Sunday 2 September 2007

Naming Your Business: 5 Tips for Brainstorming Business Name Ideas

Naming your business well allows you to provide customers with a first impression that distinctively suits your company image. A great business name is compelling, unique and memorable to your customers.

If only brainstorming business name ideas and naming your business wasn't such a daunting task.

If you're trying to name your business, you know exactly what I'm talking about. You may be completely blocked and unable to come up with a single business name idea. Alternatively, you may have a few ideas in mind, but when you look at them critically, you decide they are uninspired and ordinary, they don't suit your company's image, or they are already taken by a competitor.

I've been down that long road. It actually took me three months to name my business. In the process, I found some great resources and strategies for naming your business.

Make Your Thesaurus Your Best Friend



Start with some keywords that are related to your business, and, using a thesaurus, look up similar words. Make a list of these words.

When you are thinking of keywords for brainstorming business names, think about features or descriptions of your product or service, benefits your customers get from your company, characteristics of your target customers and the image you want to portray for your business. What words come to mind? Look them up in your thesaurus and add the results to your list.

Avoid making make too many judgments about the words. At this stage, the more words you have, the better.

Get a good variety of words and different parts of speech (nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs). Once you have brainstormed a lot of words, you can try combining words to create your business name. You will have more possible combinations that make sense if you have words from different parts of speech.

If you need more words for your list, take the words that you liked from your thesaurus brainstorming session and look those words up in your thesaurus. Again, make note of any words that you like from this process.

Combine the words from your lists to see if anything works as a possible business name.

Try Specialized Language


Plenty of areas of interest use specialized language to describe specific terms, and a lot of them use intriguing, unique and meaningful words that could help you come up with ideas for good business names.

For example, if you enjoy music or dance or science, you might search for business name inspiration in the specialized language of those subjects. Similarly, you might find inspiration for naming your business in the specialized language used in your own industry.

Mythological Figures


Searching through lists of mythological figures could help you in the task of naming your business. That's how Nike was named. Most mythological figures are known for something specific, so try choosing a particular characteristic that embodies the image you want to portray for your business and search for a mythological figure that represents that characteristic.

Idiomatic Phrases


Idiomatic phrases are figures of speech like 'a babe in arms,' or 'take the plunge'. Try searching online for lists of idioms. You may find something that is a clever fit with your company's products, services or your desired company image. Try to avoid idioms that are too common or clich� when naming your business. Remember, a good business name is uniquely your own and memorable to your customers.

Language Translators


After all of your brainstorming, you might come up with a few words that are potential business names, but for some reason, they are not exactly right for your business. To get variations on those words, try using a free online language translator to translate the words you like. Enter the words into the translator, and see how they are expressed in different languages.

Once you have used several sources for language inspiration, take a look at all of your lists and see if you can combine words from different sources. For example, a word from your thesaurus brainstorming sessions and the name of a mythological figure combined together could be the ideal name for your business.

At this point you should have a list of several possible business name ideas. Within that list, will be your ideal business name.

The time you spend on naming your business will be time well spent. Your ideal business name will help you to communicate to and be remembered by your customers and that can only be good for business.

by:Lisa McGrimmon


Tips for Creating an Information Product

Information products are one of the hottest selling items on the
Internet. And for good reason. Where else can you get timely,
relevant information that is exactly what you want...even at 2 am
in the morning?

The problem with information in books at the bookstore is that
many times it is not specific enough. I don't want to know
everything there is to know about audio engineering, I just want
to know how to record a talk, edit it and burn it to a CD to sell
on my web site. Try finding that at your local Barnes and Noble!
But it is relatively easy to find an ebook about that topic on
the Internet. Even better, a video!



Another problem with buying information at the book store is that
any information is at least one year old. That's how long it
takes to edit a book, send it to a publisher, get it printed and
finally placed on the shelves in your local book store. By
contrast, an ebook or other information product will usually have
the latest, cutting edge info on your topic because they are so
easily updated.

Information products can include anything from ebooks, videos and
special reports to complete home study courses that go "thud"
when the mail man drops it on your customer's front porch. But
information products can also include teleseminars, membership
sites and paid newsletter subscriptions.

Tip 1: Ask your prospective customers what they want.

I know this sounds obvious, but what you think your customers
want and what they really want can be two different things. You
have a lot of knowledge about your topic...that's why you are
creating an information product. But your customers do not have
your level of knowledge and are probably asking different
questions than you are.

So, while you are collecting their first name and email, add a
custom field that asks their biggest question about your topic.
After about 100 email subscribers, you will have a really good
idea what it is they are looking for! And you can use that
information to write your sales letter as well.

Tip 2: Think of the trade your customers are making.

When purchasing your information product, your customer is
trading his dollars for your information. Therefore, make it an
easy trade for him. I will trade $47 for information that makes
me $4700 every day of the week! That is why "how to make money"
ebooks sell so well.

I will also trade $47 for information that saves me 2 days
learning how to do something. That is a no-brainer! I am less
likely to trade $47 for cute stories, recipes or how to sew my
own clothes. Get the picture? Make the trade very easy for your
customer!

