According to the time in my area Spring was Sprung last evening around dinner time. Have you seen the trees budding? Can you feel the warmth in the air and best of all can you smell the scent of spring rain? The air feels soft and fresh like clean clothes on the clothes line and there’s a promise of freshness and color from the crocus and daffodils peaking through the last remnants of snow. Spring is messy too! The once glimmering white snow is now laden with road dirt and other indescribable litter. The run-off water mixes with dust and debris as it rushes across our pathways to ditches and sewers. Yet the arrival of Spring extends a welcome greeting that hears only the mating bird songs and feels the desire to fondle the warming Earth. . The vernal equinox announces the first day of spring March 20 or 21 when the sun sits directly over the equator. As the earth revolves around the sun the top half called the Northern Hemisphere, which is where we are, tilts more toward the sun and moves us away from winter and toward Spring. On the other hand, the bottom half, the southern Hemisphere tilts away from the sun bringing autumn and winter to people in Australia and South America and Africa. “Equinox”, a latin derived word means equal nights. At this time, sunrises and sunsets are about 12 hours apart all over the Earth, give or take a minute or two when the days are a few minutes longer than the nights. Spring can be rowdy too! It can get extreme in temperature and bring more of the dreaded snow or rains that add to the run-off and burst the banks of the rivers and streams. Lightning and thunder and winds can often preclude twisters and tornadoes. There is a similarity between Life and Spring that gives us the determination and courage to renew us in the face of set-backs and misfortune. Human Beings rise up to adversity in it’s many forms from personal tragedy to the disasters of Nature. And Human Beings, being human in nature, rise to the aid of humanity.
Sunday, October 2, 2016
Saturday, October 1, 2016
How to convert at least 30 of your newsletter subscribers into paying customers
If I received a quarter for every time someone told me that it's absolutely impossible to convert 30% of the subscribers on your list, I'd have an extra million dollars sitting in my bank account. Well I'm here to tell you that it can be done ONLY by using a systematic approach to converting your list. How is this done, and is it difficult you ask? Well if done correctly, it's possible you may even convert more than 30 percent. Using the traditional permissions email marketing strategies that most internet marketers use simply isn't good enough anymore. People are getting pitched to for products that they're not even interested in eventually they become decensitized to the offer. Yes, SPAM has hurt the email marketing industry but it hasn't killed it...it's simply forced some of us to develop alternative strategies to be successful. In order to be successful, you simply need to create highly targeted sublists and then pitch them an offer they cannot refuse. Now, at this point you may be thinking it's very difficult, however; it's not, so let me show you exactly how you should do it. Example: Let's assume that my ideal leads/market are stock market traders/investors. He're how I would set it up. I would create a optin-page offering someone a unique and FRE~E ecourse or report which the website visitor needs to subscribe to receive. Now, asking them for an email address and first name IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH anymore, and this is where most marketers get it wrong. You need more information to know exactly who they are and what they're interested in. In this example, I would ask for the first name, email address, Trading Experience (drop down selection list which includes "beginner", "intermediate" and "advanced" then, what do you trade (drop down list "Stock", "Futures","Forex") and Trading Style(drop down list "Swing", "Day","investor"). by having them provide this info to you before subscribing you have now created a pre-qualified, laser targetted subscriber database list. You know exactly who they are and what they would be interested in and that's invaluable information when you're trying to sell them a product. If you're trying to sell them a Swing Trading producut for beginners, let's say for example, you know exactly which subscribers on your list would be interested in your offer. When you go to send an email to that list, provided that you're using a good autoresponder system, you can query your list and find only the people that fit that description and then send them an email with your offer....and since you've captured their email adress you can do this over and over and over again. You conversion with skyrocket!..particularly if you first cultivate a good relationship with that list by providing good quality content/information which is very important, in other words, don't try to sell to them immediately, first offer them quality information and PLEASE, when you recommend a product, make sure you've tried it yourself before recommending it. To me, anyone that recommends a product they haven't tried themselves is unethical, so don't do this. Be helpful and honest to your subscribers and they'll reward you for it. As I already mentioned, your conversion percentage will increase dramatically simply by pre-qualifying and cultivating your subscriber before offering a product to them, however; if you really want to absolutely skyrocket your conversion you have to structure your product offer to subscribers using a a very unique and systematic approach which I've perfected over the last couple of years... ..and these are the same advanced conversion strategies I talk about in my in my coaching program over at http: intelligentmarketer where I'll show you how to launch a product with the force of an atom bomb and make 30 times more sales than you normally would.
