#(posting at 6am for maximum engagement)
Text
Zuko Has Bipolar Disorder
#continuing trend of being dxed with something and immediately picking a character to project it onto#but also that ABRUPT fucking personality change after the angst coma (+ change back after crossroads)#is PEAK manic 'im going to fix everything about my life starting Today' episode + crash. really a lot of zuko's behavior/reactions#before & during cod + perhaps s2 in general (impulsivity/recklessness/identity crisis) he fucking Cuts His Hair To Cope look...#atla#he's also implied to have long stretches of insomnia + a drive to keep moving.#hey do you know what that sounds like now that I know i was struggling with bipolar disorder as a teenager/young adult#bipolar zuko#this is my new thing#(posting at 6am for maximum engagement)
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Driving Tired – When Drowsy Equals Danger
Driving drunk is a big no-no. Many people won’t drive when ill. But you may be shocked to find out that driving when you’re tired can be almost as dangerous.
With one in six crashes now being linked to driver fatigue, this is too significant a problem not to notice. As police can’t check for tiredness with a simple breath test – as with alcohol – it’s up to us all to ensure that we don’t get behind the wheel when we should be hitting the hay.
Why is driving when tired so dangerous?
People are less alert when they’re tired. It’s that simple. Fatigue dramatically reduces reaction times, alertness and concentration. It’s harder to assess risks, which in turn leads to poor decision making. Then, if you do go to sleep behind the wheel, as you will do nothing to prevent the accident – such as swerving or emergency braking, the crash will be more dangerous, both for you and any vehicle – or worse – that suffers your impact.
It is estimated that 1 in 25 drivers have had an incident in the last 30 days where they may have dozed off behind the wheel. The highway police regularly reports that tiredness is a factor in thousands of crashes annually – with a significant percentage resulting in loss of life. Fatigue is said to triple your chances of a crash.
Driving without sleep is comparable to drink driving. Getting behind the wheel without sleep for over 20 hours, is said to be the same as driving with enough alcohol in your blood to put you over the legal limit.
You may have heard that sneezing behind the wheel is dangerous because you close your eyes for a fraction of a second. However, it’s actually possible to fall asleep behind the wheel and not even realise it for anything from a quick moment to 10 seconds. This is known as a microsleep. Some drivers even report being jolted awake by the rumble strip – especially seeing as the monotonous and boring environment presented by motorways and dual carriageways can often cause you to drop off.
What does the law say?
Whilst we’ve mentioned there’s no specific law against being tired behind the wheel, if something does happen, and it’s proven that you were asleep, then you could be charged with dangerous or careless driving. Should this result in a death then the maximum sentence is 14 years in prison.
The DVLA must be informed about medically induced sleepiness – or face a fine of £1,000.
Some of the common causes of tiredness behind the wheel…
The following factors that often contribute to fatigue include the following:
· Lack of sleep or disturbed sleep – when you keep waking up in the night or noises like severe wind or rain cause you to only get intermittent patches of sleep.
· Time of day – apparently people get sleepy around 10am in the morning or around 2pm – 3pm in the afternoon, and may find their eyelids getting heavy.
· Stress – can be like a physical weight we carry around, draining us of energy, and inducing sleepiness and tiredness.
· Changing sleep patterns – because of shift patterns, jet lag or even the clocks going forward or back, can cause you to become fatigued.
· Driving for long periods – or any other monotonous activity, can cause you to become very tired. Repetitive sounds, including audiobooks can contribute to this effect.
· Medication – check the back of your pills and medicine bottles. If the medication indicates drowsiness as one of the side effects, then avoid getting behind the wheel.
· Creature comforts – you’ve got the heated seat. The comfy backrest, your favourite audio book playing… Is it any wonder that these relaxing features can see you drifting off behind the wheel.
Signs You’re Getting Tired
If you start exhibiting any of the following symptoms, when you’re behind the wheel, then it may be time to pull into the next services, or lay by to get some rest:
· Difficulty concentrating – if you can’t keep focused on the road, or your mind keeps flitting around, then this is often due to a lack of energy and mental stamina bought on by tiredness.
· Yawning and stretching – the classic signs of sleepiness. Much like sneezing – be aware that yawning behind the wheel, may cause you to close your eyes.
· Heavy eyelids – full of the dust of sleep. Trouble keeping your eyes open is a real warning sign of danger.
· Eyes beginning to roll and lose clarity – as you nod off your eyes can roll back in your head, preparing to drift off into sleep.
· Neck muscles relaxing – making the head droop as you literally nod off – the expression comes from the action. Watch out, as you suddenly jolt back into the moment giving you a sure indication that your body wants sleep.
· Missing your exit – as you are unable to concentrate or are in a daze behind the wheel nearing a waking dream state.
· Difficulty remembering the last few miles – the mind wanders as tiredness encroaches, making it difficult to keep your thoughts active and present. You may find yourself going into your head, and not realising how far you’ve travelled.
· Drifting from your lane and going over the road – as you engage in microsleeps, momentarily losing control behind the wheel. If you hit the rumble strip, you know you’ve dozed off.
· Increased chance of road rage – like a weary toddler who doesn’t want to go to bed – you’re more prone to volatile emotional outbursts when you need to get some shut eye.
And How to Avoid Getting Tired
If you know you have to go for a long drive, then it’s imperative you start getting ready a long time beforehand. Some of the following tips will help you start off with enough energy, and maintain your focus:
· Get plenty of rest – the night before you have to set off. It’s recommended that you get between 7 and 8 hours sleep for a full tank.
· Plan rest stops in your journey – do a little research, find out where the services are, and stop off to stretch your legs, have a drink and shake off any tiredness.
· React to the signs – if you start to feel tired, then take immediate action and stop the car – so you can either stretch or even sleep.
· The kids are alright – got kids in the car and feeling tired? Stop off at a park and let your partner, or any other adult in the car, take them off to play, whilst you get some valuable shut eye.
· Drive as a team – not like you’re at Le Mans… but instead take turns behind the wheel, so that one of you can rest and alternate duties for the duration of the trip.
· Leave night time for sleeping – if you usually sleep between 12pm and 6am then don’t try to drive this late. Your body, mind and energy levels will want to revert to routine. The older you get – the more this happens.
· Don’t rely on the classic tricks – opening the window, talking and turning up the music are temporary fixes. If you actually feel tired, then the only cure to stop you from falling asleep, is to get some fresh air and take a proper nap.
· Caffeinated drinks – actually might not help if you’re already wired on this stimulant. They can help short term – but if you need to really get some energy, consider drinking a coffee or energy drink, then getting a short nap, before waking feeling refreshed and energised.
And Finally
If there’s any doubt in your mind about your condition, don’t drive. Call up and explain the situation. People will be understanding about missed trips, and if something is incredibly important, then you can always put it off until later. Don’t travel tired – you wouldn’t travel drunk – so don’t put your life or the lives of others at risk.
The post Driving Tired – When Drowsy Equals Danger appeared first on BreakerLink Blog.
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Do Twitter Ads Really Work? A Surprising Experiment: 17.2 Million Views From a Single Twitter Thread
As the New Year approaches, many of us find ourselves in a reflective mood. And that’s exactly how JotForm founder, Aytekin Tank, felt as 2017 was drawing to a close.
As he walked along the Embarcadero, one of the liveliest and most scenic areas in San Francisco, looking back on the year, he was a little zoned out to everything happening around him. Meditative. Introspective. Contemplative.
He had many things to celebrate: JotForm had grown to a team of more than 130 people across the globe, it had more than 3.2 million users and its revenues continued to climb every month. It’s also worth noting that all of this happened without taking a dollar in outside funding — a not-so-common story in Silicon Valley these days.
But despite all the good news, there was something that didn’t quite sit right with him.
“Our competitors were super loud on the internet and their user numbers weren’t even close to ours,” he explained to me. “They were announcing one investment round after another, ending up on top of TechCrunch, and we were just quietly going about our business.”
During these moments of reflection, Aytekin realized that, like his competitors, he also had a story to tell.
So he decided to do just that — share his story. But in his own unique way.
Building a brand through stories
The first order of business for Aytekin was simple:
Write stories to share the JotForm journey.
With autonomous teams around him, he was able to dedicate his time to whatever tasks he felt would impact the business the most, so going all-in on content was an easy decision for him.
His first post — How NOT following my dreams enabled me to build a startup with 3.2 million users — was published in a popular Medium Publication, The Startup, and reached over +50K pageviews almost overnight.
His second post — Time off or the top of TechCrunch? — was equally as successful.
“I published these stories on December 18th and 26th respectively”, he explained. “Given their traction and how they resonated with a huge audience, I made my mind up. I was going to get serious about writing in 2018.”
Aytekin had found his niche.
His authentic, honest stories resonated with startup enthusiasts and he decided to write at least two posts per week throughout 2018 to share his journey as founder and CEO of JotForm.
Embracing Twitter: A $24,098 Twitter ads experiment
After his initial success on Medium, Aytekin was keen to share JotForm’s story across multiple channels in order to reach new audiences.
In July 2018, he decided to experiment with Twitter. Specifically, he was curious:
If Twitter could be a great platform to repurpose content
How Twitter ads could help him amplify his content.
After all, Twitter and blogging aren’t really too different:
“Apart from its character limit, Twitter isn’t any different when it comes to sharing your authentic voice,” he explained. “It’s blogging in 280 characters.”
As a platform, Twitter may not have changed too much since over the years — except increasing the character limit from 140 to 280 characters.
But what has changed significantly is the way people use the platform.
Twitter used to feel almost like an RSS feed, full of people sharing links and hashtags, trying to hijack every ounce of attention possible. But now, as Nathan Bashaw pointed out, things are changing:
Interesting example of how internet culture has evolved:
In the early days of Twitter, people used to just share links and headlines all the time. That basically never happens anymore. Now you have to say something in your own voice when you share something.
It’s better.
— Nathan Bashaw (@nbashaw) May 11, 2018
Some of the best performing tweets nowadays are those that tell authentic stories.
For example, Rodolphe Dutel’s recent tweet about workplace culture really resonated with his audience (and beyond), picking up 31,265 retweets and 134,655 likes.
Dear tech companies,
Employees don’t need ping pong tables or beer fridges at work.
Employees need flexibility to do their best work and enjoy life. For instance, working remotely.
Please offer trust, not toys.
— Rodolphe Dutel (@rdutel) September 15, 2018
Would it have been as successful if Rodolphe had simply shared an article link and headline? Probably not.
Kicking off the experiment
Having seen various tweets and threads succeed like Rodolphe’s, Aytekin set out to reverse engineer a “viral” tweet of his own.
The plan was simple:
Repurpose a successful Medium post into a Twitter thread and boost it with Twitter ads to test the limits of Twitter as a platform to spread Aytekin and JotForm’s message.
In order to craft the Twitter thread, Aytekin used his Medium analytics for inspiration:
With this data, he was able to see which articles had resonated most with his audience and tell a story that he was sure would connect with people on Twitter.
He chose to create a Twitter thread based on his post entitled: ‘Don’t listen to those productivity gurus: why waking up at 6am won’t make you successful’.
Here’s a link to the thread:
1/ Don’t listen to those productivity gurus.
Waking up at 6am won’t make you successful.
A thread
— Aytekin (@aytekintank) July 16, 2018
The results: 17 million impressions
The aim of this experiment was to test the limits of the Twitter algorithm, and the power of Twitter ads, so Aytekin decided to spend as much as possible on this ad: $24,098 in total.
The tweet generated 17,177,432 impressions on Twitter.
Here are the results in full:
Aytekin didn’t jump right in and spend $24,000 overnight. In fact, when the experiment started, the plan was to spend a maximum of $5,000.
But as the tweet began to take off, the budget was raised accordingly.
