Commercial Construction

Hotel SEO is one of the most crucial elements of any hotel’s online marketing strategy. A competent online marketing agency employs strategic search marketing tools and formulae to put the hotel website on the first page of the organic or paid listings in prominent search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN or Bing according to the preferred keyword and phrases. Search engine optimization can also help with branding the hotel and increase its online presence and exposure.

However, it should be noted that SEO is a technical job that requires a professional and systematic approach and planning. It is important to carefully examine the search engine behavior of internet users and potential customers. In the planning phase, time should be invested in researching appropriate keywords oriented on brand, product, location and context. An efficient SEO manager will also determine ROI potential of each keyword or phrases, evaluate the volume of each keyword as well the level of competition for those select keywords. Although, focus of preliminary research should also be on fragmented keyword searches, misspellings and alternate keywords which could be used by potential customers.

SEO strategy should ideally be bespoke and customized for the property and its restaurants or amenities, and should cover components such as metatags, keyword density, site navigation, menu links, Google places optimization, search engine submission, 301 redirects among many others. It is helpful to think globally while devising SEO strategies because clients are expected to have access to the hotel website from any corner of the world. A proficient positioning or ranking on popular search engines can exponentially increase the footfall, and consequently the revenue of any hotel.

SMO is another strategy which can help a hotel brand solidify its online presence via customer engagement. Online social media can offer a vast range of creative promotional solutions through the imaginative use of platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Foursquare, blogs and much more. Social media is used by over billion internet users, which makes it a great source for traffic as well as a must for every hotel’s online marketing plan. It should be taken into consideration that social media marketing is more than just one size fits all. Adequate time should be taken to understand the goals and objectives and then a customized hotel social media optimization strategic plan should be devised.

SMO can also play an important role in turning around the search engine ranking for a hotel business. Effective hotel SMO is vital for community management, communicating with customers and connecting online consumers with the brand which can result in landing more visitors and bookings. Keeping this in mind, social media should be incorporated in online marketing strategy of any hotel website. A fine tuned and cutting-edge SMO tactic can radically draw potential customers to a hotel’s website from every corner of globe and bring significant return on investment for any hospitality or tourism business.

If you are attempting to learn which of the marketing initiatives is leading to conversions and traffic, you might want to look at the availability of the online performance tools like Google Analytics. A high-quality reporting tool makes it easier to concentrate the marketing efforts on the more important areas that are likely to result in the best return on investment.

Google Analytics offers a perfect resource for monitoring all-types of websites. If you are running an e-commerce site, you have the opportunity to monitor specific data related to user interaction on the website, which might relate to specific actionable methods to increase sales, how visitors are navigating the site, and date related to items purchased. If you have a situation of shoppers abandoning the shopping cart mid way through a shop, you are able to use the stored data to established with pages might be causing the problems. A specific page can easily be changed or updated in an attempt to increase sales or conversions.

Tracking information offered by Google Analytics is wide-ranging and includes basic information for all pages, including:

Bounce rate: Use this data to see which pages seem to be receiving the higher bounce rates. Adjustments can now be made to those pages in the hope of improving on the performance.

Exit Pages: Get a complete ideal of which pages a visitor is more likely to leave the website. For instance if the highest rated exit page is a sign-up newsletter page that features as a standard part of the check out process, it might be necessary to make some chances to that page. Moving the sign-up box elsewhere on the website might be more beneficial.

Conversion rate: By referring to the data on the conversion page you are able to monitor the marketing efforts to establish which promotional strategies are working most effectively.

Social media data: You can use the social media information to see which pages are shard and most popular. This should give a great indicator of the listed products that should be promoted more heavily.

Device used: If you start to notice a high volume of traffic coming from the mobile devices, you might want to look at developing a dedicated app or mobile site.

Income per keyword/page: A further quality of the tracking tools is to see which keywords and pages are turning into successful sales. With a list of buyer keywords you are able to target those more aggressively in the hope of further increasing the sales.

By taking the necessary action to monitor the most successful pages and inventory, it is that much easier for a company to continue to promote the most successful pages and products available on the e-commerce websites.

What’s an about me page, you might ask?

It’s a page that you should have on your blog or website that tells your visitors a little bit more about who you are and what you do. If you have a blog or a website, you most definitely need to have an about me page. In case you didn’t know this, statistics show that it’s the most visited page on a blog after the last post.