Passport safety tips
Protect Your Passport Your passport is the most valuable document that you will carry abroad. It confirms your U. S. citizenship. Please guard it carefully. Do not use it as collateral for a loan or lend it to anyone. It is your best form of identification. You will need it when you pick up mail or check into hotels, embassies or consulates. When entering some countries or registering at hotels, you may be asked to fill out a police card listing your name, passport number, destination, local address, and reason for travel. You may be required to leave your passport at the hotel reception desk overnight so that it may be checked by local police officials. These are normal procedures required by local laws. If your passport is not returned the following morning, immediately report the impoundment to local police authorities and to the nearest U. S. embassy or consulate. Passport Fraud Law enforcement records show that U. S. passports are sometimes used for illegal entry into the United States, or by criminals abroad seeking to establish another identity. This can cause embarrassment to innocent U. S. citizens whose names become associated with illegal activities. To protect the integrity of the U. S. passport and the security of the person bearing it, consular officers overseas have found it necessary to take precautions in processing lost passport cases. These precautions may involve some delay before a new passport is issued. Safeguard Your Passport Carelessness is the main cause for losing a passport or having it stolen. You may find that you have to carry your passport with you because you need to show it when you cash traveler's checks or the country that you are visiting requires you to carry it as an identity document. When you must carry your passport, hide it securely on your person. Do not leave it in a handbag or in an exposed pocket. Whenever possible, leave your passport in the hotel safe, not in an empty hotel room, and not packed in your luggage. One family member should not carry all the passports for the entire family. Guard Against Thieves Coat pockets, handbags, and hip pockets are particularly susceptible to theft. Thieves will use all kinds of ploys to divert your attention just long enough to pick your pocket and grab your purse or wallet. These ploys include creating a disturbance, spilling something on your clothing, or even handing you a baby to hold! You can try to prevent theft by carrying your belongings in a secure manner. For example, consider not carrying a purse or wallet when going along crowded streets. Women who carry a shoulder bag should keep it tucked under the arm and held securely by the strap. Men should put their wallets in their front trouser pockets or use money belts instead of hip pockets. A wallet wrapped in rubber bands is more difficult to remove without notice. Be especially cautious in a large crowd - in the subway, on buses, at the marketplace, at a festival, or if surrounded by groups of vagrant children. Do not make it easy for thieves! I always make a color copy of my passport and visa and carry that with me and secure my passport in the hotel safe. Some countries require you to always carry your passport on your person. But, most will not have a problem if you carry a color copy.
Alarm clocks an insight
For most the sound of an Alarm ringing first thing in the morning is a shock. You set it the night before, for whatever time you would like to wake up, and yet you are still annoyed with it when it actually goes off at the time you requested. If you are like me, then you will prolong the act of getting up by constantly hitting the snooze button – which gives you another few minutes before it rings out again. The irony is that I personally never go back to sleep as I wait in anticipation for the sound of the dreaded clock to go off yet again. Clocks nowadays have very different sounds to wake you, but none of them in my experience are welcoming, my current clock has a very high intermittent bleeping sound – which drives me crazy each morning, but without it, I would not wake up, so ironically I do depend on the irritating sound it makes. Perhaps I need to look at alternative clocks that offer a better noise to wake up to? Traditional mechanical alarm clocks have a bell on top that rings, but digital alarm clocks can make other noises. Simple battery-powered alarm clocks make a beeping sound whereas novelty alarm clocks can speak, laugh, or sing. Clocks have definitely improved in time (no pun intended) and the features too have improved – these range from: built-in radios, nature sounds, dual alarms, CD players, iPod docking bays, sunrise simulators, programmable snooze etc. The Digital Clock is probably one of the most popular Alarm clocks in use today because they can be very useful (they are usually fitted with in-built radios as standard and are usually inexpensive to purchase) However the digital clock does have its drawbacks. Since they run on electricity and have no permanent memory, digital clocks must be reset every time they are moved or the power is cut off. This is a particular problem since a power outage during the night usually results in the clock failing to trigger the alarm in the morning. To reduce the problem, later designs often incorporate a battery backup to maintain the time during power outages. What does the future Alarm clock have in store for us? Among annoyances caused by alarm clocks is sleep inertia, a feeling of grogginess that results from abrupt awakening. Progressive alarm clocks claim to solve this issue. They include sunrise alarm clocks, dawn simulators and progressive auditory alarm clocks.
