Author: Pamela Swift

Categories
Finance & Capital

What Can You Include in a Debt Consolidation?

According to Merriam-Webster, the definition of the verb consolidate is to “join together into one whole” or to unite. In the debt world this means bringing multiple miscellaneous debts under the same umbrella, so to speak. The goal is to make it easier to keep track of debts and pay them off, shorten the repayment timeline on said debts and reduce the amount of interest you ultimately pay when doing so.

Using a debt consolidation loan to streamline other numerous debts is perhaps the most popular method here. Most, if not all, consumers would admit that being responsible for one monthly loan payment is simpler than trying to juggle various other debts — and that it’s preferable to pay less interest than more, of course.

But not every debt under the sun is eligible for the consolidation process, nor would it make a whole lot of sense to consolidate certain types of debts based on their interest rates. Keep reading to learn more about what it’s often possible to include in a debt consolidation as well as what types of balances are typically excluded from this process.

Types of Debt You Can Consolidate

The types of debts most eligible for consolidation are unsecured — or not tied to physical assets that the lender could repossess in the event of default.

This makes the following debt types solid candidates for consolidation in many cases:

  • Credit cards: It often makes sense to consolidate high-interest, revolving credit card accounts because they tend to be one of the most expensive types of debts to carry over time. This is particularly true for cardholders paying the minimum amount due each month, as doing so usually extends the lifespan of the credit card balance by years and tacks hundreds if not thousands of extra dollars onto the price tag.
  • Private student loans: Whether or not it makes sense to consolidate student loans usually depends on the type — federal vs. private — as well as their interest rate.
  • High-interest personal loans: Say you took out a personal loan in the past when you had worse credit, but you’re now able to qualify for a more competitive interest rate. It could make sense in cases like these to take on new debt to pay off the old debt for less. Similarly, if you took out a payday loan in the past and now are able to secure a loan at a lower interest rate, it almost certainly makes sense to include this in the bundle.
  • Medical bills: If your medical bills have gone to collections and there’s no way to negotiate with your provider, it may make sense to seek out a more reasonable interest rate via consolidation.

Notice we said “in many cases.” This is because there’s no one-size-fits-all rule determining if it’s a smart idea to consolidate certain debts. Much of the outcome rests on whether or not you can qualify for a debt consolidation loan at an interest rate lower than your current debts.

Types of Debt You Cannot Consolidate

On the flip side, secured debts that are backed by collateral are usually ineligible for consolidation, with the two biggest examples being mortgages and auto loans. However, it also doesn’t make much sense to consider consolidating these as they tend to carry low interest rates as is. For instance, it wouldn’t make sense to consolidate an auto loan on a used car at 9 percent APR if you’d only be able to qualify for a consolidation loan at 12 percent APR.

A good rule of thumb to remember: You can usually include unsecured debts with high interest rates in the debt consolidation process.

Categories
Communication Skills

Do NOT Unleash a Digital Campaign Before Checking These Things

The world of online advertising is very dynamic. Just as fast as the internet and social media change, so do the dos and don’ts of campaigning on them. However, there are some basic guidelines that will stay as long as the internet exists – and that’s quite a long time. We got the chance to have a chat with the owner of Viking Media, Orel Asformas – and if you haven’t heard the name by now, we’re talking about a marketing solution whiz – to learn more about his take on the matter. He gave us four good tips for dazzling online marketing. Ready? Here goes.

Orel Asformas, the man behind Viking Media.

  • Is it unordinary?

Orel: “The first rule of digital marketing is that there are no rules. This may sound like a cliché, but it basically means that nothing should be ruled out automatically. Don’t do what everyone does, and don’t reject an idea just because nobody else has done it yet. Very few things are taboo in the world of online advertising. Quite the contrary: A lot of advertisements are not good enough, just because they don’t bring anything new to the table. 

“If you want to be remembered, your modus operandi needs to be completely different from what everyone else is doing. A successful digital campaign is first and foremost one that entices the viewer to be exposed to it. As opposed to radio, TV or newspapers, in the online world you can just skip an ad if you don’t want to see it. This means that you need to present the viewer with something very unorthodox that will make them stay on your ad, even though they can easily move on to something else.”

  • Is it daring?

Orel: “It’s very easy to wave off an idea just because it may seem forbidden or unacceptable in the online marketing industry. However, in reality there’s very little that’s not allowed in this virtual playground. Gone are the days when advertising needed to be conformative in order to be successful. Today you need to surprise and raise an eyebrow (or two) in order to stand out, so find that very thin line between ‘this is groundbreaking’ and ‘this is too much’ and put one foot on each side of it.

