Archive for December, 2008

9 Tips on Starting Your Blog

Sunday, December 28th, 2008

 

Sponsor: TBA

1. Choose your topic.

Before you start you will need to think about your blog’s topic. Remember if you pick a good topic people will be coming back to your blog. The more people you have, the more money you can make. Before blogging you need to brainstorm. Take a week and write your ideas in a notebook. When thinking about a topic you will need to consider these things:

  • Things that you are interested in.
  • Thing that you have a lot to say about.
  • Thing that other people might be interested in.

2. Choose and describe your audience.

After you know what you are writing about you will need to describe your audience. This will help you to tailor your content to them. After all they are the once that will be making you money. These are the people we are tailoring our blog to:

  • People looking for advice in blogging, finance and consumer rights.
  • People who know what they want to do, but are not sure how to start (or do it)

3. Find similar blogs.

Look for blogs that are covering the same topic. That way you can get a feel of what people are interested in.

4. Choose your platform.

You have a lot of choices. You will need to decide for yourself what you want. We prefer to host our own Wordpress installation because it gives us a lot of flexibility. However you might want to consider these

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9 Tips on improving your credit score

Sunday, December 21st, 2008

Sponsor:

Iowa Computer Services – Computer Repair Maintenance and Training, Iowa Wedding Photography, Des Moines, Iowa Senior Pictures

 

1. Pay your bills on time.

If your credit card bill (or sometimes utility bill) is not paid on time it will reflect on your credit report. Late payments will have a HUGE impact on your credit rating. PAY YOUR BILLS ON TIME!!!!

2. Don’t use all of your credit.

Amount of outstanding debt is another significant factor in the calculation of your credit score. If your debt % is more than 30% of your credit line, you might be penalized by getting your score lowered.

3. Be careful when applying for loans/credit cards

If you are applying for too many cards in the short period of time your credit score will be lowered. As a rule of thumb don’t apply for more than 1 credit card a month.

4. Be careful when co signing a loan

Remember if a person you cosigned with defaults on the loan (or has late payments) your credit score might be affected. You will also be responsible for the loan if that person doesn’t pay. Choose very carefully the people you are going to co-sign with.

5. Monitor your credit

Make sure to check your credit report at least every 4 months. You have an opportunity to get a free credit report by going to

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