The larger the project, the more difficult delivering it on time will become. So many things can happen that will slow down the site, throughout the building phase. Thankfully, there are tools and other ways to keep track of what is going on, so your project will not be delayed. Here are a few of them that will help you out on your next construction site. Time lapse Cameras If you are looking for a tool to keep track of all that is going on, on your construction site, then what you need to do is to use a jobsite camera for your time lapse. Maybe you have never thought about this before, or you did not know that such a professional camera existed today, but either way, the time lapse camera is the only solution that will enable you to know exactly what is going on, on a daily basis, and if the work rhythm is as it should be.Most importantly, if the work is not getting done on time, you will be able to easily figure out the source of the problem, giving you the possibility to act on it immediately and stop the waste of time. It is also the best tool to help you get better in the future, as you can watch the whole time lapse, at the end. This way, you will understand the weaknesses and strengths you have had on this site, so that you can adapt next time, by solving issues and keeping the best methods that have worked well this time around. Make Sure that Information flows on Site, all the Way to Management Trust is not a word that should be used on a construction site. You need results. And to get them, you should ask for everyone on site to report to base, through the head of each department, daily. Anything that you postpone tomorrow, could cost you one or more days of delays, in the end. Managers are there to read the info that they receive from the people on the ground and determine if all is going as planned.If it is not the case, it is also their job to react and change whatever needs to be, so that the work can get back on track. Sharing knowledge and receiving input from the people on site regularly, is also a way to get everyone involved and to benefit from any great idea one might have to accelerate the proceedings or to make the site safer for employees, as well. Acquire Digital Tools to maximize Your Efforts We live in modern times, where almost everything that we do can be helped through the use of digital tools. If we don’t keep up or use them to the maximum of their capacity, then we lose on efficiency, which we will probably end-up paying in time-loss on the site, which will translate into fees related to a late delivery. Digital tools offer a comprehensive platform for information to be translated into better management techniques and decisions. It should be used in every aspect of decision-making, when it comes to a construction site.

It’s often said that you either adapt to the changes taking place or are eliminated. With the new dawn of technology, the phrase has been inevitable, especially in the business world regarding marketing. Marketing is the backbone of any business that aspires to do well, which is essential to invest in high-quality marketing to ensure the perpetual prosperity of any business. Many proprietors have opted to use marketing agencies as it’s a new promising trend. How do Marketing Agencies Work? Marketing agencies analyze the market and help their clients strategize marketing methods and implement them. To be more precise on what the marketing agencies do, below is a breakdown of their roles. Pinpoint promising marketing strategies- when the marketing agency helps the client identify a sound system, it is easy to achieve the target of pulling many fans towards your business page, resulting in increased sales and expansion. Manage marketing campaigns- After coming up with the strategies, the ball needs to be set rolling by executing the plan so that the client can analyze the results and weigh the business performance later on. Analyze marketing results- If the business performance is constant, the marketing agency develops new strategies to ensure that sound business performance is progressive. It’s vital to note that choosing the right marketing agency should be done gradually and carefully since the company’s success depends on them. One ought to select an agency that deals in your company’s specifications among the many agencies in the pool of marketing. Most effective agencies invest more time in content creation as it’s ”king” in marketing. Enticing content is the basis of any successful digital marketer. Content creation works hand in hand with Search Engine Optimization (SEO) which ensures that content is visible to a specific target audience. The goal of SEO is to make the right piece of content visible to the right person. It’s essential to note that SEO is not effective without content because it’s only with content that the search queries can be answered. Most marketing agencies make their work effective by maximizing the use of SEO with correct content for appealing results. If your website is not already optimized for search engines, work with a digital agency that specializes in SEO campaign management to get started.  