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I was surprised when I asked parents to tell me the life skills they wish their kids knew, and there was a resounding request for a few topics:

How to open a bank account
How to budget & balance accounts
How to write checks and pay bills
And how to start saving for retirement
It seems some of the things we take for granted are, as a result, missing from what we teach kids.
In the last article, we focused on opening a bank account. This article is the second article in the four-part series and will look at how to teach kids to budget and balance their accounts.

Budgeting

It’s not shock that budgeting can be boring and tedious. I’ve personally never been excited to sit down and create my budgets, but it’s something that creates wealth and pays off down the road.

So how do you get kids excited about it? How can you add a little glamour to something so dull and boring? Easy – make it a game with payoffs.

Firstly, it’s important to know how to create a budget, then to adhere to the budget.

Creating a Budget

You may have your own way to create a budget, and that’s fine. In my experience, the easiest way to make a budget is as follows:

On a piece of paper, draw a line down the middle:

Spending BudgetCalculate your average monthly gross income and put that at the top of the page, then multiply it by.80 (for example, if you earned $1,000, you would end up with $800)
Fixed ExpensesWrite down all of your FIXED expense categories (i.e. phone bill, insurance, mortgage etc… ) and put them in one column on the left side of the page
Variable ExpensesNext write in the variable expense categories (i.e. food, gas, leisure, etc… ) and put them in another column on the right side of the page
Fill in all of your expenses
Net Budget after Fixed Expenses – Subtract fixed expenses from your spending budget If it’s a positive number, you don’t need to change anything If it’s zero or a negative number, you should look for expenses that you can cut or lower
Budget variable expenses – Using your Net Budget after fixed expenses, determine what you can spend on variable expenses without overspending each month
Set a budget for each variable expense so you know what you can spend on each category in a given month
Making it Fun
OK, now that you have a budget outline, it’s time to get the kids excited.

I know what you’re thinking: “My kids will never be excited for this.”

They will if you give them some prizes or payoffs. Here’s how:

First, tell them what a budget is and show them the paper. Next, tell them that you’re going to do a contest (if you have more than one kid, this works even better).

Contest 1: Anticipating Spending

The first contest is to see how close they can budget their money to reach a break-even or $0 over the course of a month. In other words, the goal is to predict your spending as close to the penny as possible.

If you have more than one kid person that gets the closest to break-even without going negative wins a prize. With just one kid, tell them that they get $5 or $10 if they reach break-even, and every penny they are off, you deduct 10ȼ

Contest 2 – Saving After Spending

The second contest is to see how well they can budget their money over the next 30 days. If they can save money, tell them you will give them whatever they save. That means if they save $5, you’ll give them another $5 (just like companies matching a person’s 401K contribution).

If you have more than one kid, tell them whoever is able to save the most will win and get a special prize. You will obviously choose the prize since you know your kids best.

Coming Soon

In the next article, we’ll discuss how to write checks and pay bills. You will also learn how to combine check-writing with these contests to simulate the real world of budgeting for your kids.

Most millennials are now in there 20s and 30s, beginning a career climb and also the time when you are making major financial decisions. These financial decisions can include home ownership, investment strategies, and family planning. Certainly, you want to try and avoid some of the financial hazards that have transpired in the lives of previous generations.

Financial literacy is seldom taught in school, so if you didn’t learn it at home growing up, your first time in the “real world” may get you into some financial distress. Read below to learn some of the top financial tips that will help millennials make smart financial decisions.

Take online money management courses

Because most millennials excel at technology, I would suggest signing up for courses in basic economics, accounting and budgeting. These types of courses can be very affordable and very well delivered by the online professor. I feel this is a very efficient way to update yourself on financial topics that may simplify and improve your financial life.

Build up your retirement savings

Did you know that Wells Fargo revealed that almost 50% of millennials weren’t planning for retirement? Make sure you participate in your employer’s 401(k) plan, even if you can only afford to contribute the minimum every month.