Take time to read your digital camera owner s manual
All cameras come with an owners manual, but so few people take the time to read it. Once they get past the basic operations, they get anxious to go out and try the camera. Maybe all the new terms are confusing or there seems like too much information to digest. This is understandable, but by not reading the entire manual, you limit yourself and many cool features of your camera are never used. Hopefully you will find the following suggestions helpful in getting the most from your digital camera. After your first overview of the features your camera possesses, decide what you would like to explore the most. Pick only one special feature. Read the instructions on what this feature can do and how to use it. Don’t worry if it isn’t completely clear, that will come in time. Now the fun part. Take your camera and start using this special feature. Try all the different settings within this one feature. See how your pictures change. Explore what this feature does. Don’t stop until you know this feature inside and out and don’t go onto the next feature until you have fully explored this one. When you are satisfied you know the ins and outs of one special feature, return to the owner’s manual and pick another special feature you would like to learn. Repeat the above process with this feature, only returning to the manual when you are satisfied you have mastered the new skill. By working through the owner’s manual in this way, you will find it isn’t so overwhelming. The hands-on practice of each skill will help you learn it thoroughly. When you have covered all the cool things your camera will do, go out and enjoy them all. You will be glad you took the time to become friends with this wonderful creation.
Xylitol the cure for caries
Some of our first memories are all about health, we are taught to keep our hands clean, brush our hair, take a bath, and brush our teeth. We are taught how vitally important it is to clean our teeth after every meal or at least twice a day, to floss daily, and to avoid candy or sweets. You might have seen the demonstration of a tooth placed in a glass of Coca-Cola that drink full of acid and the common table sugar called sucrose. The tooth started to decay before you and you might have wondered why? Is it the acid, because it couldn’t be the sugar could it? Coca-Cola also contains other sweeteners such as high fructose corn syrup, dextrose, corn syrup, and the like. Would you believe that these sugars are in fact the most cavity-promoting substances in a person’s diet? Of course how many of us actually brush between meals? How many of our children floss every day? Could it be that the allure of the chocolate bar and the cola are too much for any of us to resist? Most kids find them selves to be in this predicament and even perhaps you as an adult might feel its nagging craving. This might be the reason why cavities or caries as the medical industry calls them, still remain a common occurrence. A National Institutes of Health (NIH) survey (for survey go to nidr. nih. gov/news/consensus/final_cdc_statement. pdf) reported that 20% of children between the ages of 2 and 4 have had cavities. Furthermore, by age 17, nearly four out of five have had at least one cavity. So our percentage of people experiencing cavities is not getting better it is in fact getting worse! Jumping from 20% to 80% is a 300% increase in the number of young people who have or had a cavity. How about us adults how do we fare in this great struggle? The study goes to say that adults between the ages of 35 and 44 have lost at least one permanent tooth to dental cavities, and that 25% of the people ages 65 to 74 have lost all of their natural teeth. So why does sucrose hurt our teeth and is their an easier way to combat it? Did you know that tooth decay is a bacterial disease? Cavities are simply the symptom of what is going on inside your mouth. These caries or cavities are formed through a bacterial disease known as tooth decay. Bacteria in the mouth called Streptococcus mutants actually change the molecular structure of sucrose, corn syrup, and many other sweeteners. Without this molecular change sucrose and the like would increase the probability of type 2 or “maturity-onset” of diabetes and other diseases, but instead we just get a bacterial tooth disease to make up for it. The things we do to our selves with out even knowing it. So this is the reason why we were