Controlling expenses is the surest way to better savings

The youth of today struggle with the idea of savings. We are in such a fast paced world that delaying gratification for better rewards in the future is a long lost ideal. All past generations were more frugal and thoughtful about the way they spent money. Do you recall how judiciously your mother and aunts wrote down everyday expenses in a diary? Yes! It helped them keep to a said budget every month.

Why have things changed so much

It is true that we can’t blame anyone else for our poor saving habits, but we still have to take into account how much the world has changed today. Perhaps if we were living in the same time and conditions of the older generations, we would be saving the same way. So we really have to closely examine the changes of today.

Marketing and advertising is highly advanced and intrusive

Older generations had it easy in the sense that there was less temptation to buy things. Advertising was limited to conventional media such as newspapers, radio and television. The exposure to such marketing messages was limited and did not come in the way of most of everyday activities. The result was a spending trend which was healthy. People saved and there was no real pressure to seek instant gratification by purchasing today!

Undoubtedly, the environment mentioned above is a good one for savings and long term financial goals. However, today the environment is a whole lot different. With the advent of the internet, it is fair to say that advertising and marketing has gotten a whole lot manipulative with high level measuring systems in place. Here is a very simple example. Spend some time browsing through an ecommerce site for a particular product. You will notice that for the next few days there will be advertisements of that product series displayed to you. You could be looking through your social media or just browsing for something unrelated. You will see the ads. Such is the level of marketing! There are bots that figure out your behavior and market specifically to you. In such an environment, it is of no surprise that you find saving difficult.

Track expenses the quick way!

The old school method of expense tracking by noting down in a diary may not be practical today. Hence there are home accounting software online available. They sever as an online money manager tool. The usage is very simple. All it takes is an internet connection and you can login and input your expenses as and when they happen. All the data is stored on servers. This means you don’t have to make space in your PC to store expense data. You only have to login and directly enter the expense in the online home accounting software.

There is currently such software available for free! Take up one of those and you are on the path to better savings!