make-a-will

4 Reasons to Make a Will

Legal Advice /

When you are young and just starting out, you don’t think too much about the need for family lawyers. They spend most of their time working out ways to enjoy life and have more fun, about their career choices and how long it will be before they get their dream job.  In fact, very little time is spent thinking about worst case scenarios or the end of life. That is why so many young people do not even think to make a Will.

However, if the unthinkable should happen – and statistics show that it happens more often than we would like to believe – your assets, be they ever so few, would not be likely to go to your loved ones unless you have a Will.

Here are 4 reasons to act responsibly by making a Will.

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start-an-ecommerce-store

What You Need to Do to Start an Ecommerce Store

Business Advice, Website Development / /

Many businesses both large and small are consulting digital agencies in order to make use of the Internet to enlarge their business and increase their bottom line. Even sole traders can start up an e-commerce store from which to sell their products or advertise their services. In fact, a great many people have found success in doing this. If you are thinking about starting up such a project, here are some tips on what you need to do.

  • Create a plan. This will include several components such as deciding what to sell, finding out where to access it, working out how you will differ from the competition, locating your target market and getting the legalities and store policies into place.
  • Setting it up. There are many things to decide in this step. Will your store have phone support? What domain and plan will you use? What will be the name of your store? Will you use drop-shipping or have stored inventory and if the latter, where will you store it? Selling digital goods saves a lot of problems with storing and packaging. You need to create a special bank account and decide on your merchant account so that people can pay you. PayPal makes it easy, but they do take a percentage of each transaction.
  • Decide on your website details. It is essential to make your website easy to navigate, with all the important details highly visible. Make sure it is responsive so that people using iPhones and iPads can use it easily. A content management system (CMS) like WordPress will make it easy for you to add and edit content instead of relying on – and paying for – a website designer to do it each time. You will need to write the product descriptions, including all the relevant information to help customers make their choice. You also need to write your privacy policy and get an SSL certificate to protect customer’s credit card details. Get a marketing plan and to learn how to measure results with analytics.

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Adwords Marketing

Is Adwords Marketing Right for You?

Website Marketing / /

Once you start looking into ways and means to advertise your small business, you will soon come across the option of Adwords marketing offered by PPC experts like Slinky Internet Marketing. This usually refers to Google Adwords. Google makes it really easy for almost anyone to set up an Adwords, or pay per click campaign, with options for much of the work to be automated, but that is not to say it is the best way to create such ads. It can be an option for those who find the process difficult and tedious.

Part of the automation process is that the ads are placed onto websites without any input from you. The keywords you use are what determines where the ads are placed. It is important then to use the right keywords. Some words sound the same but have different meanings so you need to use the negative keywords function to weed these out. Otherwise you will be paying for clicks from people who are not in the least interested in your product.

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twitter-social-media-market

Social Media Marketing Tips for Twitter

Website Marketing / , /

Twitter is a social media marketing platform that people with an online store sometimes overlook because it is only text based – or was, that has changed now with one image allowed per post. Still, when you have a lot of products it is difficult to know what image to use. And since the text is not very long, you don’t get much chance to describe the product. So how can you use Twitter as a digital marketing platform? Here are a few tips from a digital agency to help you.

  • In actual fact, Twitter is stripped to the bare bones of social media marketing which makes it very easy and quick to use. Once you get used to ‘tweeting’ in short, succinct phrases you will find that your marketing efforts don’t take much time and can reward you much more than you would expect. You don’t have to set up a page, or worry about creating an interesting post that gives all the details. A few words and a URL and you’re done.

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Experienced Corporate Lawyer

Why You Need an Experienced Corporate Lawyer

Legal Advice / , /

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

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

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Leasing Business Premises

Tips for Leasing Business Premises

Business Advice, Legal Advice / /

If you start up a business that cannot be run from home, you will need to lease business premises. There is a great deal to consider and plan including getting professional advice from lawyers and in this case, an experienced property lawyer because signing a lease will mean you are committed to pay a specific amount on a continual basis for the term of the lease. In addition, you may need to outfit the premises before you can start selling to get an income. Here are some of the things you will need to consider apart from the price.

