Thursday 11 May 2017

How to Start an Online Business at a Minimal Cost

Like a traditional offline business, online business has become a viable business investment; and a number of internet entrepreneurs today make an impressive income online without having to rent an office, storage space, and hire costly working staff; which is the case with traditional offline-based business. Ideally, the overall cost of starting and running an online business has really gone down today, and anyone with or without any prior knowledge in internet marketing can easily manage an online business without having to dig deeper into their pockets. On the other hand, you don't need to have your own product or service to sell so that you can be able to make a living online: All that you need to starting operating a successful online business at a very small capital investment is a working website, affiliate product or service to sell online and an online audience that will buy the affiliate product or service you are promoting through your website.

How to Have Affordable and Effective Business Website:
Since a website is a necessity for anyone to run an online business, the very first thing you need to think of is how you can have your own website. Owning a website today is very easy and you don't need to be a tech-savvy for you to have one: With WordPress Content Management System (CMS), even a novice can build a working website within a very short time and at a very low cost. However, if you feel you can't make it on your own, you can hire a website designer who is knowledgeable in WordPress to do it for you, since CMS is the only way you can have a website faster to save time and cost.

Still, on a website, you need to do a research on available web hosting companies to ensure that you select affordable and the best web hosting services, which will guarantee maximum website performance when you are done designing your website. Most web hosting companies have WordPress auto install feature inbuilt and after buying your preferred hosting plan, all you will need to do is to install WordPress and get started. During the process of hosting registration, you can also check if the domain name you need for your website is available and register it. However, if the domain you needed is not available, the best thing to do is to try different domains such as .com, .biz, .info, .org, and more so that you still have the same name you needed.

Ensure that the general design of your website is appealing to both human and the search engines: This is made easy with WordPress and all that you need to do is select and install the best WordPress theme that will not limit your website performance. Put more efforts on the design of your website's landing page since this is the page that will have affiliate links of most of the products that you will be promoting, and the same page that will lead your site visitors to affiliate site where they will make a purchase of products you are selling through your website.

Moreover, you will need to include website marketing techniques such email subscription in the general design of your website: You can install a WordPress plugin that does email subscription and link it with one of the autoresponders such as MailChimp, getresponse, aweber, and more; so that the whole email marketing process like subscription and email updates are automated.

Finally, work on search engine optimization (SEO) to ensure that your website gets the best ranking in the search engine results page. SEO process is made easy with WordPress SEO plugins that you can install and use for free to maximize website's SEO features such as Meta tags and Descriptions, keyword research, and more. However, you can also decide to outsource the whole process to SEO specialist to accomplish things like content writing and lead capturing using detailed eBooks talking about the product you are promoting. SEO specialist can also use paid search engine marketing technique for generation of paid traffic so that your website can get more traffic, which is important for a higher conversion rate.

Utilize Affiliate Training Programs:
Now that your website is ready, just one more important thing to do; find and enroll in affiliate training program so that you can have the basic training that is necessary for you to be able to sell affiliate products or services successfully.

Basic knowledge of the affiliate product you are promoting is not enough; you need to have hands-on skills necessary for one to be able to market a product to potential customers successfully. If you can't afford paid affiliate training programs, you can enroll for a free training program, which is being offered by most affiliate training companies such as Affilorama and Wealthy Affiliate. However, free affiliate training programs always have limited features and may not offer a lot that you need to know about affiliate marketing.

Self Assessment for a Successful Affiliate Marketing:
Like any other business out there, self-assessment is very important in online business, specifically affiliate marketing: Ensure that you have all the basic skills needed to run affiliate marketing; special or technical skills are not necessary for one to be successful in affiliate marketing. Also, ensure that you practice patience since online business takes some time to gain an online audience and start to be profitable. Finally, if you feel you can't manage a given area in affiliate marketing, try out outsourcing to help leverage on time and other important resources.