taught to brush our teeth after every meal and floss every day to minimize the ability of these bacteria to damage our tooth enamel through that slow every minute, every second, of every day tooth decay. The act of brushing ones teeth actually removes the bacteria from the surface of the tooth or the enamel where it does its nasty work. Some of the mouth washes or antiseptics are designed to kill the Streptococcus mutant bacteria. Dentists do their best to protect our teeth’s enamel with dental sealants, and with fluoride. Fluoride has a number of serious drawbacks as a preventative measure, its only strength is that is has been shown to strengthen tooth enamel. However, just because it strengthens your teeth’s enamel doesn’t mean it actually slows down the rate at which that enamel will decay, and it surely does not rebuild the enamel you have already lost. This is why there is so much controversy about fluoride as a “preventative measure”. The primary source of energy for the Streptococcus mutants is carbohydrates, especially sucrose and high fructose corn syrup. So restricting the use of the carbohydrates such as sucrose will deprive the bacteria of its needed fuel slowing the rate at which your teeth decay. So why am I writing this message to you? Simply to introduce to you a safe effective way for preventing and perhaps even stopping tooth decay all together. This preventative tool can stop tooth decay and may even reverse cavities allowing your body to heal its self. This is not a sonic mechanical tooth brush nor is it a complete set of gold plated dentures. The tool I am referring to is an all natural sugar! It goes by the name of Xylitol. You might be thinking “I thought you just said that carbohydrates especially sucrose are the main fuel on which this bacteria lives off of. Now you want me to eat it?” Be patient with me and all will be told. Sugar, what do you think of when I say sugar? Well if you’re like most of us you are thinking about the common everyday table sugar called sucrose that has been bleached white and is lying in your pantry or in that beautiful tin canister sent to you for Christmas. Not all sugars are or were created equal. Like sucrose xylitol is a natural food product, derived from certain fruits, vegetables (harvested mainly from corn), barriers, nutshells, and even tree bark. Xylitol is as sweet as sucrose and has about the same mass which is why you can substitute it on a one to one ratio for sucrose in all your cooking. So here is my point xylitol has no predisposition to cause cavities unlike sucrose and high fructose corn syrup. Thus this point in and of it self can actually help you in your daily fight against cavities. The regular use of xylitol products such as, chewing gums, candies, lozenges, toothpastes, and others, can stop the progress of tooth decay and as I mentioned earlier may even allow your body to heal cavities that are already in progress. Yet another amazing exciting fact about Xylitol is that children who consume xylitol sweetened gums, candies, and toothpastes before they loss their “baby teeth”, so long as they keep regular care of their teeth as they grow, will have more protection against cavities then we ever did or ever will when they grow older. Yes, that’s right before their permanent teeth come in. Xylitol functions so efficiently because it obstructs the bacteria that cause tooth decay, by stopping their growth and preventing those nasty Streptococcus mutants attaching to the tooth’s enamel. So ideal for children because foods made with xylitol taste just as good as those sweetened with sucrose. Can you imagine encouraging your children to chew gum, or eat candy because you know it is good for them! So do I have any “scientific proof” that supports my claims and how strong is this so called proof? Thankfully the people who have done the studies main motivations were not of greed, but rather of health and life. This means a lot me, these studies couldn’t be stronger. Many companies do the minimum of what is required by law to make claims about their products; though this may be legal it is not always moral. Dental anti cavity research has been going on now over 25 years. Dr. Catherine Hayes (for study go to nidr. nih. gov/news/consensus/catherine_hayes. pdf) of the Harvard School of Dental Medicine concluded that the favorable evidence for Xylitol was so strong that “it would be unethical” to deny people of its dental protecting effects.
