hokitooms.info

Business technology in small businesses can mean a lot of different things and can be interpreted in many different ways. But it will always come down to the same thing – the technology implemented and used by a business must provide the maximum amount of efficiency for the minimum amount of cost and maintenance.Technology in business must be well planned and implemented in a sensible manner and a plan for technology management must be developed and adhered to. This may mean moving more of your business systems onto the internet to increase the mobility of your business, or identifying and investing in new systems which will do the same job but in a more efficient manner.How Can the Internet Help My Business?
If you are looking to save money for your business, the internet is an excellent place to start. If your business includes a small call centre to provide customer service, you could save a lot of money in the long run by investing in changing the phone system to an IP telephony system. This would mean that rather than incurring massive phone bills using normal phones, all calls would be routed over the internet and customers would be able to call in using a normal local telephone number.It is much cheaper to call someone through the internet than through a standard phone line and the savings you would make here would more than cover the cost of implementing such a system.You would need to ensure that your business’ internet connection is powerful enough to manage this of course. If there is not enough bandwidth to accommodate all of the calls being made, the sound quality can suffer. As long as both parties can hear what the other is saying, this does not have to be too much of an issue – making allowances for this would need to be part of your business’ strategy for technology management.What about My People in the Field?
If you have a large team of sales reps in the field, the savings which you could enjoy through the implementation of internet based telephony can be carried on to this side of your business as well. Nowadays, there are many mobile phones available which are capable of making calls over the internet using the 3G network. This would mean a possible upgrade of your corporate mobile phone contract and possibly some retraining for your staff – but ultimately it would save you money on phone bills.How do I Know that My Company is Now More Efficient?
Technology in business also encompasses the assessment and monitoring of work performed by the employees. With modern networking and targeted technology management, it would be possible to not only make your company run more efficiently for less money; but also allowing you to keep an eye on exactly what is going on in real-time.There are many products available which will allow you to monitor your employees’ statistics – be it the amount of time they are spending on each call or the amount of time they take to finishing each file before they are able to move onto the next one. Through this, you would be able to address any possible issues which may arise and discuss them with the employee.Business technology should broaden the horizons. You should be able to do more for spending less. Something as simple as making phone calls cheaper or something as involved as identifying areas of concern in an employees performance and having more information which can be used to develop strategies for the employee to avoid this.

Almost everyone nowadays wants to have his very own profitable home internet marketing business that can ease his financial burdens and help him sail smoothly through the ravages of the global financial crisis currently engulfing the economies of the world. Understanding of the ABCs or fundamentals of internet marketing is essential to the success of any online home business.Internet MarketingDifferent people of different profession and stature have view internet marketing in different perspectives. People in one hand consider internet marketing as simply the act of placing banner ads or inbound links on other websites. On the opposite hand, there are many companies claiming that it is the secret to exponentially increasing one’s wealth overnight. Caution should be exercised however, because most of these many companies only try to make you buy some sort of internet marketing program that they proclaim will make you rich by morning.At the present, internet marketing or online marketing has successfully evolved to a higher stage which now involves a combination of many components a business can utilize to increase sales regardless whether the said business is being executed fully online, partly online, or fully offline. Internet marketing is fully discretionary and it can’t be fully said that it is strictly needed for success but its recent popularity has caused those who don’t use it get left behind by those who do. It can provide a vast and unique competitive advantage to any company. It is for this reason that some companies even rely purely on online marketing to promote their business, its products, and services.Internet Marketing ObjectivesInternet marketing is being employed to make use of the Internet to do at least one of the succeeding:1. Communicate a company’s message about itself, its products, or its services online.
2. Conduct research as to the nature (demographics, preferences, and needs) of existing and potential customers.
3. Sell goods, services, or advertising space over the Internet.Internet Marketing ComponentsInternet marketing is made up of many components which may be summarized into the following:1. Making a business website and getting it launched and published over the Internet. It may consist of text, images and possibly audio and video elements that broadcast the company’s message to visitors, informing current customers and prospects of the features, benefits, and value-for-money of its products and services. The website may also include additional features that extend its capabilities like the ability to capture and store leads from potential customers or the function to directly sell a product or service online. A website may very well be the best way to establish a company’s own internet persona and business entity. Websites can always outperform their offline equivalents – brochures and mail order catalogs.2. Marketing a website over the World Wide Web via search engines otherwise known as Search Engine Marketing or SEM is the process of helping a website shop up in the top search engine pages whenever one makes a search with certain defined keywords through search engine optimization or SEO, pay-per-click or PPC advertising, or pay-for-inclusion or PFI advertising in which a website is listed in online website directories, the same way as with yellow page listings.3. Email marketing is the technique of getting information about a product or service out to customers or getting feedback from customers about a product or service through the use of emails. Email addresses of customers or potential customers can be collected through the use of the company website or purchased from lead generation specialists. Email marketing is simply the online version of direct mail marketing. There are