I’ve been at the investment game for a while now and I’ve reached the stage where I prefer to invest in the stock market via individual stocks rather than collective investment vehicles like unit or investment trusts. The main reason for this is that I’d prefer not to pay other people to do something that I know I can do better myself.Of course, it wasn’t always this way. It’s taken me a quarter of a century of experience playing the markets to evolve my own profitable investment strategy. When I first started out though, like most people, I didn’t have the confidence to take my own decisions. More important than that, I didn’t have a large lump sum to play with in order to diversify my holdings sufficiently and build in a measure of safety. I suspect that’s the position that most newcomers to the world of investing find themselves in.So I’m not ashamed to admit that my first foray into the markets all those years ago was through one of the regular savings schemes run by the big investment trusts. Twenty-five years on I’d have to say that if I were just starting out on my investment journey now, I’d do exactly the same thing.Why Investment Trusts?Note that I chose investment trusts, not unit trusts. Although these two investment vehicles both allow investors to access a diversified portfolio of stocks with relatively small amounts of money, in my view, investment trusts have three clear advantages over their unit trust rivals:1. Their management charges are lower.2. Their long term performance is generally far better.3. They can often be bought at a discount to their net asset value.So if you’re now scratching your head and wondering why, despite all these advantages, you’ve never heard of investment trusts, you’re in very good company. Although things are slowly changing, investment trusts remain a closed book to most investors because, unlike their unit trust cousins, they don’t pay commission to financial advisors. As a result, they’re virtually ignored by the financial press. Let’s face it, high commissions equal high advertising budgets and since the Sunday papers rely on advertising to boost sales, they’ll happily provide favourable coverage in their money supplements to products promoted by high-spending advertisers. That sounds like a nice cosy relationship between the big investment houses and the financial media, but it leaves the small investor out in the cold as usual – deprived of information about one of today’s best-kept investment secrets. Hopefully, I’m about to help change all that.If I’ve convinced you that investment trusts are worth investigating further, and you’re ready to put your foot on that first rung of the investment ladder, then I’ve dug out a few options below which I believe would make ideal solutions for first-time investors like you. I’ve selected a range of vintage trusts with impeccable pedigrees from the broad global growth sector. These trusts offer a very low-cost way to access a broad, globally diversified portfolio. Rest assured that they all offer a regular monthly savings option for investors of more modest means:Foreign & Colonial Investment Trust 1. First up is a trust that was my first choice when I started investing a quarter of a century ago and it’s still going strong. It’s the Foreign and Colonial Investment Trust, it allows minimum monthly savings of £50 per month and it’s currently trading at a discount of 9.6% to net assets – which means that for every £90.40 invested, you’re getting £100 worth of shares. Now these discounts can fluctuate a bit. It may be that next month the discount widens to 11% or 12% – which simply means that if you’re a regular monthly investor, you get even more discounted shares for your money. Alternatively, the discount could narrow or even slip over into a premium as sometimes happens if a trust is particularly popular with investors – thus giving your investments a boost if you bought at a discount. Over the long term, however, whether you’re a lump sum investor or a regular saver, it would be hard to go wrong with this trust as, over the last 3 years, your investment would have increased by 52.7% – not bad, although past returns are no guarantee of a similar performance in future.Witan 2. An alternative to the Foreign and Colonial Trust, but one which does virtually the same job, is a trust called Witan. It’s performed even better than the Foreign and Colonial Trust with a return of 64.2% to investors over the last 3 years. It’s also slightly cheaper, trading at a 10.14% discount to NAV (Net Asset Value). On paper then, a slightly better bet. Again, you can start saving from just £50 per month.SAINTS 3. Finally, you could take a look at another old and well established stalwart, this time from the global growth and income category, and that’s SAINTS, or the Scottish American Investment Trust. This too allows minimum monthly investments of £50 per month through its parent company, Baillie Gifford, and has performed outstandingly over the last 3 years, returning 107.6% to its lucky investors. The downside is that this performance didn’t go unnoticed and the trust now stands at a premium to net assets of 4.1%. If you’re looking for income though, this trust currently yields over 4%, so not a bad alternative to a building society provided you’re prepared to risk your capital.Whichever option you choose, provided you’re in the markets for the long term, as you should be if you want to make decent returns, I think it would be very difficult to lose money with any of these trusts. That’s doubly true if you’re making regular monthly investments as you get the advantage of pound cost averaging, which means you buy more shares when prices dip, thus increasing your returns when shares subsequently rise. A few years down the line, once you feel you’ve accumulated enough in these well-diversified, low cost trusts, you can start dabbling in individual shares like I did.So if you were thinking of dipping a toe in today’s rather choppy investment waters, but either don’t yet have a large enough lump sum, or are too scared to dive in and commit it right now, then I don’t think you can do worse than follow my example: play it safe and set up an investment trust monthly savings scheme.Until Next Time, Happy InvestingJohn Mac, The Hands-On Investor.