7 Ways to Land a Startup Job

Getting a startup job with a high-growth startup company after graduating from a college is the dream every fresh graduate has. However, the job market is today very competitive and landing a well-paying job, especially with a startup company is always very difficult if you don't do things differently to show that you are the most qualified candidate. Precisely, if you are a fresh graduate without any hands-on experience in your profession, you need to show startup companies that are hiring that you are the best candidate and you have the potential to deliver when offered the job you are seeking: And the only way to show that you have the potential of adding value to any company is by going an extra mile and do things that most fresh graduates don't do.

7 Ways to Land a Startup Job
1) Know About the Company's Services or Products
Most fresh graduates will not go an extra mile and do a research about the services or products offered by a startup company. Most startup companies will be interested to know how much you know about their products or services before offering you a job. Consequently, you can take this advantage and do an extensive research about the services or products that the hiring company is offering. The best way to do this is to go through the company's website and newsletters and find any relevant information that concerns the service or product they offer.

2) Be Aware of the Company's Culture
Before applying for any job with any company in the first place, you need to know a lot about the company's culture. Knowing a startup company's culture prior to a job application or attending an interview is very important since you will know whether the startup job will serve your personal interest and be in line with your lifestyle. On the other hand, understanding a company's culture will help you a lot during the interview since most of the interview questions will be in line with the startup company's culture and objectives.

3) Understand the Industry and the Competitors
A startup company is always faced with a lot of obstacles, and competition is one of the major problems. Understanding the industry that the startup company is found can be very advantageous to you as a fresh graduate since the administration will benefit a lot from your knowledge and contribution, to help overcome problems that are related to the industry as a whole. Try and know big competitors in the industry and what they do, and use this as a knowledge base during interviews or application for a startup job.

4) Be Active Online
Yes, being active online can be very important if you are a fresh graduate; this is because most startup companies will first search online on social media profiles for new talents and energetic graduates. Use a fully academic-based social platform like LinkedIn to build your academic profile and any experience that you may have achieved after graduating from college, and this may put you upfront as one of the candidates for a startup job that you did not apply for in the first place.

5) Be Unique and Realistic
Startup companies like creativity and a unique personality, as such, being unique in any kind of interview or job application makes you be spotted among the pool of candidates. If it is an interview you are attending to, try to be unique when responding to questions and stop common phrases and framed answers that every candidate will give. On the other hand, try to be realistic while at the same time letting out the creative part of you; this is because if you take a personality that you are not, very soon you will be caught and look very irrelevant for the startup job even if you emerged the best candidate.

6) Add a Little Curiosity
To land a startup job with any company, you need to show that you are ready to learn a lot and progress with the company. When given a chance, try to ask questions that are directly affecting or related to the company as this will show that you are interested in the matters that concerns the company. However, try to frame your questions creatively and avoid open questions that anyone would ask.

7) Be Patient
Most hiring companies including startups will not take it lightly if you keep contacting them about the interview or applications that are not responded to. You can send a thank you email after an interview, but avoid frequent contacts with responsible persons as this may look as nagging, which may degrade your value for the startup job. To add on top, don't be bitter if you don't get a chance with a startup company, after all, they have your application details and may decide to call you if one of the candidates hired turn out to be valueless to the startup company.

Best Ways to Finance a New Car

Acquiring a new vehicle, whether a used model or a brand new car, is very impressive indeed: However, you may not be in the position to fund the purchase a new car by yourself. If in such a situation, where you cannot afford to fully fund the purchase of new car, don't worry yourself too much since there are a number of ways, which you can use and still acquire your dream car without breaking your bank account or failing to meet your family's basic needs.

Precisely, I am talking about car loans and credit card services: It is always very wise to understand different car financing options that are available in various financing institutions through loans and credit cards, and then compare the interest rates and charges every financing option has before heading to your local auto-shop.

On the contrary, some car buyers spend too much of their time comparing and contrasting different models and makes of cars available in their local auto-shop, and then bargaining for a price cut to meet the budget of the money they intend to borrow without considering rates and charges, and they end up spending too much that the price cut they bargained for and managed to get will not be of any significance.

Consequently, the very first thing to consider is how you can raise funds that paying back will not be hectic, and you can only do this if you understand and compare all the rates and charges that come with every car financing option available, and merits and demerit of every option.