different methods that can be utilized to do this form of online marketing like the regular distribution of newsletters or mass mailing of offers related to the company’s product or services.4. Banner advertising is the online marketing equivalent of the traditional ads in newspapers and magazines. It is the free placement of ads on a website usually known as free ad directories.5. Online press releasing is the placement of a newsworthy story about a company, regular distribution of newsletters or mass mailing of offers related to the company’s product or services on online wire service or online press release directories.6. Blog marketing is the process of posting comments, expressing opinions or making online announcements in a discussion forum or blog directory that can be done by hosting your own blog or by comment and link exchanges with other blogs whose content is related to your product or service.7. Article marketing involves the syndication or online publishing in article sites or directories of freshly written or unique articles that tackle things related to your business, products, or services. These articles have the potential to spread and circulate over the internet since online article hosting services allow the re-publication of articles so long as all links in the articles are maintained. Traffic boost can be the primary result of article marketing, together with the promotion of your brand to a wider audience through the syndication of these articles.Internet Marketing and Home Business
A website is an element that all internet marketing components, prospective customers, and clients anticipate a business to have. Through the years, having a website has become one of the best ways to get a consumer’s trust and interest in a company and its products and services. Having no website may even cause a prospect to lose interest and head to a competitor. Up-to-date information available 24 hours per day, 7 days a week something that can best come from a website. And the all-encompassing use of online means has cased many prospects to decide to transact only with companies that have a good and useful website.Engaging in online marketing and having a website is so comprehensive in scope that it can benefit even a business that only has very local customers like a single location food store or clothing store. Internet marketing offers a very cost-effective and comprehensive way of attracting customers and it also gives a business a worldwide reach with its own Web presence that can be very hard to get from other methods especially in the case of businesses whose customers are not restricted to ma single geographical area only.A website though in some instances is not a complete necessity, can definitely provide a home business operator various benefits due to the virtual nature of most home businesses. A website can act as a storefront for direct selling of products and services as well as serve as a very inexpensive means of getting prospects as well as clients know what your business does or what products it sells especially to those home-based businesses that do not have a physical location.The internet has been one of the primary drivers that fueled the growth and expansion of home based businesses because it has paved the way for starting and maintaining a web presence with reasonably low cost. It is therefore a must that internet marketing becomes as integral part of your business plan and marketing strategy.Finding the Right Internet Marketing MixDetermining and utilizing the right marketing strategy is essential to business success. Defining the percentage of marketing efforts that should be done online, the needed Internet marketing elements and the amount of focus to be given to the website are all vital to the formulation of a marketing plan that will work. The nature of business, the budget, and some personal traits may all affect the marketing mix. All these, and many others influence the development of an internet marketing business blue print.Using Offline Elements with Internet Marketing StrategiesOnly businesses that transact 100% of their business online can make use of a fully online marketing scheme. All others should utilize a marketing mix made up of both online and offline efforts. Traditional methods can greatly supplement the effects and benefits of web marketing. In fact, there are even businesses that conduct all their operations completely online and yet employ the placement of traditional ads on newspapers and magazines to drive prospects to visiting their website and participate in online transactions with the firm. Perfect examples of business that integrate offline elements as components of their internet marketing strategies are Expedia, Travelocity and Monster.com. These firms shell out huge investments in radio and TV advertising as well as other traditional means of advertising to get consumers visit their sites where the real businesses dealings are being transacted.Develop Internet Marketing Strategies You LikeOnly incorporate in your strategy the marketing techniques you like or those that do not annoy you whenever someone does them to you, because most people probably feel the same way. The most hated marketing tool as regarded by many is spam. This is why many companies nowadays do not include email marketing in their arsenal of promotion methods.Many forget the fact that email marketing does not necessarily mean the sending out of unsolicited emails to every email address you can find. Email marketing can also be accomplished by incorporating a visitor registration webpage on your site. This page then works as a tool to gather email addresses of interested prospects. You can then create a newsletter which you can send to all who have registered in your site. You may also consider updating your newsletter and sending it periodically to your prospects. You may also create a schedule for sending regular emails just to see how your prospects are doing, if your company can be of assistance in any way, or if any of their wants or needs has changed since when you last had a conversation. This is a very efficient way of utilizing email to boost your business promotion even without engaging in email marketing.Your Budget and Internet Marketing StrategyThe budget plays a very important role in any marketing strategy as it lays out which components and techniques you can develop and exploit. A website for example needs you to select a domain name and then register and purchase it from a web hosting service. Due to the growing demand for web hosting services, the competition has greatly tightened and many now offer discounts. There are those that offer domain name registration for as low as $1.99 per year – provided you also purchase other services, like hosting, which is now also available for less than $10 per month. Next is the design and content of your website. Your can design and write your won content or your can hire a graphics artist for the design and a web content writer for the content. You can also opt to make use of the online website builders that can be found all over the internet.After your site is all ready to go, getting it found is the next task, because