Steps Followed By Marketing Agencies During Content Creation • Setting goals When heading somewhere, it’s essential first to know where you are heading to. Similarly, the agencies note down their client’s set goals, then set theirs and strategize on how to attain them through content creation. The agent should know whether they aim to gain loyal customers, increase sales, or lead generation to discern the content to create. • Learn about the target market To create appealing content, marketing agencies know the kind of audience being addressed, and it’s therefore easy for them to cater for their needs which gives the audience satisfaction. The website is considered reliable and convenient. • Choosing the format This is important since it is easier for the agencies to plan on their budget. The format depends on the expertise of the agents. With less content, they start with simple structures and then build up as time progresses. • Creating a strategy After the goals are set, the target market is identified, and the format is chosen, the marketing agency gets organized by creating a strategy for writing the content. This includes choosing topics to cover, assigning tasks to writers and the media team. • Weighing Performance To keep track of their performance, marketing agencies can analyze their performance data like online platforms, which they make compelling by ensuring their data runs throughout. This is a way to help them monitor their activities. Benefits of Using Marketing Agencies 1. It’s Relatively Cheap – Hiring a marketing agency is affordable because there is only more to gain than lose after hiring them. This is because the business maximizes on its sales, and the profit being plowed back increases. 2. Agencies are well known for their expertise in emerging trends in the market- For best results, one has to hire the best. Agencies are well vast with the latest trends in the marketing world in technology and data analysis. Performance-driven agencies use the knowledge to deliver the right content to the right audience and in the appropriate season. 3. Have experience and valuable talent- Experience is only mastered after a long period of practice. With experience, there is an assurance of good performance delivery since there is the ability to handle many tasks. After a long period of training, there is the betterment of skills, and there is talent. 4. Ability to scale demand- Agencies can scale the targeted audience demand depending on the change of seasons and preferences. It is hard to get an individual familiar with this field which is why agencies are a recommendation. 5. A broad set of skills- Skills of the company’s staff are complemented, and the more the skills, the more the productivity. It makes work easier since every team specializes in their best qualification as the agency deals in marketing. 6. New ideas and fresh perspectives- Bringing a marketing agency to the company is a plus since they complement the already used views by coming up with new ones, which might be the answers to the company’s shortcomings. 7. Marketing campaign strategies are streamlined- Having a marketing agency ensures that marketing is done effectively, new plans are made to make the campaigns effective and productive. 8. Agencies quantify results – It’s essential to keep a clear track of a company’s performance so that it’s easy to improve on the weaknesses and improve the strengths. Marketing agencies use project management tools to analyze performance data, and through this, they are able to come up with new plans for improving results. Wrap-up To stand a chance of beating your competitors, one is advised to go an extra mile in what they do. There is a lot of competition in the business world where

Real estate investment has become the top long-term investment option for many investors. Investors who intend to buy and rehabilitate distressed properties often utilize hard money loans as they are short-term and interest only. The funds can become available to investors as quickly as 15 days, helping investors compete with cash buyers to purchase their desired properties. What Is A Hard Money Loan? A hard money loan refers to asset-based financing where a borrower uses the physical property as collateral in exchange for funds. It is asset-based since the borrower uses the real estate property they invest in as security for the loan. The loans are sometimes referred to as private money loans as the funding is from private lenders instead of financial institutions. The lenders determine the loan amount to be given by ascertaining the property’s value. Traditionally, financial institutions lend money based on the borrower’s financial history and credit score. It is easier and quicker to find hard money loans than traditional loans. A borrower is still required to go through the underwriting process and ensure compliance with the requirements. Of course, when taking out any loan, it’s important that you use professional, recognised lenders and that you understand the ins and outs of the agreement. This guide should help you to better understand the entire process. Reasons Why an Investor May Need a Hard Money Loan? Some of the situations that may cause an investor to seek a hard money loan instead of a traditional financing option include: Pros of Hard Money Loans Hard money loans can be highly beneficial for borrowers regardless of their credit history. Some advantages of hard money loans include: Cons of Hard Money Loans Hard money loans are a faster option for real estate financing. It is important that you fully understand the lender’s terms and charges to reduce the risks involved.

