign-up, user account validation, optional random password generation and an administration approve/decline account feature. It also comes with an extremely powerful control panel with an online administration of users, backup, and full customization facilities from the browser. A statistics system is also in built in. What more could you want?

Read more: Online Business – Setting Up Your Own Affiliate Program