Scuba Certification: Questions You Need To Ask Before Getting Certified – Recreation
Scuba Certification: Questions You Need To Ask Before Getting Certified
Jay Umbenhauer
Learning how to scuba dive is your ticket to the ultimate underwater adventure. The scuba certification that you earn is internationally recognized, never expires, and allows you to rent or purchase your own diving equipment. You
Reducing Debt Before Its Too Late … How To Avoid The Pitfalls Of Creeping Debt – Debt Consolidation
Reducing Debt Before Its Too Late ... How To Avoid The Pitfalls Of Creeping Debt
Deb Seeber
Reducing debt usually isnt a high priority for people until they have already gotten into trouble with overspending. Using a few basic guidelines, and debt calculations, can help you see when your debt load is getting into the danger zone.
Budgeting Guidelines
First off, creditors use budgeting guidelines when reviewing and approving credit. If your debt exceeds the financial communities recommended guidelines, then you have a higher risk of credit applications being denied.
Getting, and keeping, your debt in line with recommended budgeting guidelines, is an important step in debt reduction. Use the following recommended budgeting guidelines the same ones used by Financial Institutions to review the items in your budget:
Housing 35% - Mortgage or rent, taxes, repairs, improvements, insurance, and utilities;
Transportation 20% - Monthly payments, gas, oil, repairs, insurance, parking & public transportation;
Debt 15% - Credit cards, personal loans, student loans & other debt payments;
All other expenses 20% - Food, insurance, prescriptions, doctor & dentist bills, clothing & personal;
Investments & Savings 10% - Stocks, bonds, cash reserves, retirement, rental real estate, art, etc.
Debt Income Ratios
The second step is calculating your debt income ratio. Once you know what your ratio is, you will understand just how important debt load is to your overall financial picture. Your debt income ratio is the percent of your monthly take-home pay that goes to paying debts.
You calculate it by taking the amount needed to repay debts each month, including rent or mortgage, and divide by your take-home pay your net pay after taxes. Remember, this is "Debt" ratio, so only include actual debt repayment in the calculation.
Credit To Debt Ratio
Just because you pay off a credit card is no reason to close your account. One little known fact about the Credit to Debt Ratio is the reverse effect it has on your credit score. If you pay off a credit card, and close the account, you are actually negatively impacting your credit score.
The reason for this negative effect is in the calculation of the Credit to Debt Ratio itself. This ratio is the relationship of your debt total vs. your credit limit.
You calculate it by dividing the total credit limit of all credit cards and loan accounts by the total of the actual debt spent total. Now, if you pay off a credit card, you are reducing the actual debt, which is great, but, if you close the account, you are also dramatically reducing the credit limit you have, and usually by a higher percentage than the debt reduction.
Pay Yourself First
Essential to long-term financial success, and protecting your future, is paying yourself first. While this may seem easy to do, it happens to be the last thing most people do, instead of first. Debts and other financial obligations, money for entertainment, and other spending always seem to take a higher priority. All I can say is, STOP! Think about it, if you arent worth being paid first, then who is Always put something away in your savings, and leave it alone. It doesnt matter if its only $5 a week, just do it!
Snowball The Credit Cards
Last, but not least, is making extra payments, not just the minimum payments, on your credit cards. You have probably already seen this many times, but it just cant be stressed enough. Paying just $10 extra a month on a credit card, above the minimum required payment, can cut your repayment term in half, if not more! So, squeeze out that extra payment, however small, every month, and take advantage of the compounding effect of snowballing your debt away. The Power of Financial Knowledge
Remember, you dont have to be a financial whiz to understand whats going on with your credit and debt. Just a few simple calculations, and an eye on the future, will go a long way to help you succeed financially and keep your debt under control. Be safe, be smart, do the math!
About The Author
Article courtesy of: DebtSteps.com offers comprehensive reviews of your options for debt relief. From budgeting to bankruptcy, debt consolidation, and credit counseling. DebtSteps.com is where you can get the answers to your questions absolutely free.
Copyright 2004 DebtSteps.com, all rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.
