Cost of childcare putting women's pensions at risk

Rachel Lacey

Childcare costs could be putting women’s retirement finances at risk, according to the gender equality charity, the Fawcett Society.

Childcare costs could be putting women’s retirement finances at risk, according to the gender equality charity, the Fawcett Society.

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This Guy Negotiated a 45% Raise. Heres Exactly How He Did It

If you’ve ever been hesitant to negotiate your salary with your employer, this should give you the nudge you need.

“I recently decided I wanted to move on from my job for a variety of reasons,” said Michael, 27, in a recent post on Reddit. “One of the main reasons was I felt I was undervalued.

“So with a lot of research … I went from $58,000 to $85,000.”

That’s a 45% leap in pay!

To clarify: In the end, Michael took a new job. But first, he got his existing employer to offer the same raise.

So he had a 45% raise offer on the table to remain in the same position with his company.

How to Get the Paycheck You Deserve

“I felt that the travel, the skills needed, the bad environment and the responsibility needed to do my job well were supposed to pay more,” Michael told The Penny Hoarder.

Michael’s an automation engineer who’d been working in the industry for eight years. He was with his employer for 4.5 years, the first three as a custom controls technician.

As other Redditors pointed out, the move from technician to engineer is not a natural progression in the field. That was the first factor in Michael’s lower-than-market pay.

“I was getting bored with tech work,” he explained in the comments under his post. “I went to some of the managers in the company and showed interest to learn more.”

He went on to learn new job skills on his own time, watching YouTube videos and borrowing training computers from work. He also recommends these sites:

• Khan Academy: free resources across subjects for all ages

• MIT OpenCourseWare: free online course materials for actual MIT courses

• Codeacademy: free coding classes

Here are more places to find free online courses.

After about a year of effort to show his employer he was serious about moving up, Michael got the engineering job.

While he didn’t say it explicitly, Michael’s ability to take control of his own career is certainly a factor in his success.

“Take opportunities as they are offered, and never stop learning,” he told fellow redditors.

However, after two years in the new position, he was ready to take the next step and demand compensation that matched his qualifications and work.

How to Know You’re Undervalued

While the initiative is impressive, such a move within a company can make it tough to ask for the pay your new position deserves.

“The company saw you as a technician in an engineer role and was paying you as such,” suggested Reddit user Kybuck83.

Just as he’d taken the initiative to earn the promotion in the first place, Michael began the necessary work to prove his worth to the company that likely still saw him as the 23-year-old technician hired four years earlier.

Step one? Make sure you’re right.

“I felt I was undervalued, so I needed to prove it,” Michael wrote on Reddit.

Instead of relying on his assumptions or anecdotal evidence from co-workers, he did his research. He recommends these sites for researching salaries:

• Bureau of Labor Statistics — Occupational Outlook Handbook

• Salary.com

• Glassdoor

• And of course, Google job openings and typical salaries for your position.

And keep your location in mind.

Michael points out he lives in the Midwest, where his lower cost of living brings down the typical pay offered for his position. Be ambitious — but realistic.

The salary range for Michael’s position, automation engineer, is $52,000-$101,000, according to PayScale. Geography is the second most important factor in determining where you’ll fall on the scale, after experience.

Michael learned the median salary for his job in his area is $70,000.

“So number one was finished,” he explained on Reddit. “I am being undervalued.”

Create Leverage

Next on Michael’s list was to find another job.

He never meant to lure a better offer out of his current employer. Instead, he was prepared to leave his old company to work for someone who properly valued his skills.

Since it was the first time Michael had put himself out there for a position at this level, he started by polishing his skills as a job applicant.

Before even looking for jobs, he spent an entire week just researching the process:

• how to apply

• how to create a resume

• how to do well in a phone or in-person interview

• how to speak like a professional

• how to accent his strengths

• how to follow-up after an interview

• how to negotiate salary

Then he spent another week applying for jobs, tweaking his resume to appeal to 15 different companies.

“There were many hours at the computer that week,” he told us. “I took a whole day off work and spent 10 hours straight getting started. I spent hours every night after work, sometimes until midnight.”

He found jobs and submitted applications through CareerBuilder, Indeed, Glassdoor and Monster.

He applied for jobs in different industries, but with the same job duties.

The biggest difference between the potential new positions and his current job was the amount of travel. He applied for positions that would allow him to be home a lot more.

“Extra time home is worth money by itself,” Michael said

By the end of the week, he’d lined up three interviews. Within two weeks, he received offers from all three companies.

The offers served a dual purpose: They further reinforced Michael’s suspicion his current company was undervaluing him, and afforded him the freedom to demand what he’s worth.

Salary Negotiation

In addition to the interviewing skills that impressed his potential employers, Michael was bold in his salary negotiations.

First, he says, one company offered a salary range below his bottom line. He declined it.

“Staying strong and not budging on this bottom line is essential,” he explained on Reddit.

In two interviews, potential employers asked Michael to name his salary range, and he aimed high: $75,000-$85,000.

“They seemed OK with it,” he said, even though he’d been hesitant to be the first to name a number at all.

In the end, one company offered him the job for $75,000 — and the other offered $82,000.

A jump from $58,000 to $82,000 in two weeks isn’t too shabby. But it gets better.

When Michael told his employer he was planning to leave for a better opportunity, his employer counted with an even higher offer: $85,000. To stay put.

In case you’re having trouble keeping up, Michael now has three offers on the table, hiking his salary by at least 30%.

The Final Decision

Ultimately, Michael realized he wanted to leave his job and start anew.

“The work I would be doing at the new place was closer to my heart than what I was doing at my original employer,” he told TPH.

“The travel situation was much better. The company was smaller, which was better for me. The company was more stable, and growing.”

Plus, when he mentioned the counteroffer to the company that had offered $82,000, it offered to match that salary.

He would be moving into the same position and duties at a new, better company for 45% more money.

“Getting a 45% raise probably isn’t typical,” Michael acknowledged in the post. “But the fact remains that it is possible to negotiate a better lifestyle.

“It is nerve racking [sic], intense, anxiety inducing and difficult,” he said. “But it is all worth it in the end.”

Sure, a bit of Michael’s situation is unique. He began this journey seriously underpaid at his existing job, and we hope most of you aren’t in that situation.

But for the most part, anyone can take Michael’s advice. Most importantly, you don’t have to settle for whatever opportunity is in front of you.

If you’re tired of your job, figure out how to gain the skills to earn a better one.

If you’re disappointed with your pay, ask for more.

Always do your research. Arm yourself with the information you need to be prepared to get what you want.

And, simply, don’t give up.

“The single most important thing you need to have in your career and your life is persistence,” Michael said. “Never giving up will get you further than the smartest person in the world.”

Your Turn: Have you negotiated a pay raise? What tips can you add from your experience?

Dana Sitar (@danasitar) is a staff writer at The Penny Hoarder. She’s written for Huffington Post, Entrepreneur.com, Writer’s Digest and more, attempting humor wherever it’s allowed (and sometimes where it’s not).

The post This Guy Negotiated a 45% Raise. Here’s Exactly How He Did It appeared first on The Penny Hoarder.

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Pro-train group to seek consulting money

(TNS) — The group leading the push for money to re-establish a passenger train between Scranton and New York City hopes to hire a consultant later this year as a guide to getting the project done. The train would stop in Monroe County. The Northeastern Pennsylvania Alliance, which signed on as the lead agency in November, will seek federal and state money to pay the consultant, said Alan Baranski, the alliance vice president for transportation planning.This [...]