“We started this experiment by saying we wouldn’t exceed $5K in spend,” he explained. “But we kept a close eye on the Cost Per Engagement and Impressions, and raised budget accordingly.”
As the advert was seeing super high engagement rates (over 20 percent at times):
And low Cost Per Engagement:
Aytekin continued to ramp up the spend until results started to diminish. In the end, the experiment ran for over a month in total (between July 15 – August 24).
Due to the high engagement, the thread also received plenty of organic reach on Twitter.
Out of 17 million impressions, 4.7 million were organic — so in other words, 27.4 percent of reach was free vs 72.6 percent paid.
Some key takeaways from this experiment follow…
Lessons learned from this Twitter experiment
1. Twitter is a great place to repurpose content
If you’re creating content of any form: videos, blog posts, podcasts, etc, repurposing it across multiple channels is a great way to get the most bang for your buck.
But repurposing doesn’t just mean copying and pasting a link over to Twitter.
If you want to be successful, you need to think about how you can tell each story natively to the platform you’re publishing on.
For this experiment, Aytekin could have simply shared a tweet linking to his blog post and boosted it, but I’m sure that wouldn’t have performed anywhere near as well as the Twitter thread.
By using a format native to Twitter, Aytekin was able to share his story in a way that Twitter users would respond to and be happy to engage with.
2. A Twitter thread can help you to achieve multiple goals at the same time
Impressions and engagement are awesome — especially when you’re quite new to the content marketing game.
But when you use a Twitter thread, you’re able to feature multiple types of content within your tweets and achieve various goals.
For example, in the fifth tweet in the thread Aytekin included a link back to the original article on Medium:
This tweet received more than 1.1 million impressions and over 35,000 clicks, helping to drive traffic back to the original post on Medium.
The sixth tweet in the thread mentioned @JotForm and 4,346 people clicked from this tweet to JotForm’s profile to learn more about the business:
Aytekin also picked up 5,752 followers from this thread.
When it comes to planning an experiment like this of your own, try to think about the goals you’d like to achieve:
If it’s all about impressions and engagement, you could tell the whole story on Twitter.
If you want to drive traffic, add a link back to your website.
To increase your following, @ mention your profile.
Remember: It’s important to tell a great story in a native format, so ensure you use your first few tweets to get people hooked into your narrative before including any links.
3. Twitter is a great place to start a conversation
With any highly shared tweet, you’ll always get a few trolls pop up here and there, but if you look past this, you’ll realize that Twitter is still an incredible place to start a conversation and build relationships.
Following Aytekin’s thread, he received plenty of questions about JotForm and how the business operates. This enabled him to build new relationships with people he previously wouldn’t have reached.
So, do Twitter ads really work?
This experiment was designed to test the limits of Twitter ads and the results speak for themselves:
Over 17 million impressions
35,000 visits to the original article
5,752 followers for Aytekin
4,346 profile views for @JotForm
But that’s not to say everything was perfect.
Due to the way Twitter ads work there’s no real way to tell exactly how many unique people saw the ad and many people reached out to Aytekin to say they’d seen the ad multiple times.
And for every great conversation started by this thread, there was another slightly negative reaction. It seems that some Twitter users don’t quite accept ads in their feed like they do on Facebook or Instagram, where ads are more ingrained within the platforms.
Overall though, Aytekin sees the experiment as worthwhile:
“Even though the initial cost was high, the 5,000 followers we gained from this experiment are permanent,” he explained.
“Every time I publish a new post, I get clicks, likes, retweets and comments from these followers. So the results are compounding over time. I can’t be sure if they will become long-term, highly-engaged audience members, but they seem to stick around for now.”
And the great thing is that you can replicate this experiment yourself with a budget of any size.
Simply take a piece of content that’s been successful for you on another channel:
A highly-viewed Facebook video.
One of your top podcast episodes.
Your #1 blog post.
A copy of your email newsletter.
And repurpose that content into a succinct story on Twitter.
Even if you don’t want to invest any budget in it, repurposing content to Twitter is a great way to connect with your audience and share your stories to another platform.
Have you used Twitter ads? Do you repurpose content from other platforms to Twitter? I’d love to chat about your thoughts and experiences in the comments below.
Want more content like this?
More than 45,000 marketers and small business owners subscribe to our newsletter to receive our blog posts and exclusive email-only content.
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Do Twitter Ads Really Work? A Surprising Experiment: 17.2 Million Views From a Single Twitter Thread posted first on http://getfblikeblog.blogspot.com
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Do Twitter Ads Really Work? A Surprising Experiment: 17.2 Million Views From a Single Twitter Thread
As the New Year approaches, many of us find ourselves in a reflective mood. And that’s exactly how JotForm founder, Aytekin Tank, felt as 2017 was drawing to a close.
As he walked along the Embarcadero, one of the liveliest and most scenic areas in San Francisco, looking back on the year, he was a little zoned out to everything happening around him. Meditative. Introspective. Contemplative.
He had many things to celebrate: JotForm had grown to a team of more than 130 people across the globe, it had more than 3.2 million users and its revenues continued to climb every month. It’s also worth noting that all of this happened without taking a dollar in outside funding — a not-so-common story in Silicon Valley these days.
But despite all the good news, there was something that didn’t quite sit right with him.
“Our competitors were super loud on the internet and their user numbers weren’t even close to ours,” he explained to me. “They were announcing one investment round after another, ending up on top of TechCrunch, and we were just quietly going about our business.”
During these moments of reflection, Aytekin realized that, like his competitors, he also had a story to tell.
So he decided to do just that — share his story. But in his own unique way.
Building a brand through stories
The first order of business for Aytekin was simple:
Write stories to share the JotForm journey.
With autonomous teams around him , he was able to dedicate his time to whatever tasks he felt would impact the business the most, so going all-in on content was an easy decision for him.
His first post — How NOT following my dreams enabled me to build a startup with 3.2 million users — was published in a popular Medium Publication, The Startup, and reached over +50K pageviews almost overnight.
His second post — Time off or the top of TechCrunch? — was equally as successful.
“I published these stories on December 18th and 26th respectively”, he explained. “Given their traction and how they resonated with a huge audience, I made my mind up. I was going to get serious about writing in 2018.”
Aytekin had found his niche.
His authentic, honest stories resonated with startup enthusiasts and he decided to write at least two posts per week throughout 2018 to share his journey as founder and CEO of JotForm.
Embracing Twitter: A $24,098 Twitter ads experiment
After his initial success on Medium, Aytekin was keen to share JotForm’s story across multiple channels in order to reach new audiences.
In July 2018, he decided to experiment with Twitter. Specifically, he was curious:
If Twitter could be a great platform to repurpose content
How Twitter ads could help him amplify his content.
After all, Twitter and blogging aren’t really too different:
“Apart from its character limit, Twitter isn’t any different when it comes to sharing your authentic voice,” he explained. “It’s blogging in 280 characters.”
As a platform, Twitter may not have changed too much since over the years — except increasing the character limit from 140 to 280 characters.
But what has changed significantly is the way people use the platform.
Twitter used to feel almost like an RSS feed, full of people sharing links and hashtags, trying to hijack every ounce of attention possible. But now, as Nathan Bashaw pointed out, things are changing:
Interesting example of how internet culture has evolved:
In the early days of Twitter, people used to just share links and headlines all the time. That basically never happens anymore. Now you have to say something in your own voice when you share something.
It’s better.
— Nathan Bashaw (@nbashaw) May 11, 2018
Some of the best performing tweets nowadays are those that tell authentic stories.
For example, Rodolphe Dutel’s recent tweet about workplace culture really resonated with his audience (and beyond), picking up 31,265 retweets and 134,655 likes.
Dear tech companies,
Employees don’t need ping pong tables or beer fridges at work.
Employees need flexibility to do their best work and enjoy life. For instance, working remotely.
Please offer trust, not toys.
— Rodolphe Dutel (@rdutel) September 15, 2018
Would it have been as successful if Rodolphe had simply shared an article link and headline? Probably not.
Kicking off the experiment
Having seen various tweets and threads succeed like Rodolphe’s, Aytekin set out to reverse engineer a “viral” tweet of his own.
The plan was simple:
Repurpose a successful Medium post into a Twitter thread and boost it with Twitter ads to test the limits of Twitter as a platform to spread Aytekin and JotForm’s message.
In order to craft the Twitter thread, Aytekin used his Medium analytics for inspiration:
With this data, he was able to see which articles had resonated most with his audience and tell a story that he was sure would connect with people on Twitter.
He chose to create a Twitter thread based on his post entitled: ‘Don’t listen to those productivity gurus: why waking up at 6am won’t make you successful’.
Here’s a link to the thread:
1/ Don’t listen to those productivity gurus.
Waking up at 6am won’t make you successful.
A thread
— Aytekin (@aytekintank) July 16, 2018
The results: 17 million impressions
The aim of this experiment was to test the limits of the Twitter algorithm, and the power of Twitter ads, so Aytekin decided to spend as much as possible on this ad: $24,098 in total.
The tweet generated 17,177,432 impressions on Twitter.
Here are the results in full:
Aytekin didn’t jump right in and spend $24,000 overnight. In fact, when the experiment started, the plan was to spend a maximum of $5,000.
But as the tweet began to take off, the budget was raised accordingly.
“We started this experiment by saying we wouldn’t exceed $5K in spend,” he explained. “But we kept a close eye on the Cost Per Engagement and Impressions, and raised budget accordingly.”
As the advert was seeing super high engagement rates (over 20 percent at times):
And low Cost Per Engagement:
Aytekin continued to ramp up the spend until results started to diminish. In the end, the experiment ran for over a month in total (between July 15 – August 24).
Due to the high engagement, the thread also received plenty of organic reach on Twitter.
Out of 17 million impressions, 4.7 million were organic — so in other words, 27.4 percent of reach was free vs 72.6 percent paid.
Some key takeaways from this experiment follow…
Lessons learned from this Twitter experiment
1. Twitter is a great place to repurpose content
If you’re creating content of any form: videos, blog posts, podcasts, etc, repurposing it across multiple channels is a great way to get the most bang for your buck.
But repurposing doesn’t just mean copying and pasting a link over to Twitter.
If you want to be successful, you need to think about how you can tell each story natively to the platform you’re publishing on.
For this experiment, Aytekin could have simply shared a tweet linking to his blog post and boosted it, but I’m sure that wouldn’t have performed anywhere near as well as the Twitter thread.
By using a format native to Twitter, Aytekin was able to share his story in a way that Twitter users would respond to and be happy to engage with.
2. A Twitter thread can help you to achieve multiple goals at the same time
Impressions and engagement are awesome — especially when you’re quite new to the content marketing game.
But when you use a Twitter thread, you’re able to feature multiple types of content within your tweets and achieve various goals.
For example, in the fifth tweet in the thread Aytekin included a link back to the original article on Medium:
This tweet received more than 1.1 million impressions and over 35,000 clicks, helping to drive traffic back to the original post on Medium.
The sixth tweet in the thread mentioned @JotForm and 4,346 people clicked from this tweet to JotForm’s profile to learn more about the business:
Aytekin also picked up 5,752 followers from this thread.
When it comes to planning an experiment like this of your own, try to think about the goals you’d like to achieve:
If it’s all about impressions and engagement, you could tell the whole story on Twitter.
If you want to drive traffic, add a link back to your website.
To increase your following, @ mention your profile.
Remember: It’s important to tell a great story in a native format, so ensure you use your first few tweets to get people hooked into your narrative before including any links.
3. Twitter is a great place to start a conversation
With any highly shared tweet, you’ll always get a few trolls pop up here and there, but if you look past this, you’ll realize that Twitter is still an incredible place to start a conversation and build relationships.
Following Aytekin’s thread, he received plenty of questions about JotForm and how the business operates. This enabled him to build new relationships with people he previously wouldn’t have reached.