How To Choose Keywords Before they Skyrocket in Popularity – Marketing
How To Choose Keywords Before they Skyrocket in Popularity
John Alexander
Long before the days of researching phrases with the helpful online resources of today, the art of keyword/phrase selection was often left just to guesswork. However, guesswork by todays highly competitive standards is just not good enough. So how is it possible to select a powerful traffic-pulling phrase in this fashion without researching it in real time Better yet, is it possible to choose such a phrase and get positioned before it becomes popular
Well of course it requires some research, but in a slightly different way. Every single day, we have a world of information that happens all around us. With all of the focus on the Internet these days, we need to also consider giving our attention to other medias as well. We have television programs, we have the news and the radio which all bring us current and upcoming events. With the news itself, there are often many ideas that can help the SEO to really think and plan ahead for some truly unique optimization strategies. I am talking about the potential of developing part of your client strategy around an upcoming newsworthy event. Of course it needs to be relevant and useful to the target audience. It also needs to genuinely "relate".
If at first, it does not sound that exciting, lets think about it and give you an example.
Here is a simple example.
If I were promoting a video store online right now, one of the things that I might be doing would, would be to optimize a page for the single search phrase "Johnny Eck." Perhaps an information or a tribute page would work.
But wait....Who was Johnny Eck, you ask
A way back in 1932, there was a movie by Todd Browning called "Freaks" starring a man named Johnny Eck. The film "Freaks" was about the fictionalized lives of physically and mentally challenged people who, in them days, were exploited in what were commonly called "freak shows". Johnny Eck just so happen to be born into this world without the lower half of his body and was just one of the "main actors" exploited in this rather unusual film which marked the end of Todd Brownings career as a Director.
Although you may have never heard of Johnny Eck, in over 60 years you can count on the fact that everyone will soon know who he is. The film "Freaks" 1932 already has a tremendous cult film following around the world.
So why optimize a page for a film which is over 70 years old
What many people may not be aware of, is that a brand new movie based on the lives of Johnny Eckhardt is currently being produced. The new movie has a big budget, good script, and you can be certain that many, many people are going to plan to see this film on its release. Theres no way to predict for certain, but itll probably be quite a blockbuster.
Simple Strategy: Optimize well and relate to the audience
As part of the strategy, you could prepare this optimized page offering to sell the old movie, which is now available on video. On the same page, I would talk about the film. I would write about my remembrances of seeing it for the very first time. As strange as the film is, it makes quite a statement about the how so called "normal looking" people can be very cruel.
You could talk about the film, review it. Talk about how it made you feel. Really try to relate to the audience. In creating the content, you would write for voice, just like you were talking to an old friend. At the same time, offer some trivia or anecdotes about how the film was made. I would prepare the page and get it ranked firstly for the phrase "Johnny Eck" and perhaps secondly around the name of the old film.
The Traffic Payoff:
Usually when a new "big name" movie is released, there is always a tremendous flurry of activity on the Internet by movie goers who enjoy looking up information about it. When they start searching for info on the new film and your pages come up in the top ten, theyll also be reminded about the old film and quite possibly want to purchase it. In this type of promotion, dont take the page down after the movie comes out because you may get double waves of heavy traffic. Actually, if youre lucky the whole routine is going to happen all over again when its released on video usually six to eight months later. Might there be a third wave when it finally makes it to DVD
Fine Tune Your Thinking:
Think along these lines, now ask yourself if there may be value to optimizing a page around other big events that are definitely scheduled to happen. The use of a new movie release is only one idea, amongst hundreds of others. If you practice thinking this way, you can develop strategies for retail, professional clients or even business-to-business Web sites. Newsworthy events happen all the time.
Do you think "the Olympics" might benefit a sporting goods store which offers an overview of the various participants.
Do you think that a scheduled tour of a famous rock group might influence traffic to a music site offering a contest for free tickets
How might that upcoming childrens film influence traffic to a toy store
These are only a few quick examples but learn to think laterally about news events. Take full advantage of the media in its entirety to bring maximum benefit to your clients. Its just a matter of paying close attention to those big scheduled events and creatively examining how these might benefit a your strategy.
In the scenario I explained above, it would be ideal for a video store who is selling old classic films to if they have any films available starring Johnny Eck to take advantage of the public interest that might be generated by a new movie.
By the time the film is released, assuming it is created at all I expect there will be a flurry of interest about this actors life and any old films he may have appeared in.
About The Author
John Alexander is the Co-Director of Training of Search Engine Workshops with Robin Nobles. Together, they teach 2-day beginner, 3-day advanced, and 5-day all-inclusive "hands on" search engine marketing workshops in locations across the globe. John also teaches online search engine marketing courses through http://www.onlinewebtraining.com, and he