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Heres an Easy Way to Score a Free $20 to Spend at Dicks Sporting Goods

If you or your kids are the sporty type, you may have heard Sports Authority isn’t on top of its game right now.

The struggling chain filed for bankruptcy last week, and is slated to close more than 140 storefronts across the nation.

While this might mean some super sales in the short term, you could be missing a supplier for your future sporting equipment needs. Some things — like running shoes — are not best purchased online.

Luckily, Dick’s Sporting Goods is swooping in to steal the play.

(Mixed sports metaphor? Probably. The closest I’ve ever gotten to competitive athletics was getting picked last for dodgeball in seventh grade. They actually fought over who would have to take me, now that I think about it…)

Get a Free $20 to Spend at Dick’s Sporting Goods

In what seems at first like a low-blow promotion (Look how good I am at sports metaphors! I’m doing it, right?), Dick’s is offering customers a $20 reward when they trade in their Sports Authority “League” loyalty membership card for a Dick’s “ScoreCard.”

Since Sports Authority is already struggling, it’s fair to say any business Dick’s drains from it will hurt like a football to the face.

But it’s great news if your local Sports Authority is closing and you still need a place to buy sporting goods.

The ScoreCard is a pretty sweet deal in its own right: You get a point for every dollar you spend, and when you rack up 300 points, you get $10 to spend at Dick’s.

You’ll also be the kind of VIP who gets access to exclusive coupons and sales events.

And while the free $20 reward probably won’t even cover a new pair of shorts, every little bit helps. Workout gear is expensive!

Get in the Game

Not a Sports Authority League member?

Even though you’ll miss this deal, it’s still free to sign up for the Dick’s ScoreCard.

Then, do yourself one better by paying for your purchases with a cash-back credit card or a discounted gift card to stack your savings.

That’s how we Penny Hoarders play the game.

#winning.

Jamie Cattanach (@jamiecattanach) is a staff writer at The Penny Hoarder. She understands sports really really well. Seriously.

The post Here’s an Easy Way to Score a Free $20 to Spend at Dick’s Sporting Goods appeared first on The Penny Hoarder.

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Ready for $1 Subs at Jimmy Johns? Heres What You Need to Know

Want a great deal on lunch this week?

Go to Jimmy John’s Thursday, April 21, to get a sub for just $1.

The sandwich shop is bringing back this popular promotion in celebration of its annual Customer Appreciation Day.

How to Get a $1 Sub

The promotion is good for in-store orders only.

Go to participating Jimmy John’s between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. this Thursday, and you can get sandwiches #1-6 — ham, roast beef, tuna, turkey, Italian or veggie — plus the J.J.B.L.T. for $1 (plus tax).

If you’re counting calories or carbs, don’t worry — Slims and the Unwich lettuce wrap are included in the promotion. But you might pay extra for wheat bread at some locations.

Subs are limited to “one per person,” but according to the official rules, “If you would like more than one $1 sub, you can go through the line as many times as you like.”

Personal experience tells us those lines are pretty unruly, though, so you might want to cancel your afternoon meetings to get the most out of this deal.

We’re already blocking off a few hours in our calendars.

Pick-up, online and delivery orders will be full price, and the drive-thru will be closed. But don’t worry — Jimmy John’s employees make delightful conversation, and they’ll whip up your sandwich at a disconcerting speed.

Your Turn: What’s your favorite sandwich at Jimmy John’s?

Dana Sitar (@danasitar) is a staff writer at The Penny Hoarder. She’s written for Huffington Post, Entrepreneur.com, Writer’s Digest and more, attempting humor wherever it’s allowed (and sometimes where it’s not).

The post Ready for $1 Subs at Jimmy John’s? Here’s What You Need to Know appeared first on The Penny Hoarder.

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Twenty Key Strategies for Finding Incremental Savings in Your Life

One of my favorite personal finance tactics is to find “incremental savings” in my life and do what it takes to implement them.

So what exactly does “incremental savings” mean? Incremental savings simply refers to the reduction or elimination of the cost of a recurring expense. Typically, incremental savings require only a one-time action up front or a substitution of one action for another so that there’s no change in your time investment. If you find a way to trim your energy bill, then that’s incremental savings. If you find a way to trim your grocery bill that’s repeatable, then that’s incremental savings.

The benefits of incremental savings are obvious. It means smaller bills, so that means you’re going to have more money left behind for other things in life. That usually means lower stress in life and far fewer money worries. More importantly, because they cost very little time – it’s just one up-front task that doesn’t have to be repeated or a substitution of tasks that doesn’t add any additional time – they have very little opportunity cost associated with them. You’re not going to miss out on other things because you’re devoting time to these projects, because they’re either one-shot things you can do in your downtime or substitutions for the things you already do.

Here are twenty of my favorite incremental savings strategies. Hopefully, you’re already doing most of these things. If not, you have a great avenue for easy savings.

Trim your energy bill by replacing light bulbs with LEDs. Many American homes are still lit by incandescent bulbs and CFLs, each of which have their own problems. Incandescent bulbs are very cheap up front, but they have a pretty short lifespan and they gobble energy like there’s no tomorrow. CFLs are better in terms of energy use and have a longer lifespan, but they take a while to warm up and are more expensive than incandescents.

LEDs, on the other hand, light up instantly, have an incredibly long lifespan, use less energy than even CFLs do, and the newer ones offer full spectrum lighting that’s indistinguishable from a normal incandescent. The only drawback is the up front cost, but that’s recouped by the fact that you won’t have to replace one for many years.

The solution is easy: as the bulbs in your home burn out, start replacing them with LED bulbs, one at a time. You’ll find that, before long, light bulbs become a pretty rare purchase and your energy bill will slowly decline, too.

Trim your energy bill by air sealing your home. Air sealing your home simply means looking for places where air freely flows in and out of your home when you don’t want it to happen, such as through window edges, under doors, and through the attic. Doing some basic air sealing can cut down on that air transfer, meaning you keep cool air inside in the summer and warm air inside during the winter. That means that your air conditioning runs less in the summer and your furnace runs less in the winter, which means lower energy bills for you.

Air sealing your home really isn’t that hard, either. It’s mostly just a bunch of very small home improvement projects, such as applying caulk to windows, installing a weather strip on the bottoms of doors, and adding insulation where needed (especially in the attic).

You can find a great free guide for air sealing your home at the Department of Energy’s air sealing website.

Trim your energy bill by opening windows instead of using climate control. During the hottest days of summer and coldest nights of winter, you’re going to want to close your windows tight and turn on the air conditioning or the furnace, depending on the season. However, the reality is that most days and most seasons don’t reach those extremes. Often, the temperature outside isn’t incredibly different than it is inside.

During the nicer winter and summer days and most spring and fall days, consider turning off your heating or cooling system and just opening the windows. You might not have the exact temperature that you want in your home if you do this – the temperature can vary a lot when the windows are open – but it will be in a range where you’ll still be comfortable and, best of all, you won’t be paying the energy bills for heating and cooling.

It’s easy enough. Whenever the temperature outside is within twenty degrees of what you ideally want inside, turn off your air conditioner or furnace and open up some windows. You’ll find that your energy bill goes down and your home still feels wonderful.

