If you are thinking of investing your money in stages or in lump sum then real estate investment in properties ought to be part of your overall portfolio. One advantage about real estate properties is that they increase in value over time. If you estimate value of real estate at their current prices then you will find them steadily rising despite decades of economic recession. Hence, there is always a guarantee as far price of your property is concerned although for many investors it may not be that fast as equity.

Although stocks give you faster return and sometimes within a few years, yet you cannot do any improvement on it. In case of properties you can always make conspicuous changes and bring about transformation such that its value is enhanced.

Benefits of Having Properties

In the first instance, besides able to carry out improvements on your properties, you are also able to have tax deduction on it. These are in the form of expenses related to your properties like repairs and maintenance costs, improvements made and interest paid on mortgage.

In real estate sector when you invest in property then the cost is recovered when you actually sell it on a later date. The more years go by the higher would your return as prices always appreciate no matter what. Several people remain invested in their properties till they retire whereby they are able to pay off their mortgages fully.

Predictable Value Increase and Better Leverage

When you go for property investment you may have little idea about properties. Yet if you have been able to get one for current value then it tends to go up over the years. This means that you needn’t go through intricate calculations like stocks and which ones will move up in price.

This reduces your risk considerably and you may need to wait an extra year or two for prices to go even further up before selling it. It also acts as guarantee for future mortgage on other properties that you wish to purchase. In case of large properties, it is better to appoint property managers to look after the same.

These managers would look into maintenance and repairs of your properties as well as contact brokers so that you may get higher price when you wish to sell it. Further, you can also earn a steady rental income from your properties by letting it out for tenants.

Many Europeans move to Malta. The attraction of island life, sun and the Mediterranean can prove quite alluring to some. EU Freedom of Movement laws and Maltese residence permits will enable you to relocate to Malta and get set up, at least for a few years. But what do you do if you decide that you want to stay for the long haul, possibly forever? The best way to ensure those rights is to obtain Maltese citizenship.

The road is tough and challenging, but here is what you need to know to do just that…

Know Your Path to Citizenship

The first thing that you must obviously do is reside in Malta. This is the same process, no matter whether you are an EU citizen or a non-EU citizen. The amount of time you must live in Malta varies depending on which category you fall into, so you must note the difference straight away. Both can see you acquire Maltese citizenship with residence, but they are not the only ways in which you can become a citizen of Malta.

Ordinarily, EU citizens can apply for citizenship after living for six consecutive years in the island country. For non-EU citizens, this rises to 18 years. Citizenship based on residence can only be issued once these criteria have been met, and there are no restrictions on dual nationality, so you can be a citizen of Malta and your original, home country.

Citizenship Through Other Means

It is possible for you to obtain Maltese citizenship through other means, too. If you have at least one Maltese parent (irrespective of where you were born), you can acquire citizenship by birth. If you are legally married to a Maltese national or adopted by Maltese parents, you can also claim citizenship. You may also claim Maltese citizenship by residing in Malta through the Individual Investor Program.

Perks to Maltese Citizenship

There are perks to becoming a citizen of Malta. For a start, you will have the same rights as Maltese nationals. Moreover, you will be allowed to live and work in Malta, indefinitely. You can travel freely to all other European Union countries, and you can become a Maltese citizen without relinquishing your nationality of birth. Maltese citizens can work freely in all other EU countries, and starting up a business in Malta is ideal, as they have one of the lowest taxation rates in the world.

Becoming a Maltese Citizen

As with becoming a citizen of any country outside your birth, there are a few hoops you are going to have to jump through. Moreover, you need to be committed to your adopted nation, as acquiring citizenship is a long process for many. However, the perks are unquestionably worth the wait if you intend on spending a large chunk of your life living in the Mediterranean country. Anybody interested should visit a Maltese immigration lawyer, or the migration authorities in Malta to see how they might qualify for Maltese citizenship.

It had not been long, since HROne released new features to add more value and help businesses in the current unfortunate time. As if that was not enough, HROne has now introduced one more new feature named as shortcuts. They say that this feature will help save peoples’ time to a great extent.
The users can now-

●        Add 10 Apps of relevance to them on their HROne dashboard

●        The apps can be L&D, Social or work-related

●        Every department can add different app shortcuts as per their need.
At the time of onboarding as well, the manager can add the relevant apps to the new joiner’s dashboard.