The path to despair is paved with shattered
To desire is to want something that one does not have but wishes to have. In most cases, when a person desires someone or something, they firmly believe that there is some means of slating that desire. Whether or not those means are available to the person with the desire can vary drastically from person to person. While desire has been seen as a great motivator (Alexander the Great's conquests are often said to have been fueled by his desire for more world to conquer), it may also prove to be the undoing of a person's mental health, with the most common side effect being prolonged cases of depression. Sadly, for some people, having something they desire be utterly out of their reach can often make them willingly allow themselves to go into states of melancholy and despair. Humans, by nature, want things that they cannot have. This has never been disputed throughout history and, in most cultures, is accepted as a part of human nature. People have a tendency to want things, even when logic would dictate that those things are out of their reach. In some cases, this has been a positive thing that has allowed people to achieve their dreams, but disaster can strike when a person fails. For some people, desiring something they cannot have can often make them feel inadequate or unworthy of whatever it is they already possess. For others, it can cause fits of violence and rage, typically accompanied with attempts to used flawed logic to blame someone or something else for their inability to get what they want. However, perhaps the most damaging effect that the inability to fulfill one's desires might have is the onset of depression. When someone develops a case of clinical depression due to being unable to fulfill a personal desire, the consequences can weight heavily. In their minds, the only way to lift their negative emotions would be to find a way to fulfill their desires, preferably in a manner that satisfies them. For example, a man who is in love with a woman and becomes depressed at her lack of feelings for him might become depressed. While having her openly admit to having feelings for him would alleviate the problem, it would only have a lasting effect if it was brought about in a manner where the woman did not appear coerced or manipulated into such an admission. While it is possible that some people would have no scruples over accepting a lover under false pretenses, the depression might become replaced with paranoia in the long-term. After all, if she was only manipulated into loving him, wouldn't it be just as simple for someone to manipulate her into eventually leaving him? It is true that not all people who have failed to fulfill their desires become depressed individuals with compromised mental health. However, it is generally viewed as a safe assumption that letting someone brood for too long over being unable to accomplish a goal can lead to a state of melancholy and depression. There is a silent consensus that a majority of the population would have to face several failures to drive them to utter doom and despair, but for some people, just a single catastrophic failure is enough.
Video poker how to play the game
: If you are looking for a fun and challenging alternative to playing slot machines, video poker is the game for you. Instead of simply pulling the machine handle and hoping that you will be lucky enough to meet a row of identical icons, in video poker your moves would rule whether you win or lose. Moreover, the house edge in video poker is much lower than at slots. Playing video poker is similar to playing draw poker on a slot machine. It enables you to enjoy the action of poker without having to face other players who may be more experienced and skilled than you are. In addition, in video poker, there are no dealers, no rakes, no bluffing, no cheating; it is all about you and your poker skills. How to Play Video Poker: There are several variations to video poker. Some of the video poker variations are played with standard 52 card decks while others are played with additional wild cards. All the variations are based on the traditional card game of poker. Therefore, a basic knowledge of poker hand ranking is necessary. You start by choosing the coin value you wish to play and then pick the number of coins that you want to bet. Afterwards, you click on deal and five cards will appear on your screen. You can discard some or all of the cards and replace them with new ones. After pressing hold on the cards you wish to keep, you push the deal button and the machine replaces your discarded cards with new ones. The outcome of the second draw determines whether you win or lose. Each video poker machine displays its payout table, which details the number of coins the machine pays for each five card poker hand. The payout table differs from one video poker variation to the other and so is the minimum hand that qualifies for a payout. Video poker odds are the same as in regular card poker. A 52 card deck produces more than 2.5 million hand combination. Each video poker machine is set by a random number generator, which simulates the probabilities of drawing any of the poker hand combinations. While in regular card poker, the casino ensure its profits by collecting a rake, in video poker the casino ensure its profits by setting each machine pay table differently. Video Poker Tips: 1) Learn the basics of draw poker before you start playing video poker at online casinos or at a casino nearby. 2) Know the machine payout of the table you have decided to play at by selecting the machine that offers the highest return. 3) Adjust your strategy to the specific video poker variation you intend to play. 4) Use a mathematical strategy to play the game correctly. 5) Do not keep cards that cannot be used to form a winning hand. 6) Hold on to any pair instead of keeping a high card. 7) Keep any pair rather than draw into a straight or a flush. 8) Practice playing online video poker in a play money mode.
