Improve Customer Satisfaction – WebSite Health

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Improve Customer SatisfactionOur last post discussed web site speed i.e. the time it takes to load a page once the reader clicks on a link to your site. There are added aspects to consider. For example, if your site uses a contact form.  Some templates come with a built-in contact form. While others will need a plugin to add this feature. Test the contact form for speed of response, for ease of use, and results in terms of customers and readers filling in the form. Remember to respond to them immediately.

Even if it is an automated response it is better than nothing at all. You will need to follow up within 24 hours with a real response. Otherwise, you risk getting bad comments on various boards, etc. This includes those people who post comments on various topics. Respond to them, even the negative ones. Other readers will gauge your response and decide if they wish to contact you after reading how you handle even the negative responses.

Improve Customer Satisfaction – Digital Books

If it applies a digital book might be the answer to retain loyal customers and keep them coming back. For example, we have not done this yet on our site, we are just getting started, but stay tuned we will have one sometime in the future. We also blog consistently talking about various topics that are of interest to our readers and to small business owners who are looking for information about building, maintaining, and operating a web site.

Improve Customer Satisfaction – Test after Every change

Operating a blog or a web site involves changing content, upgrading plugins, and themes all of the time. As these elements change, they sometimes stop working the way they should and the only way to find this out is to always test after making a change to confirm that everything is still working the way it should. Set up a regular testing methodology to ensure that the content is being delivered the way you wish and the plugins are doing what they are supposed to. Fix any negative test results immediately to minimize the impact on your customers.

Check the Time it Takes Web Pages to Load

We thought it is important to emphasize web page load speed one more time. There are many locations along the path between the server where your website is hosted and the user or person loading your page. There are a multitude of hops that have routers processing yours and millions of other bits of data. If one of those routers is overloaded or running a bit slow, your page will not load quickly. Same thing if your server is overloaded.

The first thing to do is to run a test called Tracert. Basically it will check the response time for all hops between your website and your location. If there are locations including your server that are responding slowly, it will be shown. You can then decide if any action should be taken and where to focus your efforts!

For more topics on customer satisfaction, click here.

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Retirees Staying in Their Homes

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Retirees Staying in Their HomesIn a survey of 4,000 Baby Boomer households conducted by the non-profit Demand Institute, 63% of Boomers plan to stay in their current home once they retire. This is a huge number and is driven by a number of financial and emotional issues that we will all face one day. With more retirees staying in their homes, what does this mean for families?

The real question is when is the right time to stay and the right time to find something smaller, perhaps less expensive, and easier to maintain? This is a tough question for many people since there is often a lot of emotional attachment to the home. After all, it may be the home where you raised your kids, you have lived in it all your life or you may just like the neighborhood and the people who are your close neighbors. it could also just be sentimental reasons that keep 63% of people who are retiring staying in their homes.

Retirees Staying in Their Homes – Considerations

The most obvious question is whether you can afford to stay where you are. There is a general day to expenses for utilities and care of the lawns etc. Then there are repairs that are needed from time to time and as we get older, we can usually do less and less which means that either it costs more to hire help or the house gets that run-down look, and the value of the home declines.

Health is another issue that affects your ability to continue with maintenance. Health costs may also dictate that the house needs to be sold to cover the cost of health treatment unless you have lots of savings to live on.

Moving is not inexpensive. There is the cost of legal and real estate fees. The actual cost of moving and doing upgrades the costs can add up very quickly. In some markets, that condo you are looking at just might be more expensive than the house you are selling.

For many seniors, it is just simpler to stay in place. Spend the money that would have gone to cover moving costs on maintaining your home. It becomes a very personal decision based on the situation, finances, emotional ties, and many other personal issues. Try to work through them one by one. Remember that no decision or delaying a decision is actually a decision to maintain the status quo!

Plan for Healthy and Unhealthy Retirement Years

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Plan for Healthy and Unhealthy Retirement YearsAnyone thinking about retirement in the next few years needs to plan. Plan for Healthy Retirement Years and unhealthy ahead of them. You may be healthy now, plan to golf every day or pursue some other activity that you have always wanted to do. If you are healthy now, there is a really good chance that you will be able to do just that. But there comes a time when our health changes. We may need to change our lifestyle. As a result, we need to be prepared to pay for the kind of support we may require.