Make a list of your whole financial picture

I recommend you make a list of everything that is spent each month. After you have digested this information, ask yourself this question. How am I going to pay for all of this? There are also four essential things everyone should know about their finances: income, expenses, assets and liabilities. Having a firm comprehension of these items will help you make sense of your finances. There are many online tools that can help you connect all your accounts – Mint, Quicken just to name a few. I believe this is your first step in improving your finances.

Research passive income opportunities

Most of us work for money all our lives and never really put it to work for us. It is possible to use your job income for passive income from your investments. For example, the IRS says passive income can come from two sources: rental property or a business in which you do not actively participate. Make no mistake; passive income is not about getting something for nothing. It involves a lot of work and is definitely not a “get rich quick” scheme.

Start a savings account

Open up a share account at your credit union even if you can’t make regular deposits. You can use this account to put extra money aside for your short term and even long-term goals. This can also be used as your emergency fund. Shoot for 3-12 months of expenses, put aside for emergencies.

Pay yourself first

Once you have money in your hand from your paycheck, IRS refund, etc. always pay yourself first. Arrange for automatic transfers from your checking account directly to your share account every payday or on a monthly basis.

Do you know the impact of your credit score?

Everyone, but especially entrepreneurial millennials need to understand that their personal credit can be the defining factor in getting working capital in the future. Getting approved for a loan can be very challenging when your credit score is low. Learn how to read your credit report and check it frequently.

Reduce your debt faster

Pay off small debts first and gradually tackle the larger ones. This will allow you to see results and stay motivated.

Enlist the assistance of a trusted mentor

There is an overabundance of information online regarding financial literacy. However, picking the brain of someone you know and trust is better. Their insights are often tailor-made to your specific needs.

Remove extra costs

It is a proven fact that millennials have expensive habits ($5 lattes every day, eating out on a regular basis, designer fashions, etc.). Keep a close eye on your expenses and trim them where you can.

Raise your children to be financially savvy

At this point you may already have young children or planning to start a family. Teach them that saving money is essential. When they are old enough take them to your credit union and help them open up their own accounts. This will hopefully excite them to continue saving their own money.

I hope you use these financial tips to keep your finances on track while you are young. Remember, you have a very bright financial future ahead of you if you start now and stick with it!

Interest rate increase in Canada

Central bank in any country is responsible for maintaining stability in the financial system. Central bank is also responsible to implement the government’s planned fiscal policy. There are certain tools available to help the Bank to fulfill its role. Controlling the discount rate is one of the tools in central bank’s arsenal.

What is Discount Rate?

Central Bank is considered lender of the last resort. In any country typically, financial institutions borrow from the central bank to stabilize their liquidity situation. Discount rate is the interest rate charged by the central bank to the borrowing financial institutions. These are short term borrowing generally extended on overnight basis. Interest charged by the central bank is the borrowing cost for the financial institutions.

What happens when discount rate changes?

Discount rate is used by the Central Bank to encourage or discourage the borrowing by financial institutions which consequently have an impact on the credit supply in the country. When the cost of borrowing changes for the bank, it affects the interest rate being charged by the financial institutions to their customer. The intention of changing the discount rate is to impact the money supply and hence the consumer spending in the country.

Since the interest charged by the financial institution depends on the borrowing cost, any change in the discount rate affects the interest charged on credit cards, overdrafts, loans, mortgage or any other form of the credit extended to the customers resulting in lowering or increasing the consumer spending in the economy.

Canadian perspective

The Bank of Canada raised the discount rate in the country from 1.25 to 1.5 per cent in the last week. This was fourth increase in the last 12 months. Inflation is expected o increase to 2.5% before returning to around 2% by the second half of 2019.

Following the rate hike by the Bank of Canada big 5 banks also increased their prime rates up to 2.95%. Prime interest rate of any bank becomes the basis of calculating interest rate for any product offered by the bank to its customers. There are other factors which determines the interest rate on a product such as the risk factors, credit history, collateral guarantees, etc. But any variation in the prime rate invariably have an affect on the final rate.

