Guest Contributor on Money Questions and Answers Blog

How to Overcome the Challenges of Bootstrapping Your Business

The following is a guest post by Ed “Skip” McLaughlin and Wyn Lydecker, the authors of “The Purpose Is Profit: The Truth about Starting and Building Your Own Business“. If you’d like to find out more about guest posting on Money Q&A, please read our Guest Posting Guidelines. Every business needs capital to start, operate, and grow. Every type of capital has a cost, with advantages and disadvantages to consider. And to some degree, every source of capital will affect the amount of control you will maintain over your business. When I was starting my company, USI, I couldn’t wait to lift off. I was ready to quit my job and felt impatient to get started. I considered sourcing money from … Read more

5 Signs You Should Hire A Coach for Your Life or Business

by Guest Contributor

Coaching has become a rapidly growing profession worldwide, expanding form its origins in sports and branching out into a number of different areas. There are business coaches, executive coaches, career coaches, health & wellness coaches, and general life coaches. But, should you hire a coach to help you succeed in life or in your business?

People seem to be recognizing that having a coach can make a difference. In fact, studies of coaching in organizations shows a return of $4 – $8 for every dollar invested.

At the same time, people have begun to recognize that top athletes spend around 95% of time practicing with a coach and 5% actually performing. While the rest of us spend almost all of our time performing, with almost no time to practice or improve.

Why shouldn’t everyone benefit from more time to work with a coach and develop mastery?

5 Signs You Should Hire A Coach

You See The Possibilities

You see great possibility for yourself, your career, or your business, but you can’t turn that possibility into a clear vision, action, and/or results. In other words, you are stuck.

What is your purpose? What is your vision for your life, career, or business? What are your strengths and how can you use them to make great things happen? A coach works with you to get answers to these questions.

Your Having Challenges

You are having challenges influencing or working with other people to get things done. Leadership – in life and in work – is partly about influencing others.

Many people have challenges with how they communicate, work on teams, and make things happen. A coach can help you develop new skills and behaviors to have more impact when working with other people. Your coach can also help you to understand how to build a powerful network of relationships so that you can get more things done more easily.

Riding the Wall Street Wave: Ways to Succeed in a Volatile Market

by Guest Contributor

Tips and Hints for Your First Stock Market Investment

Very few things in life stay the same for too long and you can certainly apply that philosophical view to financial markets, where there is often a snooze-you-lose mentality pervading many trader’s thoughts.

The way silver prices are currently reacting to market conditions is a case in point, and you can read the full article on MoneyMorning.com to get the lowdown on that situation. Volatility in many different markets is often only a breaking news story away. So, how do you successfully ride the Wall Street wave?

Timing the market dips

Volatility can bring trading opportunities, but if you want to know how to time the market dips successfully, the simple answer is that you shouldn’t even try, unless you plan to relieve your bank balance of a few extra zeros.

You might get lucky and execute the perfect trade, buying at the lowest entry point and then watching the stock price climb again shortly afterwards, but the point about timing the market dips, is that much of what you achieve will be down to just as much luck as judgment.

The investing mantra that you would do well to keep in the forefront of your mind every time you are tempted to profit from a breaking news story, is that in the long-term, consistency over immediacy will give you a much better survival rate and allow you more chance to post solid gains.

3 Internet Business Ideas You Can Try Right Now

by Guest Contributor

3 Internet Business Ideas You Can Try Right Now If you’ve ever tried to list all the ways you can make money online, you probably know that there’s no way to even scratch the surface. Internet business ideas come in droves, and every day there are more ways to monetize your presence on the web.

From being Santa Claus for kids to running an affiliate marketing business, you can put just about any talent or interest to work online. Here are 3 Internet business ideas that you can try right now:

3 Internet Business Ideas You Can Try Right Now

1. Sell Information

Do you know how to do something? Are you an expert at finding the perfect hunting spot? Do you play an instrument? Have you kept your happy marriage going for multiple decades? Do you make the best fried chicken, hands down?

Any type of information can become a product to sell if you package it properly. You can draw from your career – maybe you have an advanced degree that isn’t being put to good use in your job. There is nothing stopping you from writing an eBook or creating a video that teaches others what you know, and selling that material.

Modern Couple’s Money Guide, Well-Heeled and Rich By Thirty

by Guest Contributor

Couple worried about the investing choices overwhelming them

Lesley-Anne Scorgie is the founder of MeVest, a money school helping North Americans reach their financial potential. She’s also the bestselling author of Modern Couple’s Money Guide, Well-Heeled and Rich By Thirty. Follow her @LesleyScorgie

What causes trouble in paradise isn’t who picked up their socks or took out the trash (though those things can be annoying too). It’s money; how it’s spent, saved, invested and given.

According to Capital One, 8 in 10 couples fight about money and nearly half feel their partner’s attitude towards money is different from their own . Monetary philosophies are deeply rooted in a person’s values, thus financial compatibility is as important as personality. “Money problems” are cited as a leading cause of divorce and are rarely about money . They’re representations of issues like independence, greed, trust, respect, and commitment.

Take for example a couple where one partner is a compulsive spender and the other is a saver. The saver is bound to feel like their honey is putting the couple’s dreams for the future in jeopardy just to keep up with the latest and greatest cars, clothes, shoes, home décor and more.

Meanwhile the spender has a YOLO attitude and thinks their penny pinching partner is a cheapskate.

In this scenario financial brawls are inevitable unless the couple learns to bridge their financial gaps by understanding where their partner’s views on money came from and by working together towards common financial goals.

How To Succeed With Money As a Couple

Play As A Team

Teamwork and financial boundaries are critical when planning your future with someone. Though you may not like to deal with financial matters, it’s irresponsible to ignore them. Consider the task of checking-up on your finances like regular maintenance on your car. If you care for your vehicle, it will run smoothly and for longer than if you neglect it. You don’t want to find yourself in a bad financial position you weren’t aware you were creating.

All That You Need To Know About Income Replacement Life Insurance Products

by Guest Contributor

Income Replacement Life Insurance People are often confused about what to do with the life insurance benefits they are entitled to receive after the policyholder’s demise – invest it to generate regular income, use a part of the lump sum each month until it lasts, or find another way to channelize the proceeds productively.

In fact, a nationwide study by Forbes LearnVest on Life Insurance revealed that 66% people do not fully understand their life insurance policies. This brings us to an important point – simply leaving behind a substantial amount as death benefit is not sufficient, your dependents must also know how to put that lump sum to effective use, failing which, they may face financial problems.

Policyholders may feel that a suitable life insurance product with a large sum assured is sufficient for their dependent family to achieve important life goals and maintain their lifestyle. However, the fact remains that regular expenses need to be met on a monthly basis, and a one-time lump sum may sometimes leave the beneficiaries puzzled about how to invest/use it, especially if they are not familiar with the financial mumbo-jumbo.

Income Replacement Life Insurance Products

Bearing this in mind, a large number of global life insurance companies have launched a new product variant of life insurance – an income replacement life insurance product. These products come to rescue, if the policyholder feels that his/her family may not be able to efficiently handle/invest the lump sum payout.

Income replacement products, upon the insured’s demise, pay out part of the benefit as a lump sum, and also pay a regular monthly income over a period, say 10-15 years. In other words, income replacement products split the entire sum assured into a one-time payment, plus a continued monthly payment as well. But what makes these products really interesting is the fact that the total amount, beneficiaries/nominees receive, over a period, is more than the sum assured specified in the policy.