If your small business relies heavily on contacting clients, customers, or other business owners often, you should look at your voicemail behavior. Voicemail techniques are an often overlooked way to improve productivity, especially for sales people.

1 – Voicemails need to be short and to the point.

Forget about leaving a long message as many people will simply skip it. Try and keep it less than 15 seconds. Remember that many voicemail systems will cut a message short and the majority of a longer message probably won’t be heard anyway.

How many times have you received a voicemail that has cut the message short? Or you’ve become distracted (if not annoyed) listening to the whole thing? It happens. [Read more…]

All children need help and encouragement during their educational years, especially young children. As a parent spending time with your children and finding new fun ways to learn can only help them in the long run. Luckily for all parents there are some excellent sites out there that can help you help your child.

Most of these sites are free but a couple are subscriptions sites but are definitely worth their money in my experience. So let’s have a look at five of the best educational websites for children.

1 – Reading Eggs

Reading eggs is a site that helps children learn to read. It is designed for children from the ages 4 to 7. The beauty of reading eggs is that it allows children to progress at their own rate offering rewards and incentives as they progress. [Read more…]

When considering a baby’s name, most parents will consider how it sounds, whether they like it or not, whether their child may get teased with it and if it goes with their surname. But do they really give much thought to how it might shape your child’s personality or influence their life?

Well perhaps we should, as although there is not conclusive evidence that we are shaped by our names, some studies show that a name can affect a person’s self confidence, personality attributes and more.

This research states that boys with girly sounding names are more likely to misbehave in school. This could be to do with teasing from their peers, or feeling slightly ‘outside’ the social norm, so acting up to gain attention or to fit in. Boys with unisex names such as Riley, Ashley, Kylie, Jo/e and Jody were more likely to misbehave if there was a girl in the class who shared their name. [Read more…]

Cosmetology is a wonderful career option with many possibilities. Whether you want to start a business in your own home or work in a field that’s creative, you can achieve your dreams with a career in cosmetology.

Here are just five reasons to consider a cosmetology career:

1 – Start a Business From Home

Many people love working in cosmetology because it gives them the ability to work from home. You can setup a salon in your garage or basement with a bit of simple remodeling. This not only gives you the ability to work from home, but you also have the ability to set your own hours. Whether you want to work early in the mornings or work late into the evening, you can do exactly what you want. [Read more…]

Even the best of us say stupid things from time to time. Sometimes it’s a joking comment that comes out sounding a little more offensive than it was intended to. Sometimes you’re having a bad day and snap out a snarky remark without thinking.

The occasional slip can be forgiven, but if you don’t want to be remembered as the guy that always has his foot in his mouth, then you should keep this list of phrases to avoid in mind when you’re chatting with your boss:

1 – That’s impossible.

Saying something can’t be done makes you sound short sighted, and also makes you sound like you aren’t willing to put the effort in to find a solution. Try to avoid the word “impossible” at all times, but if you must say it, make sure you follow up with an alternative that could achieve the desired result. [Read more…]