no matter how good or useful a site is, it is of no value if people cannot find it. This is the point where search engine optimization or SEO comes in. SEO is vital to every website. You can either learn and do the SEO yourself or you can hire search engine optimizers to do it for you.Web content should be search engine optimized from the time it was written. Same goes for the web design as the manner in which a website is designed can either enhance or limit the site traffic it will be receiving in the future. SEO should definitely be a major part of any internet marketing strategy. You can opt to do things faster but more costly or vice versa, depending on your perspective and your budget.Once your website is up and running, you’ll either need to maintain it yourself or outsource the duties to an independent Webmaster to do it for you.Google AdWords and similar pay-per-click (PPC) advertising services can be a good choice as they go easy on your budget due to the fact that you can specify the maximum amount you are willing or able to spend. You also get to decide how much you will be paying whenever someone clicks on your site as well as the limit of how much you will be paying per day. You also get control over whether the pay-per-click ads appear only on major search engines or on other related websites as well. Geographic and time restrictions regarding when and where your ads run are also at your disposal, making the said ads quite easy to update. Real time tracking of the benefits is also possible with PPC services. You can also use images and/or videos with PPC advertising, which may even be less costly than placing banner ads on other websites. You can also, on the other hand, utilize pay-per-click advertising to earn money with your website to such programs as Google AdSense, Yahoo Publisher or Microsoft AdCenter.Tracking the Results of Internet Marketing StrategiesPutting up and operating a successful home-based business is not that easy especially for the average home business operator. Tracking is very important especially when you spend money on strategic Internet marketing initiatives. You should know the effectiveness on such initiatives to be able to make the right decision on whether to go on or discontinue with them. If you are satisfied with the performance of the currently implemented techniques, continue using them. If you are not satisfied, learn from your mistakes. Determine why such approaches did not work and find other means that can work better. Such practice is sure to improve your skills and enhance your chances for success.Your business will mature and grow faster and more efficiently if you know which internet marketing strategies are worth spending your money.Remain patient in tracking the performance of your internet marketing efforts and they will surely pay off. Always keep in mind that effects do not occur overnight and a significant amount of time is usually needed before you can feel the benefits. The same is with revenues, at first your efforts may seem to be in vain but after some time, more revenues will surely materialize.Strategic Internet Marketing Needs to be FlexibleThere are millions of people wanting to succeed with their own home internet marketing business and most of these also engage in strategic internet marketing. It is therefore vital that you make your marketing strategy flexible. It should be ready to quickly absorb changes and necessary adjustments. However, some knowledge, some capable assistance, and a well-managed strategic Internet marketing plan can increase your chances for success.

Technology pundits have constantly argued that the terms web development and web design are interchangeable with one another. I respectfully disagree and argue that though the terms may have been interchangeable in the past; they have long since become two terms completely separate from one another with different goals, standards, and philosophies behind them. Web development can be quickly defined as “a broad term for any activity related to developing a web site for the World Wide Web or an intranet. This can include e-commerce business development, web design, web content development, client-side/server-side scripting, and web server configuration”; whereas a definition of web design can be summed up as “a process of conceptualization, planning, modeling, and execution of electronic media content delivery via Internet in the form of technologies” (definitions courtesy of Wikipedia). We can take note of a couple of things simply from these simplified definitions. The first is that web design falls under the wing of web development and it is easy to see why many think the two are intertwined much like the concept that a square is a rectangle, but a rectangle is not a square. Web design is a part of web development, but not actually an essential part of developing the web.Web design, more specifically website design, is a process of creatively visualizing and utilizing the tools and applications created by the web development process. Web design takes the development process one step further and often finds itself using these tools for ideas and applications vastly different than what they were intended for. A quick analogy would be that of how the plane engine made for war combat was used as the basis for the car engine we use in our every day lives. Web design has brought us things like the web 2.0 concept of user generated content; some thing that web development tools are capable of, though not intended for it specifically. Content management systems such as the ones talked about earlier provide the framework for social networking websites and blogs. Dynamic web pages which appeal to our aesthetic eye use frameworks set forth by web development tools yet take it one step further by using the tool to create a masterpiece of web design.With all of America’s advances in web development it became easy to separate the two terms from their synonymous relationship; it has become a process of developing technologies and applications for the advancement of the World Wide Web. These technologies of course, can be adapted and used by anything related to the internet (such as websites) but is not merely limited to it. Content management systems (CMS) are one of the many examples of positive strides made in web development. CMS systems allow for easy management of content and data while online and can be used for simple server networking within an office, or as the backbone of an ecommerce website (voting systems in various states use CMS systems to tally and record votes via software). Web development also houses things such as the creation, modification, and innovation of scripting and coding languages. The advent of Actionscript 3.0 and PHP 5.2 can be marked as some of the great achievements of the web; Actionscript 3.0 is part of Adobe Flash CS3; however Adobe created AS 3.0 to make it much more logical for creative web applications. More specifically, web development in NY has been known to constantly utilize the most up to date tools and research to create some of the most innovative web applications.If web development is the paintbrush, web design is the Mona Lisa.