This piece of information should stand out on its own. This means that you have to have such information/detail about you on a separate page that can be found through a specific tab, usually named “About name of the author.”

Why the Need of such Information?

People who are going to land on your site and like your content, which I certainly hope they will, are also going to want to know more about you, especially regarding things like…

What do you do?
What is your background in your field?
What is your expertise?
What’s in it for them?
What is the best way to reach you?
The more specific your answers to these questions, the better your about me page will be.

Show that you’re Approachable

This is the place to show your readers and potential clients or customers that you are approachable. Be friendly in your ways of expressing yourself, do not write in a stiff manner in a matter of fact fashion, and make sure that it’s clear that you are here to help.

Your choice of contact is up to you, but the more choices the visitor gets, the more chances you’ll get to be contacted for potential business. Some people may be more comfortable using email and some may be more comfortable calling you over the phone. Yet, some people might prefer email over contact form, etc.

If in turn you’re not comfortable with people calling you, you don’t have to include your phone number. It’s not a must do, it toally up to you.

Show Proofs of what you’ve Done

If you run a business using your blog or website as a platform to attract potential clients or customers your about me page is a very good place to show your audience what you’ve accomplished so far.

If you have any interesting and professional items, such as an interview or article featuring you, that will show your readers that you are someone to reckon with, this is a very good place to show it off.

Today’s message is a friendly reminder that the Internet is one of the most dynamic places in the world. Yes, we may realize millions of people make legitimate searches on it every second of every day, but it’s easy to forget unscrupulous individuals and their malware are right beside them in significant numbers, too.

Keeping your website healthy and secure are the most essential maintenance and marketing issues in 2019, and a little preventive maintenance is worth a pound of cure.

Clients who come to me with a broken website, or a site that has poor performance, are often surprised to learn that…

their website has been hacked or compromised in some way
a lack of web server maintenance exposes security vulnerabilities
web server updates often break site plugins creating an increase in security vulnerabilities and performance issues
web server firewall setup and updates have been neglected, meaning your website is now exposed to vulnerabilities and direct attacks
improper installation and configuration of the web server have made the site vulnerable to malware and direct attacks.
There are a variety of professional tools web developers use to measure the specific health of your website. For website owners, one of the more popular tools for a quick overview is provided by HubSpot. Their Website Grader provides useful insight as to where improvements can be made concerning your website’s health in general.
While you are checking your website for security vulnerabilities and performance issues, take a few extra minutes and put your marketing hat on to ask yourself this question: What is my website’s search ranking? Besides being essential for obvious reasons, you may not realize that your website’s search ranking is partly formulated by certain factors that are directly related to its overall health-so they are inextricably intertwined. To review one without the other can quickly lead to a misdiagnosis of your website’s overall health.

Search ranking is the best indicator of your site’s visibility on given search terms and phrases that match your products and services. It’s not difficult to learn if you have the right tool, and this tool is a free service we offer to all website owners whether you’re a customer or not.

For sure, your website’s search ranking is a very complex and dynamic process. Since Google has at least 80% of the search market in North America, we are most concerned with the Google ranking number, which is based on over 200 factors! It’s the best way to know the probability that your website will be visible to any number of related searches. And since your website ranking is dynamically factored, your ranking at a given moment is a snapshot according to present conditions. A high search ranking is the Holy Grail of search engine optimization (SEO).

If your search rank is not where you want to be according to your SEO Score Card, no worries. Even if you are graded low for given keywords (<70), my SEO experts can help improve your ranking month-by-month.

As previously mentioned, some of the more weighted SEO factors are related to your website’s performance, responsiveness, and security. Here’s how it’s related.

For example, an experienced web developer can analyze and mitigate any performance and security issues related to,

Un-optimized programming
Un-optimized page responsiveness (viewability on mobile devices)
SPAM hacks
Slow host server
Host server too far away (slow page loads)
Improperly sized image files
Too many unnecessary plugins
Outdated plugins
Unnecessary redirects
Outdated CMS
… and, we’re just getting started!
If any of the mentioned reports or information provide you with motivation to improve your website ranking (SEO), performance, and/or security, please contact me for a no-obligation consultation. I’m here to help you take advantage of business opportunities by utilizing the best and most affordable website design techniques along with expert-level services in Kansas City and beyond!

