If you have a business, you probably have a website. It seems like an old trope, but nowadays, if you don’t have an online presence you don’t have a business.
But if you’re a company selling something really nuts-and-bolts, like hardware, farming implements, or fitness equipment, do you really need an “About” page? Does anyone read those things anyway?
The answer is, as you might have guessed, you do need an about page, and there’s a good reason why.
People want to buy from businesses they trust. Nowadays, you can pop online and buy books from the shop on Main Street in your town, or from a distributor halfway around the country. It makes little difference to the consumer based on cost or convenience, because getting product from downtown or across the country will be similar. The difference is what consumers know about the business behind the books.
In this analogy about the book shop, the local seller may be more attractive because he is close at hand, but only if he makes this part of his appeal. If he has no story on his website his online presence is not as relatable as someone who has a nice picture, and a history of his book business.
On the other hand if Mr. Local reveals childhood memories of living in town, and describes his motivation to bring the community to life through local business, he’s got the consumer cold, right?
So, your business needs an About page to tell what it is you do, why you do it, and a bit about your history. Include these elements, and you’ll be checking off one important step in creating great business web copy.
Book Review: Secrets of Six Figure Women by Barbara Stanny
How uncomfortable does you comfort zone have to be, before you look for a way out?
Photo by rawpixel on Unsplash
I’ve read before that no matter how happy you are in your work, you should always be job hunting. I never really understood this advice. Should I keep a current resume on a thumb stick in my purse? Should I have a good idea what competing business are paying for my type of work? Or should I really scan job sites on the lookout for a new gig?
Probably all these things are good practice. And they certainly provide an excellent method for staying out of a career rut. If you’re looking at available opportunities, you’re probably mindful of what looks exciting, or scary, or boring out there, compared to what you’re doing. Looking outside yourself gives an excellent perspective of where you currently stand.
It’s easy to get comfortable in our jobs – to know where you’re going when you get up in the morning, to feel good in a routine, to do your job and come home to your myriad other tasks that take up your evenings and weekends. But, how uncomfortable does that comfort have to get before we notice it, or do something about it?
Recently I listened toSecrets of Six Figure Women by Barbara Stanny. I have to admit a particular love for the “Inspirational” section of my library’s online audio book catalogue, and stumbling upon this book was the best type of fortune.
Although this book was written almost two decades ago, “six figures” is still a completely crazy-high figure to many of us, who Stanny would dub “chronic under-earners.” Earning over $100, 000 is still a crazy pipe dream for those of us who’ve settled for less.
Stanny is here to be the motivation we need. The six figure women she interviews are extremely relatable – which drives home the idea that we could be just like them. The layout of the book lays the “secrets” out like a checklist for our lives, to keep us on our game.
First, Stanny pushes the reader to believe she’s the author of her own destiny – if motivation is all that separates us under earners from her six-figure compatriots, she’s here to provide it.
Stanny challenges readers to stand up for themselves in negotiations, in relationships, and to keep in with people who will encourage their growth.
While I was listening, I would find myself coming up with a rebuttal to one of her points. Before I even finished the thought, she would address and dismiss the excuse as if she was right in my head.
Second, Stanny has interviewed her subjects in an informal and personal way – it’s like having a conversation with friends. The women have extremely varied backgrounds, and it’s incredible to see how some of them went from a position like mine, to the powerful women they became.
As they look back on the fear they faced when they left their jobs to pursue a passion, left detrimental relationships behind, and set inhibitions to the side in their drive to be successful, I realized gumption and a willingness to act, or “audacity,” as Stanny calls it, is one of the main characteristics of six-figure women.
I listened to the audio version of this book, while doing a job I was not passionate about, feeling like I had no control over my future, and being the classic under-earner. In laying out the “secrets” the high-earning women provided, Stanny sets specific benchmarks for one’s own behaviour.
For instance, one of the secrets is that the women felt the fear, and acted anyway. Through various examples, Stanny shows how the women were petrified they would fail at a task, or that colleagues and bosses would find out they weren’t up for the job. She says the most successful people are just as afraid as everyone else, but they carry on with the job at hand.