The Top Mistakes made by InvestorsIn my dozen plus years of advising individuals and businesses I have found a number of common mistakes that have derailed even the best laid financial plans. I thought by sharing them I might be able to help others sidestep the pitfalls and the negative impact they can have on your portfolio and long-term financial plans.1. Failing to establish a time horizon and investing accordingly -If you have expenses that need to be funded in 3 years or less, you should not be investing the cash for them in the stock market or other risky investments. These monies should be carved out of your investment portfolio (the money earmarked for long-term investing) and invested appropriately in liquid assets such as money market funds or term-certain fixed income offerings. If the money is not going to be needed for 3 years or more, an investment plan should be established based upon specific a time horizon and risk tolerance for these funds.2. Failing to thoroughly diversify your portfolio -Many investors know about the concept of diversification and think that by owning different investments, they are diversified. Diversification of an investment portfolio makes good sense on an intuitive level. However, it wasn’t until Harry Markowitz published his model of portfolio selection that this concept became a formalized part of sound investment practice and formed the basis of today’s Modern Portfolio Theory. Beyond this basic concept of diversification, the key to Markowitz’s premise is the revelation that the risk of any investment can be reduced and/or performance increased by forming a portfolio of diverse and non-correlated assets. That is, it is important not just to seek a diversity of asset types, but also to seek assets that have low or near-zero correlations to one another. It’s not about owning different investments; it’s about owning different, non-correlated investments.3. Letting potential tax implications rule your investment decisions – Many investors delay selling an investment that has done well regardless of how good or bad the future looks for the holding. Their response is, “I will have to pay taxes if I sell.” By not selling, they set themselves up for not having to pay taxes at all – usually because the investment starts on a decline and their concern switches from “having to pay taxes” to one of “hoping for a turnaround.” Don’t be afraid to take some profits off the table. While taxes are an unpleasant result of investing, I prefer to look at them as a positive sign as it indicates you are making money and your investment plan is working.4. Buying a stock based upon a “hot tip” -Too many investors listen to a friend’s advice because he or she always seems to have the next “great” money making idea. They don’t take the time to assess the idea personally and jump in because it’s only a few thousand dollars they are investing. Unfortunately this is not investing – it’s gambling. If you want to gamble, go to Vegas and at least get free drinks, dinner, a show and a room for the risks you are taking. Any investment that is being considered for your portfolio should be thoroughly researched and have passed a comprehensive financial screening scrutiny.5. Attempting to time the market -Waiting an extra day, week, or month to try and buy in at the “right price” just doesn’t work. No one can predict the future. If they could they most likely wouldn’t be sharing this knowledge with you for free. Successful investors use time, patience and a disciplined approach to increase the likelihood of maximizing their investment returns – not trying to time the market. If you have done the research and the investment is sound and meets your criteria then buy it, regardless of timing.6. Failing to regularly reevaluate your investments -Over time all investment styles, strategies and types fall out of favor. So, like timing the market, it becomes virtually impossible to know what is going to be “hot” in the next bull market and what isn’t. For this reason it is always prudent to stay up-to-date on your investments to insure they are still the same investment that you originally purchased (segment drift and manager changes can be one reason they may have changed). If your investments consist solely of mutual funds then an annual review is a good place to start.7. Basing investment decisions on emotion -Maybe the stock market is going through a bad time because of a short-term geo-political or economic event. Stay calm and make an educated, well thought out decisions about what, if anything, to do. Assess whether the event will affect the economy long-term or if it’s just a short-term blip. The best move is often no move at all. If it is a short term incident, many times the smart, prudent investor will make additional investments because the current decline provides them with an excellent buying opportunity. The key to successful investing is to have a disciplined strategy and to stick with it.8. Cashing out gains and dividends rather than reinvesting -Once you’ve realized gains or had distributions and dividends paid out, insure they are reinvested back into your portfolio. If you pull out your capital gains, dividends and interest, your money won’t compound as quickly, thereby leaving you with a smaller chunk of change down the line. Letting your investments compound is one of the major tenets of successful investing.9. Owning too much employer stock -Many people get over-weighted in employer stock because of options and stock purchase plans made available in today’s competitive compensation packages. While these are great supplements to their annual salary they can put an employee in a position of having too much money invested in their employer’s stock. Additionally, it is quite common for people to invest in “what they know” and what do you know better than the company you work for? To compound the problem many people will add more employer stock to their 401k holdings and individual brokerage accounts. Not only does this create a diversification problem in their portfolio but it also subjects them to excessive single stock risk. A good rule of thumb to follow is to insure that no more than 5-10% of your entire investment portfolio is in any one single stock. If you find yourself in this situation the importance of creating a well thought out reduction strategy cannot be overstated.10. Following the herd -The most successful of all investors are moving in the opposite direction of what everyone else is doing. They buy when most are selling and sell when everyone else is buying. By following this simple plan you can preserve your capital and potentially sidestep the next bubble (can anyone remember real estate, internet stocks, and technology growth funds?).11. Not investing at all – Somehow in today’s society that Mocha Cappuccino Latte seems to take precedence over saving for the long-term. We are a society who wishes to satisfy the “here and now” rather than the securing our future. The important fact here is that those two are not mutually exclusive. In fact, BALANCE is the key in any long-term endeavor, but by always keeping an eye on the end goal you can make sure it is not out of mind while satiating the here and now.12. Investing without a plan -Investing without a plan and lacking the discipline to follow it is a sure way to lower your chances of success. The chances of obtaining any long term goal can be greatly enhanced by creating a strategy, following it and regularly reviewing it frequently enough so it reflects any changes that have taken place since implementation. Many investors start off with a small amount of money and start putting it to work without a plan. As time progresses they find they have a mish-mash of investments in their portfolio with no clear strategy or direction. It’s never too early to invest but it’s even better to invest early with a plan.13. Taking too little risk -Some people don’t want to take any risk and cannot stand the volatility involved with risky investments. While it may seem like you are keeping your money safe and secure by not taking risk, it is more than likely you are not because of inflation. If your time horizon is greater than 5 years it is recommended that you have no less than 25-30% in growth investments (i.e. stocks) in your portfolio to ward off the effects of inflation. The actual percentage to own is dependent upon many factors including but not limited to age, time horizon before money is needed, current financial situation, etc. A good general rule of thumb to use as a starting point for the percentage of equity you may include in your portfolio is “120 – your age.”

