Tag: Options

  • Alternative Medicine Treatment of Plantar Fasciitis

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    Plantar fasciitis (PF) affects approximately two-million people in the US, of both athletic and non-athletic populations. This condition can be debilitating and significantly affect one’s quality of life in a very negative way. There are few high quality studies on this condition and the most successful treatments. Treatments range from chiropractic care, physical therapy, injections and surgeries. Fortunately this condition can typically be resolved with conservative treatment and lifestyle modifications that can prevent going under the knife. Simply put, plantar fasciitis is a strain with subsequent inflammation of the thick tissue (plantar fascia) and muscles on the bottom of the foot causing heel pain. Plantar fasciitis (PF) is characterized by biting heel/mid arch pain when first bearing weight in the morning, or after long periods of rest. The pain typically subsides within 5 minutes of walking or running, then worsens with long term activity or weight bearing. It is also associated with tired, achy feet at the end of the day and foot cramps. PF is seen in both active and inactive people, and is rarely the result of an acute injury. PF can be the result of several different factors: repetitive overuse injuries, poor fitting footwear, overtraining, structural abnormalities of the foot and improper gait mechanics. PF often becomes a chronic and/or recurring problem if not given the appropriate treatment and follow up care.

    Some contributing factors to the development of plantar fasciitis:

    Structural abnormalities: Plantar fasciitis is very commonly seen with pes planus (pictured left), or flat footed individuals. As you can see, this individual’s medial arch is almost flush with the ground. This can create strain on the plantar fascia. Severe injuries resulting in the need for surgical fusion of the foot can also create strain on the plantar fascia. In these cases of severe structural abnormalities, orthotics are typically indicated. Rehabilitation including foot strengthening exercises, chiropractic manipulation and soft tissue techniques can relieve pain and help to alleviate strain on the tissues and resolve flair ups. We use custom orthotics from Foot Levelers in our office. Using a 3-D scanner, we can have custom orthotics made to support the full structure of your foot.

    Poorly fitting footwear: Wearing improper footwear over time can lead to PF. If a shoe doesn’t fit your foot properly, your gait is altered during any weight bearing activity. This has an effect on the entire kinetic chain and can ultimately cause strain on the plantar fascia. The strength and flexibility of your foot will determine your best type of footwear.

    Overtraining: Can be a huge contributor to PF. What many athletes, weekend warriors and the like tend to overlook is the importance of recovery in their training regimens. If your tissues don’t have optimal nutrition, rest and repair time they start DEgenerate rather than REgenerate. Especially when it comes to long distance running, or quick sprints, the feet have a lot of demand.

    Nerve Impingement: Plantar fasciitis can be a symptom of sciatic nerve impingement. The sciatic nerve is the thickest nerve in your body. It originates from your lumbosacral plexus of nerves typically L4-S1/S2 with some individual anatomical variation. Although this nerve is commonly blamed for all radiating leg pain, it is only responsible for pain along its trajectory down the posterior aspect of the leg and foot. In some impingement cases, the pain can skip the back of the leg altogether and go straight to the foot. Impingement along any portion of the nerve can result in pain, but it doesn’t have to be in the leg. If there is enough impingement along this nerve, any added pressure, say forced dorsiflexion of the foot when standing or walking, can be just the right tension to create exquisite foot pain. Our bodies are always trying to protect our nervous system; reflexively the muscles surrounding the nerve will tighten in an attempt to avoid any further stretch or tension of the nerve. Ultimately, this leads to inflammation of the plantar fascia and the surrounding muscles.

    Other Factors:

    Systemic Inflammation: Though general systemic inflammation is typically not the cause of plantar fasciitis, it will increase your symptoms. For this reason we strongly encourage our patients to eat an anti-inflammatory diet specific to their needs. We also understand no one is perfect or eats perfect all the time, which is why we encourage an 80/20 approach; eat clean 80% of the time and use the other 20% to indulge. Curcuminoids, like those found in turmeric are great to help blot down inflammation in acute cases of plantar fasciitis.

