Online Fundraising - Four Deadly Blunders to Avoid with Website and Email Fund Raising

The good news is that 62 percent of adults visit a non-profit's website before donating (according to a recent online survey conducted by Harris Interactive).

That's also the bad news.

For many non-profits, the quickest way they can scare away donors is to direct them to the organization's website. Too many non-profit websites are making blunders that discourage donors from browsing, donating, volunteering or referring others to the site. Here are four common blunders, and how to avoid them.

Blunder #1. Obscure website address

What would you expect to find at http://www.gghorg.ca? Is this address obviously for Guelph General Hospital? How easy is this website address to remember? Is it as easy to remember as http://www.lenoxhillhospital.org, the address for, you guessed it, Lenox Hill Hospital? If you want donors, volunteers, members, alumni, the media and others to easily find your website, give it an address that's both intuitive and easy to remember. If your organization's name is a mouthful, then create a unique website address, as the Arthritis Research Institute of America did with its website, http://www.preventarthritis.org.

Blunder #2. Donate button on the homepage only

Some visitors will find your website by typing your website address into their browser. But plenty more will find you through a search. Which means they may land on any page of your website other than your homepage. So if you want visitors to donate, put a Donate Now button or link on every page of your site, not just on the homepage.

Blunder #3. No email sign-up

The key to raising money online is not your website. It's your email. You raise money by emailing folks who have asked to hear from you. But you can only do that if you have their email addresses. A website that does not collect email addresses is not likely to raise much money. So put a sign-up link on every page of your site, offering a free email newsletter, email updates or something else of value to your donors that they will receive from you by email.

Blunder #4. No interaction

I heard recently of a young boy who explained to his father why he didn't watch television: "It doesn't do anything. All I can do is watch it." That explains the beauty of the Internet: it's interactive. Which means your website visitors expect your website to be interactive. They expect to be able to "do something." Your visitors will stay longer, and enjoy their visit more, if you offer them online surveys, polls, petitions, quizzes, refer-a-friend buttons, donation pages and other ways for visitors to interact with your site.

Making It Second Nature

Not long ago I was laying on my son's floor throwing one of his toy balls back and forth in the air to myself and I had a strange revelation. I noticed that as I threw the ball up in the air my left arm automatically started to move to where the ball was going to come down. At the time I was pretty amazed at the fact and decided to experiment a little.

I wasn't sure if it was really moving automatically or if I was just reacting consciously very fast and it only appeared like a seamless act. I continued the act a while longer and then I started consciously trying to move my arm to where the ball would go. I was still able to catch the ball but it was a completely different feeling. I wasn't sure if I would catch it where as before I just knew I would so much that I didn't even think about it. When I thought about catching the ball I experienced a psychological shift. Just to be sure I went back to my regular method of just throwing and catching and again it felt automatic.

Next I tried to throw the ball and close my eyes and see if my hand knew where to go. It did. I didn't catch it very much but the ball always hit my hand. I tried the whole thing with my eyes closed next and I didn't touch the ball very often at all that way.

Now I know you must thinking what does any of this have to do with trading. Well, ...uh.....everything! Sure, you do need a system that works and capital and time and desire and effort but beyond that lies the mental state of being a trader. Not just a trader but a consistently successful trader.

How did my mind learn to know exactly where the ball was going? I suppose after many years of throwing or catching a ball as a kid my subconscious adapted the process in a second nature sort of way. As I throw the ball the synaptic messages it sends to my arm direct it to where the ball will be even when my eyes are closed.

In trading we watch the markets for hours a day. Some of us all day every day. The successful among us probably hours after that while practicing. I spend at least an hour a day after the market just going through trades using my system. My system is second nature to me now as a result just like the ball throwing. I still use a system and follow rules but if I am not thinking about the process too much and just flow in a zone I usually know what the market is going to do.

So how do we develop this skill or trait? I believe there are two ways and they both involve practice. One way is to work really hard at your craft and put yourself through an intensive regime of study, practice and work. If you work hard every day and try to get a little bit better every day over time it will happen if your account holds out and you don't burn out mentally. There are mental tricks you can use to make this way more effective such as building a reward system for milestones reached or keeping a daily log of your trading related activities. This method may sound tiring and for many people it would be.

The other way to gain that second nature insight is to direct your focus to having fun with your craft. Where the first method focused on laboriously going through the motions this method is more light hearted. By no means am I suggestion that trading should be taken lightly. I am talking about approach here. If you turn the homework you should be doing every day into a kind of mental game you will be much more likely to do it and more importantly draw upon your experiences in your real-time trading. You should keep the pace fast if that helps and maybe talk to yourself about what you are seeing along the way. Make a funny sound or something as you enter trades and again as you exit. Maybe upbeat sound effects for winning trades and light hearted crashing sounds for losing trades. Do whatever works for you but keep it fun.