Another “secret” is “letting go” of the ledge that we think is keeping us safe. She talks about over-coming self doubt, letting ourselves be the boss, and finding the balance between our careers and the rest of our lives.
Mostly, she tells us that we have a say in how we live. If we think we’re stuck, that we don’t have options, that what we have is the best we can do, we’re lying to ourselves.
I realized listening to this book that I am not alone, and that I am only as stuck as I allow myself to be. The Secrets of Six Figure Women was a great read for anyone looking to get out of their comfort zone.
For those of us with no mechanical abilities, and (extremely) limited haggling skills, car shopping is intimidating, to say the least. However, sometimes it’s gotta be done. So buckle up!
“Buying a used car is like buying a pig in a bag,” my dad told me recently. After he explained his colloquialism, I realized he was right: you really have no idea what you’re buying when you purchase a used car.
However, you can hedge your bets by being the most conscientious and careful consumer possible. While a dealer bears some responsibility for giving you the information you need, in the end, the onus is on you to get the best deal possible.
Here are some things you can do to improve your chances of getting a good vehicle at a reasonable price:
Know what you want: Going to a car lot to look for “a car,” with no other parameters in mind, is no way to go. Do your research. The good Lord gave us the gift of the Internet – use it.
Research into the brand helps. There are websites that let you sit in on a virtual test drive. Some car review websites give you expert analysis comparing one car company to another in the specific body type you want. You can find out specs on size, features, seat comfort, and common problems. If you need it, you can even find out the towing capability and the amount of fuel it’s likely to use.
You can also find out what previous consumers have had to say about the type of car you’re considering. For those Amazon.ca users who frequent the “customer reviews” section, you may find this especially helpful.
I remember looking up minivan reviews and seeing that one particular brand was said to “eat brakes like pizza.” All this is information to keep in your pocket, but it may or may not have a bearing on your decision. On the other hand, I heard another rumour that a certain brand of minivan tended to leave its transmission on the road around 120,000km. I can guarantee I wouldn’t have been purchasing a that particular van with 115,000km on it for instance.
Find out as much as you can about your target vehicle Now’s the time to check out specific vehicles: to drive, to ask questions, and to inspect.
Test drive the car and inspect it yourself. Make note (and that means actually write down) any noises, scratches, dings, or other potential problems that come up while you’re driving. Try all the things you will use in the car: the seat adjusters, the doors, the mirrors, the sun roof. Sit in the back seat to see if it’s comfortable and make sure everything looks good. You can write in a deal that the dealership fix, say, a windshield chip, before you take it home. It’s harder after it’s left the lot.
Regardless of the research you’ve done it’s tough to know what maintenance you’ll have to do with any car in the future. Some cars just withstand the test of time better than others. Previous owners – and how they treated the vehicle – can have a big impact on the wear and tear.
Car proof reports can tell you if the car has had accident or other insurance claims, how many owners the car has had, and can provide some maintenance records. They are great information and are provided free by some dealers.
It is a good idea to have a third party (read: not dealership employed) mechanic take a look at the car you’re considering. Especially if the Carproof showed an accident report in its history.
A mechanic can tell you if any part of the car is going to need immediate attention, and might be able to notice things you won’t – like if a car is improperly patched up after an altercation with another vehicle. You will have to pay the mechanic for his/her expertise. You will have to take the afternoon to get the car to your mechanic and back to the dealership. It is worth it.
After all this consideration, pick your target vehicle – but keep in mind and in hand the ads for the other vehicles you were checking out. You can use them to bolster your confidence, and to play your hand better during negotiations.
It’s haggle time If you’ve made it this far, you’re probably pretty far invested in your target vehicle, and that’s okay. But don’t be afraid to walk away! I’m pretty sure car sales reps can smell desperation.
Decide what you’re willing to pay for the vehicle. Forget the sticker price for a minute and decide what you think the car is worth and what your budget will allow. Establish in your mind an offering price and how high you’re willing to go. When it comes to haggling, do not deviate from this plan!