    Alternatives to conservative care:

    Cortisone or steroid injections are very commonly given for Plantar fasciitis. In some really tough cases this can absolutely be necessary to “put out the fire” that is the inflammatory cascade, to get you out of pain initially. We never recommend looking at this option as a cure. Cortisone is a very powerful anti-inflammatory that alleviates pain without correcting the underlying issue, potentiating further injury and recurrent episodes. Another option is surgical intervention. In some cases, surgery is the best option for a particular case. We prefer to exhaust conservative treatment options before travelling down this avenue. A study on an overweight and obese population (43 total) suffering with plantar fasciitis for an average of 34.8 months, were given decompressive surgery to the nerve to the abductor digiti minimi with partial plantar fascia release and tracked over a 4-year period. It was found that 75.6% of patients were in deed pain-free or had only mild pain post-surgery (pain decreased from an 8.5/10 to a 2.5/10). However patient satisfaction post-surgery was only 48%.

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    Source by Ann Barter

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  • Affiliate Programs For Beginners

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    Starting out, you need only two affiliate programs, one to recommend physical products, the other for information products.

    The clear winner for physical products is Amazon. For information products, the best one used to be ClickBank, but JVZoo has overtaken it this year.

    Here’s why Amazon and ClickBank are the two best options.

    Amazon Associates

    The Amazon Associates program is very well known. You use their links to promote certain products and you get a cut for every item bought through your links. Commission varies between 2% and 8%, depending on the product.

    But every time someone lands on Amazon trough your affiliate link, you get a cut of everything they buy during that visit, not just the product you recommended.

    This makes using the Amazon Affiliates program really powerful.

    The way to leverage the program is to write product reviews on your blog. It is the simplest way to make money online, especially for beginners.

    Once you’ve started making some money through your first few sales through the program, you can start to scale by reinvesting that money, and up your income.

    JVZoo

    There are loads of information products online. You could even consider the internet an information product. People, simply, use the internet to find information.

    Much of that is free, but people are willing to pay for information that will make their lives better.

    The commission you get by recommending these products can go up to 75% – a huge increase on what you get for physical goods.

    It is much harder, however, to sell information products. Commissions are higher, but coversions are lower.

    I would have recommended ClickBank before this year, but JVZoo has taken over for one reason.

    There are more product launches on JVZoo.

    Easy Way to Sell Information Products:

    Product launches make it much easier to sell information products.

    You do essentially the same thing as for physical goods, you write reviews and include an affiliate link people can use to buy the product.

    Product launches are specific days when a new one goes on sale. You choose a product to review, you can see upcoming launches through MunchEye, write your review, include your link and use the hype of the first day to generate traffic and sales.

    Since there are a lot more product launches on JVZoo this makes it much easier for someone starting out to make their first bit of money and attract traffic.

    People searching for a review are nearly ready to buy something. That makes it easier to sell to them. And a good review helps them. It helps them not waste money on products not fit for them or time having to research all the details themselves. You’re also not competing with the people who put out the product, in fact you are helping them.

    Those things make reviews great for affiliate marketing.

    You will have to work hard, but your reviews could be passively earning you money months or years down the road.

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    Source by James Pierce

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  • What Marketing Strategy Is the Best for You?

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    If you pick the right marketing strategy, you’ll be like that little guy in the middle of my diagram above. Yes! Winning! Fist pumps!

    The problem with marketing today is that there are way too many options and it’s much too confusing. It makes me dizzy just thinking about this stuff and I’ve been immersed in it for 35 years.

    Well, I lay down on my bed last week with a notepad and started to map out my “Unified Theory of Marketing Strategies” with an emphasis on online marketing.

    And I actually came up with something that’s not totally confusing, and might even be helpful to a few people.