Trim your energy bill by running ceiling fans correctly based on the season. A ceiling fan in a room can go a long way toward making it comfortable by encouraging air flow, circulating the air throughout the room. During the summer, you simply want air motion to create the cooling effect that you feel on your skin. During the summer, you’re more interested in having the warm air that collects near the ceiling move toward the middle of the room and the floor where people can feel it. If a ceiling fan is doing its job, it enables you to turn off your furnace or air conditioning at a wider variety of temperatures, saving on your energy bill.

How do you achieve that? Ceiling fans have a little switch on them that changes the direction of the blades. Stand directly underneath the fan with the fan running. If you feel air blowing down on you, then the blades are moving in the right direction for the summer months. Otherwise, if you barely feel air moving at all, the blades are moving in the right direction for the winter months. If the blades are moving in the wrong direction for the season, turn off the fan and flip the switch that controls the direction of the blades and you’re good to go for the next six months or so.

We tend to leave the ceiling fans in our house running most of the time with the blades in the correct seasonal direction. This enables us to rarely turn on our central air or furnace, which cuts down on our energy bill overall since the fans use very little energy.

Trim your cable bill by eliminating premium channels that you don’t watch. Take a look at your most recent cable or satellite bill. What packages are you subscribed to? Do you have a channel package that’s much larger than the “basic” package that’s offered? Do you have any premium channel packages added onto that, like HBO or Starz?

Now, ask yourself how often you actually watch those channels. Do you really watch anything on there with any frequency? Maybe you subscribe to HBO just to watch Game of Thrones, in which case you’re paying somewhere around $180 a year just to watch one television program. Maybe you have a big extended package, but you really only watch two channels 99% of the time and they’re in the most basic package.

The key here is to remember that it’s only worth paying for channels you actually watch. It is never worth paying for channels that you rarely or never watch. Watching a channel for one or two hours a month does not justify an additional $10 or $15 on your cable bill. Focus on keeping the 20% of channels that make up 80% of your viewing and drop the rest.

Trim your cable bill by shopping around for a better cable or satellite service. If you’re not under any sort of contract for your cable or satellite service, you’re a free agent. It’s time to start shopping around for a better offer.

My recommendation is to do as suggested in the previous tip and figure out which channels make up 80% of your television viewing, then start examining packages from various companies which will provide those channels at the lowest possible price. Make sure that you’re factoring in the “teaser” prices that companies offer, as many companies will give you a great rate for the first year of a cable contract, but the prices inflate during the second year. Average the “teaser” and regular prices in that situation.

For starters, the satellite providers (Dish Network and Directv) are available almost everywhere in the United States. Many towns also have a cable provider or two (Mediacom or Time Warner or someone else) and some towns have their own local provider as well. Do your homework and compare all the options, then switch to the one that will save you a bundle each month.

Trim your cable bill by cutting the cord. Another option for cutting your cable bill down to size is simply eliminating that bill and using over-the-air free television signals along with your internet plan and the streaming video services that the internet provides to provide all of the television viewing options you need.

Getting over-the-air television signals is easy and extremely cheap. Just buy a digital antenna at your local electronics store or at Amazon and install it by mounting it on a wall and attaching it to your television. The internal tuner in your television will take care of the rest.

For additional programming, services like Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Instant Video add a ton of additional programming to your television for $10 a month (or less) via your internet connection. Combine that with sports services like MLB.tv and you can easily replace most of what you enjoy from cable for a much lower price.

Trim your credit card bills by negotiating lower interest rates. If you carry a balance on your credit card and face a minimum monthly payment each month, you’ll quickly realize that most of that monthly payment is made up of interest. Rather than repaying what you borrow, most of that check you send in just goes to the company, with only a small fraction actually going to reduce your debt.

If you want to lower your monthly payment, the most effective thing you can do (besides paying it off, of course) is to negotiate a lower rate. Simply call up your credit card company and tell them that you’re struggling to cover the bills and may not be able to do so in the future. Ask for a reduction in interest rate and, if the person you’re talking to can’t do that, ask to speak to that person’s supervisor and ask that person for a lower rate. Remain calm and positive throughout the call.

It’s worth noting here that sometimes credit card issuers will close your account (leaving you still with a bill) or reduce your credit limit if you do this, so be aware that this is a potential outcome. Don’t negotiate your rate on a card that you need.

Trim your credit card bills by using balance transfers. Another approach for reducing your credit card bills is to transfer high interest balances to other credit cards that offer a lower interest rate. Many credit cards offer a zero interest rate on balance transfers, which means every dollar you send in directly pays off the balance.

Many credit cards offer reduced interest balance transfer offers, particularly cards that offer this as a bonus for signing up. They essentially issue a payment on your behalf to your other credit card and then add that payment amount to your new card, where that amount earns zero interest for an extended period of time.

While this doesn’t mean that you can just ignore that transferred amount, as it will eventually have an interest rate again, you often can get away with a reduced payment here for the time being. You can also take advantage of that zero interest rate and make larger payments to get rid of that debt completely before the interest rate comes back. In either case, you’re going to wind up with lower bills, whether now or later.

Trim your credit card bills by switching to another card for primary usage. Different cards have different features. For people who carry a balance, interest rates are a very important part of the equation. For others, the bonus program associated with the card can make a big difference, too, and can save you money in other ways.

First of all, let’s look at the situation where you carry a balance from month to month. In those situations, you should shop around for a card with a lower interest rate and, ideally, one with an introductory balance transfer program so you can move the balance from your higher interest card.

If you don’t carry a balance, you may want to look at a credit card that has a better bonus that comes along with using the card. Cards offer rewards up to as high as 5% cash back or a 5% discount at specific retailers, so if you get a Mastercard or Visa associated with the retailer you shop at most frequently, that can be a sweet deal.

If you’re looking for a better card, you can start looking at The Simple Dollar’s list of the best credit card offers we’ve found.

Trim your student loans by consolidating them. Student loans can be a real burden for anyone who’s freshly graduated from an institution of higher learning.

In general, there’s not much benefit to consolidating federal student loans acquired after 2006, as they have a fixed interest rate. If you do consolidate them to get a longer repayment term, you’ll lower your bills for the moment but you’ll be in repayment for much longer and that will cost you more money in the long run.

The real savings comes from consolidating private loans, which allows you to easily shop around among lenders to find the best deal for consolidating your private student loans. You can drastically reduce both your monthly payment and your interest rate by doing this.

The Simple Dollar has a great guide for student loan consolidation if this is an option that’s useful for you.

Trim your grocery bill by switching to the most cost-effective grocery store in your area. Most people get into a routine of shopping at the same grocery store or two all of the time and don’t even consider changing it. However, it’s very likely that the store you use regularly isn’t actually the best store for your dollar.

I recommend trying to shop at a bunch of different stores over the course of a month or two, buying many of the staples that you usually buy at each different store – buy milk, cheese, bread, vegetables, and so on according to what you normally buy.

Keep track of the receipts and then compare them when you’re done checking out a lot of stores. The store you should be shopping at is the one that offers the best prices on the items you buy regularly. If you do this, your grocery bill will naturally shrink from here forward.

Trim your grocery bill by buying more store brand items and fewer name brand items. Many people gravitate toward name brands due to familiarity and, to a smaller extent, attractive packaging. Yet, when you do this, you’re paying extra for advertising and for a pretty picture on the box. It has virtually no impact on what’s inside the box.

My recommendation for anyone is to try out some generic or store brand versions of the items that normally fill up your grocery list. Try out things like store brand bread, store brand cereal, store brand dish soap, store brand canned tomatoes, store brand frozen vegetables, and so on.