If you want to choose a reliable SEO company that can give you the best results, you are on the right page. An easy way to choose a good company is to read reviews, website content, and case studies. If you want to narrow your research, you can follow the five tips given below. Read on.

Tip #1: Define your SEO Goals

First of all, you need to define your Search Engine Optimisation goals. If you don’t know which areas of your website you need to work on, you may want to hire a service provider to perform a digital analysis of your website.

Tip #2: Look for a Provider that can Track your Data

You should look for an SEO agency to track your website data, such as click-through rates, site visits, contact forms, and phone calls, just to name a few. If you want to choose the right Strategies for your website, make sure you hire the company that can track your data.

Tip #3: Read Reviews

Reading reviews is the best way to find out if the company is the right one. You can read the online reviews and testimonials about the agency. You can search for these reviews on major search engines, such as Google. Make sure you read reviews left by the previous users of the agency. These users will give you a deeper insight into the service quality of the provider. If there are a lot of negatives reviews, chances are that the provider is not a good service provider.

You can also contact the agency to ask for case studies. This will help you get a better idea of what the agency can do for you.

Tip #4: SCHEDULE A CONSULTATION

Before you hire the services of the company, you may want to schedule a consultation. The agency representatives will be more than happy to perform industry research and suggest some powerful strategies. With a consultation, you can get a much better idea about the type of service you can get from the agency.

Also, it is important that you develop trust with your Search Engine Optimisation agency. Make sure you understand what the agency representative is trying to explain. Do you like their attitude? During the consultation, you can also ask questions until you are satisfied.

Tip # 5: DEFINE YOUR BUDGET

Finally, since you cannot hire a service provider that you can’t afford, make sure you set a budget before you look for a provider. Don’t forget to ask about the package deals the agency offers. This will help you find out if the service provider can offer the services in your price range.

The majority of agencies offer a lot of packages based on the client’s budget. As far as choosing a package is concerned, make sure you consider your budget limits. Spending too much money in the beginning is not a good idea either.

Popular, these tips will help you choose the best SEO agency to meet your business needs.

Our businesses also differ in terms of interface with clients. If you do “business to business” transactions, the number of people you interact with on a daily basis may differ from someone whose business relies on interacting with consumers. Appointments may be more practical in some instances than others. You have to tailor-make how you manage access to your particular situation if you are to eliminate distractions. Having said that it is important to note that some people do not mind spending the whole day at the office entertaining friends, visitors, and casual acquaintances dropping into the office whenever they feel like it. Do not be that kind of person. It sets the wrong kind of example to junior staff and can harm one’s productivity because these people take up time that you do not have and besides you want to cultivate a professional environment.

The demands of the day are enough to fill the eight working hours available unless if you tend to stay back and play catch up. How do you stay competitive in the market if there is no separation between work and play? Anybody serious about success and achieving effective results will put boundaries that are clear so that there is no confusion. Entrepreneurs are more susceptible to this especially when the workplace is easily accessible. The fact that you are your own boss even puts more responsibility on you to maintain self-discipline and self – management. I have written a whole book called, “Achieve More through Self – Leadership. In it I walk you through the practicalities of how you can get better results through managing self.

Appointments are an important way of not only managing time but managing life. They help you become more structured and productive. Some people seem not to be able to honour their appointments. I once attended a job interview that was supposed to start at 10:30am. By 11:30am there had been no communication about what was happening or when the supposed job interview was going to take place. I decided at the point that this company was probably not good enough for me to join because if you don’t respect people’s time you probably do not respect them.

You may be saying appointments are just not for me yet you never rock up at the doctor, dentist, lawyer or hairstylist without an appointment. Why is that the case? Because you simply won’t see the dentist without an appointment. They have given you conditions acceptable to them. We tell the world around us how to treat us by what we allow.

Some people are always available when you want to see them. If you are always free to see people at short notice, you are probably not that organized. The one who owns a diary will manage the one who doesn’t own one. Why? Because the one without the diary is always available, even though he is very likely to forget important meetings, dates and engagements because of a lack of organization. I used to have a boss who kept a diary and whatever you promised to do in the line of work, he would write down, including the day and time you said he would have it by. You would of-course forget because you didn’t record it like he did and when the time to deliver comes, guess who would be found wanting. It was then that I decided that I do not commit to an action that I am not willing to write down because, what’s written gets done!