There is no getting around this. If your goal is to have the automatic reflexes that kick into gear when you subconscious mind sees an opportunity then you need to practice. Every day I run through the prior two trading days step-by-step and using the Pivot Trend difference model from my NQ Scalping System (http://www.wattstrading.com/Scalpingtheeminis.html) I pick a trading day from the past that directly follows trading days that resemble the recent activity. I bet if you ask any professional or Olympic athlete if they could reflect on what it is that makes them so consistent that the answer would be practice. I can say for sure that the extra time I put in after the markets close is the key to my success.

Good luck to you all. Trade well!

Business Expense & Tax Deductions - A Complete Guide on Business Expenses For Tax Deductions

You are about the "crack the code" on business expenses and tax deductions.  Following this simple-to-follow and easy-to-implement information will help you get the most out of your tax deductions.  

The expenses to run a trade or business are business expenses. Rent, payroll, advertising, repairs, interest, depreciation, taxes, etc. are few examples of business expenses. If the business is run to make profit and the expenses are ordinary and necessary, then these expenses qualify as deductible business expenses. Payroll expense is commonly accepted expense for most businesses and therefore it is deductible business expense. 

It is necessary to distinguish the business expenses from cost of goods sold, capital expenses, and personal expenses because these expenses have special rules to decide how to figure out these expenses, and how much can be treated as deductible business expenses for a particular tax year. Let us review these expenses with some more details.

Cost of Goods Sold:

If you are in manufacturing or resale business, you need to value your inventory at the beginning and end of tax year to determine your cost of goods sold. Cost of raw materials, freight, storage, direct labor, factory overheads are the type of expenses that go into figuring cost of goods sold. Cost of goods sold is deducted from gross receipts to figure out gross profit. The expenses allocated to figure out cost of goods sold, cannot be claimed again as business expense.

For more information about tax aspects of cost of goods sold, please refer to chapter 6 of IRS Publication 334. Please refer to IRS Publication 538 on inventories. 

Capital Expenses:

Capital expenses are the part of your investment in the business. Business start up costs, business assets, and improvement costs are the main types of capital expenses. Capital expenses are considered assets of business and generally their benefits are available for period more than a year.  You must capitalize, rather than deduct these expenses. You may be able to recover this expense through depreciation, amortization, or depletion. These recovery methods allow you to deduct part of your cost each year. 

Business start up costs: You can elect to deduct or amortize certain business start up expenses. For more information, please refer to Chapter 7 and 8 of IRS Publication 535. Advertizing, travel, and training are the examples of business start up costs.

What if your attempt to get into business fails? In that case, the costs you had before making a decision to acquire or begin a specific business are your personal and non-deductible expenses. The expenses for search or investigation of a business or investment possibility are examples of this kind of expenses. The costs you had after making a decision to attempt to acquire or begin a specific business are capital expenses and you can deduct them as capital loss.

Business Assets:  Land, buildings, machinery, furniture, trucks, franchise rights, and patents are examples of business assets. You must fully capitalize these assets.

Improvements: Improvements are capital expenses if they increase the general value, or the utility value and life of the asset.  New electrical wiring, lighting improvements, structural improvements etc. are examples of Improvements that can be treated as capital expense. However the repairs intended to keep the machinery in normal operation is not capital expense and you can deduct these repairs as normal business expenses.

Personal Expenses:

While recording an expense transaction in books of business, it is important to make sure that it is not personal, living, or family expenses as these are not deductible business expenses. However, if you have an expense that is used partly for personal and partly for business purpose, divide the total cost between the personal and business part. You can deduct the business part of the cost.

Business use of home and car are examples of personal expenses that can be partly treated as business expenses. You need to be very cautious and precise in treating personal expenses as business expenses as this is the area which might trigger tax audit.

If the deductible business expenses are more than income, you have a loss. There may be limits on how much of the loss you can deduct. Not-for-profits limits, At-risk limits, Passive activities etc. are some limits that decide deductible loss. Net operating loss can be used to lower taxes in other years.  

Basement Waterproofing Contractors - Make Sure They're Busy

Before you sign that independent contractor agreement, consider this:

You're hungry, and you and your special someone decide to eat out. You drive down the road and find two restaurants standing next to other. From the outside, they seem about the same with one significant difference: the parking lot in front of one restaurant is nearly empty. The other restaurant? Packed! The lot is nearly full, and there's a crowd at the door. Through the restaurant windows you see smiling faces and filled tables. You pull in, and when you're greeted at the door, you're told there will be a 45 minute wait for your table. Will you leave the restaurant and go next door to the one that can serve you immediately? Isn't there a reason the other one is empty?

