Archive for October 3rd, 2008

Teaching children to write is very important in today’s world. Kids are not required to write very much in school anymore. They can receive a high school diploma with only a minimal amount of writing education. Here are 6 steps for teaching your children to write.

1. Inspire them. Show your children that writing can be very fun and exciting. Show them letters you have written. If you keep a journal show your children how rewarding and exciting it is to look back through the years in your journal.

2. Writing competition. Something you can try is a writing competition. I did this with my own children and it was great. I had each of them write a 400 word article on any subject they chose. You can try this and give them any reward you feel is appropriate for the best one.

3. Start a blog. Blogs have become extremely popular and you could use it as a family journal. Your children could write articles and then they could let their friends know about the blog as a way to show off their work. You could even give your readers an opportunity to make comments about the different articles and vote for the best one.

4. Buy a notebook for each of your children. Tell them to write down their ideas as they come. This is something that many successful people do because great thoughts come at all hours of the day. They can also use the notebook to start a journal.

5. Have your kids learn to write thank you notes. You and others give your children many gifts and sometimes it is hard to just get your children to say thank you. Can you imagine the joy that will fill someone’s heart if they receive a thank you note from one of your children for a gift or special outing?

6. Write letters. Writing letters is a habit we should all have. You can help you children develop a love for writing by encouraging them to write letters to grandparents and friends. They can even write letters to you complete with postage and an address. I have sent my children mail before and it is very fun.

Teaching children to write can bring a lot of joy into your family. You need to first inspire them by showing how much fun writing can be. You can conduct writing competitions, do a blog, encourage your children to write thank you notes and send letters to friends and family. Writing is a great activity.

Tweet This Post

You have a simple objective with your website – attracting qualified visitors to be converted to business opportunities. In order to achieve this you will need to ensure that they wish to return and this will only come through having rich content. You then need them to take some form of action that will create a business opportunity for you

Some research suggests that 40% of websites are ineffective. Personal evidence would suggest that particularly with SME businesses it is as much as double this. If you are in business with your website you need to be able to ask yourself the question – how much does my site contribute to my business?

As to what constitutes a positive contribution and what you can do about that is another matter. Contribution is most often measured in terms of bottom line revenue, be it direct or indirect. You should measure this after all you have most likely put a heavy investment into your business website and unless you are in the practice of throwing money away I would suggest you conduct an audit of your website to clearly determine just how effective it really is. In the mean time you may wish to consider the following points:

1. Treat your website with respect – You have spent a lot of money putting it together. You continue to spend money keeping it active. You pay far more for a salesperson who invariably is involved in activities that can be achieved through your website. Be smart, use your resources effectively and deliver better results

2. Designing to meet the needs of those with disabilities – Whilst it may sound strange to expect blind people to read your website this is in fact a requirement under W3C standards and in fact a disabled person apparently took the Sydney 200 Olympic website to court because they could not read it as a visually impaired person and won their case. A few websites now have the ability to be read aloud as they comply with the W3C standards but I would venture to say this is a small minority.

3. Does your website address your entire market – How many websites seek an international audience yet are only delivered in English. In Australia we are particularly notorious for this and so of en such websites seek out our Asian partners as a key target market. Even matters as simple as providing phone numbers without international codes or giving out 1300 or 1800 numbers without the local number. We sometimes overlook the fact that terms in our own country are not understood overseas.

4. Designing to meet the needs of those with disabilities – Whilst it may sound strange to expect blind people to read your website this is in fact a requirement under W3C standards and in fact a disabled person apparently took the Sydney 200 Olympic website to court because they could not read it as a visually impaired person and won their case. A few websites now have the ability to be read aloud as they comply with the W3C standards but I would venture to say this is a small minority.

5. Does your website address your entire market – How many websites seek an international audience yet are only delivered in English. In Australia we are particularly notorious for this and so of en such websites seek out our Asian partners as a key target market. Even matters as simple as providing phone numbers without international codes or giving out 1300 or 1800 numbers without the local number. We sometimes overlook the fact that terms in our own country are not understood overseas.

6. Responsibility for an effective website belongs with you as the business owner. Engaging suitably experienced Web Architects can assist in delivering an effective design that will provide functionality that works with your business and an Internet marketing strategy that will promote your website responsibly.

7. The website is not the domain of your IT Manager of PA – This is a corporate tool and impacts every part of your business. Get your whole management team involved with decisions made about the look and feel, the functionality and the support. Be sure to involve the marketing people by the way!

Tweet This Post