What will change for Canadians

1. Cost of borrowing will increase: New credit will become more expensive which discourages people to borrow and spend more money. Spending will generally reduce which will ultimately help with easing the inflationary pressures on the economy. Businesses also put off expansions and other borrowing plans if the expected investment is not expected to generate sufficient returns.

2. Increase in mortgage interest: Home buyers either borrow on fixed or variable interest rate mortgages. Any new mortgages invariable become more expensive with the increase in banks’ prime rates but it also affects the existing borrowers with the variable rates. Their mortgage payments increase in line with the increase in rate. Existing fixed interest mortgages do not get affected by the increase in discount rates but any expected increases and risks are already accounted for when the such mortgages are extended.

3. Decrease in home sales: Increase in the mortgage rates discourage people to buy new homes and consequently cools down the property market. Most of the people considers home buying as a long-term investment and any increase in the mortgage not only makes it less affordable but also results in reduction in return on their investment.

4. Increased incentive to save: Increase in the prime rates also affects on the savings rates offered by the banks and provides more incentive to people to save rather than spend.

5. Lower consumer spending: Higher interest rates reduce consumer spending and investments and cause fall in the aggregate dements. Lower demand lowers the economic growth and ease the inflationary pressures on the economy.

6. Increase in value of currency: Due to the increase in interest rates, investors are more likely to save, and it may result in the increase in inflow of investment in the country which will increase in the value of currency. Exports will become less competitive and imports will increase.

Introduction

Shopping online has become the thing of the future. The past couple of years have been the most developmental for shopping online. This was mainly due to covid-19 because of which shops were closed down. To continue their business, they switched to online shops. Most people prefer online shopping as they are given a bigger choice and selection. They also don’t have any constraints set on them like time or space. This gives the shoppers the right to make decisions without being hurried up to do so. They also do not have to drive long distances to reach a shop as online shopping can be done by sitting in the same place. It is more convenient than shopping in stores.

The benefits of shopping online:

It saves a great amount of time: It takes a while to shop. Additional to finding the right products, you will also have to stand in queues for billing counters or trials. So if you are in a time crunch, you will not have enough time for this. Online shopping solves this very problem for you by giving you the opportunity to stop any time you want and come back. You also have no queues to wait in.
Making comparisons: When you go to a shop, you will see a limited selection of products. You will not have time to check out the product entirely and will not be able to compare it with other clothes. Online shopping allows you to make comparisons between different products and different websites and choose the ones that are best suited for you.
Availability: another problem you might face is the duration the shop is open. If you are free only during a particular period of time and the shop is closed, you will not be able to purchase the product. As opposed to this, online shops are open every day and all throughout the day. So the closing of the shops will not be a problem you will face.
Great discounts and prices: shopping in an actual store is more expensive. This is because the shop will not offer you discounts and such. However, online shops are in a position to give you discounts as they do not have to pay for real estate. They also do not have to pay for additional labor and staff members there. This will prove to be beneficial for you as the shops will give out discounts in place to attract the customers.
Tracking: you can trust online shops because they offer to track the product you have ordered.

The rise in online shopping:

Overall the digital world has seen a great increase due to covid-19. It has accelerated the growth of the digital world. Since we were all confined to the four walls of our house, we had no place to turn to. The online market drew us all in and helped us continue spending on products we found. Many companies took on this opportunity and as a result, made a great profit out of it. Even as the shops are reopening in real-time, we are still seeing an increase in online shopping.

Conclusion:

Once you get used to online shopping, it is difficult to go back to our old ways. We are used to the convenience that it has to offer that we expect nothing else. The online marketplace has seen an increase in the present world. People are able to shop online and buyers are able to sell online. This is convenient for both parties since they get the best out of what they offer and what they purchase. Online shopping is a thing of the present and future. It seems a very promising future and if you are considering switching to having an online shop, it is a great idea and you should definitely go for it!