You may be saying, “what if my business feeds off the “walk-ins? The fact that your business relies on walk – in customers should not be an excuse for disorder. Sometimes those who drop in unannounced may indeed be potential customers, suppliers, cold-calling salespeople, and even worthwhile business contacts. There is nothing wrong if the call is beneficial to you and your business but I believe there must be a structure and way of doing things that follows certain pre-set principles. I remember seeing a poster in an office that said “if you don’t have anything to do please don’t do it here”. It’s humorous yes, but true. Appointments help to structure your day and helps you allocate time to what’s important. This means you can focus on your most important asset: the paying customer. There is nothing as bad as walking into a place wanting to do business and staff are inattentive because there is just a demand on their time. I am more understanding if the personnel are not busy entertaining social visits at work.

In conclusion, you know your business situation better than any of us. All we can do is make recommendations that will enable efficiency that leads to growth. Some of you may actually need a personal assistant who will put order in your office and focus on the things you are not willing to do that will enable to focus on the highly value things you ought to do such as running a business.

Do you think successful people are just plain lucky?

Successful people did not become successful because they were lucky.

They did not achieve success by accident. Being at the right place at the right time, meeting relevant people, reading the appropriate book, did not come about accidentally or by luck.

Luck is brought about by Labour Under Correct Knowledge.

Successful people prepared themselves. Instead of giving up on anything they started and wanted to achieve they got stronger by learning more.

Success is a methodical, orderly and deliberate process of deciding what you want to do with your life, what are the steps that you need to undertake to get you there, and lastly what you will do once you get there.

One of the most important aspects, if not the most important aspect to success, is the ability to visualise your successful outcome and stay focused on it until you achieve it.

“Imagination is more important than knowledge, knowledge is limited.” – Albert Einstein

Successful people understood the potential power behind knowledge, yet they also understood that, for them to close the gap between where they are and where they wanted to be, they would have to piece together the enigma that is most often referred to as “life”.

They had to build a picture, a vision, of success in their mind, and then go about taking action on creating that envisioned life.

In much the same way, you have to be serious about your present and future, you need to have the knowledge that is required so you, too, may close the gap: you need to be and remain determined to devote yourself to taking massive action to build your business of succeeding in life.

You, too, will need to see the end, your dream and destiny that you desire in your mind’s eye. It is up to you to take the necessary and relevant action to make it all happen. It’s just like going to the doctor with a particular health problem.

The doctor may prescribe a medication for you to take four times a day, yet he cannot be there with you to ensure that you are taking the medication.

It comes back to deciding to be responsible for your life.

Have you noticed how it all stems from that one attitude? Being responsible for your own life.

Your success, your being responsible 100% for you to live your dream life starts here.

When you accept 100% responsibility for yourself and your current life situation, you will have the power to move towards those things you truly desire in life: which is success in all areas of your life.

This life-changing article is about possibilities and opportunities, knowledge and tools. It will help expose your unique course in life.

It will inspire, support and motivate you to excel, to do what successful people do, to have all that successful people have, and to become a shining example of a successful person.

Here, you’re not being told what you couldn’t do, instead you are being told to shoot for the stars. And above all, you are being shown how to shoot for those stars.

“A person is what he thinks about all day long.” – Emerson

Interesting thought, wouldn’t you think? So much so, it’s worth repeating: “A person is what he thinks about all day long.”

Success and happiness cannot happen if you possess the same old thoughts and beliefs.

If you do not change your mind, if you do not get rid of the unsupportive thoughts and beliefs, you will inevitably remain stuck in your old ways. Not much, if anything, will change.

Let’s give you a quick overview on how change comes about:

Your BEHAVIOUR, how you act (or perhaps do not act), controls your success or failure. Your ability to attain high levels of success is dependent upon your actions and behaviours. Your results are the outcome of your behaviour. Now let’s consider where your behaviours come from and what controls them?

Your FEELINGS command your behaviour. Every action that you take is first filtered through your feelings that reside in your subconscious mind. How you feel about something determines what you do and how well you do it. So where do your feelings come from?

Your ATTITUDES create and influence your feelings. Your attitude is your perspective from which you view life. Whatever attitude you have about anything will affect how you feel, which, in turn, affects how you act. Where do your attitudes come from?

