What to Do When That Mortgage is Finally Paid Off

Many people spend a large part of their lives paying off the mortgage on their home. Those who are wise, seek the advice of a financial planner like www.andep.com.au to help them reduce the interest and get the debt paid as soon as possible. This kind of financial planning can mean you save thousands and may even be able to pay of the debt earlier. So what happens when it is finally paid off?

Apart from throwing a party to celebrate, there are many things you can do.

  • Go on a cruise or a trip
  • Buy something you always wanted
  • Enjoy being debt free
  • Keep on paying the same amount of instalments into a savings fund

After spending 20-30 years paying the mortgage off, if you’ve been able to still live comfortably during that time, paying the same amount into a savings fund shouldn’t really worry you. At least you’ll still have it as your own money rather than seeing it all go to the lender. When you consult with a financial advisor, they will be able to advise you on the best way to invest that money to grow your wealth.

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Why a Lawyer is Essential for Your Business Sale Agreement

No matter whether you are buying or selling a business, the sale agreement is the document that the whole deal will pivot on. It is essential to have your lawyer draw it up if you are selling, and if you are the business buyer you will certainly need to have the document assessed by an experienced digital agency like northland.com.au or a solicitor to ensure everything is above board and legally correct.

There are many ways you can be scammed when purchasing a business, but a lawyer will be able to pick up on anything that is not right or even a bit suspicious and check into it. Here are some of the problems lawyers can catch.

  • Hidden debt. Sometimes a business owes people lots of money and when you are buying it, you can become responsible for all the debt. This can become a crippling obstacle standing in the way of those profits you expected. A lawyer can go through the document and add a clause that makes the sale legal only if there are no outstanding debts.
  • If you are purchasing a business, the lease is an important part of it, unless you are planning to re-establish in another location. A lawyer can look at the lease and tell you whether it is favourable or needs some clauses added to it so you can continue to trade in the way you planned.

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The Importance of Dress Sense in Business

Dress sense is not something difficult to achieve once you understand what it includes. Being well dressed in business will help you to gain the respect and position you deserve. Some people choose to enhance their looks with Botox injections; others choose to make the most of themselves by choosing styles and colours that suit them.

Both are good choices, as Botox treatment can eliminate ageing wrinkles from your face and can also be used to prevent underarm sweating which will ruin any kind of outfit you wear. Men especially, are prone to sweating and those white or blue business shirts certainly show up the wet patches. You also have to think of body odour when you sweat excessively.

Why colours are important

No matter if you’ve bought the most expensive and elegant outfit for work, wearing the wrong colours can make certain skin types look sallow or pale and that often makes you look as if you are unwell. That’s not the impression you want to give the boss or anyone else you have to deal with in business.

Wearing colours that suit your skin type will enhance your looks and make you more attractive. Knowing you look your best gives you more confidence. When you have confidence you relate better to others and this can certainly give you an edge over the competition in the workplace. When management sees that customers are happy dealing with you, they’ll be more likely to give you a promotion or a pay raise.

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Web Design Mistakes by Small and Medium Enterprises

Small and medium enterprises make a few common mistakes when they have their websites designed for the very first time. Although, an experienced web designer would point out those mistakes to you during the development stages, but it is important that you know which web design mistakes to avoid as a business owner. The following common mistakes should be avoided at all costs:

Not Having a Clearly Defined Target Market

The worst thing you can do as a business owner is not define your target market in the early stages of the web design process. The colour scheme, the fonts, images, usability, and all other elements of the design are dictated by who you are targeting. If you do not tell the web designer a clearly defined target market, and tell them to make a design that caters to everyone, you will end up with a design that caters to no one.

Flashy Design and Clutter

Some business owners go for flashy designs and try to put too much information on a single page. You do not have to utilise each and every inch/cm available on the page. If the web design is not pleasing to the eye, if there is a lot of clutter and flashiness, you might lose an average user to your competition.

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How to Choose a Digital Agency

Once you have decided to get your company’s website up and running you will need to choose a digital agency to help you with the many elements that are essential for success. It is important to think carefully about what your business needs so that you can choose the best agency – one that you will be able to work with, that has the skills needed for your particular business.

Find out what they offer

Not all digital agencies offer the same things. One might only design and implement websites and not do any social – or other – marketing. Another may perform SEO but nothing else. You need a digital agency to have the skills required for your business so it is vital to speak with them first and find out exactly what they offer.

Choosing the right professional digital marketing agency is somewhat like choosing the right builder. If you want a high end home built, you would not choose a project builder who prefers to erect cheaper homes, or vice versa.  Once you have found several builders, you choose 3 and ask for quotes. So you can do a similar thing when choosing a digital agency.