Baby boomers are retiring in droves.. Many plan to lead healthy active lives for many years to come. However not planning for the unhealthy years may leave them in a situation that prevents them from enjoying a high quality of life.  The transition to retirement is filled with many issues. For more information on this topic, click here.

What Steps Should You Consider

What are some of the steps that baby boomers can take to plan for retirement years? When is the best time to put these steps into action and who should you talk to?

The answer is to take the action immediately when you still can and are of sound mind. Involve your family in the decisions. Make sure that they are informed of your intentions and desires. Typically this is done through what is called a living will. This is a document prepared by you and your lawyer. It provides instructions to your caregivers while you are still. A living will covers who should look after your finances. More importantly, make decisions about your health care. A power or attorney or living will is a legal document. It should be given to your family or at least the person you designate as the person who will look after you when you cannot.

You may also include specific instructions about health care, your financial situation and what is to be done with your home, car, etc while you are incapacitated. Take into account the availability of the person you appoint. a Family member who is thousands of miles away vs. one that is living in the same town seems more practical. Do they have the right attitude and are they sufficiently mature to handle the decisions that are needed?

Plan Retirement Years – Power of Attorney

There is no sense in appointing someone who is of the same age or older than you are. Someone who is younger and has a higher probability of being available when needed is probably a better choice than your older brother or sister or an older attorney.

Finally, baby boomers need to also plan financially for the time frame when they may have higher health-related bills. Work with a financial adviser to ensure that you are positioned for both the healthy years as well as the unhealthy years. Plan for Healthy Retirement Years as well as years where you may need support.

Web Site Health – Customer Satisfaction

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Web Site HealthYou have improved the content of your companies web site or blog, it is fresh and accurate. There are lots of products covered and you have added all of the information that your clients and customers may need to help them decide on using your firm or contacting your firm for more information. But calls and contacts are simply not coming through and you are beginning to wonder if the investment in this web site was worth it. Maybe you should review your Web Site Health first.

There are many different attributes that will determine if customers will come to your site and then stay there to browse your material. By having excellent original content you have satisfied the search engines, but have you done enough? Once your potential readers or customers have been presented with search results that include your web site, the next step is for them to click on the link and be presented with the results.

Web Site Health – Response time

Many web sites are slow to respond for a variety of reasons. In some cases it is the server that it is running on that is slow. In others it can be a network issue. It might even be the readers last mile or modem at their location. Regardless, if it takes longer than 3 seconds to load a page, many people are just going to move onto another site and you have lost them forever!

The server and the configuration of your web site is within your control, while the other elements are not. Take the necessary steps to make sure that you are paying for a high response time server. Then design your web site to be as fast as possible. Delete any plugins that are not being used. Compress images before uploading to your blog. Delete anything that is not being used so that your blog can run as fast as absolutely possible.

Select a WordPress Template that is Efficient

There are all types of templates available. Some are more complex than others and some will load faster than others. Keep it as simple as possible. Test a lot until you have a template that delivers the content in an efficient manner that is satisfying visually to the customer. Keep testing to ensure that the theme and template work well with your server. Remember the 3 second rule and if your site is not loading within this time frame you could be losing customers.

For information on customer satisfaction information, click here.

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Five Guidelines for Financial Health

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Guidelines for Financial HealthThese were Five Guidelines for Financial Health that were developed by a survey company regarding Guidelines for Financial Health. A score of 5 means that you probably will end up financially well off, while a poor score means you will probably end up without the income or savings you need in retirement.

The correct answers are shown in bold, if you want to obtain a score of five. We also decided to expand on each of these items to help readers understand the meaning of each of these areas and how they can affect your finances over the long term. Let us know if you find this useful! This post regarding Guidelines for Financial Health could be one of the most important posts on blog that you have ever read! Do you need a million to be able to retire comfortably? Probably not, but check out this post if you want to learn more.

