3 Tips for Removing Pet Hair at Home

Pets are lovely creatures that bring limitless happiness into any home. But no matter how much you love your furbaby, it’s normal to feel frustrated because of the amount of hair they shed. Good thing there’s a number of solutions available. Here are some:

Photo by Gulyás Bianka on Unsplash

Adhere to a regular cleaning schedule

A regular and thorough vacuuming is the best way to remove pet hair from your home. Start high and work low, using proper attachments to run the vacuum over walls, into corners and over draperies and window sills. Static electricity and low humidity in a home can help pet hair cling to surfaces. Running a humidifier is good for you and makes breathing easier, skin feel more hydrated and it helps keep tufts of loose pet hair from clinging to surfaces. If you have a pet, keep a schedule of regular vacuuming to maintain a home free of pet hair. Source: SheKnows

Use a squeegee

You can also use a dry rubber squeegee or rubber broom to lift up any pet hair from carpets. It might freak you out slightly and cause slight rage at your vacuum (why is it missing so much?!), but man, does it ever work. Just “rake” an area with the tool in short, fast strokes and you’ll see hair peeling up off the carpet. Source: CleanMySpace

Don’t forget to groom your pet

Don’t duck your grooming responsibilities; embrace them. Giving your dog or cat a quick one-minute brushing outdoors or in the garage every day will save time and effort spent dusting, sweeping and vacuuming every week. With a little hair off the dog (or cat) at a time and place of your choosing, you’ll soon see a reduction in the number of fur bombs you find around the house.

Bonus: Your cat won’t hack up as many hairballs for you to step on before you’re fully awake in the morning. Source: VetStreet

Don’t be afraid to let your pets roam around inside your carpeted home. If ever your carpet needs deep cleaning or repair, you can always call us. We’ll have it sorted for you in no time!

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{VIDEO}: The Top 5 Mallet Putters of 2018 (Beyond the Data)

At the conclusion of every Most Wanted Test, we publish our results. We share the data we collect and rank the winners. It’s simple and straightforward, but some of you have asked for a bit more insight. We hear you.

In this video, the MyGolfSpy Staff goes beyond the data. Adam, Sam, and Harry discuss how we test putters, tackle some of the myths surrounding the importance of how a putter looks, and give you an overview of why we think the Top 5 finishers in the mallet category performed as well as they did.

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Returning to work after a heart attack can be tough, but also good medicine

By AMERICAN HEART ASSOCIATION NEWS

After five weeks off recovering from her heart attack, Melissa Murphy looked forward to returning to her job.

“I’m back out, and I’m contributing again,” the Iowa mother of two remembered thinking. “I’m not a victim, which is how you sometimes feel when you’re sitting on your couch and everybody leaves to go to work or school and you’re left with your thoughts.”

But she occasionally ran into a few bumps during her transition. As someone who sometimes travels hours at a time for her work in the pharmaceutical industry, Murphy initially was nervous to be so far away from emergency help. And her anxiety already was heightened from adjusting to a work schedule far more rigid than the month of relaxed daily routines she had just left behind.

Returning to work after a heart attack often requires patients to clear unexpected psychological hurdles in addition to the physical ones they already face.

But the effort could pay off. Research suggests going back to work can be critical to fighting off depression and improving overall health, in addition to avoiding financial hardships.

In a study published last month in the journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, nine out of 10 people who suffered a major heart attack had returned to work within a year. For those who didn’t, or who ended up working less, many reported depression, a poor quality of life and money problems that made it difficult to pay for medication.

Dr. Haider Warraich, a cardiologist at Duke University Medical Center and the lead author of the study, said relaying such findings to patients can help reassure them about the safety of returning to work. His research looked at more than 9,300 heart attack patients, more than half of whom were employed at the time of their heart attack.

“There are a lot of misconceptions around whether work-related stress might cause a heart attack,” he said. “While stress is a risk factor for heart disease, it’s much lower than traditional factors like [high] blood pressure and smoking.”

In addition, “treatments for heart attacks are better than they’ve ever been,” Warraich said. “That kind of information might help ease some of the fears or psychological barriers patients might have about returning to work.”

For survivors, the question “will I ever get back to where I was before?” pops up repeatedly.