If you want to purchase a good portable monitor, you may have your own reasons to go for it instead of regular monitors. The thing is that these monitors have a lot of features that set them apart from regular bulky monitors. With the passage of time, we want more screen space to work with. Many people use these monitors for work; others need them for gaming purposes. In this article, we are going to take a look at some of the most common features of 4K portable monitors. Read on to find out more.

The Best Features to Look for

Just like any other device that you can purchase, different types of portable monitors come with different features. However, there are some features that you must look for if you want to purchase the best portable monitor to meet your needs. Let’s talk about 6 of those prominent features.

1. Size

First of all, size should be the number one consideration when it comes to purchasing portable monitors. Although many of them are larger than regular laptop screens, it is important to keep in mind the purpose you are purchasing them for.

If you go for smaller units, they will be more portable. But if you need a monitor to edit your 4K videos and photos, we suggest that you go for a bigger screen.

2. Weight

Another important consideration is the weight of these monitors. If you need a 4K monitor to carry with you from one place to another, we suggest that you consider the weight of the device you are going to purchase. The reason is that these devices are lighter and easier to carry around.

3. Screen Quality

The quality of the screen is another important factor to consider. If you just need a monitor to watch Netflix, you may not need a 4K monitor. On the other hand, you must go for a 4K portable screen if you need to sift through tons of lines of code or you need to edit a lot of 4K photos on a daily basis. In this case, we suggest that you invest in a high-resolution IPS monitor.

4. Orientation Control

In any 4K portable monitor, orientation control is an important feature to look for. This is even more important if you need a monitor in order to edit photos or perform the coding. If you turn the monitor from portrait to landscape mode, it will be easier for you to make the entire photo visible.

Apart from this, the portrait mode will make it easier for you to scan several blocks of code without any problem. Apart from this, chances are that your desktop monitor may not have this feature. Therefore, it is a great idea to invest in a good 4K portable monitor.

5. Connectivity

Another important feature to look for is connectivity. After all, your monitor may not be useful enough if you cannot connect it to your devices. Although it is a great idea to have DisplayPort or HDMI support, make sure that the money to you are going to purchase features are usb-c connection.

This new technology allows you to to transfer a lot of data between your devices. So make sure your monitor has this feature.

6. Touchscreen Input

It is great to have the touch screen feature in your portable 4K monitor, if especially if you want to use the device to do your creative work. If you combine it with whiteboarding software, you can turn it into a multipurpose device to create modify and present content.

Do you have a website or blog you publish content to every day but still not able to get enough visitors?

Have you just created your very first blog and are keen to try out all the ways to promote it?

This article presents 10 smartest and most effective strategies you can use to promote your blog and instantly attract visitors who are genuinely interested in your niche.

1. Stop Tweaking / Modifying Your Blog

Are you spending too much time tweaking your blog to give it the right feel? Let me tell you, the overall design does not matter to your audience as much as your content does. Instead of tweaking your blog every now and then, focus on creating content that is fresh, engaging and informative for your readers and make them come back for more.

2. Creating Pillar Content

Producing quality content is one of the biggest challenges for bloggers because creating high-quality content on a regular basis isn’t easy. Good content makes a powerful impact on your audience, which is why it is important that you take the time to create the high-quality pillar content that can solidify your blog’s reputation. Pillar content refers to a series of posts that represents your blog’s best content. It includes all the great posts that you will refer new visitors to for their usefulness.

Great content serves as a go-to source for good and informative message for your audience within your particular industry. Pillar posts provide major support to your blog and are considered a very important component or staple of your blog. When you start promoting your blog, pillar content will serve as your bait to attract more traffic.

Once you have set up your blog, the very first strategy you should implement is to create relevant posts and populate your blog with some really new, yet interactive information.