Types of Car Finance
1. Hire Purchase Plans
Hire purchase plan offers probably the easiest way to acquire a new car: When buying a new car through hire purchase, you put down an upfront deposit payment, which in most cases is cash, but you can also use an asset like an existing car or something; and commit to a set number of monthly instalments where you will be paying a fixed amount for a specific period of time.

You immediately get the car you wanted after the agreement and can take it home with you. However, the car becomes fully yours after paying all the installments as agreed, and through a legal process, the auto company that sold the car to you through hire purchase has all the rights to repossess the car if you don't fulfil the agreement of paying monthly installment.
Merits of Hire Purchase Plan
- You can have the car you need after the agreement
- Its easy payment method since the cost of acquiring a new is spread and you don't need to pay the full amount at once

Demerits of Hire Purchase Plan
- The car becomes fully yours after settling all the monthly installment
- The auto-company can decide to the legal process to repossess the car if you fail to make your payments as agreed
- You cannot resell the car unless you have fully paid for the car

2. Personal Loans
obtaining a new car through personal loan may be a safer method than through hire purchase since you can decide to resell the car to settle your loan payment should you change your mind about owning a car. To ensure that you get the best lending deal for auto loans, make sure that you do a substantial research on the rates and charges that every loaning institution imposes, to ensure that you don't end up spending a lot while you could have saved a little if chose a given institution over another.

On the other hand, most lending institutions offer low rates and charges for the customers who commit their property as a security, as such, you can go for low rates and charges by using one of your property as a security: However, this may sound risky since you are in a position to lose your property should you fail to make loan payment in time.

Merits of Acquiring a New Car Through Personal Loans
- You can decide to resell the car to make full payment of your loan if unable to raise the money
- You can get low rates by using your property as a security
- You can compare different rates and charges and go with the best offer

Demerits of Personal Loans
- Most lending institutions have a minimum amount to borrow, which may be higher than what you need
- You can lose your property should you fail to make payments in time

3. 0% Rate Credit card
If done the right way, acquiring a new car through credit card is the easiest and cheapest way of all the methods available to buy a new vehicle. Apart from being the cheapest way to buy a new car, credit card offers a legal protection to the card hold, and in any case, the deal backfires after paying some money, the card holder will be able to get his money back in full. To acquire a new car using a credit card at 0% rate, you need to set a monthly direct debit to meet, which is at least the minimum payment any credit card deal will offer.

Ideally, to make sure you do it right and spend little in the general purchase of the car you need, set up a direct debit amount that will enable you to settle the car debt within the allow time-frame for you to achieve the 0% rate. You can calculate the right direct debit to use by dividing the overall cost of the car you want to acquire by the number of months your credit card has the 0% rate.

Ensure that you balance between the credit limit and the cost of the car that you want to own: This is very important because the car may be costly and meeting the 0% rate deadline may be hectic if your credit card has a lower limit. Therefore, to buy an expensive car with a credit card, you can do it right only if your credit card has a higher limit.

However, there are a number of questions you need to ask yourself if buying a new car using your credit is the best way for you. This is because, just like other methods of getting car finance, a credit card has some few upsides and downsides that you need to know before making your final decision whether to use your credit card.

Merits of Using Credit Card to Purchase a New Car
- If done the right way, buying a new car through credit card is the cheapest since you can do it without having to pay any charge or rate on top of the car selling price like it is the case with other car financing methods.
- Credit card purchase offers some legal protection and both the card holder and the credit card issuer are liable for any misfortune and you can end up getting back your money in full or partly in such cases.
- If you use your credit card to buy a new car, you own the car from that day you purchased it, which is impossible with other car financing methods.
- Credit card purchase method offers a flexible means of paying for your debt, and you can pay the minimum amount if any case you can't raise more cash.
- In most cases, the 0% deal of credit card payment comes with impressive offers, and you can be lucky to get one which you could not have gotten if you don't use your credit card to buy a new car.