●        The employee can also add the shortcuts as per their reference later.

When asked as to what made Mr. Karan Jain, Co-Founder, HROne introduce this new feature to help businesses in this situation, he said, “The time wasted between switching apps at the time of work is enormous. According to research, the employees, on an average, an employee switches 35 job critical applications more than 1,100 times in a day. So, we thought as to what we can do to help them save this time and invest this in something more meaningful? So, after a lot of brainstorming session, we came up with this feature. It consolidates all you app requirements in one place so that the employees can get things done quickly. It would not be wrong to say that HROne is now a launchpad for all your applications.”

To this, Project Manager, Mr. Magnum Gupta added, ‘ We were just waning to announce the feature as we consider this one of our best. It is similar to that of how your mobile asks you to make a shortcut of your emergency contacts or people you chat frequently with. We are just waiting to see how our new clients find it as the existing ones are having a good time using it! Not, to forget, the feature is available on both mobile and desktop versions.”

If you want to know more about their product, you can get in touch with them by fill the form and schedule a demo.

HROne Journey

Incepted in 2013 with an intent to simplify and automate HR functions, the Founder by 2017, after automating more than 250+ companies HR processes successfully realised that the jigsaw was only half- completed. While automating the functions helped save time, the problem-solving approach adopted still had scope for improvement. So, after analyzing the market, and associating ourselves with experts from IIT, ISB, ISC they worked together to make the HROne HR software and application extraordinarily smart and easy to use just like Ola and Swiggy!

Now, it stands still in the HCM marketspace with record 3,00,000+ satisfied users and 350+ happy clients across 18+ industries. They further plan to keep mechanising and humanising HR tech and make it as simple as ABC for employers, HRs, managers, employees, and contract-based workers.

Along with development of software technologies it has become essential to track employee productivity too. For this, developers have brought in productivity tracking software such that business managers may now track employees while they are at work. This means that employees are no more at liberty to be casual while on their tasks and that they are supposed to be very diligent and hard at work during the time they are on it.

This software is an intrusive method of detecting employee productivity and it has been seen to be beneficial to both business managers and their workforce. It has been found to be reliable to track employees working from home or far off places including other countries.

For most business owners this has been found to be one most effective monitoring tool for employees as there has been multifold increase in business productivity since such systems came into force.

Tracking Productivity Issues with Metrics

There are several metrics that are embedded in software that tracks employees in real time while they are at work. These help employers and their managers to track team efforts, any dereliction of duties on part of one or more employees, unnecessary personal work and social media browsing and deliberate attempt to leak out sensitive data to outsiders and workplace politics.

Metrics used in real time may differ according to companies or firms yet by and large, the software tracks almost all activities quite well. These are employee attendance, login time and logout time, login user name, name of the computer, active and idle times of each employee, website browsing including URLs, social media engagement including chat sessions, documents used and emails sent and received and data leaks and so on.

Focusing on Quality of Work

Business managers are able to avoid unnecessary controls too. They know the problems of micromanagement and the software is helpful in restoring undue interference in employee’s work. Again, if employees know that such monitoring helps them too then they do their best at tasks and creative works without any insider interference. Perhaps best part of this software is that it allows employees to improve their focus and skills so that honest workers among them stand to get incentives and promotions.

Businesses also have advantage of saving money for false overtimes or rely on simple gimmicks of an employee. Above all quality of work is accessed very well from one single location remotely without bothering each employee about their productivity.

With everything going on in the world right now, PR consulting may be at the bottom of your business’s to do list.

But hiring a PR agency to get your name out there, cutting through all the post-lockdown noise, could be the smartest thing you ever did.

Not convinced? Here are three good reasons you need a public relations agency right now.

You want to grow        

You used to have steady annual growth but things have leveled out recently and you want to find a new way to boost sales.

While PR isn’t strictly speaking a sales-based service, increased awareness of your brand will position you in front of your target audience, maximising the chances of growing your business. It’s not a quick fix, and most agencies will tell you to play the long game – it can take 12 to 18 months to see a real difference – but once you have a powerful brand, you will reap the rewards.

You want to be known

You believe that your products and services are the best, but that’s not really much use if nobody knows you exist.