3. Don’t Focus On Monetizing Your Blog Too Much

Many new bloggers create blogs to earn money. Although there is no harm in earning money, putting too many banner ads on your blog can become too distracting for your audience. If there are too many, they can make your blog look really ugly and they can actually take your visitors away from your blog. Do you still think this could be a great way to promote your blog? I bet you don’t. In fact, you should focus on building your email list and a targeted pixel list. Both of them will help you get what you’re desperately looking for, more visitors and more money by re-targeting your visitors through paid ads.

4. Research Your Niche and Find Out Who and What Matters

A very important step you should take before starting your blog is to thoroughly research your niche. You should need to spend know all the ins and outs of your niche and know who matters, for instance, who are the influencers, big players and small players contributing to the niche in their own capacities. You should make a list of all the competing sites, channels, podcasts, influencers, communities and groups that are working within your particular niche. It’s very easy with SE Ranking competitor research.

By doing so, you will have a major reference file of all your competitors within your niche. You will be able to see what they are doing and talking about and also all the items they are putting for sale and products that are popular among your audience.

5. Reach Out To Your Audience

Once you have your blog nicely set up and great content to pull your audience in, start promoting your blog. Take out the detailed list of all the influencers, big players and small players you’re made prior to starting your blog. Keep a close eye on the small players, because you need them for blog promotion. You can start by offering them testimonials, case studies or even a blog post they would be interested in publishing. It is important for you to start a one-on-one relationship with the big and small players. By contribute on other people’s’ sites through commenting and sharing their work on your blog, they will start to recognize you and connect with you.

6. Become An Expert In Your Niche

Whether your niche is SEO, Digital Marketing, Content Marketing or any other, you should not only attain extensive knowledge about your niche but also present it in an interactive and engaging way through your blog. Your future audience is waiting to read content that addresses them and their needs. It is the power of your writing and expert analysis that will help you attract your audience.

7. Post Comments

Commenting on blog posts and participating in various forums and social groups is often seen as a way to get backlinks. But if it’s done right, no such issue will arise. Always post comments on blog posts only when you have something meaningful and informative to add. Make sure to use your own name to do it, and not your brand. Participate in niche groups and influential communities on social media. Present yourself as an authority in your niche and genuinely help people. Don’t just drop links.

8. Create An Interactive Conversation Flow And Acknowledge Your Readers

When creating content, make sure it is engaging enough to get the audience talking. Your posts should pose questions from your audience and encourage them to respond or share their own similar experiences. Your audience can talk to you via blog comments or email, make sure to acknowledge them and reply to them. This will encourage facilitate interaction.

9. Monetize Your Site

When it comes to earning money from your blog, take a proactive approach, because it can bring organic traffic. When you offer a product or service on your site you can attract your target audience. By creating a profit funnel, you cannot only generate more leads but also generate a lot of revenue in the next few months.

10. Use Paid or Sponsored Media

Utilizing paid or sponsored media is a viable option and an effective strategy for blog promotion. It includes blog promotion through Facebook ads, Google ads, promoted tweets, YouTube pre-roll ads, and much more. These social networks can bring an incredible amount of traffic, as well as, hundreds of leads to your site.

Content is the most crucial element for a brand. It is a way to reach your target audience, drive traffic to your website, engage the visitor, increase conversion rates, enhance brand awareness and increase revenue.

Now, with the vast amount of content available on the internet, creating any content will not help you reach your goals. Your content needs to stand apart from the rest so that it attracts the attention of the potential customer. Therefore few qualities are a must in the content to aid your business growth and establish your brand in the market. Here are some attributes that are listed by companies providing content writing services.

Relevant

The content has to keep the target audience in mind. A well written and quality content that does not fulfill the needs and expectations of the users is not useful to them and cannot deliver results. Only the content that is valuable to the customer can influence his purchase decision.

High Quality

The content that provides information that is authentic, well researched, well written, interactive and well presented can engage the audience. The content also needs to be reliable and give value to the user. An exciting and engaging content not only encourages the visitor to stay longer on the website but also compels him to return. It is aligned with the objectives of the business.