Demerits of Using Credit Card to Buy a New Car
- Some car dealers don't accept full payment using credit cards, and worse of all, some don't accept credit card payment total.
- You may not be eligible to the 0% credit or 0% money transfer card since there are some strict requirements that you need to fulfill in terms of credit score and more.
- You may be eligible the credit card, but you may not get the credit limit that will enable you to buy a car or rather an expensive car.
- Due to flexible payment terms offered with a credit card, one may not be disciplined enough in terms of paying debts and this could lead to an extra cost of acquiring a new car.
- Some dealers don't accept payment by credit card on some brands of cars, and this may hinder you from getting the car that you intended to buy.
- Charges may be possible on credit card for some car brands when you pay more than the limit set for credit card surcharge.

4. Leasing Agreements
Leasing agreements also offer a good way to own a new car without paying for it upfront: Basically, leasing agreements are long-term means of renting a new car on a contract basis and pay a monthly fee to use the car for a given period of time or a given number of miles within a specific time-frame.

Types of Leasing Agreements:
There are two types of leasing agreements one can use to acquire a new car; personal contract purchase and personal contract hire: In personal contract hire, you can have a new car every year or after every few years without necessarily having to buy the car after the contractual agreement. Actually, it is a type of financing a new car where you pay the difference between the selling price of a car and the reselling price of the same car back to the dealer based on a forecast of annual mileage.

On the other hand, personal contract purchase is a type of financing a new car whereby you buy the car after the leasing agreement, and will only need to pay the resale price of the car to the dealer depending on the agreement and terms of use. However, before you decide which leasing agreement you need to commit to, there are terms and conditions that you need to go through to avoid extra charges and penalties that may arise.

Merits of Leasing Agreements
- Have lower monthly payments
- Lower deposit, which is usually 10%
- Offers flexible repayment terms since it allows between 1 to 3 years
- At the end of the agreement term, you can decide to keep the car by paying the resale price to the dealer or give it back and pay nothing

Demerits of Leasing Agreements
- Mileage and the condition of the car may affect the cost
- Total amount paid is sometimes higher than the hire purchase
- One has to pay the outstanding balance for them to keep the if they decide to

Questions to Ask Yourself When Choosing a Car Financing Method
To give you an easy time in selecting the best auto-financing method that is best for you, you need to ask yourself some few questions to ensure that you go with the auto-finance method that suits you:
1. Do I own the outright after the initial deal?
2. Is the upfront cost high or affordable?
3. How about monthly cost? Is it affordable?
4. Can I sell or make modifications to the car?
5. Is the type of car finance secure or not?
6. Which auto-finance offers protection against unexpected depreciation?
7. Which options accrue charges depending on terms, like charges on mileage limits


Conclusion:
Acquiring a new can be very costly and most people may not afford to pay for a brand new car outright from their own pocket. In such situations, it is always advisable to seek other auto-financing methods that are available and be able to have your dream car: However, there is a number of things that you need to consider to ensure that you don't end up spending a lot of money that you can save anyway. The best car financing method should be the one that you don't end up spending more: Hire purchase should not be the first option since it has many disadvantages. If you decide to do with loans, compare among all the auto financing institutions that are available locally, and ensure that you work with the that has the best offer in terms of rates and charges. However, of all the auto-financing methods available, credit card offers the easiest and cheapest way to acquire a new car than all.

Is Forex Trading Risky?

Forex is considered the biggest fiscal market in the world currently due to the large sum of money managed online on different forex trading platforms, which makes it one of the best financial investments to venture in. Ideally, like any other financial market, there are some risks involved and can be incurred by a forex trader anytime when trading in forex, which may include leverage risks, price risks, transaction risks, and interest rate risks among others. However, there are a number of effective forex trading strategies that can help minimize losses and maximize profits.