Melissa Murphy said her family helped her overcome anxiety when she returned to work after a heart attack. Murphy with her husband, Joseph, and children Brenna and Parker. (Photo courtesy of Gretchen Scott Photography)

Murphy, who was 40 when she suffered her May 2016 heart attack, remembers having to check in with her husband every time she left and returned home to assure him she hadn’t relapsed.

The same kind of thinking followed her to work, when she was driving hours at a stretch on remote highways.

“I kept thinking, ‘What if I don’t have cell phone service and I have another heart attack,’” said Murphy. “That was very anxiety-provoking because I thought, if I’m in a small town that doesn’t have a hospital, how is the ambulance going to get to me in time?”

Rachel Dreyer, who co-wrote an accompanying editorial to Warraich’s study, said the findings are “a call to action” for doctors to look beyond a clinical perspective.

“How do we help patients transition from hospital to cardiac rehabilitation and to maintenance of their long-term health? Part of this challenge is helping patients return to work,” said Dreyer, an assistant professor of emergency medicine at Yale University’s School of Medicine.

The study found patients who had excessive bleeding after their heart attack or who later were readmitted to the hospital were less likely to return to work than people who didn’t have such complications.

That – both Dreyer and Warraich noted – can help doctors identify patients at higher risk of not returning to work and who might need additional attention.

“Employment represents well-being and good health, and not being able to get back to work leads to detrimental effects, which we know from the literature can mean an impact on physical and mental health,” Dreyer said.

For Murphy, returning to work meant returning to a “new normal.”

“The sooner you can get back to that normalcy the better, because it can be so easy to spiral down into an anxious depression,” she said. “But you really, really must rely on your support system – from family to friends to coworkers – to get there.”

If you have questions or comments about this story, please email editor@heart.org.

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Stop Doing These 14 Things to Improve Your Business and Your Life

My philosophy used to be, say yes to everything, give 110 percent, and you can’t go wrong.

As a young writer trying to make it in the marketplace, I found myself constantly looking for ways to increase my productivity and make a name for myself. I worked on projects at all hours of the night. “I’m done when it’s done,” I told myself.

At the same time, I kept wondering how I could be so tired.

When I started my content marketing internship at Palo Alto Software, I planned to bring this philosophy with me. Then I emailed my supervisor to request some days off, tempered with the promise that I could work remotely. She replied with the request that I use days off to be truly away from the office and recharge.

As I began the internship, I quickly let go of my philosophy that working to the point of burnout increased my productivity.

It still feels weird to know I have a deadline approaching, but not sit in front of my laptop tapping away until I finish the work. But because I do not work in my free time, when I come back to the office, I feel refreshed enough to fill those hours with productivity and meet deadlines without stress.

In my quest to discard unhelpful habits like working nonstop, I considered advice from the Young Entrepreneur Council about what things they stopped doing to improve their businesses and their lives.

So how can you increase your productivity while improving your quality of life? Here are the 14 habits they said goodbye to. Maybe quitting one of these will boost your business and your personal life.

1. Browsing social media constantly

Spending time on social media can feel like a necessary way to keep up on news. But the benefits fail to offset the mental clutter.

“I have intentionally cut the amount of time I spend on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn,” says Shawn Schulze of Names.org. “I used to feel pressure to keep up with industry people I was following or to stay up-to-speed with news on these outlets. However, the emotions and distraction far outweigh the benefits.”

Instead, Schulze tries to free up the time he would spend online to take care of to-dos. “I try to focus more on getting things done or step away from technology to clear my mind over browsing social media,” he says.

2. Working seven days a week

As I learned from my time cramming on projects, sometimes, less is more.

“I realized it didn’t actually help to work every day of the week,” says John Rampton of Calendar. “I switch off on weekends and take one of the two days completely off to do a weekend away with my wife or family, or to do things locally.”

It seems obvious that the more time you spend working, the more you’ll get done. But taking time off is just as valuable for increasing your productivity.

“I feel refreshed and ready to take work back on, whereas I started feeling burned out doing the non-stop work week,” says Rampton.

3. Receiving phone notifications

“I turned all notifications, alerts, and badges off on my phone,” says Steven Fleisher of Two Degrees.