HOA (Homeowners association) communities are on the rise across the nation. Around 58% of homeowners live in HOA communities and across the country, around 8,000 new HOAs are formed each year. The prominence of HOAs and the diverse characteristics of each community pose an HOA management challenge to homeowners. Many HOAs turn to third-party companies to handle the heavy lifting of the HOA’s daily duties to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars each year.  In 2021, an estimated 35% of HOAs were self-managed. However, tools like HOA accounting software are making these duties more approachable for volunteers—regardless of their background or experience.  NO matter how you go about it, there are four things your HOA board needs to run smoothly, satisfy homeowners, and stay profitable.  Pillar 1: Streamline Dues Collection Homeowner dues are the lifeblood of your HOA, and collecting them is the most urgent function of HOA management. Dues provide the funding needed to maintain amenities, make repairs, and budget for improvements.  Usually, the task of collecting dues falls to the HOA’s treasurer, and it isn’t as easy as it sounds.  Some homeowners prefer to pay by check, while others pay by cash or card. Collecting and processing several different types of payments causes more work for the treasurer. Not to mention, depositing checks requires a trip to the bank, and they take a few days to process.  While many homeowners may faithfully mail their dues in by check, unavoidably some will forget or find themselves out of town with no way to pay. In this case, the treasurer must connect with them to arrange the payment. If the treasurer has a job, or if the homeowner works odd hours, this can be difficult.   As a result, dues payments trickle in inconsistently over the course of the month — until it’s time to do it all over again. You can see why many HOAs leave this work to third-party companies.  But the simplest solution to this challenge is to offer digital payments to homeowners. That way, they can pay with a credit or debit card, or through a bank draft. More importantly, they can pay anytime, from anywhere, without interfacing with the treasurer at all.  Unlike checks, digital payments hit the HOA’s bank account instantly. Some HOA accounting software platforms like PayHOA allow homeowners to enable autopay, so they don’t have to remember to pay their dues each month. This simplifies the dues process for both homeowners and the HOA treasurer, and gives the HOA’s cash flow much more stability.  Pillar 2: Organize Your Bookkeeping Keeping your accounting and records organized can be extremely difficult. However, with the right tools and processes, even HOA treasurers with no accounting or financial background can keep the HOA on track.  Many HOAs keep track of their accounting with basic tools like spreadsheets or even paper ledgers. These methods create several liabilities.  Though these tools are digital, they still require a ton of manual work and data entry. Not only does this make the job of treasurer more difficult, it’s more prone to human error.  The treasurer must create their own system for keeping information organized. This creates too much reliance on one individual. If they decide to leave the HOA, it can be tough to make heads or tails of their records.  Good bookkeeping practices don’t always provide the clarity needed for long-term planning or informed decision-making. It can still be difficult to gain a birds-eye-view of the HOA’s financial health.  General accounting softwares like QuickBooks aren’t built to handle an HOA’s needs. To name just a few issues, they don’t handle mass, recurring invoices well, and they don’t distinguish between property and owner. This is a huge area of concern in working with a third-party management company. These companies handle the HOA’s bookkeeping, but don’t always keep the HOA board informed about the finances. If the HOA decides to end its relationship with a management company, it can be difficult to regain control of the books and records.  For HOAs who choose to self-manage, an HOA-specific accounting software can answer almost all of these concerns.  These platforms allow you to create separate profiles for properties, owners, and vendors. They keep all your transactions in one place and automatically sync with the HOA’s bank account. Plus, these HOA platforms automatically generate reports that indicate your HOA’s financial health.  To prioritize your HOA’s goals, the HOA must know where it stands. The end goal of organized bookkeeping is to provide the clarity your HOA needs to move forward — whether that means  building reserves, conducting an audit, planning a new amenity, paying taxes, or something else. Pillar 3: Be Transparent With Homeowners  Communication is a key piece of HOA management. Homeowners pay dues to maintain their HOA community, so they deserve to know how their money is being spent, what’s going on in their community, and how to participate in the HOA board’s decision making. Accounting Remember, homeowners chose to live in an HOA community as an investment. When homeowners know their investment is being taken care of, it makes for a good relationship with the HOA board and an overall happier community.  From an accounting perspective, most homeowners want to know just four basic things: How much cash does the HOA have on hand? How much money does the HOA have in reserves? What is the HOA spending money on? What should the HOA be spending money on? The ability to answer these questions comes from organized bookkeeping, but the HOA board must also take an active approach in communicating these points to homeowners. Some state HOA laws require a level of openness, but the legal standard should be the bare minimum for transparency around finances.  Board meetings Running an HOA is a team effort, and when you include homeowners, that work will go much smoother and will be well-received.  Announce meetings a few weeks in advance. Be clear about the rules for how meetings will be conducted and