    Here goes…

    It’s yet another four-quadrant grid where the vertical axis is a scale from easy to hard and the horizontal axis is a scale from passive to proactive.

    I emerged with these four snappy quadrants:

    Hard and Passive = Multimedia

    Easy and Passive = Publishing

    Hard and Proactive = Presentations

    Easy and Proactive = Email

    Now, all of these strategies can be effective. But, yes some are easier than others. And the passive ones tend to take a lot longer than the proactive ones.

    Hard and Passive = Multimedia (Videos)

    Everyone is crazy about video these days. It’s a challenging, yet passive strategy. You put a lot work into creating a video and then post it on YouTube hoping people see it.

    It’s difficult to do well. It’s time-consuming and it can be expensive. And most videos are pure crap. If you want to do it well, it takes a chunk of change and a lot of time.

    Throwing up a lot of little videos on your website can be a nice touch, but they usually don’t get people to call you in droves.

    So, as you can see, I’m not crazy about a video strategy for self-employed professionals. I’m not saying they can’t work, but it’s a whole lot of work to do right.

    Best example: A non-duality teacher named Rupert Spira (non-duality.rupertspira.com/home). He does live workshops and films everything. Then his staff chops them up into questions and answer segments and posts them on YouTube. They’re five to fifteen minutes long. And what you see is what you get. No pitch, no hype. It’s his teaching unadulterated.

    He has hundreds of videos on YouTube with hundreds of thousands of views. Does it work? Well, his workshops are always full and all he does is a low-key email announcement to his list every month or two.

    I like this approach a lot. Got a lot of good content? Look good on video (unlike yours truly)? Then you may want to emulate Rupert.

    Easy and Passive = Publishing

    I happen to like this strategy a lot as it, ahem, built my “Empire.” It’s relatively easy: Write a how-to article on your subject matter once a week, send it out to those on your e-list and publish on your blog. Fame ensues.

    But online publishing can be a lot more than that. You can take those same articles and publish them on Medium, LinkedIn, and Ezine Articles. And then you can announce them on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. Sometimes you can get big exposure when writing an article for a major online publication. Web traffic multiplies.

    The cost is zero; an article takes from two to five hours to write (unless it takes you several days). And your ideas are online for eternity to be discovered by those looking for practical ideas. Some will opt-in to your e-list and perpetuate this virtuous marketing circle.

    The downside, of course, is that, according to my extensive research, (a 10 second Google search), there are 2 million articles published online every day. The mind reels. So your stuff will be out there, but somewhat lost in a very big haystack.

    I’m still a big advocate of online publishing, but the mountain is getting steeper and steeper. Just writing an article or two here and there won’t help you much.

    Best Example: Well, other than mine, of course, check out Henneke of Enchanted Marketing. She has a wonderful, readable, fun blog on business writing and blogging. And she walks her talk. It’s all about well-written, relevant content. If you don’t have that as a foundation, it’s a total waste of time.

    Hard and Proactive = Presentations

    I built my business on presentations in front of live audiences at professional associations and chambers of commerce. It got me attention, added people to my mailing list and generated warm leads for marketing coaching.

    And I still do presentations today in the form of webinars. I just filled my recent group program with the help of a couple webinars (also called video conferences). They most certainly do work.

    But I put presentations in the hard category, not because they are all that hard to give, but can take a long time to prepare. The last one I did took me two full days. There were about 200 slides (whew).

    Yes, that’s not the only way to do a webinar. You can just go live on Zoom Video, and that can work as well. You ultimately have to find your style and test what works.

    Presentations are proactive in that at the end you can ask for the business. And, of course, you can turn the recording of the webinar into a video in a snap and send it out to those on your list. Watch it here.

    So presentations will always play a big part in my marketing toolkit.

    One other thing though – If you don’t have a LOT of people on your email list, good luck in getting much of an attendance. Yes, you can do guest presentations hosted by others, but you don’t have the same control and ability to pitch your professional services.