As important as notifications look when they pop up on your screen, they suck you out of what is happening at work and in life at the present moment.

“I was irked and also inspired from seeing others being pulled out of conversations and situations to blind messages and alerts,” says Fleisher. “I realized that my phone interrupting me minute-by-minute was effectively controlling me.”

Feel like you’re drowning in Slack, Twitter, Instagram, and random apps you installed like Duolingo? Turn them off to reduce stress. “Since the change, life has been measurably improved both socially and professionally. Just say ‘no’ to notifications,” says Fleisher.

4. Engaging in political discussions on social media

It’s tempting to chime in on a political debate online. However, it rarely improves the discussion.

“Social media can be a massive waste of time, especially if you’re engaged in highly charged political debate,” says Andy Karuza of FenSens. “Starting this year, I stopped posting and stopped engaging in any political discussions whatsoever.”

We’ve all seen even our best contributions to a political thread get lost in the name-calling and circular discussions that pop up in the comments on social media. Instead, Karuza recommends, “Use your time for something productive, something that will make your life and business better.” Maybe for reading some poetry?

5. Reading Reddit

Sometimes, a habit that once improved your quality of life becomes less useful. For instance, Kevin Tao of NeuEve has become dissatisfied with Reddit.

“Reddit is not what it used to be. Once upon a time, it was a place of intelligent articles and thoughtful discussions, filled with a cornucopia of topics that would be excellent to bring up at a dinner party,” says Tao.

However, unless you’re in the mood for memes, Reddit may no longer provide you with the experience you need to refresh or brush up on some factoids. “These days, the quality of content and discourse has simply plummeted,” says Tao. “It’s almost all jokes and memes, and the jokes aren’t even funny.”

6. Maintaining a presence on every social media platform

As previously mentioned, browsing social media can zap your productivity and lower your quality of life. Of course, sometimes social media provides a necessary tool for customer engagement.

CPA Exam Guy’s Bryce Walker says, “After years of meager success on the handful of social media platforms I’ve used to attempt customer engagement, I’ve given up the scattershot approach. I’m at the point with my business that I have an acceptable level of engagement on a few key platforms, so I’ve given up trying to adopt new ones, and am simply focusing on these successful ventures.”

In order to manage your time and energy, cultivate the platforms that have the best following for you. Let the others go. “It saves money—and also time.”

7. Wearing a Fitbit

Social media isn’t the only technology you should use mindfully. For Brittany Hodak of ZinePak, her Fitbit actually began reducing her quality of life.

“For years, I thought my Fitbit was helping me be more in tune with my exercise and sleep habits,” says Hodak. “It wasn’t until I went a few days without it that I realized it had been doing more harm than good.”

Even devices that seem like they increase your productivity and help you reach your goals can stress you out by making you feel like you need to quantify everything. “Now I have less to stress out over, and I’ve re-learned to listen to my body instead of depending on a device to tell me how I’m feeling,” she says.

8. Allowing meetings to run long

Once again, more time spent does not always equal increased productivity. “Far too often, meetings have a tendency to run long or to not be focused or on point,” says Nicole Munoz of Start Ranking Now. “It’s unfortunate when the meeting agendas are not accurately addressed because there wasn’t enough pressure to get the right work done.”

“We’ve started to enforce hard stops on our meetings,” says Munoz. Letting meetings run long shows a lack of focus rather than a drive to accomplish more. Stay on task and keep it short.

9. Dwelling on anxious thoughts

Avoid soaking in anxious thoughts, because they tend to be misleading. “Anxiety is caused by our minds trying to convince us that whatever our problem is, it’s permanent (‘I will always feel this way’), pervasive (‘This will affect every area of my life’) or personal (‘No one has ever dealt with this issue’),” says Rachel Beider of Massage Greenpoint.

Remember that anxious thoughts fail to reflect how manageable or temporary some problems truly are. “In reality, these are entirely unoriginal thoughts that people have been having for years,” says Beider. “When I notice this kind of anxious thought, I let it go.”

10. Comparing yourself to others

Likewise, comparisons motivate you to pursue objectives that do not match your true goals.

