When you head out to a pub on a Saturday evening, you might not be thinking clearly about how you are going to come back home that night. All you want to do is to have fun with your friends and there is nothing that can stop you from it. You park your car carefully and then the whole night is ahead of you. Before you even know it, you sip one too many drink and you find yourself under the influence of alcohol. It is time to go home, but should you drive? I guess you should have planned everything more carefully before the evening. If this is your reality and if you have had an accident, you might want to contact hollowsboonen.com.au immediately.

It is estimated that in Queensland, Australia, over 30% of accidents are related to drunk or drug driving. You have to admit that the number is rather huge and way too many people in the country die this way. but this is not where it all ends. Of course, you can always choose to walk home when under the influence of alcohol (provided that this is an option of course), but still 1 in 3 pedestrians who get killed on the roads die due to have alcohol in their blood. Let’s not forget that alcohol is a depressant and it slows your reactions dramatically. Your judgement is impaired, and you are more likely to make the decisions that are unreasonable. even your balance is different then usual and you might feel extremely sleepy after even moderate consumption of alcohol (this is what happens to me and this is why I always drink at home only so that I can go to bed immediately if I feel like this is the best thing for me to do in this case).

Finally, it is not cool to drive when you have alcohol in your blood. This is something that many people will tell you. Just ask around and you will know what I am talking about here. Why would anybody endanger the lives of others just so that they can have fun and drink when going out?

Getting compliant is of the utmost importance for businesses when they wish to prevent violations of the law and unethical conduct. Having an effective and well-considered compliance program in place can go a long way in reducing the risk of prosecution against the business and mitigating sentencing if there is a failure in compliance. Moreover, there are also positive, significant secondary benefits of a compliance program for businesses and these advantages can vary as per the company’s nature.

Some of the top benefits that most businesses can enjoy if they get compliance are:

Quality Improvements

A good compliance program proves to be immensely useful in preventing errors or failures before they occur and can also detect them at an early stage. This eventually reduces the need for redoing or repeating tasks. Early guidance for assuring compliance with standards can save considerable time because it reduces the need to redo tasks that don’t meet the appropriate regulatory standards. Thus, this can contribute to the bottom line of a business.

Increased Efficiency

Regardless of industry, every business is focused on improving efficiencies for the purpose of increasing stakeholder returns, but only a few of them have considered compliance as a way of boosting operational efficiency. However, it is a fact that when compliance is incorporated in a business’s operations instead of being restricted to a single department, it can actually enhance efficiency. If compliance is ascertained at every level, there is a lesser need to spot check every task. Employees can be trained to be compliant in order to make it a real-time and efficient process instead of a cleanup. There are companies, such as Minutes Depot, which can be helpful in this regard.

Risk Management

Every business faces operational, strategic, financial and other risks and these risks increase tenfold in industries like finance and healthcare, which are highly and strictly regulated. An efficient and effective compliance program is fully integrated for risk management purposes. All risks and benefits are considered for optimizing decision making and for mitigating risks. When you follow the standards that have been set out, there is a lesser risk of getting into trouble.

Trust and Brand Loyalty

When a business has an effective, clear and broadly communicated compliance program in place, it is basically signaling stakeholders that compliance is their top priority. It highlights their commitment to do business in the proper way and by following the highest ethical standards. It is also a demonstration of the business’s expertise concerning the relevant laws and regulations. When vendors, suppliers, employees and customers see this commitment of the business, they have a higher overall feeling of trust, which eventually breeds brand loyalty.

Competitive Advantage

Last, but definitely not the least, having a compliance program in place can also give a business some competitive advantage. When your rivals are not following a program, you can market your business as one that follows the highest standards that have been set. As people see that you are not trying to circumvent the law or hide from it, they are more likely to come to you than your competition.

As a lawyer, almost nothing is as satisfying as owning or being a partner in your very own practice.

But with great power comes great responsibility, and one of those responsibilities is getting more clients.

More clients means more revenue and you get to stay operational.

Now that it’s 2017, the internet is more powerful than ever for driving new customers to your business.

Whether you’re just starting out, or have a website already established, the 3 steps below will help you acquire more clients.

1. Make Sure Your Site Design is Functional and User-Friendly

The first step to acquiring more customers has nothing to do with attracting new traffic, but everything to do with converting your current website visitors.

While lawyers are certainly familiar with the law, many aren’t as familiar with fundamental web design.

Simple imagery and color schemes make a big difference to site visitors, especially first-timers. Your design should be easy on the eyes and match your brand’s unique personality.