Using adsense for building your online business
Even though AdSense is a very popular income source for many online marketers, few will make enough money from it to make AdSense their primary business. If you are currently trying to increase your AdSense earnings there are some tried and tested rules that will help you achieve more clicks and make more money. As an online marketer, you realize that you must be consistent and persistent to achieve the goals that you set for yourself. The AdSense business is no different. Yet the people who make the most money with AdSense are the ones who work at it smarter rather than doing the same things over and over that do not produce good results. In fact, it is a popular myth among online marketers that you must only develop and promote websites that pertain to high paying keywords. As a rule the marketers that make the most money from AdSense are the ones who consistently keep building websites around medium priced keywords within a theme. Then as they go along, they build websites that are related to that common theme. For example, you might build your websites under the theme of 'computers'. The mistake some people make is to develop one site devoted to only computers. It is advantageous to the marketer to make many websites related to computers such as laptops, computer hard drives, computer keyboards, etc. It is the concept of more is better that will make you the most money. As you start building your AdSense publishing business, here are some major rules to consider that will maximize your profits: 1. Track your successes and failures. 2. Use the latest tools and software available. 3. Keep your AdSense sites easy to navigate. Do not promote anything else on these websites. 4. Treat your AdSense business as a real business. The marketers that make the most money with AdSense are the ones who treat it as a business and consistently continue to produce high quality websites around themes or 'niches' daily. If you are just starting out, you have to realize that there is a lot of work involved to set up your websites, do the seo optimization, track your your results and then repeat the process. You can use the latest tools and software to automate the keyword selection process, create good websites and do most of the tedious seo optimization for your AdSense websites. In this regard investing some money in the right software will turn more profit in the long run because you will be able to make more sites faster. The name of the game in the world of AdSense is to make highly profitable websites and keep making more of them all the time. A large AdSense income does not happen overnight. The best way to make the most money with your AdSense business is to follow the rules outlined here and constantly build more websites. Like planting seeds in a garden, you will reap AdSense income according to what you sow.
House for sale 7 easy ideas and advice for creating great curb appeal to the outside of your home
: No matter how beautifully decorated the inside of your home may be, if the outside of the house does not reflect what lies behind the front door, you may easily lose the sale. Potential homebuyers frequently make a list of homes from various internet sites, advertisement listings or through a realtor that they wish to see and then drive by these homes to get a ‘feel’ for the property and the house. Bottom line, if your home looks unappealing from the outside there is a good possibility your home will be crossed off the list of potential purchases. Decide to spend a weekend fixing up the outside of your home and stick to a plan. 1) Call two or three local landscapers and ask them to come out for a landscape appraisal but most importantly ‘pick their brain’ for ideas of how best to show your home. Explain that you are selling the home and wish only to make the most of the exterior at minimal cost to you. In some cases, you might be surprised, particularly during slow landscaping seasons that you can afford to have a professional lightly landscape your property or at least modify a portion. For less than $500, an associate of mine had a local gardener come in and plant 12 tropical plants, 8 large flowered bushes, trim the existing trees to shape, pull the weeds, cut out sod to merge two planting beds, plant 20 small flowering bushes and throw down several bags of mulch in 2 afternoons. She also saved a little more money by having him transplant bushes from another part of the property to the front where she planned to create a more dramatic impact. Further, his price included clean-up and removal of gardening debris, which saved her a lot of time after the work was complete. Her soil was very hard to dig into and it would have taken her twice as long to dig one hole as it did for the gardener to dig several; he was familiar with such difficult work and he had all the right tools to do it quickly. My associate only paid him to service the front beds while she saved money by cleaning up the smaller side beds on the side property by doing it herself. (The gardener even let her borrow his expert tools as long as she promised to return them the following day, which she did.) You might be surprised at the minimal but well-worth price of hiring a professional gardener, particularly