“It’s so easy to compare oneself to everyone else, and thus, to always find those who are doing something “better” than you,” says Darrah Brustein of Network Under 40. “On the one hand, a comparison can act as a motivating tool, but for me, it generally acts as something that results in my making decisions that are out of alignment with what I actually want.”

11. Seeking validation on your dreams

Validation makes you feel comforted. However, it can limit you, too.

“Visions are difficult to describe, and not everyone will subscribe to your vision of a future that you see for yourself,” says Martin Ekechukwu of WHTWRKS Inc. “The difficulty lies in being unwavering in that vision and attacking barriers to bring that vision to life.”

You cannot always communicate a vision or convince others to buy into it. So you must stick to it regardless of what kind of validation it inspires. “It’s easier to get talked out of a vision, and much harder to sit in your truth and recognize that no one else is going to validate this dream for you,” says Ekechukwu. 

12. Checking email constantly

Less is more when it comes to increasing your productivity. Using email productively is a constant balancing act. I often joke that if I had a penny for every email I received, I could afford to hire someone to answer my email for me.

“I’ve finally learned to stop checking email 30 times a day and only limit it once in the morning, once in the afternoon and once in the evening,” says Kristin Marquet of Creative Development Agency, LLC.  

Establish expectations about how others should contact you with something urgent. “If someone needs an immediate response to something, they know to call me on the phone,” says Marquet. “Limiting email checking to three times a day has enabled me to become more productive.”

13. Micromanaging

Be honest with yourself about what is within your power. And when something is outside of your power, don’t worry about it when you can’t control it anyway.

“This year I have intentionally stopped trying to control and micromanage everything. I have made it a goal to delegate more and worry less,” says Mike A. Podesto of Find My Profession. “In years past, I would constantly worry about the status of each and every thing being worked on.”

“What I have found is that there is very little I can control,” says Podesto. “My time is better spent working on things I can control.”

14. Saying “yes” to everything

“This year, I vowed to dismiss thoughts and plans that no longer serve me,” says Klyn Elsbury of Landmark Makers. “ Last year, I felt like the majority of my life was focused on always saying ‘yes’ and pleasing others, for my own sacrifice.”

Be selective with your energy. When you do this, you increase your productivity at work and improve your quality of life at home.

“This year, I set very clear vision statements and for every action, I pause to reflect if that action is taking me closer to my goals or further from them,” she says. 

Have you quit a habit to increase productivity or improve your quality of life? Tell us about it on Facebook or Twitter.

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Seven Dreamers & The World’s Most Expensive Shaft

Is $1200 a lot for a golf shaft? It sounds like a lot, particularly for an entry-level model.

It is, and Seven Dreamers Laboratories is entirely good with that.

Seven Dreamers started in 1957 as a company called Super Resin. As it developed industry-leading technologies in composite materials with industrial and aerospace applications, the company mantra of “creating things the world has never seen” led to some remarkable achievements. After becoming the global leader in molding carbon fiber reinforced plastics (CFRPs) in the 1970s, Super Resin produced parts for Japan’s Hayabusa satellite project in the 1990s.

The company vision of seven centers of excellence throughout the world, focuses on everything from advancements in aerospace engineering, to sleep devices and even a fully automated laundry folding machine which can separate according to fabric type and member of the family to which each article of clothing belongs. It’s the company that creates the ” I can’t believe a company can actually make that” category of products, and as of 2014, Seven Dreamers broached the uber-premium golf shaft market and quickly assumed the title of most expensive production golf shaft in the world.

In every consumer market there exists products which unapologetically price out the majority of would-be consumers – and it’s also nothing new to golf, though, until the advent of PXG, it was a dynamic more in play in Asia (Japan and Korea largely) where $75K can buy one a full bag of Honma Beres Five-Star series clubs and a whole bunch of 24K gold-plated street credit.

The eye-popping prices on such items serve to attract a clientele for whom several zeros one way or another determine how many pairs of Jimmy Choo shoes to purchase and whether or not it’s getting old to ski Vail every single winter break. First world problems indeed.