Recipients of home health care in Illinois have certain inalienable rights of privacy guaranteed by the Privacy Act of 1974. Agencies who provide home health care and participate in Medicare and Medicaid programs are required by law to do a complete assessment of your current health status, which includes information which can be used to indicate your progress towards your goals. Home health agencies must use the OASIS – the Outcome and Assessment Information Set to evaluate your health. And to accomplish this, the agency must obtain information from you. This information will be used by the HCFA (Health Care Financing Administration, the government’s Medicare and Medicaid agency) to ensure that your agency meets quality standards, and administers its patients appropriate care. As a patient, you have the right to refuse to provide information to assess your agency. If you choose to provide information for the assessment, it is then protected by the Federal Privacy Act of 1974 and the HHA OASIS – the Home Health Agency Outcome and Assessment Information Set records system. You always have the right to examine, review, copy, and request corrections of your information in the HHA OASIS records system.The information which is collected will be used for a number of purposes. In the first place, it can support litigation which involves the Health Care Financing Administration, as well as support requests by constituents to Congressional representatives. The information is also used to support policy, regulatory, and reimbursement functions performed by the Health Care Financing Administration and by home health care providing agencies. The information is also used to study the quality and effectiveness of care which is provided by agencies providing home healthcare in Illinois. Assessments based on this information are used to survey and certify Medicare and Medicaid agencies; and they enable regulators to provide these agencies with data to improve the quality of their patient care. The information is also used to develop, validate, and refine the system under which Medicare disburses payments; and for health care payment related projects. It also supports the research and evaluation of epidemiological projects which relate to the prevention of disability and disease; or which maintain or restore health.The Health Care Financing Administration can release your information without your consent, but recipients of this information must agree in writing to continue the confidentiality of your information. Release of your health and independent retirement living information is permitted only to the Federal Department of Justice for litigation involving the Health Care Financing Administration; to agencies to assist them in improving their services; to state governmental agencies for evaluating the cost and effectiveness of state services; to congressional offices responding to constituent inquiries, made at the constituents’ written request; and to individuals and organizations researching epidemiological projects relating to disease or disability prevention. While you, the patient, are under no obligation to provide information on the OASIS (the government cannot instruct the agency to refuse you its services), nonetheless incomplete or invalid information can cause payment errors, and make it more difficult to determine whether the agency is providing you with quality service.

Everyone is attacking the insurance companies and rightfully so. They have been asking for it every time they come up with another excuse to deny someone the care they need. They’ve become the evil in the industry when they put a policy in place to deny, deny, deny until the people who are entitled finally give up filling out form after form.Of course, the American people are looking to the president to solve the problem. It doesn’t look as if the problem is anywhere close to being solved. In 2008, Obama said that making the American people buy their own insurance is like requiring the homeless to buy homes. In 2010, just two years later, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act he enacted did that very thing and in 2012 it was upheld by the Supreme Court even though it was immediately challenged by a majority of the States in the U.S.In all of this turmoil, I don’t hear too many people complaining about the cost of health care itself. I’m not saying I don’t hear people complaining at all. I’m saying that the squeaky wheel gets the attention and the squeaky wheel in all this is the complaint about insurance companies and what the president can do. Health care costs itself could use a little more attention.When a visit to the ER for a broken wrist costs a thousand dollars, I think we’re talking about a health care system that is literally running away itself unchecked. Walk into a hospital and look on the wall for a menu, a price list or anything that other businesses are required to provide. You won’t walk into a restaurant and order before knowing what the cost will be. Why can the hospital get away with it?So, you can’t control the insurance companies and you can’t control the mess the government is making. How about take matters in your own hands and start cutting health care costs yourself? It’s not that hard. All you need to know is that the options are available and be willing to use them.First of all, cut down on the trips you make to the hospital or the doctor’s office. This does not apply to people who have ongoing conditions that require frequent doctor’s office visits. If that doesn’t apply to you, then by all means be your own doctor.If you have a symptom, look it up on the internet. Go to the credible sites that offer solid advice. Webmd is at the top of my list. But, you should also look at a few others. Just like you might get a second or third opinion on serious medical conditions, go to several different sites and make sure they are all giving the same advice. Mayoclinic, Medicinenet and Healthline are some others that have articles written by doctors and you just might find the information you need.Remember though, if you take your health care into your own hands, you are responsible for following the advice the right way and using your own discretion if you happen to have a condition that precludes you from taking said advice. In a legal slap happy world, people love putting blame on others when they really only have themselves to blame. Quit being part of the problem, looking for that easy paycheck, and become part of the solution.Cutting down on hospital or doctor’s office visits also means that you need to stock up on certain supplies and have them in your house or in your car at all times. Make yourself a kit of common medical items that you might possibly need for non-emergency situations. Bandaids, gauze, tape, peroxide, wound cleaners and anything else that you can imagine that will make your kit complete. Make a smaller kit of only the essentials for your pocketbook or book bag.If there is a symptom that doesn’t require emergency attention and you have tried to look it up or you are unsure of what to do, go to a clinic. That’s why they are there. Clinics offer low cost solutions to getting medical advice. But you might get offered a prescription or a treatment that you can’t afford. Don’t hesitate to ask for alternatives. You’d be surprised how effective alternative health care treatments can be.In the case that a trip to the hospital or the doctor’s office is necessary, there are still great ways to cut down on health care costs. The first thing you need to know is that health care does not have to cost as much as it does. Keep in mind that it’s a business. The insurance companies look at it like a business. The doctors and the hospitals run it like a business. So, treat it like a business!If you have to go to the hospital, challenge the bill when you get it. Take it to the business office and negotiate it down. There is a sizable margin of wiggle room and you have every right to ask for it. Most of the time, you’ll get a reduced cost without even an argument. When they do argue, don’t take “no” for an answer. Climb the ladder of supervisors until you get to the decision maker. You will find that behind the closed doors is a much nicer person willing to give you a highly reduced hospital bill.If you require surgery, treatment or any health care that will be set in the future, negotiate the bill upfront. Just like negotiating the hospital bill that you’ve already received, you can negotiate future health care costs as well. Climb the ladder to the decision maker and ask them what they can do for you. If insurance companies can get discounts of up to forty percent, then why shouldn’t you be entitled to the same?Insurance companies aren’t designed with you in mind. They are money-making factories put in place to take your money and hope that they never have to pay. Looking to the government for the solution really isn’t doing anyone any good. When the government is required to find a solution, they have to find one that fits all shapes and sizes for all of its constituents. A task that is nearly impossible.Take matters in your hands when you can and make sure you follow through when you make that decision. You just might live longer anyway. After all, you should be able to figure out what’s best for you and possibly keep yourself out of the hospital or the doctor’s office altogether.