What you’ll find is that most of the time you’ll not even notice a difference between the two except that the store brand costs less, which means that you have more money left in your pocket. Try out store brands, stick with the ones that click for you, and enjoy a lower average grocery bill.

Trim your medication bill by trying generic versions of the medications that you use. If you’re a regular user of prescription medications and your medical insurance isn’t top notch, it’s very likely that there’s a significant price difference for you between the regular version and the generic version of the medication. If the generic version can save you a bundle, it’s worth considering.

Your first step is to talk to your doctor about it. Will the generic medication take care of your problem? Many generics are identical to the name brand medication, but in some cases, they’re not. Your doctor will know whether a generic version is right for you.

If your doctor approves and writes a prescription, go to your pharmacy and give it a try! If it works exactly the same, your prescription expenses will drop through the floor, which can make an enormous difference in your monthly expenses.

Trim your banking bill by switching to a bank without fees for the services that you use. If you use a bank that charges you for having a checking account or constantly dings you with ATM fees, you need a new bank. Those are expenses you really don’t need in your life, especially since there are many banks that don’t charge such fees and competition is heavier than ever in the banking space.

You should look at the multitude of banks and credit unions in your area to see what they offer in terms of interest rates and fees for the services that you use. You should also compare those offerings with what’s available in terms of online only banks, such as Ally Bank and SmartyPig.

If you switch to a bank that eliminates your banking fees and earns you a little more interest, you’ll see your expenses drop naturally and also see a bit more earnings as well without any real effort from you.

Trim your life insurance bill by switching to a term policy (with a few caveats). If you have a fairly recently established universal or whole life insurance policy (within the last year or two), it’s probably going to make short term and long term financial sense to cancel that policy and replace it with a term policy.

The reality is that the “investment” portion of many life insurance policies isn’t that good until you’ve dumped money in it for years and years. If you’ve reached the five year mark or so on such a policy, it actually can become a fairly solid investment, but in the early years, it’s really not very good and you never really fully earn back those years.

If you don’t have a life insurance policy and have any dependents, you should strongly consider getting one, and I recommend a term policy for the biggest benefit you can afford.

Trim your cell phone bill by shopping around for a better plan. Much as with your cable bill, if you’re in a situation where you’re not tied to a cell contract, it makes a ton of financial sense for you to shop around and look at other providers because they often offer great deals for new customers who switch to them (and sometimes you can get the “new customer” deals from your current provider if you mention that you’re considering switching).

Check out the wide array of cell phone providers in your area, including both the big ones like Verizon and Sprint and smaller ones like US Cellular. Figure out which company offers the best deal for you as a new customer on the services that you actually use and then make the big switch.

For the most part, switching cell companies is pretty painless. You keep your same number and the only real difference is that you’re paying a much lower bill to a different provider.

Trim your cell phone bill by considering pay-as-you-go providers, especially if you’re a relatively low intensity user. Many pay-as-you-go companies (like my personal favorite, Ting) actually offer a very good deal for people who aren’t heavy users of cell phones.

Usually, such pay-as-you-go companies offer a la carte offerings where you can pick and choose which services you want. Do you want unlimited texting for a certain dollar amount each month? Or what about a capped number of texts for a lower amount? Unlimited voice, or a certain number of minutes? How much data each month?

Take a hard look at what you actually use. You’ll probably find that you use far less than you’re actually paying for with your provider. If you’re already using a low-end plan, take a hard look at what pay-as-you-go companies can give you. You can save a lot of money each month.

Trim your membership bills by downgrading or eliminating services that you rarely use. Do you really use Netflix all that often? What about your gym membership? What about any other online services that you subscribe to, whether it’s a software subscription or anything else?

My rule of thumb is this: if I’m not using a subscription service enough to drop the price down to a dollar or two per hour of usage, it’s not worth my money. Anything that costs me more than that per hour better be giving me a lot of benefit.

Walk through your credit card and bank statements and figure out what services you’re paying for each month. If those services aren’t providing significant value for you, cancel them! Those savings can really add up!

Trim your entertainment bills by renting entertainment first instead of buying it. This one’s real easy.

If you buy a lot of books, start going to the library first instead of the bookstore. If you buy a lot of movies, start going to the library first and, if that doesn’t work, check out Redbox or other video rental kiosks and, if that doesn’t work, rent them online from sites like Amazon.

The truth is that most books we buy never get read multiple times, and most movies we buy never get watched more than once. Don’t buy either until you’re sure it’s going to see multiple viewings.

If you take a serious approach to trimming your spending, incremental savings can help a ton in terms of lowering your expenses without adding even more time commitments to your life. If you can take action on even five of these twenty tips, you’re going to be saving real money on all of your regular expenses from here on out.

Good luck!

The post Twenty Key Strategies for Finding Incremental Savings in Your Life appeared first on The Simple Dollar.

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Age UK urged to consider involvement in energy market

Helen Knapman

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Age UK has today been urged by the Charity Commission to consider its involvement in the energy market.

Age UK has today been urged by the Charity Commission to consider its involvement in the energy market.

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Why You Should Worship Your Paid-Off Car

As spring warms up, car dealerships are rolling out the red carpet to lure you in. In addition to special sales and dealer incentives, they’ve got new models to hawk and an array of tricks up their sleeves. If you’re not careful, a quick look around the lot can lead to a signed sales contract and a several year’s worth of car payments in a hurry.

Obviously, the best way to avoid this mess is to dodge the dealership altogether. In the meantime, it also helps to find ways to appreciate the car you already have – especially if it’s paid off. Sure, she might have a few dings and scratches, a slight rattle, or maybe a cup of crunched up Cheerios in the back. But she’s all yours, and she’s free.

Five Reasons to Love Your Paid-Off Car

Got a paid-off car you merely tolerate? Before you hit the dealership in search of something new, consider these reasons you might want to fall back in love with your old, paid-off car instead.

Reason No. 1: You might retire with a lot more money socked away.

The average monthly payment on a new car surged to $493 during the last quarter of 2015, according to a report by the credit agency Experian. That works out to a cool $5,916 per year, or $33,031 over the average length of a car loan, which is now 67 months.

If you forgo the new car and stash that money away in your retirement account instead, you could easily get a whole lot richer over time. Even if you spent $1,000 a year on car repairs to keep your old clunker on the road — meaning you only stashed away $4,916 a year — you’d have an extra $29,375 saved up after five years, assuming a modest 6% return per year.

And after that even if you stopped adding to the balance and simply let it grow for another 25 years, you’d retire with an additional $126,072, assuming 6% growth. That’s worth stretching a few more years out of your old ride, wouldn’t you say?

Reason No. 2: Save extra $$$ in your emergency fund.

If you’re already on track for retirement — or too overwhelmed by it — consider how your life might change if you opted out of a new car payment and simply saved that money instead.

Let’s say you held onto your old car and saved the $300 a month that you would have spent on a new one. After one year of saving, you’d have $3,600, not including any interest. And after five years, you’d be sitting on $18,000!

Whether or not you end up needing that money for an emergency along the way, that’s a lot of cash — enough to pay for nearly anything life throws your way. And trust us, you’ll need it eventually.

What’s more, that’s also enough to buy a decent new or good used car in cash. Keep it up, and you may never have to make a car payment again.

Photo: awfulshot

Reason No. 3: When it gets hit with a shopping cart, you don’t have to care.