But there are also supporting technology and production processes which are more expensive – and theoretically lead to improved performance, though not necessarily by the same magnitude as the difference in price – even when compared to products which are generally thought of as premium. Regardless, it’s a best of the best portion of the market which sits somewhere beyond typical designations like premium and elite. The rules are different in these spaces because the customers operate under a different set of principles which can be contrary to how the majority of markets operate.

UBER-PREMIUM SHAFTS

Actual shaft manufacturing is more technical than the following description, however in the interest of brevity, the common process begins with sheets of prepreg (material of combined resin (glue) and carbon fiber) wrapped in various orientations around a steel mandrel. Depending on the desired weight, flex and internal/external dimensions of the shaft, each section (industry types call them flags) of prepreg is placed in a specific pattern along the mandrel.

Once complete, the layers of prepreg are wrapped with a thin, shrinkable tape and baked in an oven under approximately 1 atm of pressure. As the sheets are heated, resin is allowed to bond the layers together. Then, the tape and mandrel are removed, and surface inconsistencies are sanded away, leaving what is, in theory anyway, a perfectly round shaft. Finally, the shaft is painted. The net result is any mass-produced shaft, even those with premium price tags, built within a range of spec tolerances (weight, flex, and torque). There’s plenty of good-natured debate around the degree to which changes in said specs impact performance, but the reality is the tighter the tolerances, the more expensive it is to manufacture.

Seven Dreamers primary point of distinction is a unique and proprietary process which, it asserts, results in shafts with superior construction and performance and unparalleled consistency from shaft to shaft.

Seven Dreamers uses an autoclave rather than oven-baking each shaft. This allows Seven Dreamers to use shaft molds (rather than shrinkable tape) inside the autoclave which place each shaft under 6-10 atm of pressure, squeezing out any excess resin. The layers are cured, leaving a hardened, perfectly round shaft. Because the final product doesn’t require any grinding or coating, the aesthetic is entirely inconspicuous and void of any inconsistencies. Without any paint, the shaft is a naked carbon weave with a decidedly generic “Seven Dreamers” monogram and serial number. If it looks unfinished, it is only because we’re conditioned to see the final paint scheme as something OEMs often do to differentiate product and garner attention from TV/media audiences.

The real substantive difference is not that the process yields shafts manufactured to exceedingly tight tolerances but that it helps to mitigate the usual trade-off of weight and stability. Any company can make a shaft both heavy and stiff. It’s like asking the head chef at a fine French restaurant for a PB & J.

However, to achieve a low launch, low spin profile in a sub-70 gram package, which retains ample stability and a signature feel; well that comes at a cost – and a rather steep one.

THIS SHAFT:

I generally fit best in tip-stiff driver shafts in the 75-gram range (think Project X HZDRUS Black, Mitsubishi Diamana Whiteboard/’Ahina). Any lighter and dispersion suffers. Much heavier and swing speed (which maxes out around 112 mph) drops off drastically. This Seven Dreamers T-series shaft is 67 grams but plays with the stability of heavier premium shafts, particularly in the tip section. The butt section, if anything, felt a bit soft, comparable to the Graphite Design AD-DI 7x.

The decrease in weight should theoretically lead to increased peak swing speed, but based on numbers gathered from my Foresight GC2, I didn’t experience any statistically significant increase in swing speed, though my peak ball speed was 1-2 MPH higher than typical. Dispersion wasn’t appreciably better or worse.  Some golfers are very sensitive to the total weight of a golf club and moving 8-10 grams either direction could be a major adjustment, though I suspect it’s easier to adjust to a lighter shaft than a heavier one. Depending on what bend profile a consumer requires, Seven Dreamers offers 33 different shafts (ranging from 40 grams to 80 grams) in the stock, T-series ($1200 MSRP) which is now available in North America through select, high-end fitters.

If the need is a one-off bespoke shaft custom built for only your swing, Seven Dreamers does that too, but it will require a visit to one of two studios in Tokyo and $2500.

RATIONAL OR RATIONALE?

