“Healthy Employees, Healthy Business: Easy, Affordable Ways to Promote Workplace Wellness” by Ilona Bray and a team of experts is a good book that may go unnoticed by many businesses. In these difficult economic times for many, starting a wellness program may not be on the forefront of many corporate and business leader’s thoughts. However, as pointed out in the first chapter, “Why You Need a Healthy Workplace,” the incorporation of wellness programs and the encouragement and assistance with keeping employees healthy can significantly increase the bottom line. The statistics in the book claim that most companies have a positive return on the investment of instituting wellness programs. The book claims that only a small minority of companies fail to break even and that’s often because their initial investment of time and money was too low.

The book then goes on with chapters on strategies for a successful wellness program; worksite evaluations and program launches; prevention and early detection to help employees stay well; very basics on healthy eating, nutrition, fitness and exercise; suggestions for lowering stress levels, working without tobacco, helping an addicted worker, reducing obesity, dealing with chronic illnesses, choosing health benefits, and finally drafting workplace policies that promote health.

The book also contains a CD-ROM that includes forms such as Wellness Plan Worksheet, Wellness Program Interest Survey, Treatment Center Evaluation Form, a Food and Exercise Diary among a few others. Additionally, there are the audio MP3 files on Why Create a Wellness Program, Wellness Program Incentives, and Wellness Program – Walking.

Much of the information on health in this book can be found in greater detail in books specifically on the subject, but the short chapters here do provide the basics in a context of creating a wellness program for a work environment. Each chapter was advised by an expert in the field so the advice is sound and accurate.

Like many Nolo books, there are many sidebars and boxes that provide additional resources on topics as well as success stories from business owners. The credentials of the advising experts are also listed at the beginning of each chapter.

Health and fitness are extremely important and I’m a firm believer that preventing disease and keeping oneself fit will not only help people enjoy their lives more, but be happier and more productive workers. Not to mention the lower cost of healthcare for medical problems that are preventable by living a healthier lifestyle. I applaud businesses that take an interest in helping their employees become healthier by implementing wellness programs. I think Bray’s book “Healthy Employees, Healthy Business” can assist many businesses with encouraging employees to be healthier and starting programs to educate and assist them with their efforts.

The world forges forward at a constant speed, with more and more business types and entities stretching their business services up to twenty four hours each and every day. One hundred years ago, or perhaps even fifty years ago, you would not ever have heard of such a thing. All of these are driven by a few things. The first rationale is competitiveness, or maybe a more suitable phrase would be ‘revenue’, as each company tries to defeat the competition. The second factor driving this tendency is accessibility, as more and more people need to have these services at varying times of the day, and in completely different time zones as well.More companies have grown to be intercontinental in nature, so the necessity to gratify their developing client base’s needs, drives these businesses to push the limits in relation to operating hours. It is as if the modern world rests much less, and while this may be beneficial for the profit margins of companies, it is probably not as advantageous to consumers as we may think. When you really think about it, people are generally more elastic with their time, because they can now get a late night meal at one of the numerous available food delivery outlets in close proximity to their household, and while this may be convenient, it might not exactly always be advantageous. The very expediency of it causes people to grow to be laid back in the way they approach their days and nights.We have a tendency to do things simply because we can, and in today’s world, it’s going to take a very controlled approach to balance our lives effectively. The flip side of the coin is that if we do not approach our lives well, we could quite easily end up burning out. Mobile devices, while handy, fuels these undesirable habits, because we tend to want to check emails and messages at odd times of the day, often doing just that one last check right before getting into bed at the end of the day. Hassle-free, but not at all times healthy and balanced.Maybe if we go back to splitting our lives into compartments or sections on a daily basis, we may have a more healthy way of life. We are literally flooded with information each day, it is literally just a click, or the flip of a switch away. Social media allow people to be connected twenty four hours a day, so if we are not very careful, we could simply burn out. We have to discover how to shut out the remainder of the world, even if it is simply for quick amounts of time during the day. When we have the ability to do that, we in actual fact become more productive, because our concentration increases during restful times.I’m sure that many people cannot imagine life without the need of being permanently connected in some way, but possibly we need to look at it as an alternative to get back our focus. How did people do it one hundred years ago, when there was not much more than a candle and a book at their bedside? Possibly there were a smaller number of events in their lives, but perhaps those events were more important.

Every day, millions of people use Google or other search engines to find information about business services or products for sale. 90% of these users click on the links located on the first page of search results. Those sites which do not appear on the first few pages often get very few clicks or no clicks at all. Hence, websites need to be optimized so that they can get a favorable ranking in Google.Nowadays, we can hire the services of professional SEO consultants who have years of practical and applied knowledge, and can use latest SEO software, to bring their client’s websites to the top. Their service starts with identifying the best keywords to use for higher page visits. These search phrases or keywords are directly related to the products or services offered on the client’s website. This is the most important step in any SEO campaign as a poor choice of keywords can ruin the prospect of the website.To choose the best keywords, professional SEO consultants study the site, the target audience and the competition. Once the keywords are selected, the next step is to create links from other relevant websites. This is a laborious process since it takes many different links to generate sufficient amount of traffic. To get these links, they will register the website in directories, forums, wikis, social bookmarking, etc.Most professional SEO services also include the creation and optimization of the content of the website. Recently, Google changed its indexing software and introduced a new software called ‘Google Panda’ which can easily detect websites with copied or junk content and can exclude them from indexing. Thus, it’s important that the content is original, makes sense and is pleasant to read.The SEO consultants will also indulge in ongoing analysis of the positions reached, the bounce rate, time spent on the site, user navigation and many other factors that will help people in achieving the goals of their SEO campaign. Once a desired rank is achieved, it is also important that the professional SEO consultant keeps a track of the site to make sure that it retains its rank.Thus, people who want to get more traffic to their websites through legitimate means can hire the services of a professional SEO consultant, who can use different SEO techniques to get backlinks for the website, increase the flow of traffic and eventually improve the ranking of the website.