So, do Twitter ads really work?
This experiment was designed to test the limits of Twitter ads and the results speak for themselves:
Over 17 million impressions
35,000 visits to the original article
5,752 followers for Aytekin
4,346 profile views for @JotForm
But that’s not to say everything was perfect.
Due to the way Twitter ads work there’s no real way to tell exactly how many unique people saw the ad and many people reached out to Aytekin to say they’d seen the ad multiple times.
And for every great conversation started by this thread, there was another slightly negative reaction. It seems that some Twitter users don’t quite accept ads in their feed like they do on Facebook or Instagram, where ads are more ingrained within the platforms.
Overall though, Aytekin sees the experiment as worthwhile:
“Even though the initial cost was high, the 5,000 followers we gained from this experiment are permanent,” he explained.
“Every time I publish a new post, I get clicks, likes, retweets and comments from these followers. So the results are compounding over time. I can’t be sure if they will become long-term, highly-engaged audience members, but they seem to stick around for now.”
And the great thing is that you can replicate this experiment yourself with a budget of any size.
Simply take a piece of content that’s been successful for you on another channel:
A highly-viewed Facebook video.
One of your top podcast episodes.
Your #1 blog post.
A copy of your email newsletter.
And repurpose that content into a succinct story on Twitter.
Even if you don’t want to invest any budget in it, repurposing content to Twitter is a great way to connect with your audience and share your stories to another platform.
Have you used Twitter ads? Do you repurpose content from other platforms to Twitter? I’d love to chat about your thoughts and experiences in the comments below.
Want more content like this?
More than 45,000 marketers and small business owners subscribe to our newsletter to receive our blog posts and exclusive email-only content.
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BUSINESS IN BRIEF 13/2 – News VietNamNet
Shops, supermarkets to remain open during Tet
As many as 104 shops and supermarkets will remain open during Tet (Vietnamese Lunar New Year).
Big C supermarket chain has announced that it would increase its operating hours at stores nationwide from Monday to Wednesday this week to meet the increasing shopping demand for the holiday season. Its supermarkets will remain open from 6am to midnight instead of the current 7am to 11pm.
According to Big C, the purchasing power of people has surged, with more demand for food, confectionery and fruits. In fact, the purchasing power has seen the highest rise so far, putting load on its chains, Big C said.
The purchasing power is expected to increase in the last three days of the lunar year, which is why Big C decided to increase its operating hours.
Co.opXtra supermarket in HCM City will also increase its operating time from 6am to midnight. It will remain shut only on the first day of the Lunar New Year, which falls on February 16.
Lotte Mart supermarkets will operate from 7am to 11pm. Some of its supermarkets in HCM City will be open during Tet holiday.
Satra and Satrafoods supermarkets will operate from 6am to midnight from February 12-14.
AEON Mall will also remain open during Tet.
Vincom commercial centres and Vinmart supermarkets will increase the number of staff to ensure smooth delivery of goods and payment.
The municipal Department of Industry and Trade has announced that all supermarkets, shops and markets will reopen on February 19 after the holiday.
Phu Quoc island district targets 1,200 tonnes of pepper in 2018
The island district of Phu Quoc in the Mekong Delta province of Kien Giang aims to produce at least 1,200 tonnes of pepper in 2018.
According to Vice Chairman of the district’s People’s Committee Huynh Quang Hung, Phu Quoc has about 520 hectares of pepper plants, mainly in Cua Duong, Cua Can and Duong To communes.
To develop pepper output, quality and economic efficiency, the district is providing farmers with cultivation techniques to prevent diseases, and investing in building an irrigation system for the dry season.
Local authorities have also helped farmers upgrade pepper growing areas with poor productivity and low economic efficiency, expand new areas and develop pepper-based ecotourism.
The district also studied building pepper production towards Global Good Agricultural Practice (GlobalGAP) and applied advanced cultivation techniques to create clean and profitable products.
In 2017, Phu Quoc produced 1,245 tonnes of pepper, surpassing the yearly target by 3.7 percent, up 2 percent compared to the previous year.
In Phu Quoc, farmers do not use chemical fertilizers but organic ones and dry peppers under the sunlight instead of by machine as in other regions. Thanks to this natural farming process along with favorable climate, rich soil and abundant sunshine, Phu Quoc pepper is famous for its heat, pungency and strong aroma, especially the red pepper.
Phu Quoc pepper was recognised as a “collective trademark” by the National Office of Intellectual Property of Vietnam under the Ministry of Science and Technology in 2011.
Hanoi targets 7.5-8 percent export growth in 2018
Hanoi has set a target of 7.5-8 percent in export growth in 2018 as compared to last year, which requires stronger efforts from both the industry-trade sector and businesses.
The capital city raked in 1.04 billion USD from exports in January, up 24 percent from the same period last year.
The revenue included 139 million USD contributed by the State sector (up 9.8 percent), 352 million USD from the non-State sector (up 16.6 percent), and 556 million USD from FDI firms (up 33.6 percent), according to the municipal Department of Industry and Trade.
All key groups of commodities posted strong year-on-year export growth in January such as agricultural products (13.6 percent), computer components and peripheral devices (68.1 percent), transport vehicles and spare parts (12.7 percent), machinery and spare parts (21.8 percent), glass and glass products (25 percent).
However, the sale of agricultural products to China is facing obstacles since this market is tightening plant quarantine. It has also encountered strict quality and food safety requirements from the US, the EU and Japan.
Meanwhile, Hanoi’s export still depends on FDI companies which dominate the production of processed and manufactured products with high added value.
Nguyen Gia Phuong, Director of the Hanoi Investment, Trade and Tourism Promotion Agency, said to help businesses expand the export market and advertise their products, the agency has continually organised overseas promotion campaigns, especially the countries that Vietnam has inked free trade agreements with.
It has also worked to receive foreign business delegations so as to help local craft villages and companies to seek partners, he added.
Nguyen Thanh Hai, Deputy Director of the municipal Department of Industry and Trade, noted the department and the Hanoi People’s Committee will support enterprises in terms of access to loans and markets, increase trade promotion in such markets as Japan, China, Hong Kong (China), and Germany, help local companies to diversify export markets.
The department also plans to push ahead with administrative reforms, abolish unnecessary business conditions, and improve online public services, Hai said, adding that Hanoi will pay attention to promoting products’ competitiveness, investment effectiveness, and businesses’ engagement in global value chains.
State capital manager urged to root out corruption
The committee for management of state capital at enterprises must join hands with relevant agencies to chalk out concrete measures to prevent corruption, losses and waste, said Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc.
The Government leader made the call at a ceremony on February 12 to hand out a decision to appoint Nguyen Hoang Anh, former Secretary of Cao Bang province Party Committee, to the post of chairman of the special committee to manage State capital at enterprises.
He laid stress on the committee’s two key long term tasks, which are bolstering equitisation and divestment of state capital and improving capacity and efficiency of state-owned enterprises, especially large corporations.
The privatisation process must follow the principles of publicity and transparency as well as bringing the greatest benefit to the state, Prime Minister Phuc said, noting that due attention must be given to the fight against vested interests and corruption in every phase of the equitisation process.
The Prime Minister also required the committee to exercise its power in monitoring and inspecting the operation of enterprises under its management.
Anh, for his part, promised to do his utmost to fulfill the mission entrusted by the Party and Government. He also presented some specific measures which will be carried out in 2018 and the following years to tackle corruption, a headache issue in the country for years.
Earlier, on February 8, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc signed a decision to appoint Anh as the head of the state capital management body.
The Government issued Resolution 09/NQ-CP in early February to set up the special committee as an agency under the Government that acts as the ownership representative of State capital at wholly State-owned enterprises and at joint stock and liability companies with two or more members.
The committee has a legal status, seal with the national emblem and an account opened at the State Treasury.
Nguyen Hoang Anh holds a master’s degree in world economy and international economic relations and a bachelor’s degree in political theory. He held the post of Secretary of Cao Bang province Party Committee from March 2015 to December 2017 before assuming the new role in the State capital management committee.
State budget revenue in January up 5.2 percent on year
Total revenue of the State budget in January was estimated at 114.2 trillion VND (5 billion USD), equivalent to 8.7 percent of the year’s estimate and up 5.2 percent from the same period last year, according to the Finance Ministry.
Domestic revenue, estimated at 95.5 trillion VND, reduced from the same period last year. The figure was equal to 98.6 percent of the revenue in January 2017, but equivalent to 8.7 percent of estimate.
Meanwhile, revenue from crude oil surged 48.6 percent year on year, reaching around 4.1 trillion VND and accounting for 11.4 percent of estimate. The Finance Ministry attributed the increase to high world price, with Vietnam’s oil fetching an estimated 66 USD per barrel, 16 USD higher than expected price and 7.4 USD higher than the price in the same period last year.
Revenue from foreign trade was estimated at 22.5 trillion VND, up 9.6 percent on year.
In the same period, State budget spending was estimated at 91.5 trillion VND, equal to 6 percent of estimate. Debt payment accounted for 15.5 percent.
Government bonds worth more than 16.5 trillion VND were issued in January, ensuring money supply for spending and debt payment.
Supermarkets in HCM City gear up for Lunar New Year
Many supermarkets are launching attractive promotion programmes in the days ahead of Tet (Lunar New Year) to attract customers. Tet falls on February 16 this year.
In addition to cutting prices on more than 5,000 essential items from January 11 to February 14, Co.opmart and Co.opXtra have teamed up with suppliers for another programme under which they will cut prices of many kinds of fresh food by the maximum possible rates for seven days starting just before Tet.
They have also applied “Super discounts” and “Buy more, get more discounts” on the weekend and incentive programmes for their loyal customers such as offering high reward points.
Similarly, Korean retailer Lotte Mart also launched three consecutive promotion programmes: The “Tet comes to Lotte Mart” programme takes place from January 24 to February 15, with discounts between 5-49 per cent on more than 1,200 products; “For a full Tet” from February 7 to 15 with discounts on over 80 Tet-featured products; and “Starting a desired spring” programme from February 13 to 21 with hundreds of products discounted between 5-49 per cent.
Supermarket chain Big C is offering a discount of up to 40 per cent on 13 types of fruit. Imported fruits like Egyptian oranges, Korean pears, French kiwis and South African grapes are priced at VND30,000-83,000 (US$1.32-3.64) for a kilo until February 15.
Moreover, for the first time, French and US green and red apples will be sold at the same price of VND29,900 a kilo.
In addition to this, Big C will launch two “unprecedented price shock” programmes applicable to its food and fresh goods until New Year’s Eve on February 15.
According to insiders, the closer to Tet, retailers increasing apply promotion programmes to enhance competitiveness in attracting customers.
Market movements in the peak shopping days for Tet usually change quickly. Therefore, retailers need to keep a close eye on up-to-date figures to identify changes for timely responses.
Goods transported to the city’s two wholesales markets have increased strongly to meet peak shopping demand for the New Year from February 11 to 15.
Nguyen Van Huay, director of Thu Duc Wholesale Market Management and Trade Company, said goods volume entering the market can reach up to 7,500 tonnes a day, an increase of 10 per cent over last year’s Tet.
Vegetable volume at the market fluctuates between 2,700 tonnes to 3,000 tonnes a day, while fruits are between 4,300-4,500 tonnes a day.
At Hoc Mon wholesale market, the amount of goods entering the market from February 12 (four days ahead of Tet) may go up to 5,500 tonnes per day, up 100 per cent compared to normal days.
According to traders at the two wholesales markets, the supply of popular fruits for Tet such as grapefruits, mangos, tangerines and dragon fruits may be not much higher due to unfavourable weather last year.
About 150-170 tonnes of grapefruits and 100-120 tonnes of mango are expected to enter Thu Duc Market a day on days near Tet, but their prices will rise sharply if there is a surge in demand.