Seven Dreamer’s story is one of both quantitative and qualitative appeal. From a materials and process standpoint, everything Seven Dreamers does is undeniably premium and given the plethora of available shafts; this isn’t a play to attract primarily high swing-speed players. That said, any number of shaft OEM’s (e.g., Mitsubishi Chemical and Fujikura) can make this same claim, though one can debate whether or not Seven Dreamers proprietary production process is empirically better than that of long-standing market leaders. That said, in my individual testing, the Seven Dreamers shaft performed commensurate with other premium shafts I’ve tested, which one would expect given the price tag. Pragmatically, it offered a titch more ball speed but at a lighter total weight.

That fact alone won’t satisfy the concrete sequential, value-based consumers but for potential buyers for whom cost is of no consequence, the criteria are different, and the rules are such that most of us can’t relate – hence the qualitative nature of uber-premium products. When the topic is $38,000 House of Testoni shoes, $500 M yachts or a Gulfstream G-650, it’s an entirely different beast where ironically, price really has very little to do with the purchasing decision.

It’s about buying a brand and investing in that identity as much as it is about the product. It’s a commitment to be able to state without reservation your product is by some measure, the absolute best in the world – and it’s not necessary that others agree.

Seven Dreamers isn’t well-known, even by the gearhead metric and one long-tenured industry insider had reservations around whether Seven Dreamers will become a mainstay in the evolving ultra-premium segment of the market. While it continues plans to reach deeper into the North American market, I wouldn’t expect Seven Dreamers to dilute the price point or do anything which marginalizes the exclusivity of the product or name. As a brand, it’s the consummate wild card. Tour players are dabbling more in the ultra-premium shaft space. If one of them win while bagging a Seven Dreamers shaft (Charl Schwartzel nearly did at The Players this year) it could create momentum similar to what we’ve seen with TPT, which was in Jason Day’s driver when he won the Wells Fargo earlier this year and in Justin Rose’s bag during several worldwide wins late in 2017.

Beyond the exclusive nature of Seven Dreamers shafts, it begs a fundamental yet divisive question – Is this the holy grail of shaft manufacturing or is it yet another attempt to create a distinction without any real difference?

So what should we do next? Ignore it? Test it?

For more information, visit the Seven Dreamers Laboratories website.

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How Artificial Intelligence Can Help Small Businesses

Unless you live off the grid, chances are some form of AI permeates your day-to-day, whether you realize it or not.

A recent global consumer survey revealed that only 33 percent of consumers think they use an AI-enabled device or service, while 77 percent actually use AI technology.

Do you ever wonder how your phone autocompletes words as you type a text message? Or how digital assistants on a website chat service respond to your message so quickly? The answer is artificial intelligence. AI is everywhere these days, and is rapidly gaining momentum.

As in our personal lives, artificial intelligence is also dramatically changing the way companies operate—and not just mega-retailers with deep pockets, but companies of all sizes in an array of industries.

What is artificial intelligence?

Although this may seem like new technology, artificial intelligence dates back to the 1950s. It has taken on different forms and uses—you might hear AI referred to as machine learning, deep learning, or cognitive computing depending on the frame of reference.

Now that you know a brief history and a few AI aliases, let’s take the next 15 seconds to define it.

We’re going to put aside the chatter about self-driving vehicles and robots replacing humans to focus on a simpler definition brought to us by Merriam-Webster, which defines AI as “the capability of a machine to imitate intelligent human behavior.”

It’s a way to program machines or computers to carry out tasks or respond to queries with human intelligence. By taking thousands of data points and setting rules (an algorithm) for the problem-solving process modeled on human neural networks, AI can provide human-like responses. 

How AI can help you run a smarter small business

Maybe it seems like artificial intelligence tools are only accessible to huge companies like Google or Apple. But as these mega-corporations continue to invest millions of dollars in developing AI and pushing it into mainstream society, it’s becoming more accessible and more affordable than ever for small businesses.  

Let’s take a look at how you can incorporate machine intelligence to make your company more efficient and improve your bottom line.

1. Smarter email marketing

AI has been a playing a significant role in marketing for years. The good news is that it’s a reasonably mature concept and a great area to get your feet wet in.

Have you ever received an email from a business with a subject line that reads something to the effect of  “Come back, we miss you,” implying that you haven’t visited their store in a while? If so, this is artificial intelligence, and it’s actively working in the background.

Email marketing has one of the highest return-on-investment (ROI) at $38 for every $1 spent.