The demand for skilled construction workers has risen globally in recent decades. As a result, construction companies and industry project administrators compete to hire suitable candidates to fulfil their building activities and requirements.  If you need to recruit several new hires this year, it’s best to prepare to tackle the task beforehand. Here are some strategies that enable your recruitment department to source highly-skilled construction workers. Before conducting interviews, it’s helpful to screen applicants using psychometric assessments. Psychometric tests measure an individual’s specific characteristics using a wide range of assessments. Traditionally, these qualifications include cognitive abilities and behavioural traits, evaluated through aptitude and personality tests.  In addition to enabling employers to make more informed hiring decisions, psychometric tests streamline the recruitment process. The concepts and data driving psychometric tests are scientific, making them more dependable than personal judgments from the hiring staff. Large multinational corporations are increasingly using psychometric testing in hiring new employees, suggesting its effectiveness. With that being said, the construction industry can also use this screening method.  Whether building sustainable homes, constructing manufacturing plants, or working on real estate projects, you must hire the best construction workers. Unfortunately, not all construction companies know how to effectively advertise work opportunities, leading to low applicant turnout. One primary step in recruitment is knowing who and where your target audience is. Multiple candidates often visit various platforms to seek job advertisements. Therefore, construction companies must place job postings on sites where many potential applicants keep an account or actively use it. Consider these two major platforms:  Many people rely on social media platforms to seek something important. These could include vintage and rare items, long-lost friends, and ideal jobs. They visit these social networking sites at least once a day. For instance, 72% of the American public today uses at least one type of social media platform, according to Pew Research Center. Therefore, it’s essential to know whom to target and decide which social media platforms are popular and widely used by them. “LinkedIn is arguably the most popular way to find good recruits. Remember to also check out the industry groups (actively participating where possible),” comments James Durr of Birmingham auction house Property Solvers. Besides social media platforms, job seekers often maintain accounts on job recruitment sites. These digital platforms are widely accessible to employers and employees.  Evaluate these sites and pick those that allow construction workers and staff to perform job searches effectively. A hiring manager can also check which websites have the most qualified candidates and devote more resources to these platforms.  Besides leaving it to the hiring specialist, there are options like online hiring platforms and free recruitment agency software, which complete the work of a manager by choosing skilled candidates. You don’t even have to be that involved in the hiring process. These tools are specifically made to filter and create shortlists of potential workers, so you won’t have to go through each one and collect. Besides, you can even send the whole list to your client with one click. You can forget about asking writers to create offers for your potential workers since these tools also do that. On top of it all, you can track the status of your proposals and be able to follow every stage of the hiring.  Companies may not be the only ones assessing in a highly competitive job market. Candidates also look at an employer’s working conditions and benefits before applying. As such, study how your organization can entice more skilled workers. Consider conducting a survey or placing yourself in a construction worker’s shoes and determine which work factors are essential.  Look beyond your salary and monetary offers, insurance and health benefits. Study the different motivations that drive an employee, including job security and career advancement. Simply put, provide an attractive package that allows them to choose to work for you rather than your competitors.  After determining which positions in your construction company you need to fill, it’s time to write better and more effective job descriptions to guide your future candidates. When creating an outline for your job post, be concise in describing the job requirements so applicants can discern whether the construction job is a good fit for them. Vacancy announcements should clearly state your company’s minimum requirements and avoid posting vague job descriptions.  A construction job description must be written clearly and include what skills are vital for the position. A job vacancy post must also indicate the required experience, education, or background requirements.  Additionally, clearly state whether the job is temporary, contractual, or permanent. Think of all the other details necessary for a candidate to know and add them to the posting.  Safety must be a primordial concern for a construction company, as workers in the sector are highly vulnerable to injuries. Advertising your company’s safety compliance accreditations or its record of solid safety practices can be used as leverage to attract more qualified candidates. This holds especially for those who consider this element a major deciding factor for their job application journey.  Recruiting new employees becomes easier when you use a safety culture that promotes worker protection. It also demonstrates that you’re concerned about your employees’ well-being and implement the appropriate critical measures to make their jobs as safe as possible.  Conclusion  Setting up recruitment strategies is essential for any construction company. Hiring qualified candidates will allow your construction business to operate smoothly, incur lesser risks and damages, decrease turnover, and improve productivity. The key is to generate the proper methods and ways to attract new and efficient employees. To effectively hire the ideal candidates, know where to find them and be clear with what you want from them. Consider providing attractive compensation packages to help you become one of the most preferred construction industry employers.