Thu Duc Wholesale Market’s management board forecasted that grapefruits can be priced at VND60,000-65,000 per kilo for green skin grapefruit and VND28,000-30,000 a kilo for Nam Roi grapefruit, while it is VND130,000-150,000 for a kilo of Hoa Loc mango, VND45,000-50,000 per kilo of sweet tangerine and VND80,000-100,000 per kilo of custard-apple.
Nguyen Huynh Trang, deputy director of the HCM City Department of Industry and Trade, has asked the management boards of the two wholesale markets to keep track of markets and update supply-demand and pricing situations, in order to quickly report to the department and relevant agencies if there is a sudden fluctuation.
Flowers in Trà Vinh selling like hot cakes
Flower growers in the southern province of Tra Vinh are excited as this year’s flower season has been productive, with price increases from VND10,000 (50 US cents) to VND15,000 per pot compared to last year.
Specifically, prices of daisy flowers and dahlia range from VND75,000 to VND100,000 per pair, while paper flowers cost from VND80,000 to VND 100,000 VND per pair.
Hong Phan Dau, a flower planter in Long Duc Commune, Tra Vinh Province planted 4,000 flower pots of all kinds.
“Prices of flowers this Lunar New Year are higher than other years from VND10,000-15,000 per pot,” he told Vietnam News Agency.
More than 60 per cent of his flowers have been purchased by traders from Binh Chanh District, HCM City and Tra Vinh Province, he said.
Tra Vinh Province has two ornamental flower villages, one in Vinh Yen Hamlet, Long Duc Commune and one in Long Binh Hamlet, Ward 4 with 158 households growing flowers on nearly 30 hectares.
Developed over more than 60 years, the two villages were recognised by the People’s Committee of Tra Vinh Province as traditional villages in 2011.
Nguyen Thi Ngoc Nhi, head of economic division of the provincial people’s committee, said the province is building many programmes to develop the two villages.
The locality will mobilise resources for investment in transport infrastructure, electricity and water supply for gardeners to approach new science and technology.
In recent years, thanks to the flowers, people in the villages have a more stable income.
Every year, these two villages supply Lunar New Year markets with about 300,000 pots of flowers.
Apart from serving markets in the province, Tra Vinh flowers are also popular and traded in provinces such as Ba Ria – Vung Tau, Binh Duong, Ho Chi Minh, Dong Nai and Ben Tre.
Hanoi encourages exporters’ expansion
Ha Noi’s export management authorities have set out to invigorate local firms to achieve an ambitious goal of growing export turnover some 7.5 to 8 per cent in 2018.
Nguyen Thanh Hai, deputy director of the Ha Noi Department of Industry and Trade, said that in the future, his department and the Ha Noi People’s Committee will continue their utmost support for local enterprises in the forms of businesses loans and easing market access.
He emphasised trade promotion activities with partner countries such as Japan, China and Germany, saying that trade ties with these long-term exporting markets are most likely to bring benefits to the city’s business community.
However, some markets have proven to be more difficult for local firms to crack. In recent times, China has tightened its plant quarantine on Vietnamese agricultural imports, while the US, EU and Japan market have also put up technical barriers to Vietnamese products with new standards for quality, food hygiene and safety, said Hai.
Nguyen Gia Phuong, director of the Ha Noi Investment, Trade and Tourism Promotion Centre, told the Vietnam News Agency that for local enterprises to expand their export markets and promote Vietnamese brand names, participation in international and regional promotional programmes is crucial, such as the February 2018 consumer goods trade fair in Frankfurt, Germany.
He also welcomed foreign business delegations to support Ha Noi’s craft villages, particularly agricultural products, traditional textiles and garments, in hopes of not only revitalising age-old trades, but also boosting overall trade turnover and diversifying export markets.
The city is committed to improving its administrative procedures, reducing incessant business and investment conditions and enhancing online public services’ quality.
According to the Viẹt Nam General Department of Customs’ report on Ha Noi’s January 2018 export and import values, the city reached a total turnover of US$1.04 billion, up by $139 million year-on-year.
The private sector contributed $352 million to total turnover, while the foreign direct investment sector added $556 million, having increased by 16.6 per cent and 33.6 per cent from 2017’s numbers, respectively.
All of Ha Noi’s major export commodities grew strongly in January 2018 from the same period last year, including agricultural products, computer components, automobile spare parts, machine parts and glass products, according to the GDVC’s report.
The most important task for domestic exporters now, according to Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong, is to maximize its penetration of the global market for agricultural products.
At a February 8 conference in Ha Noi, Minister Cuong said that in order to expand agriculture export markets in the context of increasing protectionism, firms should not expect the negotiation process to be anything but difficult and time-consuming.
Cuong recommended a number of measures, on which the competent authorities and Vietnamese commercial counsellors in other countries should coordinate closely, in order to actively seek and introduce foreign agricultural associations, corporations and enterprises to Vietnamese products.
Bumper Tet for watermelon farmers
Farmers who grow watermelon in Ca Mau Province’s Ca Mau City are raking in high profits because of a bumper harvest and rising prices for the Tet (Lunar New Year) holiday when the fruit is used on virtually every family altar.
Le Van Muoi, who grew 4,000 sq.m of watermelon under Vietnamese good agricultural practices (VietGAP) standards, harvested watermelon last week and sold them for VND8,000 (US 35 cent) a kilo.
After deducting all production costs, he was able to earn a profit of VND30 million ($1,300) per 1,000 sq.m. “This is the first year I’ve used VietGAP standards. I’m very happy because I had a bumper crop and high prices,” he said.
In previous years, Muoi grew watermelon using traditional methods and did not see high profits.
In recent years, growing watermelon for Tet brought high profits for farmers who decided to expand cultivation for the Tet crop.
In Ly Van Lam Commune’s specialised watermelon cultivation area, farmers have planted 73 ha for this Tet, up 13 ha against last Tet. Of the figure, 21 ha are planted under VietGAP standards.
Farmers have planted red and yellow flesh watermelons and the seedless variety, all of which have had a high yield and good quality.
The commune’s watermelon is famous for its sweetness.
Many watermelon farmers have escaped poverty and become wealthy, according to the Ca Mau Province Farmers Association, which has organised courses on farming techniques to help them improve their profits.
For this crop, farmers earned an average profit of more than VND15 million for each 1,000 sq.m, according to the association.
Many farmers who grow vegetables in the commune have applied VietGAP standards for mustard leaves, water spinach, cucumber, bitter melon and tomato.
Nguyen Chi Thanh, who owns a 1.3 ha garden in the commune’s Chanh Hamlet, said his family had grown five types of vegetables and fruits under VietGAP standards, including bitter melon.
Last week, traders purchased his bitter melon for VND10,000 a kilo, which is expected to rise near Tet, he said.
“My family will have a good Tet thanks to our use of VietGAP standards,” he said.
Growing VietGAP vegetables normally offers a profit of 15-20 per cent higher than normal vegetables.
Nguyen Van Nhan, chairman of the Ly Van Lam Commune Farmers Association, said the farmers should develop a brand for vegetables and expand their sales network.
The Ly Van Lam Agricultural Service Co-operative, which has planted vegetables under VietGAP standards, plans to develop five sale points in Ca Mau City this year and expand its vegetables planted under VietGAP standards to 10ha.
As of last December, the co-operative had planted five hectares of VietGAP vegetables.
More co-operation expected between Hoa Lam Group, Operation Smile
Prof Dr William P. Magee, managing director of Operation Smile, recently paid a working visit to the City International Hospital in the Hoa Lam – Shangri-La Medical High Tech Area.
It was aimed at connecting and creating bilateral co-operation opportunities for setting up professional clinics to serve the community.
A developed Operation Smile
Operation Smile was one of the first non-governmental organizations from the US to come to Viet Nam as part of the normalisation of Viet Nam – US ties and with the hope of changing the lives of unfortunate children with congenital malformations and other facial malformations through voluntary surgery programmes.
“Operation Smile would like to go further by not only operating on 2,000 – 3,000 unfortunate children each year, but also developing professional clinics to improve the quality of community healthcare programmes,” Nguyen Viet Phuong, development deputy president of Operation Smile Asia Pacific and head representative in Viet Nam, said.
“We have a huge human resource of 12,000 volunteers and medical experts in 60 nations around the world for 35 years, and we hope to take advantage of these strengths to increase professional training courses, improve safety and create favourable conditions for local people to access modern healthcare,” he added.
Tran Thi Lam, chairwoman of the Hoa Lam Group, the developer of the Hoa Lam – Shangri-la Medical High-tech Area, said she is delighted and ready to co-operate with Operation Smile to bring benefits to local communities, especially unfortunate children with congenital malformations, and contribute to developing a modern and efficient medical industry.
“This is my wish for the high-tech medical field,” she said.
Dr Truong Vinh Long, medical managing director of the Hoa Lam Group and general director of the Hoa Lam International Hospital, said after the City International Hospital, Hoa Lam International Hospital is the second to be built using the public – private – partnership (PPP) model between Hoa Lam Group and People’s Hospital 115.
It has 350 beds and VND1.5 trillion (US$68 million) to build.
These are two out of a total of six hospitals which are planned to be built in the Hoa Lam – Shangri-la Medical Hightech Area.
After visiting the newly-completed Hoa Lam International Hospital, Prof Dr Magee expressed his surprise at the reasonable investment, good design, quality of construction, modern equipment and the space available for patients. He expected the co-operation to be successful.
Two days ago Vietnamese Vice President Dang Thi Ngoc Thinh, who is also the chairman of the Sponsoring Council of the Viet Nam Children Support Fund, met Prof Dr Magee and appreciated the contribution of Operation Smile in bringing smiles to and changing the lives of hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese children.
She hoped that in future Operation Smile would continue to support Viet Nam in taking care of children’s health in general and providing surgery and rehabilitation for children with facial deformities. The Vietnam Children Support Fund would actively co-ordinate with and create conditions for Operation Smile to bring smiles to more children with congenital malformations in the country, she promised.
In the last 28 years in Viet Nam, Operation Smile has collaborated with many organisations and individuals to bring smiles and change the lives of ten of thousands of children, especially children with cleft lips and congenital malformations.
Operation Smile has also undertaken many other humanitarian programmes such as dental examination and treatment; cranial surgery; treating burned scars; exchanging and training medical specialists ….
Since coming to Vietnam in 1989 Operation Smile and its partners have examined and treated more than 40,000 children, giving them and their families new lives.
Fruit, vegetable exports up 37% in January
Viet Nam earned some US$321 million from fruit and vegetable exports in January 2018, a year-on-year increase of 36.9 per cent, says the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD).
China, Japan, the United States and the Republic of Korea remained the biggest importers of Vietnamese fruits and vegetables in the month. Other markets with strongly soaring fruit and vegetable imports from Viet Nam were Japan (69.3 per cent), the United Arab Emirates (56.3 per cent) and China (52.4 per cent).
Viet Nam, meanwhile, imported $152 million worth of these commodities in January, of which fruits accounted for 76 per cent.
MARD said the domestic fruit market saw great fluctuations, with a rise in the price of dragon fruit in the Mekong Delta region.
The trend is expected to continue in the lead-up to the Tet (Lunar New Year) festival.
Prices of star apple and jack fruit also climbed up, reaching VND15,000 (US 7 cents) and VND43,000 ($1.9) per kg, due to increasing demand for these two fruits in the United States and China, respectively.
Meanwhile, the price of orange in the Mekong Delta region fell dramatically due to abundant supply and crop disease.
Prices of several vegetables also dropped in the Central Highlands province of Lam Dong due to high supply fuelled by favourable weather.
For instance, the price fell by VND500 per kilo to VND3,000 for cabbage; by VND2,000 per kilo to VND8,000 for tomatoes, and by VND2,000 per kilo to VND20,000 for broccoli against the prices in the beginning of January 2018.