Tip 3: Try to include one or more of these angles in any
information product. Will the information in your product:

- make people money?
- save people money?
- save people time?
- save people pain (physical, emotional or financial)?

If you can include one or more of these angles in an information
product, you will have a real winner on your hands!

Tip 4: Break your long ebook into parts.

If you have a 150 page ebook, consider breaking it up into three
50 page ebooks. Everyone likes to get more value and it feels
more satisfying to get three different ebooks rather than one fat
one. It feels like you are getting more for your money.

Tip 5: Add enough bonuses to make the purchase a "no-brainer"!

After you create an information product, go out an find about 5
to 6 related products that you can offer as bonuses. If I am
buying a $47 ebook and you offer me $500 in downloadable bonuses,
it makes the buying decision very easy. I recommend downloadable
bonuses because they are easy to deliver and don't cost you
anything. This is also a good excuse to get their email for your
owner's list - you need their email to deliver their bonuses.

Tip 6: Sell first to those who have already bought from you.

Online business owners are like cows many times. We always think
the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. We are
always looking for NEW customers when our best customers are the
ones that have already demonstrated their loyalty by buying our
product!

We need to ask them what else they want. Another great way to
monetize existing customers is a membership site. So much per
month for access to special info, a monthly conference call or
even a private newsletter. Can you say residual income?

So, start with a niche. Ask that niche what they want. And then
start creating information products that satisfy the itch they
are ALREADY telling you they have. It is a blast and you will
achieve expert status in your niche in no time at all!

by:Stephen Beck


Saturday 25 August 2007

The Do's and Don'ts of Starting a Business

by:Bill Albright
This article about How to Start a Business highlights the top ten do's and don'ts of starting any kind of business. Starting a business is not complicated if you are aware of what to do, and more importantly, what to avoid. It is my hope that these two lists will work together and serve as a guideline when you start your own business, no matter what industry you're in.

Top 10 DO's of Starting a Business

In the planning stages of any new business, optimism usually gives the new business owner plenty of drive, but it can be very easy to become misdirected. This top 10 list was developed for business owners to stay on course and maintain proper direction in the beginning stages. Every business is a little different, however, so you may need to make a slight modification to these Top 10 DO'S of Starting a Business when you apply them to your own business model.


1. Live frugally and begin saving up money to put into your own business.
2. Learn how to start your intended type of business by working for someone else in the same line of business first.
3. Consider the benefits of starting a business on the side of your main-paying job first, such as after hours, so you can still eat and pay rent while learning how to be successful in your business.
4. Consider the advantages of starting a family business. (24/7 help, cheap labor, employee trust, etc...)
5. Objectively measure your skills and training against potential competition before your start your own business.
6. If you're starting a business manufacturing a product, consider subcontracting to low-cost suppliers. (China can make anything for less money than you can.)
7. Test market your product or service before putting any substantial money into the business, even when just expanding.
8. Make your own "pros" and "cons" list, describing all the positive and negative changes to you and to your bottom line, including everything you can think of related to the specific business you are considering starting.
9. Talk to lots of people in your intended industry for advice before starting a business. -Sometimes sub-suppliers to your industry have good advice, too.
10. Make a serious comparative analysis of all opportunities you are considering.

Top 10 DON'Ts of Starting a Business

Like the list above, the following are suggestions to consider when starting any type of business. They are designed to work hand-in-hand with the first list so that you can avoid the most common pitfalls of starting a new business.

1. Don't think about leaving your job until you have started to see some monetary results and fully completed your full start-up plans for the new business.
2. Don't consider starting a business in a field you do not enjoy.
3. Don't risk all of your assets. Limit your liabilities to a predetermined amount when starting a business. It can be a percentage of your worth of a dollar amount, but the point is to pick it from the start and to never cross that line.
4. Don't compete with your employer when you start your own business, especially when moonlighting!
5. Don't be in too much of a hurry to get your business started. When learning how to start most any business, there are no real penalties for missed opportunity.
6. Don't start a business that involves too high a risk, or has to major a hurdle. Take on ten 2-foot hurdles, never one 20-foot hurdle!
7. Never start a business in which you must have the lowest price to succeed, established competition can always under-price once it's in their best interest.
8. Don't be afraid to learn about the negative aspects of your intended business when you are first learning how to start it. You can't start a business with blinders on.
9. Don't let your entrepreneur self-confidence outweigh careful diligence.
10. Don't let the promise of a conceptual high reward deter reality testing. You can never guess what people will actually pay for anything until they do so.


How To Make Money On Blogs

by:Andrew Nielsen
Making money from a blog requires skill, luck and work. In this article we describe how it can be done.

Let's first look at the sources of revenue which are available for blog authors.