Continuous improvement is the mantra of some of the most successful business organizations. Even in supply chain management, where it seems that a business has already perfected its systems and processes, there’s always room for further improvement. This will help you provide better service and customer satisfaction for your primary client. Your main objective in continuous improvement is to identify gaps and opportunities for further improving the service you provide to your clients. If you’re looking for ways to improve your supply chain management capabilities, you might want to look into integrated supply chain services. Here are a few other suggestions on how you can offer better services to your client. 1. Do An End-To-End Analysis One of the first few things you can do if you’re looking to deliver better service for your supply chain management (SCM) clients is an end-to-end analysis. Gather people from all departments or units involved in the SCM process. You can task them with reviewing the entire SCM system and process. This will allow them to identify any gaps or inefficiencies. You can also use data analytics technology to help in the review. By doing an end-to-end analysis, you’ll be able to identify specific gaps or opportunities for improvement, as well as see the overall system and how everything comes together. It doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll find something wrong with the SCM setup; you might just see a few gaps or flaws here and there. In looking to deliver better client service, you should try to identify ways to reduce time spent on certain tasks, as well as ways to bring down expenses. These two are the easiest to quantify and measure, though they’re not the only areas of opportunity for improvement. You can also review your client’s SCM process for possible redundancies or roundabout processes that can be further simplified or streamlined. 2. Focus On Client’s Core Objectives You should make sure to focus your efforts on your client’s core objectives. If you provide services for the whole SCM process of your client, this gives you the room to make changes where they’re needed. But even if you’re providing services or solutions for only a portion of the SCM process, you can still find ways to improve. For example, if you provide logistics solutions and transporting services to a food processing company, you can offer to review the schedule and routing of the pickup, transportation, delivery, and unloading of their products. If you pick up from several hubs, plants, or processing centers, you can propose to do a review. The review should be focused on how to optimize the whole schedule and routing system. There might be ways to reduce the number of trips made or to use the backload as an opportunity to deliver other items or transport to nearby delivery points. 3. Train The Front Lines To Enhance The Customer Experience Of The End User If you have some level of interaction with the client or end user, that’s another opportunity to create value-added service for your client. You can, for instance, focus on enhancing customer experience if you’re the service provider for the customer support hotline or the portal for the monitoring and tracking of deliveries. As a service provider for the customer support operations of your client, you can also conduct a review of the whole process of customer service engagement and operations. Your objective here would be to look for further opportunities to improve the experience of your client’s users or customers whenever they contact customer support. 4. Integrate Order Entry And Customer Service Systems If you’re the service provider for both your client’s supply chain order entry and fulfillment systems, as well as the customer service systems, you have the opportunity to propose that their order entry system be integrated with the customer service systems. This will give their customers a seamless experience, which would greatly contribute to customer satisfaction. An example is if you provide the order entry and fulfillment platform as well as the customer service portal for your client and they’re separate systems. The end users would have to interact with one platform for order entry and then another for customer service. They might not know this if you don’t say outright that a separate entity handles the customer support operations. However, this doesn’t mean they won’t experience the separation of your order entry and customer support systems. They might have an idea if the customer support frontliners admit or disclose that they can’t answer some of the customers’ queries because they don’t have access to certain tools in the order entry platform. This may negatively affect customer satisfaction because their issue won’t be easily resolved and they’re being made to wait due to the divide in the order entry and customer support systems. Conclusion You should conduct an end-to-end analysis of your client’s SCM system and process so you can get both the big-picture view and the details of what needs to be improved. With the information you get from the review, you can identify specific gaps and opportunities for improvement. You can suggest intelligent pickup and delivery scheduling and routing systems, train frontline customer service support, and also integrate customer service portals and order entry systems.