In 2017, Viet Nam achieved a year-on-year surge of 40.5 per cent in the export value of vegetables and fruits to $3.45 billion.
Becamex IDC to trade on UPCoMin February
The Investment and Industrial Development Corporation (Becamex IDC) will trade more than 23.4 million shares on the Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM) on February 21.
The firm’s shares will start trading at VNĐ31,000 (US$1.37) per share.
On December 1, 2017,Becamex IDC put 311.2 million shares, or 23.6 per cent of its chartered capital, for sale at its initial public offering (IPO) but sold only six per cent of the shares.
The company raised only VNĐ587 billion from its IPO, with foreign investors purchasing 56 per cent of the shares sold.
One month after the IPO, Becamex IDC attempted to sell 296.4 million shares left over at its previous IPO, but the second attempt was also unsuccessful as the company was able to offload only 5.1 million shares, earning VNĐ158 billion.
Thus, Becamex IDC sold a total of 24 million shares, or 7.7 per cent of the total shares offered for sale after two attempts, earning VNĐ745 billion.
Under the privatisation plan for Becamex IDC, the company has VNĐ13.17 trillion in chartered capital.
The company will offer 311.2 million shares in its third IPO, while a quarter of its capital will be sold to strategic investors and 0.4 per cent stake will be transferred to its employees.
The government will hold 51 per cent of the company’s chartered capital after it completes the equitisation process.
Government issues Vinachem charter
The Government has issued the organisation and operation charter of the Viet Nam Chemical National Group (Vinachem).
Its chartered capital is now more than VND13.7 trillion (US$602.2 million). It’s expected to be VND20 trillion by 2020.
The Government will hold 100 per cent of its charter capital.
Accordingly, Vinachem will be a one-member limited company and will operate under the Law on Enterprises and related laws besides the charter.
Vinachem will have the primary functions of investment and trading of State capital in the chemical sector, fertiliser and plant protection trade and petrochemical and mineral exploitation and processing. It can invest in its subsidiaries or associated companies.
Vinachem’s organisational structure will include a member council, general director, deputy general directors, surveyors, a chief accountant and an international auditing board.
The chairman of the member council will be appointed the Prime Minister based on the proposal of the Minister of Industry and Trade.
Vinachem’s general director will manage the daily activities of the group and take responsibility for any assigned tasks.
The general director will be chosen by the member council after getting approval from the ministry. Each general director’s term will not exceed five years.
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Victorian cleaners back paid more than $37000
The Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) has recovered $37,754 for 23 cleaners in Colac, Victoria, who were underpaid their shift and toilet cleaning allowances.
The recovered wages makes up more than half the amount of money the FWO has recently recovered for workers employed at various locations along the Great Ocean Road and Otway region of Victoria.
Under the Cleaning Services Award 2010 the full-time, part-time and casual employees received hourly rates of up to $23.08 for ordinary hours, up to $32.31 on Saturdays, up to $41.54 on Sundays and up to $50.77 on public holidays.
According to the FWO, the employer was unaware that the cleaners were also entitled to a toilet cleaning allowance of up to $2.52 per shift to a maximum of $12.39 per week which they did not receive.
Under the Award an employee engaged for the major portion of a day cleaning toilets will be paid an allowance of 1.766 per cent of the standard rate per week or 0.359 per cent of the standard rate per shift.
The workers were also underpaid a penalty rate allowance of 15 per cent of the ordinary hourly rate for early morning shifts starting before 6am and afternoon shifts finishing after 6pm.
Inspectors have issued the business with a formal caution warning that enforcement action will be taken if further breaches occur. The employer has been placed on notice that future breaches of workplace laws will not be tolerated.
FWO Natalie James said many businesses were overconfident when it comes to the intricacies of Australia’s workplace laws and her agency will be taking an increasingly hard line with employers who cannot demonstrate that they made a diligent effort to understand their obligations.
“There has never been so much freely available information to assist employers to understand their workplace obligations. The time for excuses is over,” said James.
“We conduct follow-up audits of businesses previously found to be non-compliant to make sure they have changed their ways. Repeat offenders can expect to face enforcement action including potential litigation and significant court penalties.”
www.fairwork.gov.au
The post Victorian cleaners back paid more than $37000 appeared first on Australasia’s Cleaning Industry and Environmental Technology Magazine.
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Victorian cleaners back paid more than $37000
The Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) has recovered $37,754 for 23 cleaners in Colac, Victoria, who were underpaid their shift and toilet cleaning allowances.
The recovered wages makes up more than half the amount of money the FWO has recently recovered for workers employed at various locations along the Great Ocean Road and Otway region of Victoria.
Under the Cleaning Services Award 2010 the full-time, part-time and casual employees received hourly rates of up to $23.08 for ordinary hours, up to $32.31 on Saturdays, up to $41.54 on Sundays and up to $50.77 on public holidays.
According to the FWO, the employer was unaware that the cleaners were also entitled to a toilet cleaning allowance of up to $2.52 per shift to a maximum of $12.39 per week which they did not receive.
Under the Award an employee engaged for the major portion of a day cleaning toilets will be paid an allowance of 1.766 per cent of the standard rate per week or 0.359 per cent of the standard rate per shift.
The workers were also underpaid a penalty rate allowance of 15 per cent of the ordinary hourly rate for early morning shifts starting before 6am and afternoon shifts finishing after 6pm.
Inspectors have issued the business with a formal caution warning that enforcement action will be taken if further breaches occur. The employer has been placed on notice that future breaches of workplace laws will not be tolerated.
FWO Natalie James said many businesses were overconfident when it comes to the intricacies of Australia’s workplace laws and her agency will be taking an increasingly hard line with employers who cannot demonstrate that they made a diligent effort to understand their obligations.
“There has never been so much freely available information to assist employers to understand their workplace obligations. The time for excuses is over,” said James.
“We conduct follow-up audits of businesses previously found to be non-compliant to make sure they have changed their ways. Repeat offenders can expect to face enforcement action including potential litigation and significant court penalties.”
www.fairwork.gov.au
The post Victorian cleaners back paid more than $37000 appeared first on Australasia’s Cleaning Industry and Environmental Technology Magazine.
from
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Text
Victorian cleaners back paid more than $37000
The Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) has recovered $37,754 for 23 cleaners in Colac, Victoria, who were underpaid their shift and toilet cleaning allowances.
The recovered wages makes up more than half the amount of money the FWO has recently recovered for workers employed at various locations along the Great Ocean Road and Otway region of Victoria.
Under the Cleaning Services Award 2010 the full-time, part-time and casual employees received hourly rates of up to $23.08 for ordinary hours, up to $32.31 on Saturdays, up to $41.54 on Sundays and up to $50.77 on public holidays.
According to the FWO, the employer was unaware that the cleaners were also entitled to a toilet cleaning allowance of up to $2.52 per shift to a maximum of $12.39 per week which they did not receive.
Under the Award an employee engaged for the major portion of a day cleaning toilets will be paid an allowance of 1.766 per cent of the standard rate per week or 0.359 per cent of the standard rate per shift.
The workers were also underpaid a penalty rate allowance of 15 per cent of the ordinary hourly rate for early morning shifts starting before 6am and afternoon shifts finishing after 6pm.
Inspectors have issued the business with a formal caution warning that enforcement action will be taken if further breaches occur. The employer has been placed on notice that future breaches of workplace laws will not be tolerated.
FWO Natalie James said many businesses were overconfident when it comes to the intricacies of Australia’s workplace laws and her agency will be taking an increasingly hard line with employers who cannot demonstrate that they made a diligent effort to understand their obligations.
“There has never been so much freely available information to assist employers to understand their workplace obligations. The time for excuses is over,” said James.
“We conduct follow-up audits of businesses previously found to be non-compliant to make sure they have changed their ways. Repeat offenders can expect to face enforcement action including potential litigation and significant court penalties.”
www.fairwork.gov.au
The post Victorian cleaners back paid more than $37000 appeared first on Australasia’s Cleaning Industry and Environmental Technology Magazine.
Source: https://highpowerclean.com.au/victorian-cleaners-back-paid-more-than-37000/
from High Power Cleaning Melbourne https://highpowercleanau.wordpress.com/2017/10/05/victorian-cleaners-back-paid-more-than-37000/
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Text
Victorian cleaners back paid more than $37000
The Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) has recovered $37,754 for 23 cleaners in Colac, Victoria, who were underpaid their shift and toilet cleaning allowances.
The recovered wages makes up more than half the amount of money the FWO has recently recovered for workers employed at various locations along the Great Ocean Road and Otway region of Victoria.
Under the Cleaning Services Award 2010 the full-time, part-time and casual employees received hourly rates of up to $23.08 for ordinary hours, up to $32.31 on Saturdays, up to $41.54 on Sundays and up to $50.77 on public holidays.
According to the FWO, the employer was unaware that the cleaners were also entitled to a toilet cleaning allowance of up to $2.52 per shift to a maximum of $12.39 per week which they did not receive.
Under the Award an employee engaged for the major portion of a day cleaning toilets will be paid an allowance of 1.766 per cent of the standard rate per week or 0.359 per cent of the standard rate per shift.
The workers were also underpaid a penalty rate allowance of 15 per cent of the ordinary hourly rate for early morning shifts starting before 6am and afternoon shifts finishing after 6pm.
Inspectors have issued the business with a formal caution warning that enforcement action will be taken if further breaches occur. The employer has been placed on notice that future breaches of workplace laws will not be tolerated.
FWO Natalie James said many businesses were overconfident when it comes to the intricacies of Australia’s workplace laws and her agency will be taking an increasingly hard line with employers who cannot demonstrate that they made a diligent effort to understand their obligations.
“There has never been so much freely available information to assist employers to understand their workplace obligations. The time for excuses is over,” said James.
“We conduct follow-up audits of businesses previously found to be non-compliant to make sure they have changed their ways. Repeat offenders can expect to face enforcement action including potential litigation and significant court penalties.”
www.fairwork.gov.au
The post Victorian cleaners back paid more than $37000 appeared first on Australasia’s Cleaning Industry and Environmental Technology Magazine.
from End of Lease Cleaning Melbourne|Bond back cleaning|Bond Cleaning |Vacate cleaning Melbourne https://highpowerclean.com.au/victorian-cleaners-back-paid-more-than-37000/
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How does this weekend homesteader get ahead?
There are many challenges facing the beginner homesteader… and even the more seasoned practitioner who is running out of wind. Recently, I had the opportunity to reflect on these challenges in my own personal journey, and actually went out to get some answers. For those of you following the humble beginnings of Wellwood Farm, I have a full-time off-farm job (two jobs if you count family life). I’m also not from around these parts, and am really just trying to figure stuff out as I go, especially since I have no background in agriculture. Basically my challenges are linked to limited resources, namely (and in no particular order) time, money and community. So I was thrilled to learn that, in exchange for a bit of my time, the organizers of the Guelph Organic Conference (which usually occurs the last week of January) were allowing me to save hard earned $ getting connected to like-minded individuals.
The deal is, you get free access to all workshops when you volunteer that day. If you want maximum flexibility, sign up for Saturday set-up and/or Sunday teardown, but there’s also coat check, registration desk, workshop facilitation, etc. I signed up for Saturday setup as I wanted to be free for all 4 workshop sessions that day, and although it’s tough getting there at 6am, I can tell you now that I’ll be doing the same next year. We greet tradeshow vendors, help them unload their stuff and find their booth, and most of them are very grateful there’s someone there who knows what’s going on. There are some breaks in the waves of equipment, supplies and props, and that’s when you start chatting with your fellow volunteers about their experiences and which workshops they’re interested in. Like the guy that started telling us about a farm that grows native pawpaw trees under black walnuts as they’re the only ones that can, hence reduced competition and…Oh, hold that thought, there’s a truck backing up that needs to be unloaded. Anyway, it’s a cool way to meet new people, some are veterans, some are newbies, but we’re all there to help out and have a good time. Look at my fellow volunteers in the first two photos, for example.