    Best example: John Nemo of LinkedIn Riches (linkedinriches.com). His webinar is a blast. There are a lot of them out there in the online marketing world. And many, Like John, have set them up as evergreen webinars that are scheduled to play automatically several times a day. These are kind of a hybrid between publishing and presentations.

    Easy and Proactive = Email

    In my opinion, email is the most powerful overall marketing tool. And it gets the least respect. But I can’t imagine even being in business without email marketing.

    Social media gets all the PR and all the attention, but email gets the business. A recent study showed that email generated 40 times the business results of Facebook and Twitter combined.

    Email is the online tool that’s been around the longest, and I think it’s taken for granted. Promotional emails have expanded exponentially over the years, but most of it isn’t very good.

    We wade through our email boxes like we sort our mail over the trashcan. Delete, delete, delete. Why? Because it’s either not relevant or it’s boring. Usually both.

    I feel that email has the greatest potential of all the online marketing strategies because it’s both relatively easy and the most proactive marketing medium of all. Your message goes right into the mailbox of your potential client. Nothing else can do that.

    Marketing email holds great opportunities for improvement in several areas:

    1. How to incorporate humor as the most powerful attention-getting device in existence (that almost nobody is using).

    2. How to telegraph your value proposition straight to the minds and hearts of your prospect.

    3. How to make your emails clear, focused, and easy-to-read.

    4. How to craft a compelling call-to-action that is hard to resist.

    5. How to get emails to thousands of your prospects without looking like spam.

    If you’re not working on ALL of these, your emails will not get the attention and response you want.

    Best Example: Therapy Practice Accelerator. Visit this site and get on the list just to see the brilliance of the email marketing. It’s all about demonstrating results.

    What marketing strategies will you choose?

    Take the four marketing quadrants into consideration. The easier a marketing activity, the more likely you’ll actually do it. And the more proactive a marketing activity, the faster the response you’ll get.

    Cheers, Robert

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    Source by Robert Middleton

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  • What Is Drug Court in District of Columbia Superior Court?

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    There are drug courts throughout the Country. Generally, they are special courts designed to treat people who have an addiction cases and are in the criminal justice system. There are currently more than 2,450 Drug Courts operating throughout the United States with all 50 states having a program. District of Columbia Superior Court Drug Intervention Program (SCDIP) has been in operation for over 20 years. SCDIP is a voluntary program.

    Criminal defense attorneys who make a blanket statement "I don't have clients do drug court" are doing a disservice to their clients especially if the reason they are in criminal justice system is for addiction. Good criminal defense attorneys will explore all options including participating in this program.

    Over the course of the last year, SCDIP has gone through some major changes. SCDIP requires a minimum participation of 5 months. This article gives a brief overview of how the typical defendant enters District of Columbia Superior Court Intervention Program.

    The client comes into the criminal justice system either charged with a misdemeanor or a felony case in DC. Superior Court. It should be noted that SCDIP is only applicable to charges prosecuted by the United States Attorneys Office for the District of Columbia. The Attorney General for the District of Columbia criminal prosecution division does not participate in SCDIP; and therefore, serious traffic charges are not eligible.

    Misdemeanor cases Intake

    The defendant reports for arraignment (initial charge). Thereafter, the case is set for status. The Court at arraignment may impose an evaluation and if positive program placement. If the positive test pretrial may order an addiction severity index (ASI). ASI is an evaluation where a drug counselor expert advises what treatment is required of the defendant.

    At the status hearing, pretrial services may recommend drug court as an option. If pretrial services recommends drug court, the government will be given 2 to 3 weeks to screen whether they will allow participation in drug court. The case will be set for an additional status hearing.

    At the final status hearing, if pretrial services and us attorneys and the defendant agree the case will be certified to the drug court calendar on a Tuesday or Thursday.

    Upon successful completion of a misdemeanor case in drug court, the case will be dismissed.