A bridging loan could be the ideal solution when considering applying for short-term finance. But how do you know which type of bridging loan is the best option? Closed and open bridging loans are two of the most common types you can choose from. We explain how to tell the difference between the two. Reasons to choose a bridging loan A bridging loan is one way to bridge a short-term gap in your finances. Intended to be paid back over a shorter period of time than a standard loan, there are several reasons why bridging finance could be used, including: When applying for a bridging loan, two main types are available – closed and open. Here are the key differences between the two. Open Bridging Loan This is a loan which is open-ended, i.e., it has no set exit strategy or end date. However, most open bridge financing will typically clear within 12 months as a short-term loan. Closed Bridge Loans Unlike an open loan, a closed bridge arrangement will have a pre-agreed end date and an exit strategy that includes a clear repayment plan. Closed bridge loans are seen as more secure by lenders in terms of repayment. Open or closed bridge finance – which one to choose? The final bridge loan product you choose will be dependent on your circumstances and whether you have exchanged or completed on your current property or not. If you know you will have the finances to pay off the loan and can evidence it to your broker, you will be offered a closed bridge loan. They are also considered more secure by most lenders and can attract better interest rates. If you are still in the process of selling your property and have not yet had a firm offer or exchanged, then you can still apply for a bridge loan to buy a new property, but it will be open-ended. If you are in any doubt, a bridging loan specialist should be your first port of call before applying for bridging finance.

Poor communication must be avoided in construction sites because it is one of the main reasons for project delays. This may take various forms like unclear communication resulting in wrong interpretation or confusion, delays in the flow of information, and pointing communication to the wrong area or people.  These components of poor or ineffective communication may lead to mistakes and delays. Ordering the wrong materials and mislaid steps in the construction processes may also lead to project delays. In worst-case scenarios, disputes may arise. This is because a lack of proper communication could lead to misunderstandings in a construction project. Thus, it’s crucial to keep everyone updated on the project to prevent miscommunication.  Fortunately, these problems can be avoided by improving communication in the construction sites. With proper communication, all information will be delivered and received, and thus, miscommunication is less likely to happen. The question is, how can communication be improved in these areas? Here are some of the ways to do it:  1. Allow Field And Office Workers To Communicate With One Another In construction sites, communication breakdowns often take place between field and office teams. Thus, it can form a conflict as well as delay production. To reduce problems that may come up during the construction project, consider fixing the gap between these two teams.  When everyone in your company works together, blunders are restricted and morale remains high. In this case, you need to look for the right technology. This will help in centralizing the communication as well as facilitating collaboration. As a result, you’ll have a real-time view of a project’s progress, while allowing the teams to connect across the construction site and office.  For instance, you can invest in wave communications to have a reliable internet connection in the area. With poor connection, there is a tendency for some workers not to receive the information coming from the office and vice versa, which may lead to project delays.  2. Build Trust With One Another  Keep in mind that the construction industry deeply depends on a relationship. One major part of that includes trusting all workers to get the job done and communicate your messages properly and effectively.  While improving trust in this industry may involve a culture shift, know that there are ways you can do to improve communication with your employees. For instance, build trust, lessen doubt, simplify collaborations, and take responsibility from the top management to the bottom-rung workers in every aspect of construction projects.  3. Make Communication Simple Proper communication may boost productivity in construction as there will be no room for confusion. Better communication is possible by relaying concise and clear messages across all employees. The importance of understanding a message completely the first time it was sent is immeasurable, most especially in construction sites. Avoid using jargon and other terms that others may not understand. Keep messages simple, direct to the point, and brief. In addition, you need to focus on the most important and relevant details every team member needs to know. Meanwhile, you must give as much information as possible so confusion may less likely to transpire. 4. Offer Training Make sure to allow workers to improve their skills and obtain new ones. You can do this by training your employees on the use of new software, apps, equipment, regulation, and safety features. In a way, this will benefit your business as well as your workers.  Through training, you keep the relationship between the employees and company strong and improve the communication in all teams. This will also lessen the possibility of your employees leaving because they’ll feel wanted and valued by their employer. Investing in employee training can give an advantage to employers as this will lead to more skilled employees. Remember that workers are more attracted to companies offering the right training as they feel these are where they’d love to stay until their retirement.  Thus, if your employees matter to you, do everything you can to keep them in your care. Conclusion Clear lines of communication should be one of the top priorities to achieve a successful construction project. When proper and effective communication is practised consistently, the involved parties can serve the clients better while keeping in line with company and industry standards. This will result in an enhanced quality of collaboration, so unclear instructions and misunderstandings will be avoided. Furthermore, projects will flow smoothly if the teams communicate well with one another. Hopefully, the tips mentioned here will be beneficial in improving communication in construction sites. 