This brings up two points:

1. If you’re not using email as a marketing strategy for your business, now is the time to start, and
2. If you’re already using an email tactic, it’s time to fine-tune it with artificial intelligence.

If you have a brick-and-mortar store, the best way to collect customer email addresses is at the point of purchase using a POS system. If you’re exclusively an online retailer, you’ll capture their email address when they land on your site or when they check out.

Modern POS systems and ecommerce platforms will have integration with an email marketing platform like MailChimp. You can sync your physical and online customer list with MailChimp to create segmented email lists by dividing it up into smaller groups, for instance by location or purchase frequency.

Segmenting email lists will help you create customized email campaigns that better serve your customers. For example, if you’re hosting a special event at your store, it doesn’t make sense to send an email to customers out of state.

You can (and should) also take it a step further with automation. Email automation allows you to create emails that automatically send when triggered by a subscriber’s activity, inactivity, or a specific date like an anniversary. The triggers are essentially AI at work in the background. If a subscriber takes a certain action, a programmed (or machine-learned) response is triggered, and so on down the line until the customer (hopefully) converts to a sale.

2. Stronger sales

You can’t talk about marketing without talking about its fraternal twin, sales. Like two peas in a pod, it’s hard to separate these areas of business because there is so much overlap between them.

Using artificial intelligence as a way to increase sales is also a mature concept that goes hand in hand with AI for marketing. Therefore, it’s another excellent way to ease yourself into the world of AI without feeling overwhelmed.

Depending on the nature of your business, you may or may not have a dedicated sales team, so we’re going to cover both scenarios in the next two points.

3. Reduce repetitive, mundane tasks

For those with a dedicated sales team, there are dozens of tools out there that use machine learning to assist with the sales process; it’s just a question of where precisely you need the assistance.

For example, are you looking for a way to eliminate the back and forth of trying to schedule meetings at a time that works for everyone? If so, an AI personal assistant like X.ai that can schedule meetings can help your team spend their time on more important things.

4. Do a deep dive into what works (or doesn’t work)

Or maybe your phone sales have taken a nosedive, and you’re not sure why.

Leveraging a solution like Talk IQ that integrates with your phone system to analyze conversations between the sales team and customers. It can help identify critical differences in approach by salespeople and assesses the effectiveness of sales tactics on KPIs to help you hone your strategy.

5. Expand your team with a chatbot

For those that don’t have a dedicated sales team, don’t worry, there are still plenty of tools for you too. For instance, a popular sales tool is something you’re probably already familiar with: chatbots, those pop-up windows that appear when you first land on a webpage.

If you have a website, it’s a great idea to incorporate a chatbot. Think about it—it’s like having an employee working 24/7. It’s also a communication platform many customers prefer: 53 percent of customers prefer to use online chat before calling a company. With software like WhosOn, your customers get immediate responses.

6. Understand your customer’s journey on your site

You can also track your user’s journey as they navigate through your website and analyze their behavior using AI tools.

These valuable insights can help you create a more personalized experience for the customer. And since 80 percent of marketers say customized content is more effective than content that isn’t personalized, using this type of data and business intelligence can help boost your bottom line.

7. Revolutionize human resources

Lastly, we’ll leave you with one less obvious area of business where AI is slowly creeping in, and that’s human resources (HR). Activities like candidate screening or employee communication aren’t typically thought of has having a direct effect on a company’s bottom line in the way sales and marketing do. But hiring is a huge investment, and turnover can have a real effect on your bottom line.

Tools that use AI can help you wade through hundreds of applications quickly, so you can spend your time with the most promising candidates.

For example, a chatbot like Talla can streamline the interview process by providing a set of questions based on the criteria of the role; saving you time during the screening process. You can also use it as an FAQ knowledge base about benefits, policies, or any other relevant company information after you bring a your new team member on board.

To sum up

While some small businesses have been quick to embrace the influence and changes brought by artificial intelligence, others are a little more cautious. Whichever way you lean, the reality is AI is here to stay. It might already be helping you save time and resources. It has the potential to make our lives simpler and our businesses more efficient and profitable.

As the saying goes, “if you can’t beat them, join them,” and embrace the benefits of artificial intelligence.