  • The future needs of your business. You may need to expand, so are the premises large enough? If you expand in a different direction, is there anything in the lease that may prohibit you from selling different goods? Moving from the location after you have built up goodwill there can mean you are virtually starting all over again, so get it right the first time.

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Components of Your eCommerce Store

6 Necessary Components of Your eCommerce Store

Website Development / /

Once you have made a decision to start up an eCommerce store, there are several components that you will find essential, whether you are going to choose a full-service web design agency or a cheap web design company. In fact, it is wise to find out all about what you need even before the final decision is made.

For a start, some things – e.g. the shopping cart – will cost you, so you need to know whether or not you can afford them. That said, there are many ways of reducing costs; one of them is to use free services or a free trial period for when you first start up. That will allow you to have extra to spend on advertising.

So here are 7 necessary elements that your eCommerce store will need to get started: –

  • Since so many shoppers these days use their iPhones to shop, your website needs a responsive website interface by an expert. This means that button and other icons that they need to click on must have lots of space around them – enough for their finger to do the clicking rather than a tiny arrow from the cursor. You also need to choose the shopping cart with mobile functionality in mind. More about responsive here

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power-of-attorney

More about Power of Attorney

Legal Advice / /

Since the Power of Attorney is a legal document it should always be stored in a safe place. In addition, copies should be given to the person you have appointed as attorney.  If the appointed attorney is going to deal with real estate in NSW on your behalf, the document should be registered with the Land and Property Information Division of the NSW Department of Lands. This is the only requirement for the document to be registered. When and if you revoke the Power of Attorney document, the cancellation should also be registered.

Why witnesses are needed

When you create a Power of Attorney there has to be witnesses that sign the document. These witnesses are meant to ensure that you understand what you are doing and believe that the person you appoint is capable of acting in your best interests. This prevents older people being manipulated into giving unscrupulous family members legal right to administer their estate to their own benefit.

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Logo Design

Basic Principles of Logo Design

Website Development / /

If your company needs a logo it is a sure bet that you want it to be unique, distinct, easily recognisable, practical, appropriate – and to have that wow factor that is difficult to explain, but you know when you see it. This is not so easy to do as it may sound, even for a good web designer with a great deal of experience. It takes discussion with the client and research of the company and of the general history of the business it represents, not to mention finding out what ideas, if any, have already been thought of.

However, there are certain basic principles of logo design that must not be forgotten in the general scramble to offer something that is different, but effective.

  • Simplicity – logo design that is overdrawn will not translate well to all media and when it must be really small will become blurry and indistinct. Look at some of the most well-known logo designs and you will see that the shapes and colours are really simple – think Nike and Apple for example.
  • Memorable – following closely behind simplicity, the design must be memorable. In fact a simple design is usually a memorable one because a single shape is easier to remember than something more complicated that has several elements. Being appropriate is part of it memorability.

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Estate Planning

Two Main Aims of Estate Planning

Legal Advice / /

Once it was considered that only affluent people needed to bother with estate planning. But much depends on your idea of affluence. When compared with many Third World countries, many inhabitants of Australia could be considered affluent. According to experienced family lawyers if you have some assets, it would be a good idea to see your lawyer about estate planning. There are two main aims for this –

  1. It will help to avoid any financial hardship for your next of kin in the event of your death.
  2. It will minimise any family arguments about who should get what out of your assets.

While you may think the latter is not all that important, some family squabbles go on for decades and can really fracture a family, often forever. Then of course, there is one other good reason for estate planning and that is to reduce taxes. Some of the taxes that were once in force are no longer in existence, but there are always others to take their place, so you can’t avoid them completely. So estate and death duties are out, but capital gains tax is in, as well as other various taxes that may depend on just what your assets are. If you need help finding a lawyer, try this Lawyers List.

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