Bots traffic continues to increase day after day, thanks to their various uses. There are two types of bots, the malicious bots and the god bots. Bots can be used in communication, indexing websites, scraping content from a website, or even launching attacks on the online infrastructure. With the bad bot traffic at about 40% of all the internet traffic, it is only necessary to have various bot protection mechanisms. A Completely Automated Public Test to tell Computers and Human Apart (CAPTCHA) is one such mechanism for protecting your site against bad bots. What is a CAPTCHA Many internet users are asked to tick some boxes to prove they are not robots at one point. You may also have seen a set of images and asked to select one that contains a fire hydrant, chimney, or streetlights. All these are to prove that you are not a computer or a bot. A CAPTCHA is a test, a Turing test, to be specific. It is simple enough for any human to solve but complex for a computer to solve. Bots are automated scripts or computers. Therefore, they cannot be able to solve the test. Of all the internet security measures, CAPTCHA is the most loathed. In theory, CAPTCHAs are a good idea. Their objective is to keep the bot at bay and spam comments away. They are common online, with over 200 million of them completed daily. However, captchas pose a problem to the user experience. They do this in the following ways: CAPTCHA’s User experience issues Interrupting a user’s workflow CAPTCHA adds an extra irritating step between users and the task they seek to accomplish. Even the recent versions of CAPTCHA can be hard to read. For instance, although Re-Captcha is among the oldest CAPTCHA generators, it forces users to decipher text images from old books. The advantage here is that the text comprises actual words and not random strings of letters and numbers. This is an excellent idea, although the words can be hard to make out regardless of how good your vision is. Because of their hardness to read, they slow down your browsing experience. Accessibility issue For people e having visual difficulties, solving the CAPTCHA can be excessively hard. This is a critical usability issue. Some CAPTCHAS have audio alternatives but are, in most cases, even harder to decipher and sound scary. CAPTCHA puts a burden on legit users Beyond the accessibility and the usability concerns, at the core of CAPTCHA, there is a flaw. The fundamental issue is that CAPTCHAs force legitimate e users to complete undesirable tests because of issues that are far beyond their reach. That is not their fault. With CAPTCHAs, all the users are presumed guilty. Because of these reasons, there are many alternatives to CAPTCHA and reCAPTCHA. These measures put bad bots away without affecting the user experience. Alternatives to CAPTCHA More enjoyable and more accessible tests As we have established above, completing a CAPTCHA is unpalatable. There are several user-friendly alternatives to CAPTCHA that have popped up. Some like Sweet CAPTCHA and PlayThru gamify the entire process of proving that you are a human being. However, while playing a game is better than entering an obscured string of text, the issue of accessibility remains for these processes. Visually impaired users cannot play the game. Furthermore, because people are accustomed to filling the traditional CAPTCHA, gamified alternatives to CAPTCHA are seen as juvenile or even annoying. Other alternatives to CAPTCHA like Egglue and Text CAPTCHA ask a series of simple questions that a human being can answer using intuition or logic. NuCAPTCHA employs behavioral analysis to assess the risk levels for each visitor. Based on how the user is likely to be a bot, the solution assigns CAPTCHAs of varying Difficulty levels. The downside of this alternative to CAPTCHA is that it still affects a user’s workflow. Honeypots These are traps set to catch bots without the human being noticing they were there. Honeypots are not visible to a human being. Hidden form fields are one of the most common forms of honeypots. An extra entry field is added to the webform. It is then hidden from human users using CSS or JavaScript. However, bots will still see the entry field and fill the entry. Reject the form automatically, and take measures to mitigate against the bot if the above happens. However, honeypots still are not perfect. Website visitors using screen reader software still encounter the field. This creates confusion and increases the chances of failing the test. Verified sign-in The other option that you can use to confirm the visitors is by requiring them to log in to your website using accounts like Facebook, Disqus, Gmail account, or Twitter. This solution is vital as it removes the anonymity that malicious users rely on when posting abusive or rude comments. By tying comments to a verified account, you add an extra layer of responsibility while discouraging trolls. The issue here is that not all the users have the required verified account. They may not be able to access the service. To solve this, you can use a tool like Gigya or Janrain that allows the user to select from various accounts to log in with. However, many users do not like the idea of using their social accounts to log into unfamiliar websites. It is because of privacy issues and spamming of the account with messages without their permission. Timestamps The next alternative to CAPTCHA is using timestamps. Bots are faster compared to human beings. When users come across a form, they take time to read the instructions, decide what they will key in, and enter the text. On the other hand, the bot populates the form instantly. You can use time stamps on our form to reject the forms that are filled too quickly. However, this method is not secure enough to be used alone. There are sneaker bots that are programmed to fill out the form slowly to