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The new Great American Road Trip: Pedaling from coast to coast

By AMERICAN HEART ASSOCIATION NEWS

A road trip across the country is a someday dream for many Americans. Pedaling the roughly 4,000 miles from coast to coast adds an epic aspect to the adventure.

“When I was a kid, I met a guy in a bike shop whose bike was loaded down with bags,” said Craig Miller, an avid cyclist who co-hosts a popular sports radio show on KTCK in Dallas. “He told us he was riding from California to New York. I thought that sounded like the coolest thing I’d ever heard. I couldn’t believe that under his own power he was going coast to coast.”

Miller recently did just that, although not by himself. He was part of an eight-man relay team that completed the annual Race Across America in seven days, seven hours, with one of them on the bike all the time.

“I dipped my toe in the Pacific and dipped my hand in Chesapeake Bay,” he said. “It’s an incredible sense of accomplishment.”

Thousands of people get that feeling every year, traveling on their own, in groups, on guided tours – or in sections, completing the trek over a period of years.

It’s not a new idea. In 1884 – this is not a misprint – an Englishman named Thomas Stevens rode a penny-farthing, an old-fashioned bike with one enormous wheel and one tiny one, clear across the continent.

According to his memoir, Around the World on a Bicycle, “The first essential element of success is to have sufficient confidence in one’s self to brave the criticisms – to say nothing of the witticisms – of a skeptical public.”

The trip involved lots of railroad tracks, canal towpaths and rugged open country, and Stevens had to walk about a third of the way. But 104 days after leaving San Francisco, he rolled into Boston.

The ocean-to-ocean ride is still a big challenge, but it has gotten easier. A national system of bike-friendly roads offers several recommended routes, though cars often share the pavement.

And the U.S. Bicycle Route System is rolling toward an ambitious goal of 50,000 miles of specially marked and mapped routes to take cyclists across the country and to many points in between.

“We’re building an interstate network that can take advantage of the best bike routes out there,” said Virginia Sullivan, director of Travel Initiatives at the Adventure Cycling Association. Like the interstate highway system for cars and trucks, she said, “We want to make it as easy as possible for cyclists to travel the country just by following route numbers.”

The 53,000-member nonprofit organization, headquartered in Missoula, Montana, dates from the mid-1970s, when the founders fashioned a TransAmerica Trail for cyclists to mark the 1976 “Bikecentennial.”

That prompted Adventure Cycling to research bike routes around the country and publish guides recommending cyclist-friendly paths and roads, scenery and attractions, and other advice for getting around America on two wheels. Its network now encompasses over 46,000 miles of bike routes throughout the country and three preferred paths – northern, central and southern – stretching coast to coast.

The next step is even more ambitious. Teaming with the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, Adventure Cycling is spearheading the U.S. Bicycle Route System, which designates state-certified bike routes that will forge a national network.

Sullivan said the effort was inspired by comprehensive bike networks in Europe and Great Britain, and spurred by the growing popularity of cycling and the development of local and regional bike routes.

“The idea is to integrate them into an officially numbered and signed national network,” she said. “Cyclists are not just looking for low-traffic roads and wide shoulders, but access to services and accommodations. We’re finding that small towns are especially welcoming. They realize that cyclists come through and spend money.”

Since the national corridor plan launched in 2010, the USBRS has grown to nearly 12,000 miles in 25 states and the District of Columbia, with numbered routes and road signs every few miles. Adventure Cycling has just hired a full-time USBRS coordinator to accelerate the push to involve the remaining states and build the 50,000-mile network.

“We’re thrilled with what we’ve accomplished so far, and we really think we can complete this in the next few years,” Sullivan said. “If it inspires somebody to get on their bike and make their heart a little healthier, then we’ve done our job.”

After finishing his frenetic cross-country trip, Miller looks forward to a more leisurely transcontinental ride when he has more time. In the meantime, he’s on his bike nearly every day.

“It’s the same feeling I had as a kid,” said Miller, who’s 51. “An incredible feeling of freedom and adventure and exploration. It keeps me fit, but mostly it’s just a blast. Whether it’s a five-mile ride or 50, it’s just a blast.”

If you have questions or comments about this story, please email editor@heart.org.

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