Easy Steps to Travel With Your Pet Cat
Pets are part of our family and we can not bear their separation. Taking along your pet wherever you go is really a tough task and sometimes we feel unable to manage it. Cats are some of the best pets that are good looking as well as offer an enjoyable company. While you are planning to go out for vacation, you must be thinking to accompany it. But there are number of problems that you face while traveling with it.In this snippet we will give you a thorough understanding about the easy steps that can facilitate you a safe journey along with your cat. You need to have plenty of time for preparing an airline travel plan with your cat. The effective chore of action is explained as under:1. Contact To AirlineThis is the first and the most basic step towards your travel plan. Here you need to select the best airline allowing your pets to travel with you as all of them are not pet friendly. Make sure that there is no extra cost and restriction. Ask the authorities if they allow your pet to be in the cabin instead of cargo. Make an advance reservation in the non – stop airline so as to avoid the layovers.2. Do Some ShoppingWell, it is the high time to shop for your furry friend. Buy a suitable pet crate, toys that it likes, cat food, bowls, water bottles and identification tag, if needed. While buying a suitable crate keep in mind the size restrictions that the airline has set up and purchase the best one accommodating your pet.3. Visit The VetGoing to see your vet for an overall heath check up of your beloved cat is the most important part of travel preparation. Regardless of the health status of your cat, go to the vet and have some advance medication. Ask your vet for a tranquilizer, health reports and majorly the proof of vaccination shots.4. Decorate The CrateBefore leaving for your journey do not forget to decorate the crate to pamper your adorable pet. Place the toys inside that it loves to play, keep the bowls inside and stick a “live animal” caution on it.5. Traveling MannersOff course you need to behave sincerely with your pet while it is travelling. Try to keep talking with it throughout the way so that it can ensure a safe journey. Give the medicines that you need to give it before the flight departures and restrict the food supply for sometimes.Following the above tips you can have a happy journey with your four legged friend.
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How Social Media Allies and Upsides Your SEO Efforts?
SMM and Search Engine Optimization are usually given a separate space in the digital marketing arena.
And, quite reasonably, they are the two most decisive factors in the online marketing sphere.
But what we fail to understand is why many businesses do not acknowledge social media marketing as one of SEO’s most influential allies.
Do we intend to say that social media directly encourages your Search engine rankings?
The simple answer could be NO!
You must recognize that social metrics like Facebook likes and Twitter followers indicate social profile authority but have no hand in directly circumscribing the search engine rankings.
Surely, our straightforward answer is confusing. However, we completely believe that SEO and smo are powerful collaborators whose association must be leveraged for digital marketing success.
Let’s dig deeper and express how SMM can merit and warrant your SEO strategy.
The Relationship Between Social Metrics & SEO
Let’s assume that there might have been experiments conducted in the past that determine the use of social-media metrics such as social mentions and engagement level for search engine rankings.
But due to the unpredictable and unstable nature of smo and the weak signals generated, professionals might have dropped the attempts.
This was well elaborated by Matt Cutts back in 2014 in a Webmasters video. He was the Head of Google’s Webspam Team back then, and he revealed that social media provided incomplete signals.
Also, search engine algorithms can’t ascertain the reliability and authority of the smo posts and the profile.
Nevertheless, is there an Indirect way that social media influences search engine rankings?
And, this was embellished in the Cutt’s video itself.
He said that Google treats all social media websites like any other website on the Internet, which means that the same rules apply to Facebook, Twitter and so on as it applies to other websites.
Benefits of Social Media for Business
A Linkable Opportunity
As most social media consists of links to other websites, site owners and content creators can use it to promote their content.
You can employ a particular mixture of organic and paid promotions strategy to maximize your audience base.
Here’s how this happens-
As you use social media, there might have been countless times that some articles impacted you.
The impression an article made is evident in the things you share and communicate on social media. You might often use the information from the article in your other works, giving the source article a reference.
Understand that people cannot relate to something unless they know about it. Social media gives the perfect opportunity to content creators to prompt the audience and share link-worthy content.
You might well concede that SMM has given attention to many websites and individuals who were not known before. Creating Brand Mentions
Now, suppose someone or something (brand, product, service, individual, business, etc.) that has not yet been identified by Google suddenly notices many remarks online. In that case, it will influence Google to categorize them as an “entity”.
These are some unique circumstances that can boost your search engine rankings. This is bound to the context you are being mentioned or how people are talking about you online.
Understand that you are not adjudicated for how high you rank for a thing but what you entail as an entity.
So your website might not be getting a mention for a specific thing right now, but seeing the number of people who put trust in you, they can well start recognizing your business for that particular piece.
This is called the power of positive mentions.
Nevertheless, you need to make sure that positive mentions are not just on social media but on all public forums.
You can spring your brand marketing with your true audience base and inspire positive reinforcement and communication on social media.
Social Media For Searches
You cannot miss the fact that people use social media to search for a particular product or brand, and your audience base is just not limited to Google or Bing.
As you operate Twitter, you will realize that the social media channel with its trends, hashtags, insights and other tools give you a perfect opportunity to collude with the potential customers, making your content visible to the users.
You will find similar responses to Pinterest and Instagram.
Also, if anyone wants to know more about your company, he/she will likely ascertain your presence on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter channels- do a quick search and decide upon if he/she wants to deal with your business or not.
In 2016 Mark Zuckerberg had mentioned that “Now people are doing more than 2 billion searches a day between looking up people, businesses, and other things they care about.”- source Techcrunch.
Facebook had earlier retreated on a semantic graph search engine and launched a true keyword search, which landed in more search queries for media channel.
Twitter, since its onset, has been the leading destination for the population to flock for searches, especially in the event of big global news. Full post search appeared to have worked for Facebook and have expedited query volume.
Changing The Idea Of SEO
We have reached the phase where SEO is not just centered till Google optimization. We need to realize that search engine optimization is extending and converging on smo.
Also, if Google has been unclear about its stand, Bing, on the other hand, has been quite positive in including social metrics in its search engine algorithms.
You may well agree that the audience that reaches the company website, lurking through digital media channels, has already interacted with the company in a very pragmatic sense.
Also, digital media gives users the capability to engage more powerfully and compellingly. Hence, it will be only effective to broaden your social, media capacities and elicit brand awareness and growth.