You’ll want to ensure your site loads fast enough so that users aren’t annoyed and leave hastily. With attention spans ever-decreasing, this is now more important than ever.

Finally, make sure your site’s navigation is both effective and easy to use. Make your most important pages easy to find and call-to-actions even easier.

You’d be surprised how many more clients you’ll convert by making a few simple tweaks to your site’s design.

2. Write Useful Content and Share It

Once your site is converting optimally, next you want to focus on driving more traffic to it.

One of the best – and completely free – ways to do this is through content marketing.

Content marketing is exactly what it sounds like. It’s effectively marketing your website by creating and sharing content.

As a law practice, there are an endless amount of topics you could potentially write about. Choose 3-5 of the most important problems you feel your clients face and share advice about them through articles or video.

Then spread that content through social media, other websites, and general word-of-mouth.

A little bit of hustle when creating and marketing your content can literally bring in thousands of new monthly visitors with not much upfront effort.

3. Learn Basic SEO and Implement

In Step 1, you learned about improving your website’s conversions.

In Step 2, you found out how to boost traffic to your site virtually immediately.

In this last step, you’ll learn how to play the long game of traffic and acquire more customers month after month, with minimal additional work.

It’s called search engine optimization (SEO), and it’s a proven way to boost your traffic.

There are many guides and tips out there with titles like “100 Essential SEO Tips for Your Blog” or “60 Must-Do SEO Tactics”.

Those are simply ridiculous.

A good, sound SEO strategy really only needs a few things:

• Proper keyword targeting
• Keyword utilization
• Site design mechanics

Most other tips are nonsense and non-essential to the growth of your website. Sure, they might help out a little bit, but for the getting the best use of your time, these 3 are all you need.

There are tons of top quality, free beginner SEO guides to get you quickly up and running. A quick Google search of “beginner SEO guides” should get you started.

Once you are, definitely track your progress using an online SEO analyzer. You’ll be able to find your site’s top ranked keywords, content, and more.

Also, those analyzers are great for gaining insight on your competitors’ strategies, which can help you tremendously in improving your own.

Conclusion

More online clients for your business is a simple matter of attracting more visitors to your site, then converting them at the highest possible rates.

If you follow the steps above, your practice will start getting more inquiries than you know what to do with, which is almost always a good problem to have.

 

 

 

 

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There is quite arguably no greater divider in the United States than the issue of abortion. A source of both political and social divide for decades, there are still those who vehemently oppose it and others who will fight for it with all that they have. Last week, abortion opponents scored one in the courts when the Supreme Court struck down a highly restrictive abortion law.

Oklahoma’s Supreme Court struck down a law that would impose restrictions on abortion providers that required such things as taking samples of the fetal tissue of the aborted baby from any mother who is younger than fourteen years of age so that it may be preserved for state investigators.

The restrictive law also made it criminal for providers to violate the statutes such as fetal tissue samples or to try to circumvent parent consent. It also allowed for more stringent inspection and overseeing powers for abortion clinics around the state.

The original intention of the fetal tissue requirement was to capture predators and child rapists when possible. It was a law that was intended to protect women and children’s rights. Center for Reproductive Rights, based out of New York, however, has challenged the restrictions saying that they unfairly target only those facilities, that perform abortions.

All nine members of the Supreme Court unanimously found that the abortion laws violated the state’s Constitution in the respect that each legislative bill must only address one subject. The reason for their decision is that only one subject is allowed per bill to prevent legislators from tacking on provisions to pass laws that are unpopular and would likely not make it on their own merit.

The argument from proponents was that the bill does address only one subject, that subject being women’s reproductive rights. But, their argument was struck down. The court rejected it saying that the current bill violates the single-subject law and that the abortion law had the presumption of an “all or nothing” passage.

In addition, four of the nine judges stated they would have struck down the law on grounds that it was unconstitutional because it put an additional burden on those seeking an abortion, which is allowed by law.

Law enforcement and many a trial lawyer are disappointed by the ruling. They saw great gains in being able to prosecute child rapists using fetal tissue as evidence, especially in cases where girls are less than fourteen years of age.

President of the Center for Reproductive Rights, Nancy Northup, believes that the law’s intention was nothing but a first step to limit the rights of women to make decisions for themselves. Stating it was a shameless attempt at intimidating women against following through with their abortion rights.

Oklahoma’s government is a Republican-dominated agency primarily focused on enforcing conservative ideals. The current ruling is a small victory for more left-minded thinkers. With the Presidential election on the horizon, the discussion of women’s rights is in full swing, making the issues more prominent across the nation.