    Felony cases Intake

    The defendant is presented on a felony complaint. The case is set for preliminary hearing. The court at presentment may impose an evaluation and if positive program placement. If the defendant test positive test for drugs, pretrial may order an addiction severity index (ASI). An ASI is an evaluation where a drug counselor expert advises the Court what treatment is recommended.

    If pretrial services recommends participation in drug court and the defendant ais willing, he may proceed without US attorney's recommendation. Unlike the misdemeanor the defendant may have 2 separate court dates, one before the felony judge and one before the drug court judge. In fact, the defendant can request a trial or plead guilty and still participate in drug court.

    If the United States Attorney's office approves for participation the defendant, the US Attorney's office may grant an Amended Sentencing Agreements (ASAs). If the defendant successfully completes the ASA, the government will agree to permit the defendant to amend his / her plea at the final sentencing date and plead to a lesser included misdemeanor charges instead of the felony.

    If the US attorney's office did not approve participation, upon successful completion of a felony case in drug court, the court may grant a term of probation but it is not guaranteed.

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    Source by Mark Rollins

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  • The Best eCommerce Practices for a Seamless Customer Experience

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    In this generation of online shopping, none of the businesses can thrive without an outright eCommerce site. Further, websites became an integral part of digital marketing strategy and hence improving a dynamic, appealing and user-friendly website is essential. From visual elements to UI / UX elements, everything matters! They should be able to lure customers and offer them a top-notch experience of shopping.

    So, here's a quick guide for the budding eCommerce entrepreneurs to start off their stores like a pro and let every single visitor has an exceptional experience. The points discussed below also explain how every minute element of an eCommerce site has a direct impact on the perceptions and interests of the visitors.

    Homepage must be engaging enough for the customers

    You hardly have 4-5 seconds to capture the attention of the visitors and the first thing they see is the home page. Within those fraction of the time, you need to show them what you have and how amazing your brand is. Make it approachable with a clean layout, uncluttered elements, and bold colors. Put all the promo offers, deals and discounts on the homepage only with tempting banners / sliders to captivate the attention visitors.

    Smooth navigation to persuade customers to explore

    The navigation and its related elements have to be pretty intuitive and easy to use because that enable the customers to explore more of the other pages on the site. The basic behind such effortless navigation is clarity of elements. That means menu, search box, categories, sub-categories, call-to-action, all should be organized well and redirect customers to the page they were seeking for.

    Businesslike content presentation is essential

    Users don't just view your website for the products but also read what's written to know the brand and for other snippets of information on products you offer. However, flowery language, long sentences and tough words are never that catchy to visitors! So, put all your information, headlines, offers and sales announcements in simplest words and in separate blocks to avoid cluttering.

    Responsive search tools are a must

    Make your search effective and responsive with filters, keywords corrections and suggestions. Customers are impatient beings! If they do not get the exact things they were looking for, they will just leave. These options will help them find the exact items they have in their mind by typing the keywords. Filters enable them to search for products according to features, colors, size and other specialties.

    Clear Call-to-Action and simplified checkout

    To redirect customers to the checkout page without any hassles you need to place clear call-to-action on the product pages. Further, to assure that none of your customers leaves because you have a lengthier checkout process, then make it short with fewer fields.

    At the end of the day, your website is for selling not just for capturing the attention of visitors. So, if there's enough traffic driving from the search engines to your website, leaves no chance to turn to their paying customers with these proven practices.

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    Source by Rob Stephen

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  • Annuities and Tax

    An annuity is simply a “series of payments made at equal intervals.” That means that your mortgage, insurance, savings, and pension are all annuities. Mostly what makes something an annuity is the regularity of the payments. But the kind of annuity we are talking about here is the kind of long-term investment where you pay into it over time, and then you collect payments from it over time – often for life.