“Remember that even if you cross the line, this isn’t necessarily bad for you. Your digital campaign might draw negative feedback, but in today’s high-speed reality, that feedback will be forgotten faster than you think. What will remain in the minds of consumers is your product, because of that buzz around it.”

  • Is it unforgettable?

Orel: “In direct continuation with the last tip, your goal is not to make people think good things about your product. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a nice bonus, but it’s not your aim here. Your aim should be to stick in people’s mind. Everyone campaigns by making their product seem positive. You need to make it something that stays in someone’s head – and that pops up at exactly the right moment (during a visit to the grocery store, for example).

“One good tactic is to entice emotions, but not necessarily positive ones. If your ad is, let’s say, disturbing or spooky, you can be sure it won’t be easy for the viewer to brush it off their mind. It’s also important, however, to make sure that the product or service you’re trying to sell sticks inside the mind as well – and that’s done by linking between it and the ‘emotion enticer’. For example, footage of two customers fighting over a shampoo bottle at a grocery store is certainly not something the viewer will forget, and the linkage to the product here is really strong.”

  • Is it extreme?

Orel: “It’s time to meet my ‘est’ rule: When you choose a theme for your online campaign, make sure it’s the best projection possible of that theme. Don’t just make a funny ad, make it the funniest you can. Don’t settle for spooky, go for the spookiest. Being lovely doesn’t suffice, the ad has to be the loveliest thing the viewer has seen lately. Before you publish anything, watch it again, just to see if you can tighten some screws and go even more extreme than you already have.

“That’s not enough, however. When you show your results to other people around you, check out their reaction. Think if you can make them laugh/cry/gasp/flinch even more than they had, and how you can do it. Only when you can say with complete confidence that you put your best effort into the ‘est’ rule, it’s time to unleash the beast.”

Categories
Customer Service

How Businesses Can Connect with Reluctant Customers

Not all customers are enthusiastic. True, some consumers can’t wait to buy a business’s new tech product or to sign up for a new streaming service. However, many businesses have to contend with “reluctant” customers. That is, a number of customers may be good leads for a business, but for whatever reason, they’re reluctant to make a purchase. Indeed, these customers may face financial difficulties or even societal pressures that could prevent them from engaging with a business. Here, we’ll take a closer look at this subject and explain how businesses can win over uncertain customers. 

Identify the Problem

Certain businesses just have a bad reputation simply because of the nature of their industry. For example, it’s reasonable to assume that few people are excited to speak to a divorce attorney. Yet, thousands of people need divorce attorneys and rely on their expertise. As such, it’s imperative for businesses that fit this description to identify why a good lead might not  want to engage with their brand. Once you make this determination, you can move on to the next steps . . .

Address Concerns Directly

In many instances, individuals may be hesitant to spend money on a product or a service because they don’t understand it fully –– or because they have misconceptions about the business. Let’s look at another example: millions of people suffer from foot pain and bunions, yet, relatively few are willing to undergo surgery for tailor’s bunion. That’s because people still wrongly assume that bunion surgery is painful, unnecessary, and expensive. In reality, none of those things are true, but businesses have to address those concerns in order to reach leads who are on the fence. Remember, the more transparent your brand is, the better. 

Don’t Apply Pressure

Hesitant customers are unlikely to respond to “the hard sell.” Rather than trying to browbeat reluctant customers, look to offer them support. Deciding to make certain purchases can prove very difficult for customers in a tense emotional state. So the more you’re able to comfort and reassure them, the more likely you’ll be able to build emotional bonds with them. 

Focus on the Positive

No one ever wants to declare bankruptcy. Or purchase a security system for their home. Or get a prostate exam. Yet, the truth is that there are tangible benefits to all of these purchase decisions. Indeed, some of the things customers are least willing to spend money on may well prove to be the most beneficial to their well-being. Businesses with a high number of reluctant customers should make it a point to focus on these positive outcomes. If at all possible, enlist satisfied former customers to spread your message too. Reluctant customers may be tough to reach, but they’ll listen if you send them the right message!

Categories
Operations

Scissor Lift; A Safer Material Handling Solution

Suppose you have been thinking of a mechanical lift that is accurately matched and can achieve task within the production, maintenance and other industrial settings. Then scissor lift is your go-to equipment. Operators, site managers and maintenance personnel utilize this machine to increase industrial productivity. And this is only achievable if the concerned machines are high quality scissor lifts with the recommended standard of size and weight. To understand the concept of this post, let’s quickly define critical terms.