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Why You Need an Experienced Property Lawyer to Lease Commercial Premises

Starting up a new business? One of the main things you need are premises from which to run it. You won’t generally want to buy such premises as that would be very costly. Leasing commercial premises is the usual way to find a good home for your enterprise. However, don’t go in and sign a lease unprepared. Unless you know a lot about leases there are too many things that can work against you. Consulting a well known lawyers list list such as www.lawyerslist.com.au and then hiring an experienced property lawyer to examine the contract and make any necessary changes is the best way to go.

A lease that is drawn up by the landlord will ensure that all his or her needs are met, but may be rather light on what the lessee needs. If you have never leased before, you will most likely be unaware of what these needs are. And often the legal language is confusing, so you may not understand exactly what is meant by some terms or clauses.

Here are some of the things that can happen when you sign a lease without really knowing what it contains.
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How to Get the Best Out of Your Adwords Marketing Campaign

Once you have decided to dip a toe into the waters of an adwords marketing campaign you will need to do everything possible to ensure success. Unless you have a large budget, you may be concerned about what adwords will cost. If your budget is low, here are some tips to help you.

  • Don’t aim for those high ad positions. Most people think the top three ads are the place to be as they will convert best. However, analytics show that this is not true. Often, the lower positions get better conversions. Experts have found that many people who click on the top ads do so on impulse, rather than because they are looking for something specific with the intention of following through.
  • Long tail keywords are your friends. For a start, they are much more specific and will attract people who actually want what you offer better than if you used a general, single keyword with a broader meaning. For instance, “Joondalup dentist” is a more specific keyword than “Dental Clinic”. It is much more likely to attract people who want a dentist in Joondalup, so your ad is more targeted and hence, more successful.
  • Create a separate campaign for broad, popular keywords. These can be a drain on your more specifically targeted ads if lots of people click on them quickly and use up your daily budget before the other ads get a chance to show.

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How to be More Successful in Email Marketing

To be successful, email marketing needs to achieve three things.

  • Get most of your addressees to open the email
  • Get them to read it right through
  • And get them to click through to your offer

If your email marketing efforts don’t quite manage this, here are some tips to help you become more successful.

  • Create an email that people look forward to reading. You can do this by sounding more like a friend who is interested in them than a corporation that only wants them to buy something.
  • Don’t talk about a list or subscribers and don’t sell in every email. Some emails need to contain only information that is valuable to the reader. Be generous and give things away rather than selling, at least sometimes. Use your name so that people feel they know you. Use their name, but not too often.
  • Create interest by using an attention grabbing subject line. How to (do or be something) is always a good opener. Statistics prove that it is one of the most attention grabbing openers there is, often outperforming unique subject lines that have been pored over for hours.
  • Use white space in the body. Subheadings, short paragraphs and bullet points help busy people scan quickly and get your point across without boring them.

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Why You Need a Corporate Lawyer for Shareholder Disputes

There are many different kinds of shareholder disputes and the best way to solve them is to consult with commercial lawyers. A lawyer will be able to see things with an impartial eye and help you negotiate through what is often a painful maze to get the best outcome for you and for the company. So what kinds of disputes can happen if you own or are a director of a company?

Here are just some: –

  • Disagreement over the direction the company is taking
  • conflict of interest if you or any other director has an interest in another business
  • Poor performance from a director or a shareholder
  • Disputes can arise if the directors or board members are paying themselves high wages instead of paying shareholders
  • Disagreements between partners for various reasons.

If you are an owner, it is wise to be prepared to handle disputes in advance so that you can get on top of them immediately rather than letting them drag on or escalate, neither of which will do the company any good.

A corporate lawyer can set up an agreement as to the steps you will take if and when a dispute between any parties happens. Having a legal agreement will ensure that the dispute is settled quickly. It may prevent the need – and cost of – going to court to settle. Mediation by a neutral party can ensure that a fix that is agreeable to both parties is found. This may be that the aggrieved party is bought out by the others at a fair price.

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Company Structure – Why You Need an Experienced Corporate Lawyer

Many people dream of of setting up their own business without really looking into it. While you may have special skills that would make a great business, you also need to know a lot about setting up and running it. In fact, you really need an experienced corporate lawyer like Lawyers Perth to help you set the company up in the first place. Why?

For a start, there are four different business models, so which one is best for your business? What you choose can have a big impact on things like insurance, tax, asset protection and even legal costs. Rather than choose a model that suits you at the moment, you have to include your future vision for the business and ensure the model you choose will still be right for it when you expand.