Project management is an essential process for many organisations and, for anyone working in the property sector, the management side can be especially complex. Managing property development on all scales often brings together architects, developers, designers, sales & marketing professionals and more.  In order to keep projects running smoothly, however, it’s vital that teams have a tool to organise their work and for many property developers, Jira is the ideal solution to this need. But, what is Jira and how can businesses use it effectively?  What is Jira? Jira is a project management software that was initially created to enable software developers to track issues. There are now three different packages with this software: a basic project management platform project management with Agile functionality, and  a service desk solution which is designed for IT professionals.  With so many teams involved in large-scale property projects, many of which may be planned and discussed remotely, being able to collaborate effectively and track projects from start to finish is essential. Jira is a tool that can help with this and bring projects to fruition more efficiently through iterative development (or repetition of a process).  What can it be used for? Jira has evolved over the years to encompass a range of tasks and types of project management, from software development and bug tracking to content management and marketing. It can be used for flexible Kanban boards to give users complete visibility of projects so that staff can prioritise work for greater productivity, as well as Scrum software development.  Over 65,000 companies globally now rely on Jira in some capacity to manage their projects, in no small part because of the flexibility it delivers. For project management teams, software developers and DevOp teams alike, Jira provides a host of integrations and capabilities.  Jira cloud deployment is also used by thousands of teams around the world to handle various aspects of running a business, with a range of diverse roles. Cloud migration provides numerous business benefits, from lower costs and greater security to scalability and the ability to work on the go, so it’s no surprise that so many companies are choosing to adopt this technology.  How can property businesses benefit from Jira? Customisable  Property businesses can benefit from using Jira in a number of ways, starting with its customisability for integrating different teams and site requirements. It’s an industry leader in agile software and the ease with which users can set up, share and customise dashboards and workflows is a key reason for this. Jira is quick to install and configure, and it’s entirely browser-based which makes it a convenient and flexible option.  Scalable Jira is also incredibly scalable and has virtually no limits in terms of number of users or projects, making it suitable for everyone from small two-person teams through to global businesses. One of the biggest advantages for businesses is that the system doesn’t depend on SQL knowledge – it has a simple ‘What You See Is What You Get’ or WYSIWYG interface for querying tickets which results in a user-friendly platform that doesn’t require intensive training or specialist skills.  Easy collaboration For collaboration, Jira is an industry-leading software that enables teams to work efficiently together. It’s one of the primary benefits of using Jira for businesses. This permission-based tool provides joint-editing tools and monitoring capabilities to enable colleagues to see progress and updates for each task. Tasks can be arranged in priority order so that employees can tackle tasks in terms of necessity and productivity, to deliver the best result for customers or clients.  Cloud integration Cloud technology has completely transformed how businesses operate and share data, streamlining workflows and helping teams to adapt more quickly. Cloud software offers several benefits – it reduces IT costs, improves productivity and makes teams more efficient, but it also boosts security and reduces the risks of a data breach. The ability to integrate these two tools, along with many other apps, makes for a central solution that can be tailored to your needs.  Jira is one of the best tools for issue and project tracking, making it ideal for overseeing large-scale building designs or construction projects. It provides incredible agile support for teams, bringing together professionals from across the property business who may have merged together on one specific build. There are countless plugins to extend the capabilities of Jira and the ability for cloud migration makes it a versatile solution for property businesses looking to manage projects and track issues more efficiently.