Scissor Lift

This is the primary focus of this post, and then we would shed light on this term in the simplest way possible. A scissor lift is a machine designed to transport people and heavy-duty materials including equipment in a vertical direction, and get them to the spot where they are needed for further processes. Any industrial activity that requires a ladder can be done using a scissor lift. The main objective of this machine is to access areas that are difficult to reach when performing whatever task is required. The scissor lift varies in size and model; however, they perform the same industrial activities.

Material Handling

There is no one single description for the term material handling. However, there have been several attempts to define this term. Whenever a material is moved from one place to another may be in the distribution, production or workplace, then it’s material handling. On the other hand, it is much more than the movement of materials – it involves all the activities that facilitate the moving of materials until they get to the point of direct consumption. So, it ranges warehousing, storage, protection and the control of material throughout their lifespan.

How Scissor Lift Becomes a Safer Material Handling Solution

For every activity that goes on in a factory or warehouse, there is a high level of risk. This is because different technological tools and machine are used to perform individual task. And these machines are to be controlled by an experienced operator. Therefore, the need for balance and knowledge is highly required.

Individuals have a specific limit they can attain pertaining to height, but with a scissor lift, the limitation can be overcome. A number of jobs require scissor lifts, and it equally contributes to the hygienic and sanitary circumstances in the food and pharma industries. It handles production materials neatly and safely.

Scissor lift handles material safely, and with its flat top surface, the machine can carry heavy-weighted loads with prior balancing without any drop-off. It provides a safety harness or cable with a sturdy platform surrounded by a protective rail. The machine is developed to operate efficiently indoor, that’s more reason it is used within warehousing and building maintenance business niche. A scissor lift may not be able to stand the outdoor condition and challenging paths. As part of the basic safety rules, it is prohibited for scissor lift users or operators to move the machine at the same time, the platform is in the up position, especially with heavy loads.

Categories
Planning & Management

8 Essential Tools to Manage A Remote Workforce

This article will examine 8 types of workforce platforms and recommend specific tools that are essential to get the most out of your remote team.

Remote work is becoming the new normal for many businesses all over the world. Many managers are now faced with the struggle to manage remote teams for the first time. Managing remote teams is not the same as managing teams in a traditional office setting. The lack of face-to-face interaction may cause communication issues. The need to facilitate collaboration with team members across multiple time zones can get messy. Fortunately, there are tools and resources that help managers stay on top of their telecommuting employees and maximize their production.

To help determine the best tools for your business, we have categorized them by 8 functions.

  1. Video Conferencing

Video conferencing allows remote employees to visually interact with each other. Face to face interaction is important to build a stronger connection between coworkers and allows attendees to communicate via visual cues. When communication is restricted to only verbal or written, a portion of the message could be lost because people communicate with visual cues. Managers have the opportunity to see discomfort or hesitation in their team and can address the issue immediately.

Google Meet is a solution that allows employees to communicate visually with coworkers all around the globe. The application integrates other Google applications such as Calendar and Gmail to enable users to present and collaborate with viewers across all devices. 

Zoom has become the go to solution for video conferencing. The program is user friendly and allows attendees to join with video or dial in with a phone connection, share their screen and record the meeting to be reviewed at a later time.

  1. Instant Messaging

Instant messaging allows team members to quickly and instantly chat with each other. There are status settings that allow coworkers to know when other coworkers are available, away, in a meeting or any other status. This is ideal for teammates to communicate and find answers from each other quickly without drafting a formal email.

Skype is one of the oldest instant messaging systems around. With Skype, users can host virtual meetings and create group chats. VOIP options are also available to quickly call and verbally chat with a teammate or make voice calls. 

Slack has become popular for instant messaging. Users can create group chats called “channels” and when there is too much traffic within a channel, it can be sectioned off into smaller channels. Slack also integrates with Google Docs and DropBox and the API allows developers to tailor apps for specific needs within the team.

  1. Project Management

Project management software is now more important than ever because it allows managers to setup projects, assign tasks to team members and monitor the progress of a project. Managers can setup a task within a project and assign it to their employee and ensure the task is completed within the schedule assigned to the employee. 

Asana is a powerful project management tool that goes beyond task management and collaboration. It features workflow management which allows managers to take point and draw a project map. This allows managers to fix plans, spot errors and ensure no tasks are lost. The timeline feature also allows managers to ensure tasks are completed within their scheduled time frame.