In June of last year, the US Supreme Court struck down laws in Texas that likewise restrict facilities that performed abortions across the state. Other issue lately being debated in the courts is the recent ruling that pro-life pregnancy centers must give information about the option of abortion in California.

Although claiming that they have the first amendment rights to uphold their religious beliefs, any center that is licensed through the state must inform their patients about all options including abortion. Although a federal law, many abortion mandates are being tackled on a state level. Many abortion mandates are continually being passed and then challenged across the nation.

I was wondering the other day what some of the most common criminal acts were and what
criminal law Phoenix had to deal with and was all about. I came to the conclusion that drunk driving was one of the most common act people commit and I am sure that you would easily agree with me that this is indeed the case. Can you believe that? Of course, there are some other criminal acts I can think of that people are likely to commit these days such as robbery or theft or various drug offenses, but drunk driving is definitely very high on the list and it seems that not that much can be really done about it unless you know somebody who specializes in criminal law Phoenix.

If you or somebody you love have been accused of something such as drunk driving or being in possession of drugs, they might be in denial. What are such people supposed to do, especially if they have been wrongfully accused of something? Should they do nothing, or should they rather seek help from an experienced criminal defense attorney? I believe that the second option definitely sounds better. I have never been a fan of not doing anything. I always prefer to do something rather than nothing. I just hope that most of you are just like me ready to take steps in order to prevent all those bad things happening in your life.

I am not usually a person who needs help finding a lawyer, but one of my family members caused some trouble last year. This young trouble maker was the son of one of my brothers. I was surprised to learn what this young kid did. He was a rather quiet young man and nobody expected that one day he would have been accused of having drugs in his possession. I felt sorry for him, so I decided to help them with finding a lawyer. There’s so many lawyers out there, but fortunately I knew exactly where to go for the right type of help and fortunately I was successful with it. The lawyer I hired was very professional and thanks to him my young nephew was able to avoid spending time in prison, something that nobody in the family wanted to see him do. Now everybody in the family knows that when you are accused of something the best and fastest course of action is to hire a lawyer who will help you to get out of this mess. I guess this is the only thing or almost the only thing you can do when you have been accused of a crime as it really pays to have somebody experienced and somebody who knows what they are doing by your side. You can always choose to go for criminal defense alone, but it will never yield the results you might be hoping for. Why do something the hard way if it can be done the easy way.

It is not easy to see if someone loved is arrested after the police suspected that he committed a crime. If a situation like this happens, it is advisable to seek advice from a skilled and experience criminal defense lawyer. A person might want to avoid hiring a professional lawyer, but in my opinion this can be a serious mistake. If somebody has been accused of committing a crime, he should not opt for the cheapest solution, which means having an attorney who was assigned by the state. This might be the cheapest solution, but attorneys can make a huge difference in the way the case is handled in court.

You might find yourself with an Escrow (or “impound”) account for a number of different reasons but ordinarily it’s because you’ve taken out a mortgage and your lender insists on you having one – particularly if you’re a first time buyer and/or can only put down a minimal deposit.  Whatever the reason it’s ultimately there to help protect your investment but, as with any product, there are always pro’s and con’s.  Here we take a look at some of the main points to bear in mind:

Key advantages of escrow accounts

• They can help protect your investment and budget with very limited (if any) effort required on your part. It’s almost like an enforced savings account that simply runs along in the background without you having to manage it on a day-to-day basis.
• Escrow accounts mean you don’t have to worry about large payments as and when they become due e.g. for property taxes or insurance – essentially, then, they also act as an accrual account.
• If you have difficulty saving, escrow accounts work well since you can’t withdraw from them – see the above point about having an ‘enforced’ savings account! You can never be tempted to spend the money on something else such as home improvements or an expensive holiday!

Key disadvantages of escrow accounts

• Escrow accounts mean you’re entirely dependent on paying someone else to do something you “could” strictly do yourself – hence you may feel as though you’ve lost control of your finances, particularly if your escrow company is changed by a management buy-out or worse still, your escrow company gets into financial difficulty. For this reason it’s also important to make sure your nominated company are fully insured in the unlikely event that this happens.
• Always remember that if rates change you may find yourself either over or under paying. If the latter – and whilst it may well be the fault of the escrow company – you still remain ultimately responsible for the difference.
• Another key disadvantage to an escrow is having your money tied up when it could be earning interest in a savings account.

If you find yourself in the fortunate position of being able to choose whether or not you enter into an Escrow (or impound account) then these are certainly some of the key considerations to take into account and ask your lender.  It’s also worth mentioning that, once entered into, opting out of an Escrow can be fairly difficult so be sure you know where you stand and take professional advice before you enter into any legal contract