Search Engine Optimized

Content that people are not able to find easily is practically of no use. Better optimized content increases the value of the content. It ranks higher in search engines and is therefore highly discoverable. All kind of content can be optimized by choosing the relevant topics and the right keywords. Optimized Content is readily available and consistent on various platforms and devices.

Marketing

Strategic marketing efforts are required to make people familiar with the brand. The platforms on which the content should be promoted and the budget required should be taken into account. The content that is highly shareable and linkeable encourages the audience to interact with it and share it with others. It moves fast on social media channels providing the required push to your brand building exercise.

Create a Niche

It is not only the information and usefulness of the content that makes it valuable. The type of audience also defines the brand. The content that can create an identity with the users sells well in the market even if the actual product doesn’t reflect those values. For example – Apple can build a ‘creative and unique’ image in the minds of the users and is in high demand among that category of customers.

Analyze Results

Compare the content with your competitors and analyze the performance. Evaluate where the content fell short and is not able to achieve the desired result. Evaluate the performance regularly and work on new improved strategies accordingly.

Conclusion

Showcase your content in different ways. Regularly create new blogs, articles, images, and videos etc. That talk about your products/services in an interesting and creative ways. Interact with the potential clients through queries, mails and feedback and keep the discussions about the brand alive. This enables to build trust and establish a name among potential customers. If you are struggling with developing quality content, then you must hire a content writing agency who can cater all your needs of unique and fresh material which will help in brand building.

Ever felt that your website is not getting enough amount of traffic? Or you have visitors but they are not actually turning into paying customers. It is because you have only made an upright website but haven’t worked enough on the UX and UI elements for making the visitors turned to buyers.

Experts in the web development realm have been consistently providing great conversion tips to assure website’s success for the companies and here we are discussing the same for PHP websites. Well, there are innumerable ways you can boost the performance of your website but need to bring to play only those techniques that will deliver results in the shortest time.

Read on to know few of them which is appropriate and simple for every website irrespective of what it deals in or what type of visitors it targets.

Improvement in the Site’s design along with Navigation

While website development is not only about appearance, good looking sites do attract visitors in the first instance. So, you need to work on its overall appearance by putting great background graphics, motion UI elements, vivid colors. Further to provide smooth navigation use clear menus, minimise scroll down options and reduce distractions through too many links.

Place up-to-date and engaging content

The notion that “content is the king’ applies for all websites of all sizes, scales, and businesses. It is one of the biggest critical factors playing its part in search engine optimisation. Thus, you need to put precise, relevant and updated content that is well convincing for the visitors to avail your services.

Put enticing headings and clear CALL-TO-ACTIONS

To keep every single page attractive to the visitors, put alluring headlines and headings for the content and keep prominent Call-to-Actions to push visitors to the main page or checkout phase.

Create Buyers Personas to target the right audience

Figure out who are your targeted customers are and what type of information might interest them. Placing such type of content that pique their interests will help them relate to you and your site.

Go for A/B testing

To ascertain a good rate of conversion in your site, it’s about testing! A/B testing is one of the effective testing ways to enhance conversions of a web page. It splits up the audience into two equal parts and redirects them to two alternate versions of a page. The page getting maximum sales will help you know which version is apt for your site.

Use responsive or mobile-friendly design

According to the latest studies on the market scenario, a hefty percentage of population use only their phones to access websites either to seek information or any service. To go with this radical change and prevent your website from being lagged back, make sure your website responds to phones of different screen sizes and resolutions and works seamlessly in the mobile user interface.

Nonetheless, if you want your website to be swamped with a great number of visitors every day, you need to work on its design as well as performance. These tips focus on both. So, to every website owner out there who are trying to good business with their websites, make sure its core aspects are optimised and tweaked in to serve only and only the interests of the targeted audience.