PR and marketing services can make your brand stand out in a crowd. A consistent, well-executed campaign is worth any number of adverts, and has a drip-drip effect. You’ll find that as more and more potential customers find out about you, more and more will turn to you and your product/service first.

You want to change

The coronavirus pandemic has changed the way many businesses operate and, in some cases, even their core services.

If you’ve had a change of heart, a PR campaign is the best way to spread the news, setting out your new agenda on your terms.

Or maybe the pandemic has made you realise you need to change the way you communicate; with face-to-face contact falling by the wayside, now’s the time to make sure your digital side is up to speed. A PR agency can help with this, making sure your social media accounts are running smoothly and your website is working wonders.

If you’re thinking of getting someone in to help boost your brand, PR consulting experts like Harvey & Hugo can help, whether on a long-term contract basis or with a more flexible approach – what have you got to lose?

The investment performance of Yale’s and Harvard’s endowments has drawn interest from other endowments and investors alike, but little research has been done on non-profit endowment performance overall, despite the $700 billion in assets they collectively manage.

One recent study,  “Investment Returns and Distribution Policies of Non-Profit Endowment Funds,” released by Georgetown University and the Stern School of Business, shed some light on endowment performance. This paper, by professors Sandeep Dahiya and David Yermack, used IRS filing from 2009-2016 to look at the investment performance of more than 28,000 organizations, and the authors made some surprising conclusions.

The authors surmise that while both stocks and bonds experienced a bull market for most of the study period, endowments may have been sitting on the sidelines, with large amounts of their assets in cash or equivalents.  They also found an interesting performance pattern.  Large endowments, which make up the majority of investment assets, had poor performance if they were located closer to a major financial center, while smaller endowments tended to perform better the closer they were to a major financial center.  It is not clear why this would be the case, but one possibility is that large funds are likely to attract, and possibly over-invest in, money managers pitching expensive, illiquid products.

Some of these finding are backed up by an earlier study from Vanguard.  Their September 2014 study, “Assessing Endowment Performance: The Enduring Role of Low-Cost Investing” noted that in the 25 years prior to 2014, the investment strategies of many endowments changed dramatically.  A balanced 60%/40% stock/bond split was the traditional investment norm, but over the 25 year period, investments in alternatives such as hedge funds and private equity increased dramatically, possibly in response to Yale’s success.  By 2013, the largest endowment portfolios had 60% of their assets tied up in such investments.  Vanguard’s study looked at whether or not this strategy shift had paid off.

The answer, unsurprisingly, was no.  The table below, from their study, shows the 5 – 25 year returns of all endowments in the study, compared to a 60% stock / 40% bond benchmark.

                                                                                          5 years                 10 years               15 years              20 years           25 years

This table also shows the long term performance of Yale’s and Harvard’s endowment compared to the rest of the group.  Their past outperformance is clear and is what led to the “Yale Model” that other funds and investors have tried to replicate, however, in the most recent 5 year period, both of those endowments have performed poorly, returning less, on average, than endowments as a group, and coming in far below the returns of a simple 60% stock / 40% bond portfolio.

Vanguard found that endowments had, over time, significantly increased the portfolio percentages allocated to alternative investments.  In the 10 years up until June 2013, large endowments increased their alternative allocation from, on average, 31% to 59%.  Medium sized endowments went from 16% to 36%, while small endowments went from 5% to 18%.  But there is no evidence that this pivot towards alternative investments has increased returns.

There are a number of possible reasons for this.  One explanation is that the performance of hedge funds overall has decreased over the last couple of decades.  Vanguard found that the excess returns realized by large endowments mostly occurred in the early to mid 2000s, before many smaller endowments began moving into the alternatives space.  But aside from timing issues, there is the problem of active management in general.  While there are clearly successful outliers, alternative investments as a group do not outperform public market benchmarks.  Generating outsized returns from alternatives, then, requires finding and accessing top managers.  And, of course, it requires those top managers to continue their out-performance over extended periods of time, something that most studies show simply does not happen.   It is also possible that expenses dragged down performance for small endowments especially.  The thinking here is that large funds should be able to negotiate better pricing based on the amount of money they are able to invest.  Smaller funds with less to invest could be paying considerably more.