Basecamp is very popular because it features a highly intuitive interface. It provides the basics of project management such as task management, messaging, filesharing, arrange meetings and search. The dashboard provides managers a bird’s eye view of all ongoing projects.

  1. Employee Monitoring

Managers have the ongoing responsibility to ensure their team is constantly improving its performance. This is especially important to businesses with sales or customer service call centers because sales training and coaching to improve performance is key to the company’s success. To properly coach a sales or customer service call center, employee monitoring is necessary and this includes both a call recording solution and screen capture software.

VSLogger is a powerful call recording software program by Versadial Solutions. VSLogger goes beyond a basic call recording system and features in-depth call reports to determine when call volume is highest for businesses to properly staff their call centers, a book-marking system to silence or extract a portion of a call for further review, the ability to monitor, download, search and playback both live and recorded calls.

Screen Capture is a computer screen recorder program to capture the activity on an employee’s computer. The program may run in the background of an employee’s computer and take snapshots of the screen. The manager can also setup the program to record the computer screen activity like a video and setup triggers to begin recording such as microphone or speaker activity.

Businesses can setup both VSLogger and Screen Capture to work in tandem and save the activity into a single audio / video file.

  1. File Collaboration

File collaboration on the cloud is the perfect tool for businesses to share files with remote teams. Collaboration of files can be stored in a centralized location that can be easily accessed over the internet.

Google Suite (G Suite) offers a platform to allow teams to collaborate using their Google Docs platform. Tools such as word processing, spreadsheets, presentation slides and more are included in the platform. Managers can create folders, store files and provide read or edit access to these folders or files for any team member.

Microsoft Office 365 offers the same cloud storage, file sharing and collaboration features as G Suite. Microsoft takes it to another level by allowing team members to download software apps such as Word, Excel and Power Point to their local computer. This frees the employee from requiring an internet connection to work on a file. Microsoft also has a type of version control to allow users to checkout a file, make changes and check the file back into the system. Managers can view the changes and restore an earlier version of a document.

  1. Cloud Storage and File Management

Cloud storage is also a great tool for businesses to transfer files to remote teams. Access to multimedia files and documents that are too large to be sent by email can be stored in a centralized location.

Google Drive is a cloud storage platform to store all of your business’ files. Google drive syncs with each team member’s local drive to ensure the entire team has access to the most recent files. When managers pair the file collaboration feature in G Suite, they can control and provide different levels of access to folders to each employee.

Drop Box offers cloud storage and file sharing. The program is highly intuitive, can be downloaded easily onto the employee’s desktop and provides a drag and drop feature for file sharing. Managers may also setup auto-sync to ensure every team member is working on the latest files.

  1. Time Zone Monitoring

One of the greatest benefits for businesses with telecommuting employees is hiring talent all around the globe. This does create an issue for managers because they will need to facilitate collaboration between team members in different time zones.

World Time Buddy allows managers to add multiple time zones in a single view. The program integrates with Google Calendar to help managers find an open time slot to schedule a meeting. World Time Buddy also features tabbing to group different teams together.

Every Time Zone offers a user friendly and intuitive interface. The work schedules of the team can be entered into the system. Managers can then choose a date and the system will provide recommended times when each team member may be able attend a meeting. The manager can then setup the meeting, download a file and email it out to each meeting member. The file can integrate into each attendee’s respective calendar.

  1. Password Vaults

Security is essential for all businesses and when employees are spread all around the globe, managers need to ensure shared systems have secured passwords. Password Vaults allow managers to generate strong passwords and store them into a central location. Users can log into the system and retrieve the passwords from a single location. 

1Password features the ability to secure workstations both in the office and remote locations. It also allows managers to choose which team member gets access with multi-authentication.  1Password provides a watchtower that alerts users of security breaches.

Lastpass features a Sharing Center to share notes and passwords to an unlimited number of users and provides a security level check to let users know the level of safety in the passwords they choose.

Conclusion

This article has listed many tools and it may be difficult to decide which tool is the right fit. Every business is unique and a solution that works best for one company may not work well for another. It is up to the business to furnish their employees with the right resources to help them be as productive when they are working remotely as they are working in a traditional office.

About the Author

Jim Shay is the Senior Copywriter at Versadial Solutions, a software company that provides powerful call recording solutions to government, manufacturing, telecommunications, call centers, public safety, financial services and many other industries.