Your BELIEFS create, control and influence your attitudes. What you believe about anything will determine your attitude about it, which will create your feelings, and then which will direct your behaviour and action. Belief patterns are so powerful that two people who are in the same situation could perceive things completely differently. It only requires us to believe what we see and how we see it. We all have thousands of beliefs – big and small. And where do your beliefs come from?

Your THOUGHTS create, control and influence your beliefs. Your thoughts are real and are immensely powerful. Everything you accept from the outside world and everything you feed yourself from within is a product of your thoughts. Everything starts as a thought.

So, it goes without saying you need to learn to control your thoughts. And when you do, you will automatically control your beliefs, your attitudes, your feelings and, consequently, your behaviour and actions.

The big secret to success:

Learn to control your thoughts and you will influence your behaviours and actions. It’s all a mind-set. That’s what we’ve been saying all along.

Success is predictable and is not achieved by accident.

Have the mind-set of the successful people and you will achieve success. Believe and it is yours!

“There is a great future in front of you, you can leave your past behind.” – Joel Osteen

Science of success experts have concluded that the brain is a goal-setting organism.

That is fantastic news for us: for whatever goal we give to our subconscious mind, it will work for us day and night, 24/7, to achieve it for us; to make it a reality.

The principal breakthrough that scientists made was that we do not need to waste our precious time and effort trying to change old thoughts and behaviours: we just simply create new ones.

And the other discovery they made was that we can continue to create new thoughts, new memories, new behaviours, new skills, and learn new things for as long as we are alive on this earth.

Now, with the new discoveries in recent years, it has been scientifically proven that our capacity to achieve and succeed literally has no limits.

Our brain has the capacity to continually learn during our entire lifetime.

Our brain can form new thoughts, can have new memories, and can learn new things by the millions, no matter what your age is. By the millions.

That’s how many new things we can learn, that’s how many new skills we can learn, that’s how many new thoughts we can have, that’s how many new behaviours we can adopt.

This is encouraging because there is no limit on your capacity to achieve new things.

No limits whatsoever for the human brain to learn, memorise, develop, achieve and perform at higher levels than ever imagined. It makes no difference what your age is: you are capable of learning anything new that you want to learn.

That adds to what we spoke of earlier: no more excuses.

“The future belongs to those who prepare for it today.” – Malcolm X

Your brain has the capacity to achieve way beyond what was ever thought possible. So now is the time to break out of your limited thinking and start dreaming big and imagining unlimited possibilities.

Becoming successful is not impossible.

It is a choice you make through a decision. Every day, step-by-step, you may climb the mountain of success if you’ve decided to do so, if you’re committed to accomplish what the others think impossible.

Design your future now.

Prepare to receive what you desire.

Thanks to the phenomenal advances made in cognitive science and the development of NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming), personal change, personal transformation, has come a very long way.

In fact, personal growth is no longer a mystery.

NLP has brought to light that change, transformation and growth can be fast, reliable, and even fun. It has shown us that we do not need to spend thousands of hours slaving away to increase our creative-thinking abilities.

By practicing a few simple exercises and applications, you can start your creative juices flowing, and you may even amaze yourself at the quality and quantity of good ideas that you can come up with to expedite your success.

It can allow you to achieve something you seek within days and months as opposed to years and decades. That’s the power of the progress science has made on how the brain works, and also how you can have your mind to be your best ally in achieving anything you want.

Learn to live as you like by no longer living as you dislike.

Are you ready to get on the road to success and fulfilment?

Bear in mind, much like everything else in life, success requires practice and massive, consistent action.

“Success doesn’t mean the absence of failures; it means the attainment of ultimate objectives. It means winning the war, not every battle.” – Edwin C Bliss

Do you feel as if you’ve outgrown your circle of friends? Perhaps you do not feel safe or understood any longer. There may be fewer and fewer things you can share with people in your habitual circle, and it leaves you feeling lonely or isolated. If so, you are not alone. Welcome to one of the core dynamics of continuous growth!

As we continue to evolve, many of us struggle with a sense of not quite fitting in with our traditional community or tribe: we may have expanded or changed beyond the borders of tribal norms, and no longer find the same sense of belonging there. Other members may have tightened the tribal rules to foster a sense of security. As a result, we may feel a sense of disconnection or alienation.