Money aside, the best part about driving an old, paid-off car is that you don’t have to care when something minor happens to it. Let’s face it; birds can and do use your car as a bathroom at times, and careless people will scratch and ding your car without thinking much of it at all.

When you still owe money on your car, it’s tempting to freak out over every nick and bump. But when it’s paid off, sheesh… who cares?

We can do our best to take care of our vehicles, but there is little we can do about bad drivers, careless parallel parkers, and birds that need to do their business. With a paid-off car, you can shrug your shoulders and move on with your day knowing that it doesn’t matter – and that you owe zilch on your car anyway.

Reason No. 4: Sleep well at night knowing you can live on less.

When the economy is good and you’re earning a steady income, that car payment might be a piece of cake. But, what happens when you lose your job, your income tanks, or other surprise expenses or bills push your finances out of whack?

No matter what, there is something to be said about living well below your means. When your income far surpasses your monthly bills, you can save for the future, take care of unexpected expenses and bills, and avoid debt like the plague. But when you live at the edge of your means, any emergency — like a job loss or health scare — can cause you to fall behind.

Without a car payment, you can sleep easy at night knowing that you don’t owe a single cent for the car you need to get to work and take care of your responsibilities. I don’t know about you, but nothing lulls me to sleep at night quite as much as the relief I feel from no longer being in debt, or carrying around the stress that comes with it.

Reason No. 5: Insurance on older cars is generally cheaper.

As a newer car ages, the cost of insuring it goes down considerably. That’s especially true once you’re able to drop collision coverage and switch to liability coverage only – that is, if you want to.

• Related: Best Cheap Car Insurance in 2016

And depending on your home state and its insurance requirements, you could save a lot of money on your plates and tags by driving used as well. In my state of Indiana, for example, our vehicle registration process is based on a sliding scale with pricing based on vehicle value and age. The older your car, the cheaper your license plate renewal and registration will be. The same goes for local excise taxes, where applicable.

The Bottom Line

Your paid-off car may no longer have that new car smell, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth keeping. The longer you drive it – and the longer you can avoid trading it in – the richer you’ll become.

Do you love your paid-off car? Why or why not?

Related Articles:

• Should You Always Buy a Used Car?
• Five Things You Could Afford If You Didn’t Buy a New Car
• Why No One Should Get an 84-Month Car Loan (Ever)

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Are You Guilty of These 6 Frugal Fails?

Do you feel like you spend time and effort saving money… only to find your bank balance stagnating?

You might be faux frugal.

This serious condition affects even the most well-meaning Penny Hoarders.

Here are the most common symptoms — and the necessary treatments to get you back on track to meet your savings goals and get smart with your money.

1. Shopping the Clearance Rack for Items You Don’t Really Want

At first glance, a pair of shoes marked down from $50 to $24 seems like a great deal. You’ll save more than 50%!

But ask yourself, do you like those shoes enough to pay $50 for them? Or were you more excited about the deal?

Sometimes the thrill of the hunt influences how much we actually like (and will use) an item.

Recent news stories also call into question the trustworthiness of these markdowns. There’s a good chance those shoes were never sold for $50 and the so-called markdown is just to trick customers into thinking they’ve found a deal.

The treatment: No, you don’t have to completely swear off the clearance rack. But try to remove the deal mentality from your decision-making process.

Ask yourself: Is the item worth the amount you’re paying, independent of the original price? Will you use it enough to justify the price?

2. Spending a Fortune on Dinner Ingredients

There’s no denying that cooking at home can save you serious money.

But the quickest way to sabotage your food budget is to choose recipes that call for obscure or expensive ingredients.

Paella is delicious, but your Wednesday night dinner isn’t saving you pennies if you’re paying $12 for a few pinches of saffron (which I’ve done, unfortunately).

You’ll also want to stay away from ingredients you won’t be able to use in other dishes. While $4 for a bottle of chili-garlic sauce doesn’t seem like a lot, if you’re only using two tablespoons on one dish, that’s not exactly cost-effective.

The treatment: Stick with recipes that use inexpensive ingredients and items you know you’ll use again. Save the splurges and specialty items for special occasions.

3. Buying Deal Coupons You Won’t Use

Just like finding deals on merchandise can tank your budget, it’s easy to waste money on deal coupons simply because you love the idea of a bargain.

But if you’re anything like me, sometimes the hard part is actually using the vouchers. I have a voucher for Bikram yoga I’ve been trying to convince myself to use for about eight months.

The treatment: Don’t swear off Groupon altogether. Sometimes you’ll find legit deals on there! But don’t go all “Supermarket Sweep” on it, either.

Before you hit “buy,” ask yourself one question: Am I excited enough about this deal to use it in the next four weeks?

If the answer is yes, chances are it’s a deal worth grabbing.

4. Signing Up for Credit Cards to Get the Rewards

Credit cards offer some pretty sweet deals. Maybe you’ll get a few thousand bonus air miles, or a certain percentage of cash back.

I’m ashamed to admit I signed up for a credit card in college just to get a free beanie. That seems like the lamest reward possible, but at the time I was excited about it.

However, these rewards often come with annual fees, high interest rates and other fine print.

You also want to keep on eye on how your number of credit cards is affecting your credit. And be careful about opening new cards if you’re planning to apply for a loan in the near future.

The treatment: Proceed with caution when it comes to rewards cards. Read the fine print to be sure you’ll be getting your money’s worth.

Does the reward outweigh the annual fee? Will you remember to use that card enough to benefit from the cash-back percentage?

5. Getting Carried Away at the Craft Store

Pinterest has brainwashed us all into believing we can handcraft any home decor item our heart desires (and for a fraction of the cost!). And sometimes we can.

But too often I find myself spending a small fortune at Michaels.

Sure, it’s $10 less than it would cost to buy a similar item, but I’m a terrible crafter; I end up with a wonky finished product. That, or I never actually make the craft and I end up donating the supplies years later.

The treatment: Be honest with yourself about your crafting abilities and the likelihood of actually completing the project.

Before you check out at the craft store, add up the cost of your items and decide if it’s still a good deal.

And don’t forget to factor in enjoyment. If you’re actually going to have a good time making the project, that matters. If you’re going to stress out, think about that, too.

6. Opening Store Credit Cards

We’ve all been there: As you’re checking out, the cashier asks, “Do you want to open a store card to save 15%?”

Sometimes I find this question hilarious. Like, when I’m spending $26 total, so my savings would be around $2.50.

But on slightly larger purchases, it can be tempting to open a card and save some money right then and there.

The trouble is, it’s easy to wind up carrying a balance on store cards, and interest rates tend to be quite high. While you may save a few dollars when you open the card, you’re more likely to pay back the rewards in interest over the long run.

The treatment: Avoid store cards unless the initial savings are significant (think, big-ticket purchases like furniture or appliances) and you can pay off the balance before you’re charged interest.

Your Turn: What pitfalls have you encountered in trying to be frugal?

Lyndsee Simpson is a writer and editor living in Washington, D.C., trying to save her pennies and avoid making bad money choices for good reasons.

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The Adventurous Way This Father of 3 Saves $300 a Month on Groceries

Are your grocery bills getting too high, and coupons getting a bit too scarce?

If you’ve already tried these 22 ways to lower your food bill, and you don’t want to get too extreme and start dumpster diving, then what’s a person to do?

Look around you! There’s plenty of food right under your feet, and it’s all free.

