It seems only yesterday that you couldn’t wait until the next time you saw them. Couple time seemed to last forever and you built a treasure trove of shared memories. Then came the kids. You wouldn’t trade them for the world, but these days you grab couple time in between trips to soccer practice, washing clothes, checking homework and refereeing squabbles over who gets to use the tablet next. 

Back before the coronavirus hit, when you wanted a night alone, whether for a romantic evening or just for some delightful peace and quiet, it was reasonably easy. You waited until the kids were at summer camp or at grandma’s or perhaps you followed a time-honored tradition of calling a babysitter. Unfortunately, it’s not quite so simple anymore. So how do you get that precious night off from parenting? 

With 1 billion active users, Instagram is a valuable tool for marketing across a variety of industries. As a business owner, it is important to keep up with the big players in social networking in order to stay competitive in your industry—which is why we’ve put together a list of new changes to Instagram that you should know about and use to leverage your business.

I’m a big fan of automating everything I can in our business. When I find myself spending time on tasks in my business that could be done by someone who makes a lot less than my calculated hourly value, I either delegate it or automate it.

The first question I ask myself is — 

Can I automate this?

It’s been a tough 2020— so much so that many of us are wondering when things will ever get back to normal. Is there even a normal now? In this series, we’ll take a look at what comes next. 

To kick things off, we’ll start with a happy topic. Vacation! It used to be that even if you weren’t going anywhere, chances are you’d have a friend or coworker that was. They’d come back with a nice tan and some great pictures to show off and be the envy of everyone— at least until the next person came back with tales of an even better vacation. Of course, things are a little different now. On the plus side, with the coronavirus having ravaged the travel industry, many hotels and airlines are offering some great deals to drum up interest. On the downside, some of the attractions you were hoping to see may have limited hours or be closed altogether. 

Do you think of yourself as an artist? When famed abstract artist Jackson Pollock referred to an artist, he meant anyone who is “building things.... some with a brush, some with a shovel, some choose a pen.” If your idea of creativity is building something from a watermelon, Pollock would have certainly approved!

Fruit carving, called Mukimono in Japan, has a long history, perhaps dating as far back as the 7^th century AD. Watermelons have traditionally been carved into vessels to hold a candle, much like today's jack o' lanterns, or made into baskets to hold flowers or fruit, but mostly these fruits are carved to add an artistic presentation to the table.

Many entrepreneurs lament over the feeling of not accomplishing everything they want to, despite the fact that they’re working hard and putting long hours into their business. When we speak to business owners who feel this way, we recommend that they learn how to write SMART Goals.

SMART Goals help people achieve their objectives by clarifying their ideas, focusing their efforts and using time and resources wisely.

Full disclosure: We are not attorneys or experts in the law and this is not legal advice. Please consult your attorney and do your own due diligence if you have questions or issues.

It’s all about the data. Customers have to trust that the personal data they provide you by punching in their card number on your website or swiping their card at your register will be kept safely and securely. Without that assurance, sales in the digital age aren’t really possible. Sure, you want to make transactions easy, but you also want to make them secure. Customers have enough to worry about without fretting about their identities being stolen or their credit cards being hacked. It is your job to help minimize their risk.

Have you ever searched for something online and then checked your Facebook page, only to be bombarded with ads for that same item you were searching? That practice is known as retargeting, and it’s an effective way to increase ROI on ad campaigns and boost your revenue!

The summer sun is baking everything in sight. You can watch the heat ripple and you wonder how everything doesn’t melt like one of those clocks in a Salvador Dali painting. Sounds like a great time for a swim. But while you’re imagining that cool water washing over you, it’s also a time to remember some basic swimming safety. 

JoomFuse has changed the rules of membership management. . . forever.

Joomla! + Infusionsoft = JoomFuse! JoomFuse integrates your Joomla! website with your Infusionsoft to content access and membership status, hands-free for you!

Manage infinite levels of paid (or free) membership using JoomFuse to integrate the automation of Infusionsoft with the power of Joomla. You control who gets access to what content... and when. JoomFuse manages access and action triggers for you, driven by Infusionsoft tags. No more duct-taping third-party software programs to try to get what you need to manage your membership (subscription) programs. Now you can sleep at night knowing it's taken care of for you.

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Six feet. It used to be that there wasn’t anything particularly remarkable about it. Sure, it was pretty common. It’s the height of the average refrigerator and the average Christmas tree. It’s also the length of a twin or full-sized mattress. If you like exercise, it’s the length of a yoga mat, and if you’re into animals, six feet is the typical height of the African white rhino. 

Lately though, six feet has taken on additional significance, since it’s the distance we’re supposed to keep between us at all times. It’s safer, of course, but it sure can make it challenging to interact with people. In the next part of our series, we’ll look at ways to be sociable without risking life and limb, not to mention your health. 

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Should you use Facebook ads to promote your products?

The short answer: Yes.

Here’s why:

Full disclosure: We are not attorneys or experts in the law and this is not legal advice. Please consult your attorney and do your own due diligence if you have questions or issues.

The affairs of the rest of the world used to seem distant. What was happening in your hometown was far more important, and unless there was a war or an earthquake or maybe a plague of locusts in some far-flung corner of the globe, most people probably didn’t pay much attention. Those days are long gone. Markets are more connected than ever before, which is why in the last of our series on Understanding the Law, we’ll look at how the European Union’s adoption of their new GDPR standards may affect you. 

Summer already? It was such a short time ago that some of us had two, three, or as much as four feet of snow in our yards. Now that the weather is heating up, make sure you're prepared for the high temperatures.

Start slow. You can't start exercising in the heat without a little preparation. Shorter workouts outdoors are in order, until you've acclimated yourself to the hot weather.