In truth, each one of us belongs to many tribes simultaneously: there is your original tribe – the family you were born into – and then there are all the communities of choice you have joined: your work tribe, your social circles, your faith-based community, your neighborhood, and more. These communities are not static; they are in continuous flux because they consist of individuals who are in continuous states of change. When there is a lot of change happening in either the individual or the community, a sense of dissonance results.

How are we to deal with this? First, it is important to recognize that tribal allegiances were historically forged for survival. They were adapted over the course of centuries to ensure the safety and survival of the group. Survival required that individuation be sacrificed for the trade-off of security.

In modern society, the tables are flipped. Whether we enjoy it or not, change is essential for survival at every level of being. The pace of change is driven by technological advances and happens with increasing rapidity: sociologists estimate that more change has taken place in society over the course of the past 100 years, than in the totality of the previous 6,000 years. Individual adaptation now is a requirement for survival, and the pace of individual change does not always match the pace at which our various tribal communities evolve. The resulting dissonance can cause intense friction and pain.

Dissonance also results from confusion between the concepts of ‘connection’ and ‘community.’ We tend to equate one with the other, when they really relate to different qualities. Connection relates to connectivity: the objective physical technology or media that enables us to build community, but which does not represent the quality of that community. Connectivity simply offers the opportunity to connect with others through internet, texting, phone calls, or any other social networking options.

Community is the result of building relationship through meaningful interaction over time. There is no shortcut; it is a process that develops when bonds of trust and intimacy are nurtured and honored.

And here lies a caveat: When we confuse connectivity with community, we depersonalize the sacred nature of true community and start relating to people as objects. Instead of developing intimacy over time, we collect friends on social network sites or try to buy people’s allegiance. Yet friending is simply an act of connecting; it does not create intimacy.

In fact, social experiments indicate that technologically dominated connectivity results in alienation and social collapse over time. In a groundbreaking social experiment conducted by Josh Harris, one of the founders of social networking on the internet, he found that the more people’s private lives were exposed by 24/7 technology, the more their sense of intimacy and relationship deteriorated until the community collapsed in violence and self-destructive behavior.

It is time to revisit our concepts of community so we can create tribes that offer a true sense of intimacy and belonging.

In his 1987 book, The Different Drum: Community Making and Peace, psychologist M. Scott Peck described several core characteristics of true community. Beyond the obvious components of inclusivity, commitment and participatory consensus, Peck pointed out the quality of embracing diversity through realism. When each member contributes their unique viewpoint from a place of humility and goodwill, the community benefits from a broader perspective in which to better grasp the full context of a situation. In other words, mutual tolerance helps members to embrace one another’s different viewpoints as an integral part of the whole, instead of imposing a forced compliance to groupthink or cohesion.

In an environment like this, members experience and express compassion and respect for one another. They allow others to share their vulnerability, to learn and grow, and to express who they truly are. When conflict arises, they learn to resolve it with wisdom and grace. Members listen to and respect each others’ gifts, accept each others’ limitations, celebrate their differences, and commit to find solutions together rather than to fight against each other. Indeed, the true spirit of community is the spirit of peace, love, wisdom and power. The source of this spirit may be seen as an outgrowth of the collective self or as the manifestation of a Higher Will.

Does this description of community sound spiritual to you? It is indeed, because Spirit is the common denominator among all of us, regardless of how separate we feel from others.

As human beings, we often experience a socio-economic sense of separation from others because of different opinions, beliefs, expectations, language, culture, or interests, since each one of us expresses these in a way uniquely different from anyone else. And still, we continue to differentiate! In this ongoing process, we continue to evolve or devolve in response to life. A community that felt like a good fit last year may no longer work today; the places where we felt embraced, now may suffocate us. Over the course of a lifetime, we can expect to outgrow and change allegiances to many of the tribal communities we once belonged to.

And yet, when we transcend the layers of physical appearance, mental beliefs and socio-economic conditioning, we find in the presence of Spirit a common denominator in everyone around us. Perhaps it is time to expand our tribal definitions to embrace a spiritual community that includes all of mankind as children of God.

Mother Teresa admonished her nuns to see Jesus in every leper they encountered, to find His presence as they looked into the eyes of the homeless. When we can look past the issues that divide us to find omnipresent Divinity in each other, we will uncover the foundations of true community.