if you find a local, one-woman/man operation with low overhead. Someone starting a new business might also be less expensive in trying to build a clientele while my associate in turn offered to advertise the gardener’s services by keeping business cards on hand during real estate visits. Consider having him/her do a portion of the work and then do the less difficult areas of your home yourself. Even if you do not have a landscaping budget, call a few local gardeners to come out for a quote just to get some great landscaping ideas you can use yourself. Most are willing to spend a few minutes of their time even if you do not use their services. Take their business card anyway and offer to send them a referral. It is all part of doing business. So consider hiring a professional gardener to add curb appeal to a tired property. 2) Stand at the curb of your property and look the land from the perspective of the drive-by potential buyer. Get in the car and drive down your street and look at the way your property compares to your neighbors. If your neighborhood is well-cared for but your property is not; where the trees are overgrown and the weeds are hiding your front door is a clear indication your home will stick out like a ‘sore thumb’ and you may lose the sale. If you live in a neighborhood where your neighbors’ landscaping is ‘so-so’, this is your opportunity to shine. My associate explained that she once lived in a brand new home in an older neighborhood where few people took the time to landscape nicely so anything she did…add a border, plant a few bushes, and place a park bench near the front driveway with container plants, certainly looked amazingly better than the homes around her property. When the time came to sell this home, she took a ride around the block and took the position of the potential buyer. As a drive-by buyer canvassing her own street, my associate noted that the viewer would see blasй curb-appealed homes and then come upon her own, where the flowers were blooming, the green grass was trimmed, the containers were filled with flowers and the inexpensive park bench at the end of the long driveway looked inviting. So plan your landscape to stand out from the rest and if your budget does not allow for the extras, then the next rule of thumb is to just make the property look ‘neat’…. 3) Neatness in landscaping is important. If a property looks tidy, the impression you will give to the drive-by buyer is that the inside is neat and well-cared for as well. Even if you are not a neat person, make an effort to neaten up the exterior. Find someone who has a ‘neat’ eye and ask for their opinion. Trim the grass and if you have spotted, brown grass, invest in a bag of grass seed and water frequently to encourage growth. Baby-sit the seeds and if necessary, place a barrier around the area to keep children and pets from stomping on them. Cover new grass-seeded areas with hay or grass clippings to prevent blowing away, from birds eating the seeds and to keep moisture in. Water newly seeded areas daily. If you have time before you place your home up for sale, fertilize your lawn…it can make a huge difference in how healthy and green the lawn shows from the street. If you do not have grass, then create areas with grass. Consider removing areas covered in stone or weeds and planting with either seeds or sod. It is a big project if you have little or no front lawn so elicit help from friends and neighbors if needed. Having some kind of greenery in the form of grass makes a huge difference to a buyer. Grass is a great canvas to making other areas of your property stand out and grass appeals to many who grew up with front lawns or always wished they had one. If you live in areas where it is impossible to grow grass, adding stone is another possibility however, be sure that stone works in that area of the country in which you are selling. Stone lawns usually fit in better in coastal properties where sand is the foundation and the cost of carting in topsoil is enormous. I often feel that all-stone frontage looks out of place in neighborhoods where lawns are more prevalent and gives the impression the homeowner really cannot be bothered to maintain a lawn. I feel that stone is not a warm product if used in large areas and should be contained in smaller garden beds if possible. 4) Once you have the grass, fix up the existing beds. (If you do not have any beds in your property, this would be an entirely different article. This article deals with homes, which have garden beds already in place that need sprucing up.) Garden beds help soften the hard lines of sidewalks, walkways, and the rigid angle of homes. Once you have weeded these beds, ask yourself, “Does the design of the current beds allow them to be connected in some way across the front of the home? Do my beds flow?” The reason that I bring this question forward in a Curb Appeal article is that my associate explained to me that she used to have to separate garden beds in front of her home; one ran right across the front left-side of the home and the other ran down the side of the driveway. Both beds were disconnected from each other separated by a walkway. This separated design made the frontage look severed and harsh. So she cut out the sod from