    How Annuities Work

    Usually, the funds that are paid into the investment are tax-deferred until you start accepting annuity payments. The taxes you pay are only regular income taxes too, which means that you pay taxes on the income just like you would any other income you receive. However, you can purchase annuities with after-tax money too. If you do that, you don’t have to pay taxes when you receive it until you receive your principal back. All earnings from annuities are subject to ordinary income tax.

    Immediate Annuities

    The two types of annuities, immediate and deferred, both require you to pay ordinary income tax on your earnings. An immediate annuity is when you give the entire principal to the insurance company, and then they invest the money and set up equal payments to you for your whole life right away with no waiting.

    Deferred Annuities

    As mentioned above, you can also buy an annuity with after-tax money – in which case only a portion after your principal is taxable. The deferred annuity means that you may not receive payment for several years while you keep investing your money and let the money keep growing tax-deferred until retirement. After that, the rules are the same; you pay taxes on the income you receive from each payout.

    Ordinary Income Tax

    You only pay taxes on your earnings at the ordinary income tax rate. What’s really exciting about this is that once you retire, your income will go down as you won’t have income from working. You may then be receiving social security retirement, your annuity, and other investment payouts. But at least on the annuities, you’ll only pay ordinary income tax on your earnings.

    Annuities are a good idea if you believe you’re going to need a set income for life. You will pay ordinary income taxes on it and you don’t get a better deal than you’d get if it were considered capital gains, but you do get a safe investment that guarantees you money for life. It’s all dependent on what risk level you like to take on investments. And, as always, it’s a good idea to diversify your investments so that you have many options when you retire. As to how annuities are taxed in states versus the federal government in the USA, you will have to check with your state as it’s different in each one.

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  • Top 5 Frugal Living Ideas to Save Money for Emergencies

    Top 5 Frugal Living Ideas to Save Money for Emergencies

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    Are you looking for ways to live frugally and save money? Frugal living means being resourceful and not spending more than required. In short, it implies that you are a careful spender and stay content living with less to save money for emergencies!

    Benefits of Frugal Living

    Practicing frugal living cannot only save you a lot of money but also help you in many other things, including:

    • Fast debt repayment
    • No paycheck to paycheck living
    • Safe early retirement
    • Fulfillment of dream vacation goals

    Tips for Frugal Living

    Here is a list of frugal living tips that will help you do away with some of the less significant things in life to save money for emergencies:

    1. Budget Your Finances: Having an effective budget is crucial if you want to achieve financial freedom. Know where your money is going and restrict where you are spending unnecessarily. Moreover, you cannot decrease your spending if you are clueless about your income and expenses! Therefore, creating a budget will reveal everything you need to know to cut back from your costs significantly!
    2. Learn to Appreciate Frugal Living: Being frugal helps you to take a look at your spending habits and reevaluate them. Previously you might have bought something that you thought you needed, but in reality, it’s not of any benefit and value at all to you. When you start to get rid of these unnecessary and expensive spending, you can learn to appreciate a more modest way of living.
    3. Quit Expensive and Unhealthy Habits: You should consider quitting expensive and unhealthy habits such as consumption of fast food, drinking excessive alcohol, smoking cigarettes, and more. These habits can be okay when done in moderation, but indulging too much in these unhealthy activities can be harmful.
    4. Save Money for Emergencies: According to a Bankrate report, 26% of Americans have no emergency fund at all. Everyone should have an emergency fund because it’s one of the best ways to prepare for any future financial crisis. Having an emergency fund can help you manage tough situations like loss of a job or an unexpected expense.
    5. Avoid Debt Wherever Possible: One of the great tips for frugal living is to avert any debt, which can be accomplished by purposely maintaining an emergency fund. Another tip is to utilize materials without owning them, like borrowing them from friends or using trading services. Make sure to think through your options to avoid piling up credit card debt for unnecessary purchases.

    Conclusion

    The above tips can help you begin your own frugal living journey. However, the first step towards your frugal living journey is to become debt-free. Also, securing a cash cushion accessible during emergencies will help get you to financial freedom.

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    Source by R. Williams

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