I’m talking about foraging: Gathering wild food that grows nearby, maybe even in your backyard.

You can save hundreds of dollars each month just by taking a walk in the woods. Foraging is gaining popularity, and you don’t have to be a sandal-wearing tree hugger to get into the game.

How I Started Foraging

I’ve been foraging for most of my life — I just didn’t know it.

When I was a little kid, my grandfather would take my brothers and me into the woods and teach us all about the wild things we could eat.

My brothers and I thought foraging was simply something you did when you got hungry playing in the woods all day. I never thought about it as a way to supplement my daily groceries.

But one day my wife and I were out for a stroll through our neighborhood. One of our neighbors was busily raking up nuts from the tree in his front yard and throwing them into a trash can.

When we asked what kind of nuts they were, he explained the English walnuts were edible, but he had so many that he was sick of them and just wanted them gone! We gathered up as many as we could.

After the English walnut revelation, my wife and I began to notice other discarded or unwanted fruits and edibles all around our neighborhood. We found an apple tree, whose owner was sick of apples. We found raspberries along a walking trail, and much more!

Some foods were literally right next door!

My wife and I enjoyed homemade applesauce, fresh fruit, walnut breads and delicious salad greens, all compliments of our neighbors.

How Foraging Helps Us Save Money

We managed to save a couple hundred dollars off our grocery bill that summer — while barely trying.

This got my wife and me excited about the possibility of finding our groceries, instead of buying them.

During peak months, foraging helps me cut my grocery bills by about a third. I usually spend $400 on food every two weeks, but at the height of the summer, I’ll only spend $250 or so. That means I save about $300 a month.

Foraging is a seasonal activity, especially in a northern climate like ours, in Ohio — so you have to eat seasonally. (In some warmer climates, you can find wild things to eat year-round.)

Plus, it’s also a cool way to eat foods I wouldn’t be able to find in a grocery store, like pawpaw, or that wouldn’t fit in my normal food budget.

For example, a pound of black walnuts costs around $14 — a bit pricy for my grocery budget. But there’s a black walnut tree in a park near where I work, and no one but me seems to know they’re edible.

It’s not uncommon for me to be able to gather a bushel (about 40 pounds) or more of apples off one tree. Apples usually go for around $2 a pound, so I can save $80 right off the bat.

If I make some of those apples into applesauce, I’ll increase my savings, and if I can the fruit or applesauce in jars, I can enjoy it year-round.

A pint of blackberries can go for as much as $6. You can easily get a pint a week from a wild blackberry bush.

Some of the other options I find around my home are ramps, persimmons, elderberries, wild mushrooms, black cherries, acorns, cat tail, hickory nuts, pawpaw, grapes, pears, apricots and maple trees.

I find these both wild and in the yards of people who don’t want to bother with the fruit anymore.

From these, I make salads, breads, pies, jellies and jams, dried fruit strips, puddings — or just eat them raw. The possibilities are limited only by your creativity!

I’ve found two great benefits about eating foraged foods: I save a lot of money, and I lose a lot of weight during the summertime.

How to Know What’s Edible

How much money you can save really depends on how familiar you are with your surroundings — and obviously, you don’t want to eat anything you aren’t sure is safe and edible.

The more foods you can positively identify, the more options you have available.

I try to become familiar with one new edible plant species every few months. It’s like expanding my own personal grocery store, one item at a time.

Don’t worry if you don’t know much about foraging — there’s lots of help out there to get you started.

Falling Fruit

One of my favorite resources is fallingfruit.org.

The site compiles data from volunteers all over the globe and loads it into a detailed, interactive map, so you can easily find your nearest apple tree or vines of wild grapes.

I was surprised to find two apple trees on the map within a quarter-mile of my house. There were even reviews of the apples from people who had already picked some!

This site is also helped me discover I’m a big fan of mulberries.

Peterson’s “Field Guide to Edible Wild Plants”

This book is a good starting resource for foragers.

It has plant descriptions, pictures, advice on where to find them and simple ways to enjoy them. The author also includes warnings for plants you want to avoid.

Foraging Groups

If you don’t want to go it alone, there’s an entire community out there dedicated to the art of finding your dinner.

People from all walks of life get together and share their love and knowledge of foraging.

For example, The Wild Foodies of Philly like to get together and discover wild edibles around the Philadelphia area.

It usually costs nothing but your time to meet up with one of these groups. A quick internet search of most cities will reveal the foraging foodies in your area.

If one-on-one help is more your style, take advantage of a regional class. For $50, Pascal Baudar will take you out into the California wilderness and teach you what’s edible, what you need to avoid and what can be used as medicine.

You can probably find people willing to explain foraging one-on-one through a local foraging group.   

Will You Try Foraging?

My advice is to start simple, looking for fruits and vegetables you easily recognize from your supermarket.

Then, if you want to branch out, get someone to help expand your knowledge of your natural edible surroundings.

And always remember: If you’re unsure, don’t eat it.

Finally, when you learn about the wild edibles nature provides, pass your knowledge on to others.

I’ve started taking my four-year-old son with me when I go foraging, using the time to teach him about the wild, much like my grandfather did with me.

My son loves our walks in the woods, and he enjoys the best classroom setting nature can provide. When my other two children get a little older, I’ll definitely take them out with me, too.

At the very worst, we enjoy a walk in the woods. At best, we come home with dinner!

So now that you know there’s food out there for the taking, there’s no reason you should pay for fruits and vegetables you can find near your home… for free!

Your Turn: Have you ever tried foraging to save money on groceries?

Disclosure: This post includes affiliate links. Adding these links helps us keep the lights on in The Penny Hoarder HQ, which makes it a lot easier to play shuffleboard after a long day of deal-seeking!

Michael Beck is a penny-pinching novice forager from Cleveland, Ohio. He is a father of three picky children who will eat nothing he puts on their plate, no matter where it came from.

The post The Adventurous Way This Father of 3 Saves $300 a Month on Groceries appeared first on The Penny Hoarder.

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Energy providers owe households 1.5bn: reclaim now

Helen Knapman

energy-reading.jpg

Over 11 million British households (42% of all homes) are collectively owed almost £1.5 billion from energy suppliers following the UK’s third warmest winter since records began, according to a new survey.

Over 11 million British households (42% of all homes) are collectively owed almost £1.5 billion from energy suppliers following the UK’s third warmest winter since records began, according to a new survey.

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The Home Party Plan is All About the Show Experience

By Deb Bixler Some say the party plan business model is dying, that virtual businesses are the wave of the future. But I disagree, this business model is all about the experience! Keep that in mind and you will realize that this type of business will go on forever. Think About This Scenario. Your friend invites […]

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Investment Association to overhaul UK equity income sector definition

Marina Gerner

GBP-in-a-pile.jpg

The Investment Association (IA) has paved the way for an overhaul of the UK equity income fund sector by launching a consultation on its controversial yield requirements.

The Investment Association (IA) has paved the way for an overhaul of the UK equity income fund sector by launching a consultation on its controversial yield requirements.

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5 Fast-Growing Jobs That Pay $40K or More — Without a Bachelor’s Degree

We’ve talked before about the best college majors and jobs you can get without a degree — but what about jobs that are fast-growing, well-paying AND don’t require a degree?

Now that would be nice.

Luckily, we stumbled upon this infographic from Rework that, based on 2014 data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), lists both the fastest-growing and -declining occupations in the United States.