So, was it worth it, did I get what I was looking for? Here’s what I learned that day.
1) Resource management (time and $)
The first workshop I attended was hosted by Hanna Jacobs of Matchbox Garden & Seed Co, and her catchy title was “How to turn a profit on under 2 acres”. Although I’m not looking to give up my day job, i figured she must have a few nuggets of wisdom if she turns a profit on the same space as I break my back on every year. And although her profit is a third of what I need to raise my family and pay for my banker’s extravagant lifestyle (aka mortgage), there were many a gold nugget to be found in her honest talk and subsequent chat that evening as the tradeshow was closing down for the day (sorry!) Her main points were: know what you want, be realistic, diversify into niche markets, have a business plan…and keep revisiting those as you go along because things do change…all the time.
The last workshop of the day, presented by Catherine Stilo, was geared toward the casual gardener rather than the professional business. It wasn’t clear whether the husband and wife team had off-farm jobs, but the abundant produce coming from their rural backyard was shared mainly with family and friends (and one very lucky neighbor). She touched on the principles of permaculture, perennial gardens and thriftiness, but what I loved the most in her presentation was those summer photos where she’s holding a fresh-picked veggie and all you can see is that smile!
Both these ladies stressed the importance of enjoying life in the process. I realized somewhere over the past 4 years I had lost that because my expectations were disproportional to my reality at that time. Eager to recreate eden on earth, I planted everything and anything in much greater quantities than I could handle. We all know those seed catalogues are awfully tempting, but would I plant as many if I were saving seeds year over year like Hanna? And if I had a smaller space and decided to use raised beds as Catherine did, would I plant that many tomatoes (and beets, and beans, and squash, and…)? Probably not. Instead, I find myself with an overabundance of food fit for a CSA that I have neither time nor energy to devote to. Now, if we were part of a community that shared the same values, the story may be different.
2) Finding a community
Last year when attending the conference, I only went to the free tradeshow looking for seeds and to see what was out there. I was a little overwhelmed at the number of booths with all their different agendas. From large scale farming equipment to co-operatives to consultants to NGOs to home gardening tools and products to food brands…and all the nuances in between. This year, I was hoping to make some good connections to recreate the community we left behind in our home country. In addition to the two speakers mentioned above, I was able to ferret out a couple of booths that could be interesting leads. The first was Fiddlehead Nursery, located near Collingwood, which offer tours of their edible forest setup. Not only is this a great way to see something new that works in our climate, but they also mentioned there was a community not far from there where some young aspirational homesteaders had started buying up properties along a stretch of side road from the previous generation (lucky snowbirds), each bringing their own contributions for the common good. I can’t wait to find out more about these guys, and even maybe meet some of them when I visit Fiddlehead Nursery in the spring. Another great conversation I had was at the Rare Breeds Canada booth, where I was told they could probably hook me up with an old timer in my area that could talk my ear off about which chickens would be best for our setup. And this post would not be complete without the lovely Nicole at Upper Canada Fibreshed, who immediately drew us in with her spinning wheel and wining smile (proof in photo above). Her group seeks to connect local wool producers, and particularly from rare breeds, directly with consumers.
Then there was Ivan, a budding consultant at Eden in Season with lots of great ideas. Although I was a bit confused at first trying to figure out what his booth was about, he was very engaging, pulled out a map of the area and circled my approximate location compared to his. I found out he did a bit of everything, with the aim of helping confused souls, like myself, explore possibilities and connect with opportunities. Although he avoided my initial question of “do you do mushrooms”, I’ll definitely be connecting with him in the near future and hopefully go out to see what he has achieved in his area. There were also several cooperatives, buying clubs, councils, organizations and associations that I need to do a bit of research on before providing an opinion. There’s a photo above to give you a little idea of the homework awaiting.
Lastly, I recalled talking to a guy promoting Outdoor schooling in a previous tradeshow, but was sad not to find him this year. As our toddler miraculously blooms into a child (when did we start having conversations all of a sudden?), we’re starting to look into school options, including homeschooling. I can only imagine there’s a whole universe just waiting for us as we go down that path, which I’ll be sure to report back on.
3) Other learnings
The two middle workshops were related to native plants for carbon sequestration and providing wildlife habitat, with an emphasis on pollinators. Although they didn’t help in my quest for resources, it definitely added to my list of cool things to try on the farm. Some are embarrassingly simple, such as tying reeds together and making a mini sand/rock garden, whereas others involve intensive rehabilitation more fit for experts. I had previously read about switchgrass and was thrilled to find a booth with someone knowledgeable to answer my questions, photos and even bowls of the stuff to get a feel of the product (last photo above).
So, in short I got what I came for and more, with the caveat that I’ve only scratched the surface and need to do a bit more digging (pardon the puns). Thankfully, we have another 2 months in good ol’ Zone 5 before we can really get outside, so as long as the passion doesn’t fade, there should be some exciting changes on our farm in 2017. Bring it on!
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New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write
2017 is your year! If you’re thinking of starting a blog, levelling up on your blog, or are looking to take your blog in a new direction, we are deep-diving into our content archives this week for the best posts to help you do just that.
As bloggers, we know that posts don’t write themselves – not by a long shot. And time doesn’t just fall out of the sky! We have to make time to create the best content we can on our blogs.
If you need extra help, you might like to check out our Creating Content Archives.
Follow These Six Steps to Make Plenty of Time to Write (and Enjoy it Too) by Ali Luke from Aliventures first appeared on June 5, 2015.
Here’s a safe bet:
You’re struggling to find enough time to write.
Virtually every blogger and entrepreneur has the same problem.
Maybe you want to write great content to build your business – but there are so many other things you have to do too.
I know first-hand how much of a challenge this can be. I started out writing around a full-time day job; today, I juggle work around my two year old daughter and baby son.
I don’t know your personal situation. But I can take some guesses:
You have a lot on your plate – sometimes you feel overwhelmed.
Big writing projects get shunted to the end of your to-do list.
When you do have some time to write, you never seem to get far.
Sound familiar?
Here’s how to turn things around, in six straightforward steps:
Step #1: Come Up With a Bunch of Ideas for Your Blog
Since you’re reading ProBlogger, it’s a pretty safe bet that you have a blog (or you’re about to start one). Do you ever find it hard to come up with enough ideas for it? Maybe you’re managing to keep up a regularly posting schedule – but you know you should be doing some guest posting, and you never seem to get round to it.
The easiest way to make faster progress on any writing project is to set aside dedicated brainstorming (or, if you like, daydreaming) time.
Grab a notebook or a bit of scrap paper, and jot down as many ideas as you can in fifteen minutes. Don’t judge your ideas, just write everything down.
Try This:
Schedule 15 minutes, once per week, for brainstorming. You’ll soon have a stockpile of ideas that you can turn to whenever you need one.
Further Reading:
How to Consistently Come Up With Great Post Ideas for Your Blog, Stacey Roberts, ProBlogger
Step #2: Create a Clear Plan Before You Start Writing
When you don’t have much time to write, you don’t want to waste a single minute.
If you find yourself getting stuck and giving up part-way, or if you often have to scrap huge chunks of your blog posts because you went off on a long tangent, then you need to get to grips with planning.
Your plan doesn’t need to be complicated. A few bullet points jotted on the back of an envelope is fine. For maximum effect, though, set aside dedicated time to plan out several posts at once.
Your plan helps you spot any problems before you spend hours writing, and it helps you shape your material into a logical structure: easier for you to write, and easier for your audience to read.
It’s also a great way to blast through any blank page wobbles at the start of a writing session. If you’ve got a plan, you can just copy or type it into your document … and you’re already part-way there.
Try This:
Give different planning methods a go – you don’t have to stick with a linear outline each time. Maybe a mindmap, a set of ideas on index cards, or even a spreadsheet would suit your project better.
Further Reading:
A 5-Step Plan to Improve Every Blog Post You Write, Ali Luke, Copyblogger
Step #3: Use the First Hour of Your Day for Your Main Writing Project
Sometimes, the real problem with finding time to write isn’t that there’s no time at all – it’s that our writing time is scheduled for the wrong part of the day.
If your aim is to “finish the ten things on this list then work on the ebook” … it’s all too easy to let those ten things fill your day. Even if you have a little time left at the end of the day, you’ll probably be creatively frazzled.
The best solution I’ve found is to put writing first. Ideally, set aside an hour – but if that’s just not practical, 15 minutes is fine.
Putting writing first could mean:
You use the first hour of your work day for your project … trust me, Twitter and Facebook can wait for an hour.
You get up an hour earlier (not my favorite solution – but I did it for eight months when I had a day job, and it let me build my career to the point where I could quit and write full time).
You shuffle around some other activities: if you currently head to the gym at 6am, could you go at lunchtime or in the evening instead?
Try This:
For this week only, commit to spending the first 15 minutes of your day (either when you get up or when you start work) on your current writing project. Put a check on the calendar each day you manage it. Next week, aim for 20 minutes per day, and/or more checks.
Further Reading:
Why You Should Get Serious About Your Writing Schedule, Kari, Men with Pens
Step #4: Cut Out or Cut Back
Your time is full already, but at least some of your activities could go in a pinch. This is always going to be a personal decision – something that I might consider essential could be on your list for ditching when life gets hectic, and vice versa.
Here are just a few ideas you might want to consider.
Cut out…
Voluntary commitments you don’t enjoy and wish you’d never signed up for. Resign in writing, and don’t leave any room for ambiguity or argument.
Time-wasting activities that don’t add much to your life – do you really need to take another Buzzfeed quiz? Try RescueTime to track your computer activity.
Cut down…
TV watching. Of course, keep up any must-sees (mine are Game of Thrones and Doctor Who) … but if you’re binging on whole seasons of shows on Netflix, cut back to an hour every evening.
Even if money’s tight, can you get a maid service once or twice a month? If that’s not an option, can you delegate to your spouse or kids?
Try This:
Look at your non-writing activities and save some time there too:
10 minutes per day on Twitter and Facebook, instead of 30, could well get you the same results.
Template emails will save you time answering common questions, dealing with routine enquiries, and so on.
Further Reading:
Why You Should Flush 90% of Your To-Do List Down the Toilet, Michael Hyatt, MichaelHyatt.com
Step #5: Keep a Time Log
If you’re still struggling, keep a time diary for a week to find out exactly where your time goes.
(If you’ve ever kept a food diary while on a diet, or a spending diary while getting out of debt, you’ll have some idea of how powerful this can be.)
You could use a spreadsheet, a physical notebook, or an app like Toggl. While entering data manually can be a pain, it does make you very aware of how you’re using your time.
Try This:
Be prepared for your time log to throw up some negative emotions – maybe you’re not working as efficiently as you thought. Go easy on yourself, and look for ways to win back just 5 or 10 minutes of productive time each day.
Further Reading:
Why You Really Don’t Have a Time Management Problem, Charlie Gilkey, Productive Flourishing
Step #6: When You’re Writing, Write!
If you’ve set aside 30 minutes to work on a post for your blog, you need to actually write.
That means not stopping after five minutes to check if anything new’s happening on Facebook. It means jotting down any distracting thoughts like “Email John” rather than stopping writing to do them straight away.
When you’re writing (or engaged in any creative activity), you can get into a state of “flow” – you might describe it as “being on a roll” or even “losing track of time”. This is what you’re aiming for, and constantly interrupting yourself will stop you getting there.
Try This:
Work in short bursts. I find that 20 – 45 minutes is about right. If you know you only have to write for another 15 minutes, not for another hour, it’s easier to push yourself to keep going.
Further Reading:
How to Maintain Focus when Writing, Mary Jaksch, Write to Done
You won’t miraculously “find” a few spare hours to write.