Five  Guidelines for Financial Health

  • Did you save any money last year? Yes
  • Did you miss any payments on any obligations in the past year? No
  • Did you have a balance on your credit card after the last payment was due? No
  • Including all of your assets, was more than 10% of the value in liquid assets? Yes
  • Is your total debt service (principal and interest) less than 40% of your income? Yes

More Details about the Five  Guidelines for Financial Health

Did you save any money last year? Yes – This is an absolute must if you are going to have money for retirement and emergencies. Set aside at least 10% of your gross income. Invest diversely and do not touch it unless there is an extreme emergency or you retire.

Did you miss any payments on any obligations in the past year? No – Not only will you maintain your credit rating, you will avoid lots of penalty fees as well as interest charges.  Following this rule can also save you money on loans in terms of lower interest rates.

Did you have a balance on your credit card after the last payment was due? No – You never want to carry a balance over or past the due date. At the lowest level the interest rate is approximately 20% for most credit cards on unpaid balances and as high as 30% on store credit cards.

Liquid Assetts

Including all of your assets, was more than 10% of the value in liquid assets? Yes – Important for emergencies, liquid assets are investments that can quickly be turned into cash to deal with an emergency. You get to avoid penalties, high interest charges, peace of mind  etc by using liquid assets to look after the financial emergency

Is your total debt service (principal and interest) less than 40% of your income? Yes – This is a key measure that most lenders use to help them decide to lend money to a customer as well as what rate to charge. If you are over 40%, chances are you will not get approved for a loan. In fact many lenders look for 30% or less before they will consider lending money at the best rates.

Think about these Guidelines for Financial Health as they pertain to your own situation and then take the appropriate action that is needed to improve your situation.

Boomers Staying Home

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baby boomers staying homeIn a recent survey of 4,000 Baby Boomer households conducted by the non-profit Demand Institute, 63% of Boomers plan to stay in their current home once they retire. They do not plan to downsize to a smaller home. They do not plan to move to a condo and they do not plan to move in with one of their children. This is a surprising statistic given the expressed interest by many people that they want to sell their homes. They want to find something they can move into which gives them less work. They are looking for freedom to travel both financially and from work to maintain their homes.

Having gone through this same analysis personally, we have reached the same conclusion about staying in our home. We initially thought we would sell our family home. We would find an inexpensive condo, lock the door, and travel. No need to worry about upkeep and routine maintenance activities. Turns out that this dream was not practical from a financial perspective unless we were willing to lose a lot of money. Here is some more detail as to why many boomers are finding this to be the case.

Boomers Staying Home – Expensive to move

We found it to be very expensive to move as we are sure that many others have. Let’s assume that your home is worth $300,000, a nice round number. Real estate fees will cost $15,000 @5%, and legal fees will cost at least another $2000. Various city taxes and fees can vary a great deal from nothing to $10, or $20,000! Then there is the physical cost of moving, even with friends helping is going to cost $500 to $1000. Of course, not all of your furniture will fit in the new home. There are window treatments along with various adjustments and upgrades needed in the new home. The sky is the limit. Add your own number, but we will choose $10,000 to be on the safe side. It will probably be much more than this.

When you add all of this up the cost to move could end up between $30,000 and $50,000 depending on your assumptions. For our money, we would rather put that $30,000 into our own house. We enjoy and stay in the same neighborhood that we have been in for over 25 years. We can also use some of that money to pay someone to look after the house while we are away as well. Note, if you travel, your home insurance will require that you have someone looking after your home while away. They should be checking on it at least once per week or more often.

When you work through the numbers it is evident that we are going to stay right where we are along with 63% of the population.

Journalism Principles to Consider When Writing Content

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Journalism Principles to Consider When Writing ContentWriting content for your website is an increasing challenge.  Journalism Principles to Consider regardless of whether you are writing for Google Adsense or to attract customers to your company’s site to sell more products must be considered. Readers have a short attention span and if you do not capture their interest in the first paragraph or above the fold, then there is less chance of them staying on your site. They move on quickly so the first rule of thumb is to put the good stuff up front to keep their attention.