We pulled out five fast-growing jobs that pay at least $40,000 per year and don’t require a four-year degree.

Here you go!

1. Wind Turbine Technician (Median Salary: $51,050)

Not afraid of heights or weather?

This physically demanding job, which typically requires a two-year training at a technical school, is predicted to grow by a whopping 108% over the next 10 years.

2. Hearing Aid Specialist ($49,600)

As our elderly population grows, so does our nation’s need for hearing aids — the reason why hearing aid specialists will be in such high demand.

Before entering the field, you’ll need to complete a two-year associate’s program, which you can often do remotely.

3. Commercial Diver ($50,470)

If you love spending time in the water, this is the job for you. You’ll fix and install equipment — all while wearing scuba gear.

Interested? You’ll need to first attend a dive training school, which lasts up to six months.

4. Diagnostic Medical Sonographer ($68,970)

Don’t let the long name scare you: This job doesn’t require you to devote your entire life to school.

Instead, you’ll spend two years earning an associate’s degree and learning how to operate imaging equipment used in hospitals and clinics.

5. Physical Therapy Assistant ($55,170)

As a physical therapy assistant, you’ll work directly with patients, helping them recover from illnesses and injuries.

Though you can become a physical therapy aide with just a high-school diploma, you’ll need an associate’s degree to earn this salary.

Your Turn: Do any of these jobs look interesting?

Susan Shain, senior writer for The Penny Hoarder, is always seeking adventure on a budget. Visit her blog at susanshain.com, or say hi on Twitter @susan_shain.

The post 5 Fast-Growing Jobs That Pay $40K or More — Without a Bachelor’s Degree appeared first on The Penny Hoarder.

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The Death of American Coal

The Death of American Coal

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5 Simple Financial Truths Smart People Tend to Forget

Smart people are significantly more capable of overcomplicating personal finance than their less-fortunate counterparts.

Additionally, because of their profound ability, they might overlook simple financial truths that, when neglected, have devastating consequences on their finances.

Take a look at some of these simple financial truths.

Which ones deserve more of your attention?

1. Behavior significantly affects the results of financial plans.

Even the most intricate financial plans are not immune to human behavior.

Unfortunately, it’s really easy to be rational and reasonable on paper, but it’s another story to be rational and reasonable in practice.

Financial planners understand this, as they have experienced firsthand how clients will often drift from the path laid before them – many times capsizing their lives.

While individuals are smart to seek the advice of a financial planner, they are even wiser to understand and overcome the intense onslaught of behavioral temptations that line the way to success.

Financial decisions can be made in an instant:

• A new truck purchased using retirement funds that results in a lifetime of undesired employment.
• Withdrawal of funds from a turbulent market resulting in a permanent loss.
• The purchase of a variable annuity resulting in horrible fees.

Desperate actions are often followed by sharp consequences.

Never avoid the simple financial truth that, even though you have a financial plan, you must use significant self control to see positive results.

2. Even the wealthy need a budget.

Smart people are often good at making a living – a great living.

But that doesn’t mean they don’t need a budget. Sometimes they think they don’t, but they’re wrong. Well, that is, unless they want to be severely ineffective with their funds.

Wealth brings with it a great deal of responsibility. Big mistakes with few assets results in few losses. Big mistakes with many assets results in huge losses.

Many wealthy people don’t feel the need to create a budget because they are able to “out pay” their financial negligence. But that comes at a high cost.

Instead, if you’re wealthy, you should truly consider the long-term benefits of creating a budget. By doing so, you should be able to identify several areas where you can save some money which you could turn around and invest. You’ll also have the opportunity to prioritize your spending so you can make the most of your awesome income.

Get on a budget – regardless of your financial status.

3. Money isn’t what matters most in life.

Smart people are great a calculations. But sometimes they get wrapped up in finance so much, they forget the simple financial truth that money isn’t what matters most.

Money is simply a means to achieve certain goals. It can’t buy everything, and it certainly can’t buy the most important things in life.

Think about your family. Think about the meaning behind your work. Think about your friendships and the way you help others. These are all more important than money.

However, money certainly can help your family. It can also enable you to embark on a new career path. And, it can help you go out to have a good time with friends or give to others in need.

Money can certainly help you in many ways. But it isn’t the full story. Money never buys the best relationships or the most meaningful work. That’s because money is a tool. But there’s something deeper that allows the most important things in life to be realized.

Seth Godin explained that doing work that’s important results in more happiness than merely profitable work. Behind this truth is another truth. That is, money shouldn’t be your focus in life. It’s a means to get you somewhere, but it doesn’t help you reach the best destinations by itself.

4. Flexibility is as important as structure.

This might sound somewhat counterintuitive, but when it comes to finance, flexibility is as important as structure.

Imagine, for a moment, that you receive a medical bill in the mail. You open it up, take a look, and gasp as you read the total: $2,150.00. You don’t have an emergency fund to cover this, and no category in your budget is relevant to this expense.

What should you do? You have a few options:

1. Don’t pay the bill because it wasn’t in your budget. While this is the strictest way of handling the situation, and while you’d technically be sticking to your budget, there are legal and moral consequences for not paying a bill you rightfully owe.
2. Give up on your budget entirely because it didn’t work and pay the bill. This is the most flexible option, although it destroys your future budget in the process. However, it does meet your legal and moral obligations.
3. Move some money from a few categories to another and pay the bill. This is a flexible method, but it’s also one that involves some structure. This meets your moral and legal obligation while ensuring that you pay less money for something else while you’re paying more toward something you didn’t expect.

As you can see, the third option is the most reasonable. Going forward, you can also make sure to budget for medical bills. The extremes of absolute structure and absolute flexibility are dangerous extremes.

5. Some people have to learn about money the hard way.

Smart people often do a face-palm when they see someone else who is about to make a financial mistake. They will often try to prevent them from making the mistake, and rightfully so. The problem is, it doesn’t always work.

If you’re savvy with your finances, don’t be discouraged when those around you make financial mistakes against your better advice. It happens. Some people just have to learn about money the hard way.

As a financial advisor, I see people make financial mistakes all the time. The best thing I can do is keep on proclaiming my message. If they take it, great. If not, I’ll keep trying. You shouldn’t give up either.

Being smart is fantastic. Just don’t forget about the simple financial truths.

This article originally appeared on Credit.com.

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11 Tools That Will Save You Time with Content Marketing

Quality content marketing takes a lot of time and effort—there’s just no way around it.

But there are, of course, some marketers who accomplish more than others and in less time.

I’d like to see you become one of those efficient content marketers, if you’re not one already.

There are a few ways to become faster, and one of the best is to use tools.

There are a ton of tools out there—some good, some bad. Some save you time, but some may actually cost you time.

I’ve put together a list of 11 tools that I’ve tried at the very least or use on a regular basis.

Instead of having to test out a ton of tools, I hope you can take my word that these are quality tools that will save you time. This, coincidentally, will save you even more time. 

Get content ideas, fast

All content marketing begins with content. It’s in the name after all.

As you might know, a content idea can determine the success or failure of the content before you even start.

It’s important to get it right, and it’s a difficult thing to do.

Naturally, it can take a lot of time.

However, you can speed up the process significantly by using the tools in this section.

1. Feedly: One of the most popular techniques to come up with content ideas is to look at content being published on other popular blogs and then improve upon it or extend it.

What you might do is compile a list of blogs you really like and then visit them when you need to come up with a few ideas.

A huge waste of time.