If you're looking for a basement waterproofing contractor to work on your home, you've got more than a bad taste in your mouth to worry about. Symptoms of a wet basement include headaches, moldy basement carpeting, wet drywall, ruined personal possessions, spreading mold, smelly basement syndrome, fatigue after hours of cleaning, and an exhausted bank account. Don't take chances on the empty business- if you reach a basement waterproofing company with a long line, there must be an awful lot of people who think they're worth the wait.

If you're not sure if the basement waterproofing contractor you've decided to work with is the best in the business, there are many ways to check out their reputation. Visit the local Better Business Bureau web site and check out their reputation- any complaints registered with them will be public for three years. Compare them with other local dealers, taking into account the size of the businesses and how many jobs has been completed for each.

It's also a good idea to check the contractor consumer web site such as Yelp! Or Angie's List. If the local contractor is registered, then reviews, company information, and ratings for quality and service will be clearly laid out as well as anecdotal accounts created by customers of this contractor will be available. There's a lot of ways online to have a customer's feelings be heard nowadays.

As a final way to check on your basement waterproofing contractor, contact them and ask for references. Many contractors will collect references from previous jobs and will be able to connect you with testimonials and contacts that will be able to give you a personal account of the quality of their service. However, whether you check with the Better Business Bureau, Angie's List, or you're checking up on references, you'll be gathering information directly from former customers about what these basement waterproofing contractors are all about.

Disney Delights That Last A Lifetime

I think that the Disney creators and animators have a gift plain and simple. They have the ability to blend so many characteristics and qualities into such diverse characters that it is amazing. It doesn't matter whether they are using boys, girls, old people, inanimate objects like cars, trucks, boats, or heroes or villains. And their use of animals is beyond my imagination of giving each critter such an individual and specific personality. It's no wonder that we all related to one or another of these characters.

We may have learned a huge set of our life morals from these movies. It does seem that there is always a villain, always a victim and always a set of characters in between that help to bridge the gap between the two ends of the spectrum. We laugh with them, our heart breaks for them, we cheer when the unjust get their punishment and lose and we say 'aaawww' when the perfect ending happens. We often tell our kids that there are no story tale endings in life but I certainly think that there are plenty of 'story tale' morals in life.

Disney stories do a good job of having the characters go through many trials and disappointments throughout the movie. They show longings and desires that must be worked for and that it takes persistence to achieve what we want.

Disney stories show multiple mood changes and behaviors throughout their movies also. We are taken through sadness, tears, spontaniety, anger, joy and of course, the ultimate 'story book' ending that just soothes our soul. They do also represent growing pains and changes that are a natural part of growing up in real life, even to the point of bringing death into the pictures. While there are sad parts to these movies it really does teach us about life in a truer form. The door of opportunity to share concepts and realities with our children is wide open after viewing some of these movies. Issues of sharing, patience, how to deal with anger and the trouble they can get into are often themes. These types of lessons would have to be judged by age appropriateness.

Well lets lighten up some! Who can not love the light-hearted bounciness of Tigger and round bellied Winnie the Pooh. Mickey Mouse and Pluto are the ultimate in man's best friend being a dog! The happy- go- lucky Disney characters just seem to stay in our hearts from the time we are toddlers and not even aware of the influence. Oh, wait! Influence? From who - us, the parents - oh yeah! Who are you passing on to your little ones? Do you find yourself intentionally trying to instill the Disney simplicity in your kids to mellow them out from this crazy paced, technology world we live in. We don't want to be archaic but animated simplicity can keep us grounded. And actually, the applications we can apply with technology definitely enhance the Disney experience and learning for these kids. Disney is definitely keeping up with the times and I love that fact!

Contractor

A Contractor is defined as a person who agrees to supply materials or perform services at a specified price, especially for construction work. If you have decided to hire a contractor for any kind of work in your house you should keep in mind certain precautions in mind.

How do you find the right contractor for your self? There are many ways you could do this. Get a prescreened contractor for your area from companies offering remodeling services? Also, you could ask your friends and relatives to refer you a contractor we who have had a project done and were happy with the work done. Alternatively, search for a contractor in the local builder’s association etc.

When the contractor you are hiring provides you with references, follow them up and ask the previous clients if they were happy with the work of the contractor and would they work again with him. It is also advisable that you should be explicit about what you to be done.

While choosing the contractor, it is better to keep these tips in mind. For example you would have a better choice if you have three different quotes. Don’t assume that the lowest quote may be the best quote, carefully compare the quotes, wait up for the right person and only hire that person with whom you feel you share a good rapport.

Always insist on a written contract specifying the start and completion date of the project by the contractor. Additionally ensure that the contractor is insured, bonded and licensed.