the bed in front of the house, around the walkway and made a connection to the bed nearest the driveway. It looked like one continuous snake-like bed and once planted with similar foliage the entire property looked really ‘pulled together’. In doing this she accomplished two things: 1) Softening the hard angles of the walkway, which did not have a garden bed in front of it and, 2) the property had the look of what my colleague refers to as ‘fluid design’. The eye now followed a soft flow from one end of the house where the bed began to the end of the driveway where the bed ended. And…there was a small surprise at the end of that bed too, which made the design interesting and appealing. At the end of the driveway, which is ordinarily dull space, the garden bed ended in a circular shape and she planted just a few extra eye-catching flowers there; just a nice little touch and the colors were appealing. The path up the driveway, followed around the walkway toward the entrance of the home was entirely landscaped and pulled together with like-flowers and shrubs. Not a whole lot, but it was consistent and it was neat. 5) Another lawn tip from my associate…she did not have time for grass to grow in some ugly, brown and bare spots on her front lawn and in some cases, the grass just never grew back at all. She cut around the bad areas and made a teardrop-shaped cut out on that spot and filled it in with a few container plants she had growing in the yard. My colleague arranged the containers on 3 different levels…small, medium and large and then filled around the containers with mulch to even things out. The arrangement looked very nice. One of her empty containers (she often picks them up in the dollar store or finds disposed of in construction sites), she cut in half and placed it cut-side down on the bare spot on the lawn in front of the 3 flower-filled containers. She filled the cut container with soil and threw in a handful herb seeds, namely dill and in about 2 weeks; the container flowed with pretty green herbs and ‘spilled out’ the container onto the ground covering the area cut out from the lawn. It made a nice presentation and was not too ‘much’ and at the same time hid the very worse part of our property. My friend noticed that even after I sold the home, the new owners still kept the container area as it was when she had the home for sale. 6) Another consideration when taking control of curb appeal when selling your home is to remove or trim down those trees and bushes which hide the beauty of your home. So often buyers look at photos of homes, which show a huge tree in front of the house that hides any view from the inside to the street. If you cannot see the home in a photo or in a drive-by viewing, this again reduces the chances that a potential buyer may be interested in your home. No one wants to ‘guess’ what a home really looks like and if there are overgrown bushes and trees hiding the house, potential buyers do not want to envision having to clear the property themselves. So be bold and trim the bushes down and if necessary, remove whatever seriously blocks viewing the home’s charm and character from the street. 7) Along the lines of seeing a home from the street is the inability to do so if you have cars parked in front that do not always need to be there. Granted, we need to park our cars but if you have the opportunity to take your car to the street or to the furthest end of your property for a few hours on the weekends or, if you have a large driveway and can move the car away from the front of the home, then take the time to do this. Buyers need to visualize the home as it would be if they lived there and anything which detracts from this thought is a non-plus for you as the seller. Weekends are usually the busiest times for drive-by house viewing so if you can move your car to a neighbor’s driveway or off your own driveway for a few hours, do so. It may make a difference in the curb appeal of your home. Also, as a reminder, if you have any cars, boats or trailers parked in front of your home, which really do not need to be there…a car you were going to work on or an inoperable vehicle without any registration and kept putting off paying to be towed away, make a decision as whether it really needs to be there or not. Call a charity to have it towed away and donate it. Put an ad in the paper or on craigslist for a free boat or project car, but by all means, remove any unnecessary vehicles, which really take away curb appeal and make the property look more like a car dealership or a parking lot than a home. So the main items to consider when creating curb appeal are to: • Neaten up the property • Plant grass or sod wherever possible – if not possible, hide bad spots with container gardens. • Trim and cut away trees and shrubbery which prevent drive-by buyers from seeing your property and the home to its fullest. • Remove cars on higher drive-by traffic days and permanently remove any cars, boats or trailers, which will not be sold with the home. • Call a landscaper for his/her opinion and talk about a quote for neatening up the property. See if you can afford at least a portion of it to be professionally ‘neatened’ and if not; get ideas from a professional that you can use later on your own.