How many times have you tried to lose weight only to lose the motivation to do so in a few days? All those magazines claim they know how to shed those pounds and all those fad diets are making you fatigued. Why don’t they work? You ask. Well there is a very simple reason for that. All this is because you do not understand your body. Yes people, your body needs as much sympathy as you do when it is not feeling well. But most people just like to get going on monstrous starvation diets and then beginning to binge eat three days later! How do you think that makes your body feel? Confused, uncared for, and unloved.But if you are up for some new training, we have the perfect weight loss solutions for you. These are solutions that will work and give you the results that no one has been able to provide. If you can follow these simple weight loss techniques, then we guarantee you will shed those pounds easier than ever before. But all we need from you is a bit of compassion – not for us, but for your own beautiful body. Take a deep breathe and relax – When you are ready to begin, you can start reading further.UNDERSTANDING YOUR BODYWe have said it before and we are saying it again, effective weight loss is all about understanding your body. When you need to get something done from someone, your first step is always to get into their heads, so you can get an insight into finding out what they really want and what triggers them to say yes. This is exactly how you are going to begin your weight loss. Buy knowing what your body needs and what triggers it to binge.A WORD ABOUT CALORIE COUNTINGSome people emphasize completely on counting calories, and other programs will ask you to ditch it completely. We suggest that you take it into consideration, but don’t let it overwhelm you. Knowing what foods have higher calories will help you towards your weight loss goals. But we will tell you how not to let it overcome your diet to ruin it.EFFECTIVE WEIGHT LOSS VS QUICK WEIGHT LOSSWhen it comes to weight loss, quick is never as good as effective. Because quick weight loss will only shed pounds most of you will quickly gain back, and lets face it, if you really are here trying to find a way to lose weight, then those fad diets probably made you sick. Been there done that, right? Well, the good news is now you can move on.THE 60 TIPSYes. Finally, the real deal on effective weight loss. They might seem a little out-there at first but they will work for you.1. Forget your weight loss goal. Enough has been said about setting goals and then planning to achieve them. But let me tell you something – if you are here reading this then this goal setting has probably done nothing for you. This is because when you set a weight loss goal, it means sticking to a certain routine. And most of us already have so much going on in our lives that it’s sometimes impossible to work along that set routine.2. Why you should keep a realistic approach. When you skip the routine it makes you so depressed you actually feel like you are this big loser who cannot do anything right. That doesn’t help now does it? Of course it doesn’t! So the first step to successful weight loss – stop thinking about that depressing objective!3. Set a motivating future objective. Most of us will do nothing for a goal to lose boring 100 pounds, but we will kill to get a pair of those discounted patented lambskins in one size less, or to get into those sexy jeans you bought last Christmas and can’t fit into anymore.4. Get into those jeans. Just take a minute, and imagine yourself in those clothes that are only about a size or two in difference. Visualize how great you look! That is what your new ‘goal’ is.5. Love yourself the way you are. No one likes being called ‘fat’ and ‘ugly’. Your body doesn’t either!6. Treat your body well. You have to learn to stop treating it like an unwanted piece of merchandise and begin treating it the way it deserves to be treated – only then will it treat you back the same way.7. Look at the mirror. Yes, look and reason with your body that you now live in an age of plus sizes.8. Find the right clothes. There are enough gorgeous clothes out there that can and will accentuate your beauty and hide your little chubby faults. I mean, come on, it’s not like you are the only one! Otherwise why would people even make plus size clothes!9. Get yourself a great new outfit. Most people reserve their shopping for after they have lost the weight. That’s utterly ridiculous. Step out of those baggy pants and that preposterous sweat shirt and go get yourself a gorgeous set of clothes and really go out in those new pair of clothes.10. New clothes, new you. Those clothes represent your new life as someone who understands their body and is on the way to successful weight loss.11. When you look good, you feel good. Depression is the real factor behind most kinds of weight gain. To get rid of depression will be to get rid of excess weight.12. Getting rid of depression. You need to find artificial ways to defy depression and be on the way to a new you. Wear nice clothes; invest in some great looking shoes. Buy some cosmetics or hair products that work for you. The secret to success is in your own hands.13. Water is your new best friend. Water is the most essential drink you will need to incorporate for successful weight loss. It will also give you great skin.14. Water is the new classy. You need to stop treating water as some second-grade drink which doesn’t account for those sugary beverages. Think of water as a sparkling, crystal drink that cools and spreads joy inside your body.15. Cut down on sugary drinks. Replace with water as much as possible. Sugary drinks give you an awful skin, excess weight and cancer. Think of that before you sip out of that disgusting soda.16. The drawbacks of sugary beverages. If you are an average American then you are gaining 245 calories a day. Multiplied over a year that makes a total of twenty five pounds! If you had been any wiser