Instead, use an RSS reader (Feedly is arguably the best), which allows you to collect all the posts published from multiple sources all in one place.

You can quickly scan the titles to see if any pique your interest and click through if you need to.

Once you add a bunch of sites to your new Feedly account, you’ll log in to a page like this:

If you visited those 7 blogs individually to find those posts, it would take at least a few minutes. Instead, it takes a few seconds.

That doesn’t sound like much, but it adds up over time.

To add a site to your account, type in a site name in the search bar:

That should bring up the site you’re looking for. Just click the little plus icon next to the blog name, and you’ll automatically have all its posts added to your feed as they’re published.

2. TrendSpottr: If you’re able to create content on a trending topic before competitors do, it’s good not only for your reputation but also for getting a lot of extra traffic.

Spotting trends isn’t easy even if you’re an expert in the field.

This tool focuses on spotting trending content, hashtags, phrases, and even influencers before everyone else catches on.

You might not be the first, but you’ll be way ahead of most of your competition.

It’s a simple tool to use. You pick a search term, e.g., “content marketing,” and then a label inside the tool, e.g., “trending influencers.” The tool then finds the most trending users who post about that subject.

Use the tool to build relationships with up and comers and to create content around trending phrases and hashtags.

Create better content, efficiently

The better your content is, the easier it will be to promote, and the better results you will get (traffic, conversions, etc.).

Tools can help you create higher quality content, and the best tools can help you do it faster as well.

I have a few tools here that you should give a try when the time is right.

3. Easel.ly: Creating images is one of the most time-consuming and expensive parts of creating great content.

Great images can turn good content into amazing content.

Easel.ly is a tool that allows even the design-challenged like me to create some fairly attractive infographics.

Of course, they don’t compare to the ones I get designed for hundreds of dollars, but if you need a decent infographic on a budget, give this tool a try.

To use it, create an account and then select a free template:

Next, you can click on any main element and change the text and alignment and even add shapes and backgrounds to it:

It’s designed to be as simple as possible, and you’ll have it figured out after using it for a few minutes.

4. Canva: This is another tool that can help you create great images without needing a great designer (I even wrote a guide to creating custom images with it).

Most of the time, you don’t need a full infographic, just small images for your content to make it more attractive. That’s where Canva comes in.

The tool has several different templates to choose from for social media posts, blog posts, and more:

You can also create an image with custom dimensions.

Depending on which template you choose, there will be different templates available in the “layouts” tab:

The canvas on the right is fully editable. You just click and drag, or click and type.

You can create great-looking images under 5 minutes—once you get good with Canva.

5. Hemingway Editor: We’ve looked at images but not your text. Great content needs to be well written.

“Well written” can mean a lot of different things:

• Good grammar
• Proper spelling
• Easy to read

This tool can help you with all of them.

To use it, paste your text, and the tool will indicate your mistakes by highlighting them in different colors:

Here’s an excerpt from my Beginner’s Guide to Online Marketing, and you can see that it’s not perfect.

While there aren’t any huge mistakes (no red), there are areas for improvement (in yellow and blue).

I re-wrote those sentences until the tool indicated that the problems were fixed, as shown below:

The reading grade level went from 8 to 7, which is generally a good thing. In addition, it got more concise, going from 189 words to 171 (almost a 10% reduction).

Stay focused on your task

If, in addition to marketing, you’re responsible for writing content, it’s important that you become an efficient writer.

A key part of that is not getting distracted or procrastinating.

The tools here will help you focus like a laser.

6. StayFocused: The name of this tool gives away its use. It’s a free Chrome plugin that allows you to block distracting websites.

Once you install it, go into its settings and choose which sites you’d like to block:

You can choose the “nuclear option,” which blocks all websites for the time period you specify.

Or you can add a few websites that waste most of your time to your “blocked sites” list.

7. Tomato Timer: There are many productivity techniques you can use to stay focused. One of the most well-known is called the pomodoro technique.

The basic idea is to break up your work into 25-minute periods with 5-minute breaks in between.

It’s a short enough time that you won’t feel too fatigued, but long enough that you maximize the amount of work you can do.

This is a simple timer built for this technique:

 

Keep organized so that you’re not doing things twice

Redundancy kills efficiency.

If you have to repeat keyword research or continuously sort through lists of outreach targets, you’ll waste hours of your time.

The only prevention is good organization. There are some really great tools that can help you keep everything in order.

8. Trello: Trello is a free project management tool. It’s built to be used by teams, but it is also useful for keeping your personal work organized.

It allows you to create “boards,” almost like one of those cork boards that people hang on walls, and then to create “cards” for them.

Create one board for each main thing you want to keep organized. For example, you might have one for your content schedule (with cards for content published, upcoming content, and content ideas) and another one for your promotional work.

On each board, you can create as many lists as you’d like and add cards to each of those lists. Here’s what a board for content ideas might look like:

You can edit the cards as well as drag and drop them from list to list.

Finally, it helps keep you organized by sending you reminders before the due date.

One more feature that you might want to use is the “add members” option, which can be found in the menu of any board.

 

Members can be assigned to particular cards so that they get notified of changes and due dates.

Improve the efficiency of your promotion

Even if your content is great, it won’t do much for you until you promote it.

You can do all your promotion manually, and it will work. But a lot of promotion is tedious, repetitive work that can be automated by tools.

You can save tens of hours a month by using the tools in this section for outreach.

9. ContentMarketer.io: This is a really thorough tool that helps you streamline all parts of content promotion.

I can’t give you a full overview here, but I’ll show you a few features.

You can upload your content or enter a URL of content you published into the tool:

The tool then scans your content for keywords and finds influencers based on those keywords.

But it finds more than the names—it also finds their email addresses and Twitter accounts.

You can easily make quick edits to the list until you’re happy with it.

The final main feature is that you can quickly email or send a message on Twitter to all those people. You can use a template if you’d like.

I recommend choosing one of my personal templates as I’ve tested them thousands of times.

10. Buffer: If you’re doing any promotion on social media, Buffer is the first tool you need to have in your toolkit.

It allows you to connect all your major social media accounts (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest) and to manage them.

In addition, you can post to multiple networks at once from within Buffer.

Another big feature is that you can schedule posts to be shared ahead of time. Once you set a schedule (in your settings), you can add posts to your queue:

Buffer will post them in the order you’ve laid out. You can drop and drag them around as you please.

You can either create these posts inside Buffer itself or add the Buffer extension to your browser.

When you come across content that you want to share, you can use the plugin to quickly add the article you want to share.

Another useful feature of Buffer is result evaluation.

The tool makes it easy to see which posts are the most and least popular. You can learn by studying the data and use those lessons to get more shares and traffic in the future.

11. Narrow.io: Narrow is a tool specifically designed for Twitter.

It finds the best people to connect with based on the keywords you enter.

The big appeal is that a lot of the following/unfollowing research and activity is automated by the tool, saving you a ton of time.

It is not a free tool, however, so I only recommend it if you’re serious about growing a Twitter following.

Conclusion

Once you have the knowledge to be a great content marketer, you need to implement it.

Good marketers know how to make use of available tools to not only keep their work at a consistently high quality but also save time that could be spent elsewhere.

I’ve shown you 11 tools here that can save content marketers’ time, but there are definitely some good ones that I might have missed.

If there are any other tools you absolutely love and use on a regular basis, I’d appreciate it if you shared them in a comment below with me and everyone else.

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