Mention all of the notes you made about the vehicle’s condition at this point.
This is the point that you discuss payment options with your salesperson. Will you finance with a dealership or a bank? Have you saved a fat wad of cash, and you’ll be using that to pay? Now is also the time to dicker about the price you’ll get for a trade in, if you have one. Be fierce, my friend. Know what it is worth beforehand so you can go in with confidence.
Do the deal There are lots of things that happen after you’ve decided on a vehicle and a price, and it will vary depending on where you buy the car. Make sure you’ve signed your important papers, have your ownership and plates sorted out, and have spoken with your insurance company to get a temporary insurance card so you can take your car home.
A dealership will take a few days to get the vehicle ready to go. It will need to pass a safety inspection, and they’ll take care of any problems you found during your test drive. In the meantime, you need to secure your financing (or dig up your cash from its hidey-hole).
When you reappear with money in hand, you will get the keys and drive home satisfied, knowing you did your best to get a good deal.
Buying a car is more complicated than it should be, given how often these transactions go down. That said, you can be all the way through, from research to new ride, inside of two weeks if all goes down well.
Now that it’s September, kiddies all over Canada are heading back to school.
But wait – are kids the only ones to participate in this great fall adventure? Not nearly – folks of all ages and stages hit the books each year as the weather cools. So many go back merely because it’s tradition, or because their parents or guidance counsellors told them they needed to.
But there are others – an increasingly prominent breed of student that goes back for all the right reasons: the pursuit of knowledge or a better life, the need to move forward in life or to gain a new skill set.
Mature student enrollments seem to be on the rise, and one has to wonder: are they better off at school than all the teenaged undergrads that enroll straight off the playground?
There seem to be some distinct pros and cons of going back to school later in life.
First, let’s define our terms. The term “mature student” varies from one institution to another, so it can cover quite a lot of ground.
For Western Law, “[m]ature candidates must have at least five years of non-university experience since leaving high school and a minimum of two years full-time (or equivalent) university study.” By my math, this means that students will be, at youngest, 24 or so to be considered a mature student.
For Western’s undergrad programs, on the other hand, mature students will be “at least 21 years of age in the calendar year in which admission is sought,” and, “have not normally been in full-time attendance at an educational institution within the previous four years.” These applicants might not more than a couple of years older than those coming straight out of high school.
For Ontario Colleges,“mature student status may be granted to applicants who are over 19 years old and do not have a high school diploma or GED.”
Suffice it to say, maturity in the case of academe seems to mean “not on a year-to-year straight path from freshman to graduate.” So a mature student may have dropped out of high school, may have graduated and then took some years to work before heading to post secondary, or may have been out of school for decades.
That said, there are some things mature students as a whole tend to have in common.
They have more on their plates Although this is clearly not always the case, mature students are more likely to have a job (they’ve been paying the bills somehow, and need to continue doing so), a spouse, and even children to look after.
This means they’re trying to fill all these roles in addition to being a student, and need to prioritize time and possibly miss out on some sleep to succeed in their studies.
A 2015 study out of the University of Guelph tasked with finding out why mature students tend to quit school before they’ve graduated, says, “role strain and the adoption of alternate paths to those of full-time study occur because many mature learners have multiple roles including employee, spouse/partner, as well as being a parent in many cases while trying to complete their degree.”
This means that mature students sometimes choose part time study, or take time off between courses in order to fulfill other demands on their time. Doing so increases the odds they’ll never make it to graduation.
They know why they’re there On the upside, students who return to school after a break can be much more motivated, and have a plan for success. Having a goal in mind (a certain certification or career) lends a certain drive to the whole process. Granted, some undergrads have this plan, and the accompanying motivation, right off the hop. Many others do not.
Guelph’s study says “mature students are found to be clearer about their reasons for attending.” This means they “can be quite successful in their studies, often achieving higher average grades than younger students.”