Spiritual community transcends all socio-economic borders, beliefs and backgrounds. It is inclusive because it operates on voluntary self-responsibility and mutual compassion, and its doors are open to everyone.

Building this type of community takes time: time to listen, to hear, to respond and to participate. Take a few moments to read the description of spiritual community again. Then, make time in your life to foster that type of connection with people who matter to you. You are one of the architects of community in your life, and you can participate in building a tribe where you belong.

What would happen to you if your home life was more organized than it is right now? Can work-life balance be achieved? What are the tools at our disposal? Could scheduling appointments and keeping them at home help us save time and prioritize?

What is the challenge we face? I sometimes find that time spent at home can be the busiest time, especially in the times we live in. Imagine someone working from home, home-schooling children, and sometimes even doing a side hustle. Imagine also the full-time home-based entrepreneur. How do they manage to do all they need to do in a day?. We are living in a time when many entrepreneurs and even company employees have adopted work- at – home culture. This comes with its challenges as the lines become blurred between home and work. These blurred lines and constraints on the limited resource called time result in over-worked, under-rested, burnt-out individuals. Whilst good time management has been encouraged and indeed, embraced in the workplace, I believe more needs to be done in changing the mindset for the elusive work-life balance to be achieved.

What are the tools at our disposal? To manage time effectively at home, there are many interventions one can employ including setting goals for the day, prioritizing wisely, setting a time limit for every task, organizing oneself, and instituting the discipline of appointments. Yes, an appointment at home! We can spend time pontificating on the pros and cons of each intervention, however, I believe we need to focus on appointments and see how this can powerfully change the course of one’s day regardless of whether it’s a workday or weekend. Life is busy as it is without any intrusions. The question is how do you handle the one who announces that they are at the gate. These can be friends, neighbors, a salesman of some product you do not even need. I am not promoting regimentation here but rather a culture of filling your day with what’s important. Everything that we succeed at is because we carefully plan and execute it. I am a firm believer that you cannot manage time if you do not manage yourself thus I implore you to incorporate planning and appointments into your repertoire. I am not talking about something I do not do. I have to achieve many things in a day therefore I set appointments with my work, others, and myself.

Could scheduling appointments and keeping them on the home front help us save time and prioritize? Whereas we have established that it is a normal business practice to set appointments and keep them, we need to abandon the liberal open-door policy of allowing all and sundry to have access to us as and when they please on the home front. Please understand where I am coming from. We each have greatness within us but for us to achieve it we need to culture great habits. Employing the use of appointments at home and seeing only those people you had agreed to see removes non-essential encounters especially during the most productive hours. I know this will vary with culture, geographical region, or even level of affluence, whether you live in a low density or high-density residential area, but doesn’t negate the need to be organized and effective. Controlling access determines how organized you are and how well you will work and rest when the time for scheduled rest comes.

What do we need to do differently? We need to be disciplined and diligent, learn to say no, now is not a good time, let’s make an appointment for next week. What are the benefits of this approach? You are not always fire-fighting to meet deadlines, You are not always tired because you have not taken time out to rest. You have set aside enough time to spend with your loved ones or a loved one. If you are a busy person, I am sure you appreciate what I am saying. Whether it’s time to work uninterrupted, family time, or “me-time”, it takes some kind of order to enjoy it.

I am not saying that those that come unannounced are bad people. No, not at all, they probably are people you enjoy spending time with. Nevertheless, there must be prior communication so that you can attend to your visitor(s) when it is convenient for both you and them. It can be quite disrupting and a whole day can just pass by without achieving anything that you had planned to do.

As we grow older we begin to appreciate that rest and recovery need to be scheduled. The fact that I am relaxing doesn’t mean that I don’t have anything to do. One therefore cannot assume that just because you are at home you are available. Maybe you have scheduled that time to rest. That is important. You need to make an appointment with yourself, spouses need to also set aside time for each other. Parents need to schedule a time to spend with their children. When you have some sort of order in your life you determine who sees you and who you see. It also means that your relationships will be healthy and that makes you a happier person.

In conclusion, I believe that the work-life balance can be achieved. There are many tools at our disposal just like it is in the workplace.I believe we could do more and be happier if we are disciplined enough to make only the commitments we can keep.I am certain that setting appointments and keeping them at home help us save time and prioritize.