You need to make that time – by finding more efficient ways to work and by restructuring other elements of your life to allow your writing to be a priority.
So here’s your first step again: find fifteen minutes, either today or tomorrow, to brainstorm some ideas for one of your current projects.
Get up early, use the ad breaks on TV, write in your notebook on the bus, or whatever it takes. Drop a comment below to tell us what you’ll be doing, and when.
Ali Luke blogs about the art, craft and business of writing at Aliventures. She has two free ebooks on blogging, Ten Powerful Ways to Make Your Blog Posts Stronger and Ten Easy Ways to Attract Readers to Your Blog … And Keep Them There: to get your copies of those, just sign up for her weekly e-newsletter (also free!) here.
The post New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write appeared first on ProBlogger.
New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write
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New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write
2017 is your year! If you’re thinking of starting a blog, levelling up on your blog, or are looking to take your blog in a new direction, we are deep-diving into our content archives this week for the best posts to help you do just that.
As bloggers, we know that posts don’t write themselves – not by a long shot. And time doesn’t just fall out of the sky! We have to make time to create the best content we can on our blogs.
If you need extra help, you might like to check out our Creating Content Archives.
Follow These Six Steps to Make Plenty of Time to Write (and Enjoy it Too) by Ali Luke from Aliventures first appeared on June 5, 2015.
Here’s a safe bet:
You’re struggling to find enough time to write.
Virtually every blogger and entrepreneur has the same problem.
Maybe you want to write great content to build your business – but there are so many other things you have to do too.
I know first-hand how much of a challenge this can be. I started out writing around a full-time day job; today, I juggle work around my two year old daughter and baby son.
I don’t know your personal situation. But I can take some guesses:
You have a lot on your plate – sometimes you feel overwhelmed.
Big writing projects get shunted to the end of your to-do list.
When you do have some time to write, you never seem to get far.
Sound familiar?
Here’s how to turn things around, in six straightforward steps:
Step #1: Come Up With a Bunch of Ideas for Your Blog
Since you’re reading ProBlogger, it’s a pretty safe bet that you have a blog (or you’re about to start one). Do you ever find it hard to come up with enough ideas for it? Maybe you’re managing to keep up a regularly posting schedule – but you know you should be doing some guest posting, and you never seem to get round to it.
The easiest way to make faster progress on any writing project is to set aside dedicated brainstorming (or, if you like, daydreaming) time.
Grab a notebook or a bit of scrap paper, and jot down as many ideas as you can in fifteen minutes. Don’t judge your ideas, just write everything down.
Try This:
Schedule 15 minutes, once per week, for brainstorming. You’ll soon have a stockpile of ideas that you can turn to whenever you need one.
Further Reading:
How to Consistently Come Up With Great Post Ideas for Your Blog, Stacey Roberts, ProBlogger
Step #2: Create a Clear Plan Before You Start Writing
When you don’t have much time to write, you don’t want to waste a single minute.
If you find yourself getting stuck and giving up part-way, or if you often have to scrap huge chunks of your blog posts because you went off on a long tangent, then you need to get to grips with planning.
Your plan doesn’t need to be complicated. A few bullet points jotted on the back of an envelope is fine. For maximum effect, though, set aside dedicated time to plan out several posts at once.
Your plan helps you spot any problems before you spend hours writing, and it helps you shape your material into a logical structure: easier for you to write, and easier for your audience to read.
It’s also a great way to blast through any blank page wobbles at the start of a writing session. If you’ve got a plan, you can just copy or type it into your document … and you’re already part-way there.
Try This:
Give different planning methods a go – you don’t have to stick with a linear outline each time. Maybe a mindmap, a set of ideas on index cards, or even a spreadsheet would suit your project better.
Further Reading:
A 5-Step Plan to Improve Every Blog Post You Write, Ali Luke, Copyblogger
Step #3: Use the First Hour of Your Day for Your Main Writing Project
Sometimes, the real problem with finding time to write isn’t that there’s no time at all – it’s that our writing time is scheduled for the wrong part of the day.
If your aim is to “finish the ten things on this list then work on the ebook” … it’s all too easy to let those ten things fill your day. Even if you have a little time left at the end of the day, you’ll probably be creatively frazzled.
The best solution I’ve found is to put writing first. Ideally, set aside an hour – but if that’s just not practical, 15 minutes is fine.
Putting writing first could mean:
You use the first hour of your work day for your project … trust me, Twitter and Facebook can wait for an hour.
You get up an hour earlier (not my favorite solution – but I did it for eight months when I had a day job, and it let me build my career to the point where I could quit and write full time).
You shuffle around some other activities: if you currently head to the gym at 6am, could you go at lunchtime or in the evening instead?
Try This:
For this week only, commit to spending the first 15 minutes of your day (either when you get up or when you start work) on your current writing project. Put a check on the calendar each day you manage it. Next week, aim for 20 minutes per day, and/or more checks.
Further Reading:
Why You Should Get Serious About Your Writing Schedule, Kari, Men with Pens
Step #4: Cut Out or Cut Back
Your time is full already, but at least some of your activities could go in a pinch. This is always going to be a personal decision – something that I might consider essential could be on your list for ditching when life gets hectic, and vice versa.
Here are just a few ideas you might want to consider.
Cut out…
Voluntary commitments you don’t enjoy and wish you’d never signed up for. Resign in writing, and don’t leave any room for ambiguity or argument.
Time-wasting activities that don’t add much to your life – do you really need to take another Buzzfeed quiz? Try RescueTime to track your computer activity.
Cut down…
TV watching. Of course, keep up any must-sees (mine are Game of Thrones and Doctor Who) … but if you’re binging on whole seasons of shows on Netflix, cut back to an hour every evening.
Even if money’s tight, can you get a maid service once or twice a month? If that’s not an option, can you delegate to your spouse or kids?
Try This:
Look at your non-writing activities and save some time there too:
10 minutes per day on Twitter and Facebook, instead of 30, could well get you the same results.
Template emails will save you time answering common questions, dealing with routine enquiries, and so on.
Further Reading:
Why You Should Flush 90% of Your To-Do List Down the Toilet, Michael Hyatt, MichaelHyatt.com
Step #5: Keep a Time Log
If you’re still struggling, keep a time diary for a week to find out exactly where your time goes.
(If you’ve ever kept a food diary while on a diet, or a spending diary while getting out of debt, you’ll have some idea of how powerful this can be.)
You could use a spreadsheet, a physical notebook, or an app like Toggl. While entering data manually can be a pain, it does make you very aware of how you’re using your time.
Try This:
Be prepared for your time log to throw up some negative emotions – maybe you’re not working as efficiently as you thought. Go easy on yourself, and look for ways to win back just 5 or 10 minutes of productive time each day.
Further Reading:
Why You Really Don’t Have a Time Management Problem, Charlie Gilkey, Productive Flourishing
Step #6: When You’re Writing, Write!
If you’ve set aside 30 minutes to work on a post for your blog, you need to actually write.
That means not stopping after five minutes to check if anything new’s happening on Facebook. It means jotting down any distracting thoughts like “Email John” rather than stopping writing to do them straight away.
When you’re writing (or engaged in any creative activity), you can get into a state of “flow” – you might describe it as “being on a roll” or even “losing track of time”. This is what you’re aiming for, and constantly interrupting yourself will stop you getting there.
Try This:
Work in short bursts. I find that 20 – 45 minutes is about right. If you know you only have to write for another 15 minutes, not for another hour, it’s easier to push yourself to keep going.
Further Reading:
How to Maintain Focus when Writing, Mary Jaksch, Write to Done
You won’t miraculously “find” a few spare hours to write.
You need to make that time – by finding more efficient ways to work and by restructuring other elements of your life to allow your writing to be a priority.
So here’s your first step again: find fifteen minutes, either today or tomorrow, to brainstorm some ideas for one of your current projects.
Get up early, use the ad breaks on TV, write in your notebook on the bus, or whatever it takes. Drop a comment below to tell us what you’ll be doing, and when.
Ali Luke blogs about the art, craft and business of writing at Aliventures. She has two free ebooks on blogging, Ten Powerful Ways to Make Your Blog Posts Stronger and Ten Easy Ways to Attract Readers to Your Blog … And Keep Them There: to get your copies of those, just sign up for her weekly e-newsletter (also free!) here.
The post New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write appeared first on ProBlogger.
from http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ProbloggerHelpingBloggersEarnMoney/~3/JEkOZZOu8l0/
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New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write
2017 is your year! If you’re thinking of starting a blog, levelling up on your blog, or are looking to take your blog in a new direction, we are deep-diving into our content archives this week for the best posts to help you do just that.
As bloggers, we know that posts don’t write themselves – not by a long shot. And time doesn’t just fall out of the sky! We have to make time to create the best content we can on our blogs.
If you need extra help, you might like to check out our Creating Content Archives.
Follow These Six Steps to Make Plenty of Time to Write (and Enjoy it Too) by Ali Luke from Aliventures first appeared on June 5, 2015.
Here’s a safe bet:
You’re struggling to find enough time to write.
Virtually every blogger and entrepreneur has the same problem.
Maybe you want to write great content to build your business – but there are so many other things you have to do too.
I know first-hand how much of a challenge this can be. I started out writing around a full-time day job; today, I juggle work around my two year old daughter and baby son.
I don’t know your personal situation. But I can take some guesses:
You have a lot on your plate – sometimes you feel overwhelmed.
Big writing projects get shunted to the end of your to-do list.
When you do have some time to write, you never seem to get far.
Sound familiar?
Here’s how to turn things around, in six straightforward steps:
Step #1: Come Up With a Bunch of Ideas for Your Blog
Since you’re reading ProBlogger, it’s a pretty safe bet that you have a blog (or you’re about to start one). Do you ever find it hard to come up with enough ideas for it? Maybe you’re managing to keep up a regularly posting schedule – but you know you should be doing some guest posting, and you never seem to get round to it.
The easiest way to make faster progress on any writing project is to set aside dedicated brainstorming (or, if you like, daydreaming) time.
Grab a notebook or a bit of scrap paper, and jot down as many ideas as you can in fifteen minutes. Don’t judge your ideas, just write everything down.
Try This:
Schedule 15 minutes, once per week, for brainstorming. You’ll soon have a stockpile of ideas that you can turn to whenever you need one.
Further Reading:
How to Consistently Come Up With Great Post Ideas for Your Blog, Stacey Roberts, ProBlogger
Step #2: Create a Clear Plan Before You Start Writing
When you don’t have much time to write, you don’t want to waste a single minute.
If you find yourself getting stuck and giving up part-way, or if you often have to scrap huge chunks of your blog posts because you went off on a long tangent, then you need to get to grips with planning.
Your plan doesn’t need to be complicated. A few bullet points jotted on the back of an envelope is fine. For maximum effect, though, set aside dedicated time to plan out several posts at once.
Your plan helps you spot any problems before you spend hours writing, and it helps you shape your material into a logical structure: easier for you to write, and easier for your audience to read.
It’s also a great way to blast through any blank page wobbles at the start of a writing session. If you’ve got a plan, you can just copy or type it into your document … and you’re already part-way there.
Try This:
Give different planning methods a go – you don’t have to stick with a linear outline each time. Maybe a mindmap, a set of ideas on index cards, or even a spreadsheet would suit your project better.
Further Reading:
A 5-Step Plan to Improve Every Blog Post You Write, Ali Luke, Copyblogger
Step #3: Use the First Hour of Your Day for Your Main Writing Project
Sometimes, the real problem with finding time to write isn’t that there’s no time at all – it’s that our writing time is scheduled for the wrong part of the day.
If your aim is to “finish the ten things on this list then work on the ebook” … it’s all too easy to let those ten things fill your day. Even if you have a little time left at the end of the day, you’ll probably be creatively frazzled.