you would have been 25 pounds thinner this year.17. Caffeine affiliation. That said, most people are hooked onto the caffeine of the fizzy drinks, so it will take you some time to get used to a no fizzy drink diet.18. Stop being guilty. Think of guilt as something that physically adds calories to your physique.19. Learn to instill confidence in yourself. So what if you had that extra glass of carbonated beverage or that yummy looking truffle at the dinner last night. Give yourself a break! It doesn’t mean anything. Move on.20. Every bit counts. When it comes to weight loss it’s the little things that matter. Even if you get rid of a few calories per day, these will multiply to give you an overall cut down of much more than you think.21. Keep a positive attitude about weight loss. Appreciate yourself whenever you are able to make any cut down or follow any diet tip.22. Don’t get lost in calorie counting. If you are at a romantic dinner, bringing out a calculator to add up dinner calories might make you seem a little crazy. Besides, it quite simply does nothing.23. Good food and bad food. The idea is to simply divide all food into categories than knowing the actual count. For example fruits “low”, sugar “high”, yogurt “low” cream “high”. Greek yogurt “low”, mayonnaise “high”.24. Substitute fish and seafood wherever possible. When you go out to eat, just try to substitute with seafood, like fish, lobster or shrimp wherever possible. Fish is especially effective for women with PMS symptoms.25. Diet breaks. You can make a great list of home cooked meals and not be able to do it everyday. A colleague might invite you, a friend may lure you or maybe you see a tasty meal in a magazine and you need to have some outdoor food. Well go, and be happy about it.26. More on diet break. Consider a glitch in your diet program as a break, a vacation and not as something that will or has broken your weight loss dream.27. Leave out sugars. Cut down on the sugars as much as possible. When you go out, ask for diet desserts. Instead of ice cream try to develop the taste for frozen yogurt.28. Diet recipes. There are many diet recipe books available online and in book stores. If you are a fan of cooking then you can try them out at home.29. Cheese can be tackled. If you are a big fan of cheese then cutting down on it might be a little impossible. So apply the tricks. For making foods like lasagna, you should opt for a stronger cheese. That way you get more flavor while the amount of cheese, and hence the amount of calories, is actually less.30. Do not ban dairy products. In this day of synthetic foods, the few healthy ingredients left on our menu includes dairy products. Although dairy products might look full of calories, recent studies show that they actually aid in weight loss!31. Daily dairy count. But of course you can’t go over the top. Keep your daily dairy count to a minimum; say a glass of milk or a slice of cheese.32. Yogurt – ’nuff said. If I haven’t stressed it enough, then I should say it again – yogurt is the new milk. A cup of yogurt has more proteins and vitamins than double the amount of milk.33. Substitute dips and dressings. You can also use Greek yogurt as a substitution for mayonnaise or cream based dips and dressings.34. Grilled is better than fried. Although obvious, this little trick can help you lose a lot of weight. Substitute grilled, smoked or baked for fried wherever possible. Whether its vegetables in Chinese or chicken in a burger.35. Smoked is also better than fried. Smoked fish is better than fried or even grilled fish. Make these little healthy choices as much as possible and you will see those pounds dropping even when you have been going out a lot.36. A word about pizza. This is the most difficult binge to controls than any other perhaps because a pizza really isn’t a health food. It’s a little naïve to think that you will be cutting it completely, because you won’t.37. Pizza problems. But you do have to make sure you eat one not more than once a week. When you do eat, you can make healthier choices by ordering thin crust instead of deep pan.38. Substitute low-fat or non-fat. Wherever applicable, use low fat milk, cream, cheese and even yogurt. You won’t know the difference when you eat but your body will.39. Cream is the real culprit. It can be so hard to give up on this on your dessert. But the way to trick your body is to use it sparingly, so you don’t end up feeling deprived.40. Use whipped cream. One great tip is that one tablespoon of whipped cream carries only about eight calories. So you can use it on a bowl of fresh fruit and get away with it!41. Don’t make every dairy non fat. Leave one dairy per day or at least every alternate day that is not low fat or non fat. Especially milk. Nutritionists say this actually helps weight loss.42. When eating out, order salad. This is a must-do for your weight loss program. When you incorporate a salad in your meal, you get filled more quickly and it leaves you no room for more of the main course.43. Incorporate activity. No diet can help you if you are sitting on your couch and making yourself physically weak and fat. It can be difficult to incorporate exercise and your job may not allow time for gym, but incorporating activity isn’t just about making yourself go to the gym for two days and then leaving it because something else came up.44. More about activity. Activity can be any activity that makes you feel better. I know this guy who told me how he liked to help people carrying groceries to their cars and using this as a workout! It made him feel better because the people seemed to love him and he was burning calories at the same time. Activity can also be dance lessons! Just imagine if you were lose weight while being able to do salsa!45. Butter walk. If you really need that cream cheese bagel, then you must walk to go get it. Yes, that is the new rule. Need that evening donut? Walk to get it. You have no idea how many calories you can account