ONE ~ Connect through Groups & Communities

First things first, you need to connect with online groups that are similar to your business. This allows you to see what your competitors are doing and what is working with customers looking for the services/products you provide. Though this is a vital step in your online business promotion, try not to push your business through these groups. You can include a link to your business’s website or blog at the end of your posts, but your primary goal is to connect not market.

TWO ~ Using Listing Services

Next, you need to make it easy for customers to find your business. Registering through listing services makes it easy for customers to find you using the search methods they are already familiar with. The three most notable choices are Bing, Yahoo! Local, and Google Places. Most businesses use these sites as they are popular across many users.

THREE ~ Optimizing the Search for Your Business

Along with getting your business name up where people are searching, you’ll need to optimize the way you word information. This optimization improves the likelihood that your business will pop up when that information is searched. This is called SEO and stands for Search Engine Optimization. There are many “how to” guides out there for more information on how to refine your SEO.

FOUR ~ Create a Blog and/or Website

A blog is a wonderful tool for customers to connect with your business and learn what it’s all about. This encourages them to stay with you over competitors as you can connect on a deeper level with your followers. Another amazing link a blog provides is allowing your customers to become email subscribers. This keeps your customers connected to your business and all the services/products you have to offer them.

FIVE ~ Social Media & Multimedia

Social media and multimedia are to a blog what SEO is to listing services. To get blog traffic, you need to post your content to social media sites so your customers can find you. Another benefit of the connections you generate through your online groups and communities is knowing what gets the most attention. Multimedia includes the use of videos to market your business. Online video marketing is actually one of the best ways to reach people as it requires very little work on their part to view. Video marketing is also a fun and simple way to reach your customers. Social media and multimedia are very important as many people are constantly connected to their social feeds.

Though it seems hectic, it is not impossible or as difficult as it appears to promote your business online. You just need to know where to start when aiming to develop your business online. If you use these easy methods, you are sure to reach the masses and increase your business. So, show the world the wonderful services your business has to offer. Bring your business to the people and the people will come to you!

An all-encompassing content marketing strategy, white hat organic SEO practices, consistent link building efforts and solid social media marketing, well, this sure makes for a killer digital marketing strategy.

But hey, too much of it all, and you’re only doing what the rest of the world is doing. Today, let’s try and look through the things a little differently.

Let’s deal with a few questions first.

Do you remember when exactly was the last time you ran a competitive analysis? Don’t mind me asking it, but have you ever done it at all? If your answer is a big, naive no, then perhaps you don’t have any idea how your digital marketing strategy stands compared to your competitors.

Let me tell you a secret, peeping over your competitors can be an unexpectedly wonderful can massively help you find your own shortcomings and in the process, help you get better at the game. I’m sure you’ve heard this saying countless times before – keep your friends close, and your enemies, even closer. And in the realm of online marketing, this is one quote you need to live by.

See, every business that exists on this planet has at least a competitor who’s aiming for the bigger portion of the pie. So doesn’t it make sense to know how your competitors are sailing more smoothly than you when both of you are dealing in the same products or services. If you look at it closely, it’s quite a creative way to get a better understanding of your target audience. Once you’re familiar with the tactics, you can formulate some really killer strategies.

So here are some of the things your business competitors can teach you about digital marketing.

Target audience and traffic: I’m sure that you think that you have a fair idea of who your customers are and where they come from. But a simple analysis can determine whether any of your competitors is attracting more traffic than you or not. It they actually are, it would be a wise idea to go for the strategies they’re going for.

Content that matters: It’s a misconception that anything that’s original, it sells. Within an industry, there is only a limited type of content that gets shared. It could be anything – blog posts or weekly quizzes and surveys or Q&As. Perhaps your competitors know it better than you do.

You also get to know what doesn’t work: The best way to progress is actually to learn through others’ mistakes, don’t you think? Your competitors can also go wrong. So it’s a good idea to constantly monitor their marketing campaigns and learn what catches the eye and what just doesn’t work with the masses.

The key here is to learn from those who are better at this game. And once you’ve figured out the key players, you make their good moves better and avoid their failures.