Three Unique, Clever, Yet Straightforward Ways to Pay For College

Yes, college costs a ton of money; and you may be one of the unlucky students to not have a household back home that can provide that money for you and your future. But don’t fear — although it’s a whole lot of money for you to even step foot inside your dorm room, there are plenty of great ways to get your college education paid off. First of….

Various Federal Reserve Notes, c.1995. Only th...

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Apply For Scholarships and Loans

It’s pretty self-explanatory. By January 1st, you can apply for some grants, a FAFSA loan, and as many scholarships as you can find. And the best part? Your loans almost always get approved. Scholarships are a lot harder to manage, but most students can probably get by with a loan or two from the government. Maybe even pay for their textbooks!

Secondly….

Save in the Parents’ Names

This is a tricky one, but a beneficial one. Know that if you save money in an account registered in your name (if you’re the student), that’ll actually impact the amount of financial aid you’ll receive. If you’re in a crunch for money to pay off your tuition, that can put you in a bind. Make sure that you have an account that’s in your parents’ names! It’s simple, but clever.

And lastly….

Grandparents Can Help, Too!

Grandpa and Grandma can also help the grandson or granddaughter out by gifting a bit of money to help with the educational costs! There’s no gift tax for any 529 plan under $13,000 for individuals. Married couples can even gift money up to $26,000 without shouldering an extra tax on their records.

 

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Do You Know Who Is Visiting Your Website

Websites are like a lot of other things. Anybody can simply toss one up on any given day, assign it a domain name, and have people coming to it like a water hole in Death Valley within a matter of days.

Of course, this is a serious challenge for most people because of things like SEO and linking. They’re not exact sciences, because of the proprietary nature of search engines and their tendency to switch up their algorithms.

Naturally, you need to know who is visiting your website. If you don’t, you probably won’t attract them back because you won’t know what they want. The easiest way to tell what your visitors want is to use survey software, which will let them tell you almost as well as if they were talking to you face-to-face.

You need to collect as much information as you can about your visitors. The trick is you need to be subtle about it. Sometimes you can break it down based on what you want to know about your visitors.

However, the key to remember is that what you say and how you say it revolves around who you’re talking to in the first place. After all, you should be using a whole different communications style for one gender, educational level and age group versus another of any of those variables. This isn’t even taking into account geographic differences. Do you think someone living in Florida thinks precisely the same way as someone living in Wyoming? If you think that, you might find that your website is only attracting scattershot, one-time visitors.

 

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