There is also the question of all around deteriorating performance over the last 5-15 years ending in 2013.  10 years prior to 2013, the performance gap between a balanced portfolio and endowment returns was less than 1%.   In the 5 years prior to 2013, during a period of steady increases in the percentage of portfolios allocated to alternatives, that gap has increased to more than 3%.  Since the study periods here overlap with Dahiya and Yermack, the possibility of endowments holding large cash positions needs to be considered as a reason for this underperformance, but it is also possible that the increase in alternatives was at least partly responsible.

Whatever the reason, it seems clear that endowments have investing in an unsuccessful strategy.  With so many low cost, liquid investment vehicles available, endowments would be better off focusing on factors and asset classes they want exposure to, and utilizing those vehicles to build inexpensive, transparent portfolios to protect and grow their funds.

All those people who buy anything thoroughly before spending money, online shopping is the best choice or them. Internet shopping gives an easy approach to a large number of variant items. Apart from the miscellaneous product, online shopping gives the facility of time-saving. From all kinds of grocery to home décor and office furniture everything is available on online stores. You can find all kinds of office accessories at BFX Furniture which is a reliable website and sell the furniture at a reasonable price. Modern technology provides an excellent experience in purchasing product. Many online stores give the best service facility and quality of products to the customers. The person who has no more time to visit the market then online stores are the best option in that situation. Furniture is the most important part of our house, office, etc. The selection of furniture according to the requirement and your need matters.in land-based furniture stores, you have limited choice but in online stores, single furniture has hundreds of designs at the same place.  Buying online furniture has many benefits. Some of them we will discuss here:

1. Online shopping websites give suitability if someone has no time to visit a real furniture store. It gives a facility to browse the product at any time of the day. It does not limit to any place so one can browse from anywhere. Several websites sell a high-quality product at reasonable prices. They have a catalog of large series of different items that delivered at your doorstep.
2. Generally, most of the land-based stores include a limited edition of furniture while at online stores there are a large number verities for single furniture. They give wide options for all products of various brands and also get the latest design furniture.
3. If we compare the price of the land-based market and online market, you will find later will be less. They give different offers to the customers so that they get attracted to online products. These offers save our money as well as time. Some of the websites attract the customers by providing different coupons from time to time or on a few special events that benefit people.
4. When we are going to purchase furniture for our home or office it is not easy to take it without help. In that case, generally, you need to arrange some convince by yourself. In online stores, the delivery of all kinds of furniture is the responsibility of the website. They deliver the furniture at or doorstep.
5. The online stores give the replacement facility on almost every product. They give a limited period to register your complaint about the product.

Industrial chillers are basically a refrigeration cooling system that helps in cooling a process liquid or dehumidifies air in commercial and industrial facilities. A chiller will either use a vapor compression or absorption cycle process to cool. There are different types of industrial chillers designed to meet different requirements. The chilled water from the industrial chillers has various applications. There are times when customers require a specific type of application where cooling is required. So here are some of the applications of chillers for the industrial process:

• Waterjet industrial chillers- This chiller is suitable not only to your bottom line but also to the environment. Waterjet chillers reduce long-term hydraulic cooling water, which helps you in saving money and is also helpful for the environment. Waterjet chillers provide you quality results along with being pocket and environment-friendly.
• Laser industrial chillers- All different types of lasers like Fiber lasers, CO2 lasers, and solid-state lasers require tight temperature control excess cooling for an efficient process and effective performance. 
• Glycol industrial chillers- One of the most important and innovative cooling systems are glycol closed loop chillers. They are the best solution for maintaining an optimum operating temperature for your multiple refrigeration compressors and refrigeration equipment. Companies like  FrigoMan Inc., are distributors of specialize in glycol industrial chillers and hence provide you with quality products and services along with expert technical maintenance.
• Plating and anodizing industrial chillers- Plating and anodizing chillers have been in the market for decades. These chillers can be used for either single or even multiple applications. 
• Food process cooling industrial chillers- Food processing chillers are very important because you cannot serve contaminated food to consumers. In order to keep your food products safe and bacteria-free, it is important to maintain and keep them at the right temperature. Cold temperatures are best-suited for most food products as bacteria cannot survive in such low temperatures.
• Brewery chillers- You cannot serve warm beers to your customers; it needs to be chilled. With an increase in the number of micro-breweries, brewery chillers are to be an important need in the market.
• Machine tools- Yes, even machines require cooling after all that excessive work they do for us. With the help of suitable chillers available in the market, you can increase the life-cycle of your machine tools and also enhance their performance.