If you are a journalist or a writer for online content, make sure you always place the really good tidbits up front. So in keeping with this rule, the good stuff is always upfront, use catch titles that will attract the reader in the first place, and place enough content on the page so that your bounce rate is as long as possible. We add more on these two topics in subsequent paragraphs.

Journalism Principles to Consider – Bounce Rate

Some people think that Google looks at bounce rate as a measure of interest by the reader. A short bounce rate means that either your content is not very good or it did not match what the reader was looking for. A bounce rate that is consistently short is usually going to mean that Google lowers you on the index results of searches or SERP and then no one is going to see your page. A longer bounce rate or higher one means that readers found your page interesting enough to stay long enough to read it and consider it. The bottom line in addition to placing the good stuff up front is to write consistently great content that readers will stay and read.

Journalism Principles to Consider – Titles

When Google, Bing, or Yahoo presents search results they list the title and a brief summary below the title. Based on this limited information we all decide on whether the site is relevant enough to our area of interest. If it is we click on it and if not we move to the next result. Your title is the most important element at this point and plays a major part in helping the reader to decide if it is worth their time to click on the result or not. Make your titles interesting, clear, and concise so that the reader can decide if this is something they should click on.

There are lots of other factors in Journalism Principles to Consider When Writing Content, however, if you focus on writing good content in a manner that readers will read, then you are well on the way to attracting readers to your site.

Retirement Investing: Don’t go it Alone

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Retirement InvestingIf you are planning to retire soon and planning to manage your own retirement account, don’t go it alone. Get help with your retirement investing. Take an active part in all decisions. Most of us do not know very much about the details of the investments we have. We participate in a mutual fund which has a combination of stocks, bonds and cash. We leave it up to our financial adviser to recommend something to us.

Then we rely on the mutual fund manager to manage the fund for us. It is a good idea to get advice from people who make it their business to understand the markets, the investment opportunities etc,. Someone has to pay them and that means you. Each time you buy a mutual fund, your adviser gets a kickback. The mutual fund manager  charges up to 2% MER fees in Canada and somewhat less in the US. You make money only after they get paid. In a down year that can mean that your account actually loses money.

Retirement Investing – Invest Directly in Equities and bonds

One way to avoid all of these fees, which are ongoing each year is to purchase equities and corporate bonds directly within your investment plan. You will pay a trading fee initially, but that is the only fee you will pay until you sell the equity. The next thing to focus on is which stocks and which bonds. Use your adviser, do your own research and stay away from speculative and high risk stocks.

In our opinion, consumers investing for retirement should focus on blue-chip companies that have a long history of paying dividends and meeting the terms of their bonds. Better still is that these companies pay a dividend on a regular basis they also routinely increase the total dividend from time to time. The same applies to corporate bonds, although in their case the interest paid is usually fixed for the life of the bond. If it is a good quality company, then your risk will be relatively low. We should mention that nothing is risk free and that is why you want to invest in a diverse group of companies so that if anything catastrophic occurs, then your total nest egg is not in jeopardy.

Seek guidance and advice from several people and them make your own decisions regarding the best approach to take with your Retirement Investing! If you worry about your investments and it keeps you awake at night, invest even more conservatively. You may sacrifice some income for less risk, but you will sleep at night.

Challenges in Retirement

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Challenges in RetirementThere are lots of challenges in retirement. Many people retire without enough money, health issues, and family issues to deal with. Still, many people can have a great retirement if they properly planned and saved enough money. Unfortunately, many Retirees are broke due to poor savings while they were working. Sometimes there are uncontrollable events in their lives, and they need to provide support to their families.

Challenges in Retirement – Stress in Retirement

Not having enough money to live comfortably in retirement causes a great deal of stress during what should be the best years of their lives. Without sufficient funds to live on, wondering where food is going to come from or how you will pay for it, and going to secondhand stores it can be very difficult for many seniors. North America is not exactly a senior-friendly continent as compared to other locations such as Europe. We do not seem to value our seniors in the same manner that they do in Europe and as a result, many are struggling with a great deal of stress in their lives.