The best solution I’ve found is to put writing first. Ideally, set aside an hour – but if that’s just not practical, 15 minutes is fine.
Putting writing first could mean:
You use the first hour of your work day for your project … trust me, Twitter and Facebook can wait for an hour.
You get up an hour earlier (not my favorite solution – but I did it for eight months when I had a day job, and it let me build my career to the point where I could quit and write full time).
You shuffle around some other activities: if you currently head to the gym at 6am, could you go at lunchtime or in the evening instead?
Try This:
For this week only, commit to spending the first 15 minutes of your day (either when you get up or when you start work) on your current writing project. Put a check on the calendar each day you manage it. Next week, aim for 20 minutes per day, and/or more checks.
Further Reading:
Why You Should Get Serious About Your Writing Schedule, Kari, Men with Pens
Step #4: Cut Out or Cut Back
Your time is full already, but at least some of your activities could go in a pinch. This is always going to be a personal decision – something that I might consider essential could be on your list for ditching when life gets hectic, and vice versa.
Here are just a few ideas you might want to consider.
Cut out…
Voluntary commitments you don’t enjoy and wish you’d never signed up for. Resign in writing, and don’t leave any room for ambiguity or argument.
Time-wasting activities that don’t add much to your life – do you really need to take another Buzzfeed quiz? Try RescueTime to track your computer activity.
Cut down…
TV watching. Of course, keep up any must-sees (mine are Game of Thrones and Doctor Who) … but if you’re binging on whole seasons of shows on Netflix, cut back to an hour every evening.
Even if money’s tight, can you get a maid service once or twice a month? If that’s not an option, can you delegate to your spouse or kids?
Try This:
Look at your non-writing activities and save some time there too:
10 minutes per day on Twitter and Facebook, instead of 30, could well get you the same results.
Template emails will save you time answering common questions, dealing with routine enquiries, and so on.
Further Reading:
Why You Should Flush 90% of Your To-Do List Down the Toilet, Michael Hyatt, MichaelHyatt.com
Step #5: Keep a Time Log
If you’re still struggling, keep a time diary for a week to find out exactly where your time goes.
(If you’ve ever kept a food diary while on a diet, or a spending diary while getting out of debt, you’ll have some idea of how powerful this can be.)
You could use a spreadsheet, a physical notebook, or an app like Toggl. While entering data manually can be a pain, it does make you very aware of how you’re using your time.
Try This:
Be prepared for your time log to throw up some negative emotions – maybe you’re not working as efficiently as you thought. Go easy on yourself, and look for ways to win back just 5 or 10 minutes of productive time each day.
Further Reading:
Why You Really Don’t Have a Time Management Problem, Charlie Gilkey, Productive Flourishing
Step #6: When You’re Writing, Write!
If you’ve set aside 30 minutes to work on a post for your blog, you need to actually write.
That means not stopping after five minutes to check if anything new’s happening on Facebook. It means jotting down any distracting thoughts like “Email John” rather than stopping writing to do them straight away.
When you’re writing (or engaged in any creative activity), you can get into a state of “flow” – you might describe it as “being on a roll” or even “losing track of time”. This is what you’re aiming for, and constantly interrupting yourself will stop you getting there.
Try This:
Work in short bursts. I find that 20 – 45 minutes is about right. If you know you only have to write for another 15 minutes, not for another hour, it’s easier to push yourself to keep going.
Further Reading:
How to Maintain Focus when Writing, Mary Jaksch, Write to Done
You won’t miraculously “find” a few spare hours to write.
You need to make that time – by finding more efficient ways to work and by restructuring other elements of your life to allow your writing to be a priority.
So here’s your first step again: find fifteen minutes, either today or tomorrow, to brainstorm some ideas for one of your current projects.
Get up early, use the ad breaks on TV, write in your notebook on the bus, or whatever it takes. Drop a comment below to tell us what you’ll be doing, and when.
Ali Luke blogs about the art, craft and business of writing at Aliventures. She has two free ebooks on blogging, Ten Powerful Ways to Make Your Blog Posts Stronger and Ten Easy Ways to Attract Readers to Your Blog … And Keep Them There: to get your copies of those, just sign up for her weekly e-newsletter (also free!) here.
The post New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write appeared first on ProBlogger.
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New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write
2017 is your year! If you’re thinking of starting a blog, levelling up on your blog, or are looking to take your blog in a new direction, we are deep-diving into our content archives this week for the best posts to help you do just that.
As bloggers, we know that posts don’t write themselves – not by a long shot. And time doesn’t just fall out of the sky! We have to make time to create the best content we can on our blogs.
If you need extra help, you might like to check out our Creating Content Archives.
Follow These Six Steps to Make Plenty of Time to Write (and Enjoy it Too) by Ali Luke from Aliventures first appeared on June 5, 2015.
Here’s a safe bet:
You’re struggling to find enough time to write.
Virtually every blogger and entrepreneur has the same problem.
Maybe you want to write great content to build your business – but there are so many other things you have to do too.
I know first-hand how much of a challenge this can be. I started out writing around a full-time day job; today, I juggle work around my two year old daughter and baby son.
I don’t know your personal situation. But I can take some guesses:
You have a lot on your plate – sometimes you feel overwhelmed.
Big writing projects get shunted to the end of your to-do list.
When you do have some time to write, you never seem to get far.
Sound familiar?
Here’s how to turn things around, in six straightforward steps:
Step #1: Come Up With a Bunch of Ideas for Your Blog
Since you’re reading ProBlogger, it’s a pretty safe bet that you have a blog (or you’re about to start one). Do you ever find it hard to come up with enough ideas for it? Maybe you’re managing to keep up a regularly posting schedule – but you know you should be doing some guest posting, and you never seem to get round to it.
The easiest way to make faster progress on any writing project is to set aside dedicated brainstorming (or, if you like, daydreaming) time.
Grab a notebook or a bit of scrap paper, and jot down as many ideas as you can in fifteen minutes. Don’t judge your ideas, just write everything down.
Try This:
Schedule 15 minutes, once per week, for brainstorming. You’ll soon have a stockpile of ideas that you can turn to whenever you need one.
Further Reading:
How to Consistently Come Up With Great Post Ideas for Your Blog, Stacey Roberts, ProBlogger
Step #2: Create a Clear Plan Before You Start Writing
When you don’t have much time to write, you don’t want to waste a single minute.
If you find yourself getting stuck and giving up part-way, or if you often have to scrap huge chunks of your blog posts because you went off on a long tangent, then you need to get to grips with planning.
Your plan doesn’t need to be complicated. A few bullet points jotted on the back of an envelope is fine. For maximum effect, though, set aside dedicated time to plan out several posts at once.
Your plan helps you spot any problems before you spend hours writing, and it helps you shape your material into a logical structure: easier for you to write, and easier for your audience to read.
It’s also a great way to blast through any blank page wobbles at the start of a writing session. If you’ve got a plan, you can just copy or type it into your document … and you’re already part-way there.
Try This:
Give different planning methods a go – you don’t have to stick with a linear outline each time. Maybe a mindmap, a set of ideas on index cards, or even a spreadsheet would suit your project better.
Further Reading:
A 5-Step Plan to Improve Every Blog Post You Write, Ali Luke, Copyblogger
Step #3: Use the First Hour of Your Day for Your Main Writing Project
Sometimes, the real problem with finding time to write isn’t that there’s no time at all – it’s that our writing time is scheduled for the wrong part of the day.
If your aim is to “finish the ten things on this list then work on the ebook” … it’s all too easy to let those ten things fill your day. Even if you have a little time left at the end of the day, you’ll probably be creatively frazzled.
The best solution I’ve found is to put writing first. Ideally, set aside an hour – but if that’s just not practical, 15 minutes is fine.
Putting writing first could mean:
You use the first hour of your work day for your project … trust me, Twitter and Facebook can wait for an hour.
You get up an hour earlier (not my favorite solution – but I did it for eight months when I had a day job, and it let me build my career to the point where I could quit and write full time).
You shuffle around some other activities: if you currently head to the gym at 6am, could you go at lunchtime or in the evening instead?
Try This:
For this week only, commit to spending the first 15 minutes of your day (either when you get up or when you start work) on your current writing project. Put a check on the calendar each day you manage it. Next week, aim for 20 minutes per day, and/or more checks.
Further Reading:
Why You Should Get Serious About Your Writing Schedule, Kari, Men with Pens
Step #4: Cut Out or Cut Back
Your time is full already, but at least some of your activities could go in a pinch. This is always going to be a personal decision – something that I might consider essential could be on your list for ditching when life gets hectic, and vice versa.
Here are just a few ideas you might want to consider.
Cut out…
Voluntary commitments you don’t enjoy and wish you’d never signed up for. Resign in writing, and don’t leave any room for ambiguity or argument.
Time-wasting activities that don’t add much to your life – do you really need to take another Buzzfeed quiz? Try RescueTime to track your computer activity.
Cut down…
TV watching. Of course, keep up any must-sees (mine are Game of Thrones and Doctor Who) … but if you’re binging on whole seasons of shows on Netflix, cut back to an hour every evening.
Even if money’s tight, can you get a maid service once or twice a month? If that’s not an option, can you delegate to your spouse or kids?
Try This:
Look at your non-writing activities and save some time there too:
10 minutes per day on Twitter and Facebook, instead of 30, could well get you the same results.
Template emails will save you time answering common questions, dealing with routine enquiries, and so on.
Further Reading:
Why You Should Flush 90% of Your To-Do List Down the Toilet, Michael Hyatt, MichaelHyatt.com
Step #5: Keep a Time Log
If you’re still struggling, keep a time diary for a week to find out exactly where your time goes.
(If you’ve ever kept a food diary while on a diet, or a spending diary while getting out of debt, you’ll have some idea of how powerful this can be.)
You could use a spreadsheet, a physical notebook, or an app like Toggl. While entering data manually can be a pain, it does make you very aware of how you’re using your time.
Try This:
Be prepared for your time log to throw up some negative emotions – maybe you’re not working as efficiently as you thought. Go easy on yourself, and look for ways to win back just 5 or 10 minutes of productive time each day.
Further Reading:
Why You Really Don’t Have a Time Management Problem, Charlie Gilkey, Productive Flourishing
Step #6: When You’re Writing, Write!
If you’ve set aside 30 minutes to work on a post for your blog, you need to actually write.
That means not stopping after five minutes to check if anything new’s happening on Facebook. It means jotting down any distracting thoughts like “Email John” rather than stopping writing to do them straight away.
When you’re writing (or engaged in any creative activity), you can get into a state of “flow” – you might describe it as “being on a roll” or even “losing track of time”. This is what you’re aiming for, and constantly interrupting yourself will stop you getting there.
Try This:
Work in short bursts. I find that 20 – 45 minutes is about right. If you know you only have to write for another 15 minutes, not for another hour, it’s easier to push yourself to keep going.
Further Reading:
How to Maintain Focus when Writing, Mary Jaksch, Write to Done
You won’t miraculously “find” a few spare hours to write.
You need to make that time – by finding more efficient ways to work and by restructuring other elements of your life to allow your writing to be a priority.
So here’s your first step again: find fifteen minutes, either today or tomorrow, to brainstorm some ideas for one of your current projects.
Get up early, use the ad breaks on TV, write in your notebook on the bus, or whatever it takes. Drop a comment below to tell us what you’ll be doing, and when.
Ali Luke blogs about the art, craft and business of writing at Aliventures. She has two free ebooks on blogging, Ten Powerful Ways to Make Your Blog Posts Stronger and Ten Easy Ways to Attract Readers to Your Blog … And Keep Them There: to get your copies of those, just sign up for her weekly e-newsletter (also free!) here.
The post New Year Reboot: Make More Time to Write appeared first on ProBlogger.
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