Risks Involved Trading in Forex and How to Overcome Them
1) Leverage Risk
Leverage risk is the mechanism by which a forex trader can control a large financial market with a small amount of initial capital. To overcome leverage risks, it is advisable that you don't risk more that 2 to 3 % of your account's value in one trade. This is important since when a small percentage is traded at a single trade and prices fluctuate, a trader will lose not a lot of money than what they can afford.
2) Interest rate risks
Interest rate risk has a huge influence on currency value; a country with high-interest rate will normally have a stronger currency since investors will be attracted to shift their assets to that country: On the other hand, when a country's interest rates fall, investors will pull out their resources and focus on countries with higher interest rates. As such, if the interest rate differential of one currency versus another rises or falls, the exchange rates and forex prices will also change significantly. Therefore, a forex trader can avoid interest rate risks by closely studying the economy of a country and the strength of its currency, so that they can foresee interest rates changes earlier before they occur and make necessary forex trading adjustments.
3) Price Risks
Just like any other trade out there, forex prices are driven by short-term or long-term supply and demand of a given currency, and as a result, may cause prices to move up or down drastically. Traders who employ some risk management techniques may have an easy time in controlling risks associated with prices. On the other hand, a trader may foresee price changes if they have in place a strategic plan to help study supply and demand of different currencies so that they are not caught unaware and incur losses due to changes in prices.
4) Transaction Risks
Transaction risk is also one of the most common risks a trader can come across when trading in forex: Since forex trading occurs on a 24-hour basis, exchange rates tend to change frequently at different times of the day or night, which leads to currencies being traded at different prices at different times of the day: This changes in exchange rates may occur before a given trade settles and cause big losses; consequently, a forex trader need to know the best time difference between the time they enter a trade and the time they exit the trade. The time differential should be as minimum as possible since the greater the time difference between entering and settling a given trade, the higher the transaction risk is involved.

Effective Ways to Increase Facebook Followers for Your Business

Facebook is currently the most visited social network site on the internet, and this makes it one of the best social media platforms, where businesses can promote their brands via different paid and free to use ad features that target potential online buyers. The main mission of creating any targeted Facebook ad is to get Followers who can convert. Facebook offers a number of options when it comes to brand promotion via targeted ads, and here are the most effective Facebook ads that a business owner can use to get an impressive conversion rate:

1) Invite Your Email Contacts and Friends
Facebook offers one of the most useful ads features, which allows businesses to create business pages, and then invite all the individuals in their email contacts to like and maybe share out their content. If you have a bigger mailing list, you can use this amazing feature to get more audience for your brand and always remember to ask your new followers to share your content with their friends on their timeline. Moreover, there is a feature that allows you to invite all your Facebook friends to like your business page, which you can utilize to get even more views, shares, and likes to help spread the word easily.

2) Use A Paid Facebook Advertising Feature
Facebook offers the best page promotional feature, which allows business owners to create pages for their brands and promote the pages to target different audience and grow their products visibility. With this paid Facebook advertisement feature, you can target audience using demographic locations, sex, age, preferences, and interest, which is one of the bests ways to get a specific group of customers depending on your brand's requirement.

3) Add The Facebook Like Button to Your Site
The like or share button feature that comes with Facebook is one of the best ways to promote Facebook adverts. Integrating the share and like buttons on your blog or website gives your site's visitors a chance to like and share out your content with their friends and relatives, which is very important for your product since it will get more audience, and in the process, you become authoritative in your niche and develop trust from online buyers.

4) Utilize the Follow Me Feature
Facebook limits the number of active friends you can add to a given profile to 5000 thousand; Unlike the number of friends you can have on Facebook, the Follow Me feature allows you to have unlimited followers for your brand, which is very vital since the more audience you get for your brand, the more website traffic you will get and the more your sales level will increase significantly and experience impressive returns. To activate the Follow Me feature, go to the settings of your Facebook Page, select Public Post feature and the set 'Who Can Follow Me' to Public.

5) Be Active on Relevant Facebook Pages
one of the most effective Facebook Ads promotion is being active on other relevant Facebook pages. You need to be social online by contributing useful product ideas and sharing your Facebook page on different pages that are relevant to your business niche. The more you respond to customers comments, questions, recommendations, and complements on relevant Facebook pages; the more you will gain trust from users and the more you will have authority in your niche, which will definitely contribute to more likes from brand users and even your competitors.