Your business may even take a different track that you hadn’t thought of, into the future. If the business model is inflexible, you face all the costs and hassle of changing over to one that suits your plans better. It is a wiser course of action to be guided by a property lawyer, who will ask the right questions to get you thinking about the future of your business.
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How a Litigation Lawyer can Help You

Have you been injured at work or hurt in a car accident that was not your fault? If so, a litigation lawyer can help you. Most likely the last thing you want to do is appear in a court of law and be questioned by Perth lawyers who will do everything in their power to make you look bad, or as if your injury is not as bad as you say it is.

That would be bad enough if you were well, but recovery from bad injury can take many months and make you feel unable to face up to emotional struggles. The trouble is that you only have a few months to start such proceedings, after which you cannot claim any compensation. But with a litigation lawyer you can get compensation without even having to appear in court yourself.

They do everything that is necessary, from telling you which doctors to go to for assessment and examination to appearing in court on your behalf to negotiate with the insurance company the amount they believe is the right compensation. Continue reading “How a Litigation Lawyer can Help You”

Differentiating Between Branding and Logo Design

To get the best logo design for your business it is important to know the differences between branding and logo. Some people think of them as being the same thing, when in fact, they are not. The terms cannot and should not be used to mean the same as each other. This is confusing because if you think of branding as the same as logo design you will be leaving many important elements out of the equation.

So what’s the difference?

  • Branding is about the identity of the business. It is the corporate image as perceived by the public that includes information about the vision, aims and goals of the company. As such, emotion plays a big part in branding.
  • Identity forms a part of this but consists mainly of the visual aspects from the overall brand.
  • A logo is a way of identifying that business by the use of an icon, thus logo design will have elements that reflect the important parts of the business. These elements may be text, colour, shape and even animation, but the design does not necessarily need to have every element.

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Why You Need a Will

Many people put off making a Will until it is too late, while others don’t think they need one. However, if you have property – and this includes superannuation – you need a Will to ensure it is distributed properly after your death. Dying without a Will only makes thing more difficult for your family and it costs a lot to have the court decide who should benefit from your assets. This cost will be taken out of your assets, so your family will get much less than otherwise.

The trouble with an old Will

You may have made a Will years ago and think that is the end of the matter, but just like many things in this life, a Will may need to be upgraded or rewritten. If you divorce and/or remarry, your current Will is no longer of any use as it is not considered valid. At least, that’s how it is in Western Australia. So a new Will must be made to take into consideration your new circumstances. Then again, if your Will was made when you were younger and you now have more children or grandchildren that have not been mentioned, you may want to rewrite your will to include them.

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Seth Godin Asks : Are you a Marketing Wallflower?

Always a favorite marketing guru around here, Seth Godin has a quick quiz with a surprisingly telling answer. Instead of trying to win over the whole world, you should aim for a select niche of customers.

True, you might have a smaller customer base as a result – but you will have greater loyalty amongst those few. Let’s take a glance at some fields where this works:

  • The “Twilight” fiction franchise – The majority of people just don’t get excited about vampire stories. So what? This series appealed to tween / teen girls with a vivid and somewhat macabre imagination. And now they’re rolling in the dough.
  • Ethnic restaurants – Sure, not everybody likes (or even understands) Mediterranean food. So what? When you want falafel, hummus, and babaganouch, you just aren’t going to get that appetite satisfied at McDonald’s.
  • Hot Topic – The mall-based clothing and gift franchise focuses on the “Goth” and “punk rock” demographic. The rest of the teens head for more traditional fare, but the headbangers and rivitheads all flock here.

Eight Mean Jabs at Internet Explorer

Web designers, why, oh why, do you hate poor little Internet Explorer so much? It seems almost like it did something to you. Did a web browser bully you as a kid? Oh well, whatever the founding incident was, it’s good to see you all working your aggression out with these hilarious images…

  1. IE fails on Jeopardy – We don’t even know how it qualified for the show
  2. Microsoft tries to make it up to us – And fails, because it fails everything.
  3. Microsoft’s error report process – Apparently they get a lot of duplicates?
  4. Four web browsers at a drive-thru – And I want to go to this restaurant!
  5. Browser-tans line-up – Apparently IE is a “butterface”.
  6. The only reasons to use IE. – …and it’s a short list.
  7. A Spanish example – Because IE is so hated, it gets insulted in every language!
  8. Bonus buck! – A whole website dedicated to beating the death drum for IE.