Loneliness in Retirement

Not having sufficient money during retirement with family often many miles away it can get quite lonely in retirement. Unless they live in a neighborhood where people have lived all their lives, they have friends to socialize with many seniors find themselves unable to get out to be with friends and socialize.

Ignoring Health Issues

Lack of money also means that they tend to ignore health issues. If there is insufficient insurance to pay for health coverage many health-related issues will be ignored until it becomes an emergency. Older age seniors develop life-threatening issues just because they do not have sufficient funds to pay for health costs.

Worry about Health costs

There is a constant worry about how they’re going to pay for health-related costs. Even a visit to the doctor or the dentist may add additional stress and aggravate an already existing health condition. Insufficient savings or insufficient health coverage can lead to stress-related health issues. Ignoring health issues can also cause more serious issues to develop.

More Retirees are Working

As a result of all of the above, we are seeing more and more retirees going back to work. They may choose to work at part-time jobs that pay minimum wage but at least they are getting out and making some money to put food on the table. This income along with meager savings that they may have and in a few cases provides healthcare coverage allows them to live a better life.

Still Getting Frisky

Another interesting fact is that many seniors are still getting frisky with the opposite sex even though they may be getting up in years. Recent articles in the news have referred to seniors partying and dancing and leaving for extracurricular activities. This is great news and will keep everybody healthy.

Moving in With the Kids

In some cases when one spouse passes away, the other spouse will move in with the kids. If there is insufficient room in the home, this can lead to lots of stress for everybody. In some cases, your mom or dad will integrate well with your family until health-related issues crop up.

Traveling is a Dream

And for many seniors traveling is actually a dream that they dream about while they were still working but sadly are unable to fulfill that dream once they retire due to insufficient funds. They have enough to live on, in some cases comfortably but not the extra money that they need to travel and see the world the way they anticipated. This is a sad reality that sinks in a few years after they retire.

Targets for Scammers

Many seniors are also targets for scammers. It’s an unfortunate aspect of our society. With lots of sales pressure placed on seniors, they often will separate them from their money leaving them in an even worse situation than they were before. This is a terrible reality.

With all of these challenges and retirement, it is still possible to enjoy retirement and make the most of your life regardless of the situation.

Get Rid of Bad Content

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Get Rid of Bad ContentDo you have bad content on your website? What is bad content, and how do you identify it? Many web site owners do not even realize that their content might be considered bad, who gets to decide if content is bad or not. Turns out there are two major groups who will decide if your content is bad, and they both will have a significant impact on the results that your web site is intended to deliver. Results meaning traffic to your web site and customers that convert to revenue for your business. Get Rid of Bad Content Now.

Who are these two groups, and how do you identify them? What can you do to fix the bad content and how do you verify that the results you are looking for are being delivered to your web site. We will try to answer these questions and more in the following narrative.

Get Rid of Bad Content – What is Bad content

Anytime you have content that is  original, well written, uses keywords and phrases that people might search for, is regularly updated and kept current, you probably have great content. Web designers get into trouble when their content is copied. If it is old and out of date and the web site is not easy to navigate it can be rated lower by the search engines. There are many more criteria, however these are probably the main ones to focus on.

Get Rid of Bad Content – Major Groups

Well, it turns out that there is an obvious group and one not so obvious. The obvious one is your customers. If they are not finding what they are looking for, they may tell you and if they do you had better do something about it.

The other group is the search engines. They use their private algorithms to rate and index your web site pages and then rank you in search results. If you have bad content in their estimation, your web site will be well down the list of search results. Chances are people searching for subjects you cover will never be seen by them.

Get Rid of Bad Content – A Program

One way to address your web sites content is to develop a regular maintenance program that will over time, keep your web site up to date and current for both your readers, your customers and the search engines. For example develop a schedule to complete the following:

  • Update the oldest content once a week
  • Add content to the shortest post once a week
  • Update your content based on what readers are reading
  • Add new content on a regular basis
  • React immediately to customer comments

Your regular addition of new content based on new products and services will keep your content looking fresh. It will be up to date for the search engines and your customers.