for by doing this simple walking ritual.46. Wholegrain vs. white flour. The debate has gone on for years, and still holds true. White flour relates to weight gain, while wholegrain flour is organic and serves good purpose.47. All is not bad. You must remember grains and carbohydrates are a part of daily diet and cannot be banned from meals, regardless of what those fad diets say.48. Being classy helps. It looks more classy and fashionable when you go somewhere and make all those healthy food choices – “Can I have a whole wheat, cucumber sandwich, and a glass of orange juice?” as opposed to “Gimme a mayonnaise sandwich and go heavy on the cheese okay?”49. Weekend attire. Apparently what you wear on a lazy weekend decides what you will eat on this lazy weekend too. Nutritionists and dieticians confirm that wearing a sweat shirt and flip flops will keep you on the couch with that potato chip bag, while adorning formal wear will give you a feeling of being careful with what you eat.50. Shop till you drop. This is simply another way to incorporate a healthy activity. If you like shopping then just shop and burn enough fat for a couple of days! Even if you can’t buy, you should try things on or simply window shop.51. When you plan to go out. When planning an outing, try to program activities that include exercise rather than a simple eating of popcorn. Anything that includes at least a bit of walking would do.52. Keep fruits and vegetable handy. You can’t keep a diet if you don’t have a stocked fridge. Because if you keep going to the grocery store every time, then you risk losing the urge to keep at the fruit snack and you might indulge in something less amusing on the way. With a stocked fridge, whenever the urge to eat strikes, you can simply go pick up the fruits or vegetables and start filling yourself.53. Do not listen to fashion models. Magazines sell not only stories, but also the models and it is their business to make it seem like everyone out there should look like this. But be intelligent and know that it is not true! No one you know is a runway model and neither are you. So be realistic and love yourself the way you are because that is what you are good at.54. Appreciate yourself all the way. It is a simple enough thing to do, and yet we don’t see many people trying this.55. Tip on appreciation. Whether you stopped yourself from having a pizza today, or talked on the phone standing up, regard yourself for making the right choice.56. Enjoy your food. Don’t go about chomping away without even really tasting the food. When you fork something into your mouth, let your taste buds appreciate the meal and enjoy it. Think of how elegant that makes you look too. And slowly you will find yourself eating slower and lesser. Remember that food is not about filling, but about enjoying.57. Learn to eat with chopsticks. Indulge in some classy food etiquette. Be a connoisseur and use chopsticks wherever applicable. It will not only fill you up quicker, but you will find yourself enjoying the experience.58. Add green tea and lemon to your food routine. There are enough people out there asking you to try green tea and lemon and telling you they assist in fat burn. There is evidence to the contrary as well, so you can’t decide whether that is true. But one thing is true – green tea is a great way to give your body some healing potion. If nothing else, it will keep you off sugary drinks because it has a low amount of caffeine which can help you cope. In any case it is much healthier than a colored cancerous soda right?! Lemon may not actually burn fat, but it does help metabolism and gives you great skin.59. Use honey instead of sugar wherever applicable. The feasibility of non-sugar sweeteners is still under consideration, so when staying off sugar may look a little daunting, you can try to replace honey. Honey is an organic and safe product and some civilizations use it religiously for its enormous health benefits.60. Think clothes, not calories. There is no harm in checking your weighing scale at times, but when you think about weight loss, don’t obsess about counting calories and watching your weighing machine everyday. Sometimes you will lose more and sometimes less. Sometimes your weighing machine won’t show you anything but your body will look all toned and great because of exercise. So gauge results by clothes and how they fit, rather than weighing scales and calories.The reality is that many people are obese and over weight because on the whole they are not happy with themselves. Whether this is because of the sugar coated, fat laden fast food diets we have acquired or whether it is simply because we have given up on ourselves, we all need help at some level.The minute you learn to accept yourself as who you are and realize a food binge is nothing but a passing fancy, you will find yourself accepting healthy food and being able to enjoy it rather than simply go about eating it.Focusing on putting a certain kind of food aside is not everyone’s piece of cake and can actually do you harm. Most nutritionists will recommend a balanced diet, which includes all food groups in the right portions. Do not take diet pills and patches unless you have discussed it with your doctor.Remember one fundamental rule: Do not think of a diet plan as being customary for a few days. These techniques mentioned above are not a diet program but a subtle, easy change of life style. You won’t drop four sizes in one month, but you will lose a lot of pounds over a longer period of time. This safe effective method will make sure that instead of you gaining weight like always and not being able to fit into the jeans you are wearing this year, you should be able to fit into last years jeans by the end of this year. Some people have changed their entire routines by using these techniques and are not even worried anymore!This is a healthy life style change which is more constant and successful than a diet program. It works for your entire life.