In short, knowing the right application, can help you determin the type of chiller that is needed. 

No wonder why Stefan Durina and Turbado successfully remained at the top in mobile phone categories for two consecutive years. Their reach to 1.5 million customers clearly shows their quality of service.

So the question is, what is so different about them? Well, Turbado is as simple and easy as any service can be. As we agree that not everyone is rich enough to buy brand new electronic devices, gadgets, and smartphones. One has always to compromise on their budget while buying them. In such circumstances, Turbado provides you a much better option.

The company lets you access these brand new electronic devices and smartphones like iPhone at a much cheaper price, and you keep using them until they get old, damaged, or you are done using them. In other words, you get a product as service at much lower rates and you do not have to stick to them forever. Moreover, they require you to pay even lesser upfronts and zero to low monthly installments. Not only this, but the company also offers a lifetime warranty, so they maintain and repair your phone free of any charges. Isn’t that amazing?

Reselling can be a tasking job at times when you do not find suitable offers at your desired rates. Since there are so many devices being sold online every day, there is always a chance that buyers will notice your offer. So, how does Turbado help you? You can simply return your phone to the company for reselling the phone or recycle it. If your phone still holds any value, the company will sell it online and let you get a new one.

PERKS OF HAVING TURBADO’S PRODUCT AS SERVICE

• Pay less money and be easy on your budget
• Money-back guarantee
• Unlimited Warranty as long as you keep the device
• Get rid of your unwanted devices without any hassle
• Recycle electronics ensuring zero waste generation
• Quality Customer service
• Fast and secure delivery to your door
• A fast exchange and repair policy

A business niche refers to a specified area of a business from the broader market that seeks to stand out from the competition. As a business operator, you should strive to find a niche to differentiate yourself from the ordinary and competitive market.

On finding the niche, you can then adopt the best marketing strategies for niche businesses by consulting niche marketing experts such as Ariel Pfeffer. Let’s look at how you can discover and dominate a business niche.

Easily identifiable customers

For you to be successful in a niche business, you must have a specific audience that you will focus your energy on. The best approach in selecting a target audience is to focus on an area in which you are knowledgeable and then identify segments within it.

It is easy to identify a specific population that you would do business with by using a set of positive characteristics. If you can’t specify or put the customers in a particular category, then that business plan is prone to fail.

With a target audience, you will be able to tailor your marketing strategies and business plans to meet their needs exclusively.

A neglected market

Another way of identifying a business niche is through finding a neglected market. A lot of industries become crammed up with small businesses that most of them forget to satisfy the customer’s needs adequately hence paving the way for a business niche.

For a business niche to stand out, there has to be a neglected need or a poorly served market. You can identify this by market researching about the unmet needs of customers. Especially in online market reviews, it is easy to point out disgruntled customers with certain services or markets.

For instance, inweb hosting, you can use Google analytics for searching for words that are not returning results. That way, you can find markets whose needs are unmet yet.

A massive potential market

For a business niche to be successful, it has to have a back up of a large potential market.  There are popular cases of a unique business springing up in a particular place, but within no time it flops. Reason being, there are not enoughcustomers to keep it going.

The market has to be big enough to earn your profits from selling goods and services. A small number of potential customers means there will be little or no growth of the business.

So, in addition to identifying the target audience, there must be enough of them to warrant the investment.

Research your customer base.

Doing comprehensive research about your customers is one way of identifying a business niche. Find out their motivations, likes, frustrations, dislikes, needs, goals and expectations. Even though this is an activity you should perform at the beginning of your business, doing regular maintenance checks will help you identify a lacking gap in the market.

Modify your business plan and do extensive marketing

Clearly define what needs you will meet in your business niche, decide on the pricing model, and tailor your business plan according to your research about the customer base.

Then, market your products and services to your market. It would be best if you modify your marketing strategies to serve and cater to the needs of your specific audience. In the same way, your business niche is specific; your marketing strategies should be focused as well.

Parting words

Finding a business niche is not only a way to make more profits, but it is also a way to create a loyal customer base.