They have respect for the process I may be overgeneralizing here, but in my experience, most 19-year-olds don’t understand the value of a dollar (much less 30 thousand of them). Racking up debt while having the time of your life at pub night might not seem like such a big deal to such a young adult. However, a few years in the “real world,” trying to pay bills and buy groceries can do a lot to give a person perspective. All of a sudden that 6, 7, or 8 grand a year cost tends to look a lot more… well, costly.
Someone who has a sense of the cost of education is more likely to try to get the bang for their (big) bucks. Therefore, they do the reading, they attend the classes, the bend the ear of their most influential instructor, and generally get the value out of the education. All this translates to a better education, and possibly better grades.
Given all the factors and variables, are mature students better off than those who’ve taken a traditional path through their degrees and certification? Not necessarily, but they certainly bring a different perspective to class discussions, and that can only be a good thing. But watch out if you’re being graded on a curve – mature students know exactly what they came for.
When I was a kid, I didn’t talk to my parents about money. I gleaned financial lessons from overheard arguments involving cut-up credit cards, and reminders that we needed to defer shopping until we got the “baby bonus” (the charming nickname we had for the government’s child tax benefit).
Photo by pina messina on Unsplash
While it wasn’t necessary for me to get all the information behind these scenarios when I was nine, surely hearing things without understanding them left some sort of imprint on my feelings about money as a grown up.
It can be tough to decide exactly how much information to share with your kids, and when. It can be even tougher to override your own internal tapes, which dictate your relationship with money, so you don’t pass the same message on to your kids.
Money is almost as bad as sex in its taboo nature: parents don’t want to talk about it out loud, and they definitely don’t want their kids knowing what’s going on right under their noses.
If parents don’t kids the ins and outs of using money, how are they going to learn? Will they have to suffer through crushing debt before realizing how important it is to borrow responsibly? Will they hoard and safeguard money for fear that they’ll run out, never balancing the need to enjoy the fruits of labour in everyday life?
The best plan is to do some teaching yourself to ensure youngsters have a solid base in financial knowledge. When do you start those lessons?
Sooner rather than later “Research shows that starting to learn about money as early as possible is a great way to give kids a head start in the process of building healthy financial habits,” said Jane Rooney, Canada’s Financial Literacy Leader, in a press release from April 19, 2017 from Canadian Foundation for Economic Education (CFEE). CFEE’s program “Lets talk with our kids about money” provides free educational resources to parents and teachers, and the lesson plans start for kids as young as five.
Of course, if you’re teaching money matters to kids who are just learning to talk, the lesson has to be child appropriate. Start with the value of money, how the money we spend comes out of the money we make, and that there’s a limit to how much we have.
“Talk about work – teach your child about the relationship between work and money,” suggests GetSmarterAboutMoney.ca, a website run by the Ontario Securities Commission.
If you need some inspiration for how to start, The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has suggestions for age-appropriate money skills you can work on with your child.
Watch your words When you choose to talk about money is really important for kids. But never underestimate the power of the words you use to convey the information. Parenting experts tell us there are good and bad ways to talk to kids about money. For instance, you never want to tell a child “that’s too expensive, we can’t afford that,” especially if you go out and buy the item anyway.
Instead, if your kid gets a case of the gimmies, tell them it’s not in the budget; it’s not about running out of money, it’s about running out of money in that budget line.
“When you’re ready, tell your child that you cannot buy new toys right now, but perhaps the toys can be put on a wish list,” suggests KidsHealth.org. “Be honest with your children — but don’t tell them more than they need to know.”
Walk your talk After you’ve started teaching kids how to use money responsibly, make sure you follow your own advice. “If you are an extravagant shopper yourself or are wasteful with money, it does not set a good example to your kids on how to manage money,” advises the Child Development Institute.
Above all, don’t fall into the trap of getting defensive or cagey about what you have or don’t have. Money is a tool we use to get through life. Your bank account isn’t a testament to your personal value, nor does it reflect your kids’ worth. If kids are worried about what other families have that you don’t, the best thing to tell them is exactly what you should be telling yourself: just because others have it doesn’t mean they can afford it, and perhaps you are prioritizing different things with your money.