Ads
By placing ads on a blog it is possible to generate revenue from visitors who click on the ads. The most common source for ads is Google's AdSense. By signing up to Google AdSense and placing a small piece of code on your blog, Google will display their ads on your blog. Advertisers who signed up for Googles AdWords program pay Google for each click on ads and Google shares this revenue with blog owners displaying the ads. Google does not disclose how the revenue is shared � they encourage you to sign up and try it out so you can see how much you generate and then decide if it is for you or not. Google places ads on webpages so they match the content on the page. A blog about traveling would therefore attract ads for airplane tickets, hotels etc. Since Google shares their revenue with you and since you want to generate a lot of revenue, you need to produce content for which ads pay well. There are tools available for determining for which keywords there is the most competition among advertisers � content for such keywords will be content that generates the highest revenue. The revenue generated per click can be anywhere from a few cents to several dollars, depending on the advertiser competition. Normally, relatively few visitors to a website or blog will click on ads. There are ways to optimize a blog or website for achieving higher click through rates. You will be able to find varied (and sometimes contradictory) advice on what is the best strategy. Follow the links below, to sign up for Google's AdSense and for tools for finding the keywords for which there is a lot of advertiser competition.


Affiliate programs
Affiliate programs are a type of partnership, where are seller of a product shares the revenue generated from a sale with the affiliate who sent the customer to the seller's website. The percentage of revenue given to the affiliate can be from a few percent to as much as 75 percent. Affiliate programs are often supported by the company handling the online payment, who then takes care of paying the commission to the affiliate the minute the customer makes payment. An owner of a blog can become an affiliate of one or more sellers and send visitors to the sellers' websites, thereby generating revenue for the owner of the blog. Affiliate links (i.e., links from the affiliate to the sellers' websites) are easier to disguise as normal links, than ads provided by Google. The affiliate can create the links, so the customer may not even notice that the affiliate is affiliated with the sellers' websites. For this reason, a higher click through rate can be achieved this way than through ads. You can expect that only a few percent of visitors following your links end up making a purchase. So also for this option, a large amount of traffic is needed to generate good revenue. Follow the links below to learn more about affiliate programs and how to find products to promote.

Getting traffic
No matter which option for revenue you choose, the key to generating serious money is to get serious amounts of visitors for the blog. This means that your blog needs to be interesting for the reader and not just look like something made for you to make money. For this reason, you need to keep the amount of ads and affiliate links to a minimum. You need to produce content which appeals to readers and to add new posts regularly to keep visitors coming back. Topics like politics, religion, gaming, gossip, arts, sports - to name just a few � seem to be popular topics. You need to select a topic which you yourself find interesting as this will make it easier for you to write articles that others will find engaging too. Blogs with a good amount of graphics seem to attract more visitors than blogs with a small amount of graphics. Besides having a blog which is interesting and make visitors return, you can get visitors using advertising, link building and other techniques used also for "normal" websites.

In this article we have explored some of the ways you can make money from blogs.


Thursday 23 August 2007

Audiobooks can help to improve your life.

Self help audiobooks come in several categories including creativity, health and fitness, interpersonal skills, motivation, personal growth, sex and relationships, stress management, success, time management, and religious titles. There really is a theme of self help audiobooks for everyone's needs.

read more | digg story


Wednesday 22 August 2007

10 Easy Steps Towards Stock Market Success

by: Joe Harris

We all need a set of guidelines to help us along the way. This is what I use in all of my investments to ensure that I maximize every profit and virtually eliminate all of my risks. Now you can too�

1. Set Your Goal

You always want to start off any potential investment by thinking about what you want out of it. Ultimately, you're going to be making money off of it�duh. But how much? How quickly? How will this particular investment play into the bigger picture of all your finances? Getting all of this figured out ahead of time will give you a clearer image of your investment down the road.

2. Time to Strategize

We all know there are literally thousands of investment tactics out there. So pick one. Take your time and study up to find the approach that works best according to your financial goals. You can tweak it accordingly as you go through the rest of these steps, but the better prepared you are the smoother the entire process will go.


3. Asses Possible Risks

It is absolutely essential that you highlight the risks your investment will bring up. The key is to look at them realistically, not optimistically. You have to be able to devise an effective and PRACTICAL management plan. This will not only minimize your losses but in turn guarantee you maximize your profits, even if the investment tanks.

Notice how this step comes before profit assessment? This is to make sure you don't get overwhelmed with excitement before you size up the gamble you're taking.

4. Think about Profit Potential

Basically, you have to get paid, but you need to be able to do it at the right time. Most inexperienced investors just go for the cash, but by the time they actually collect their profits have diminished. Know when and how to get out so that the process is smooth and efficient.

5. But Are There Alternatives?

Do a little more homework. Check to see if there are other investments that have fewer risks, a better profit potential, or if there are is another strategy that will make your life easier (or hopefully a little richer at the end of the day).

6. Scaling the Mountain

This one goes along with devising an initial strategy. Every investment you make will have its challenges to optimize rewards and minimize shortcomings. By anticipating them you can create a strategy that will do just that.

7. Design Your Plan B

Set specific boundaries as to when you should get out of an investment. Whether everything goes wrong and you need to bail out or you've hit it big and need to move on, having explicit limits prevents you from losing returns or just losing more money.

8. Making the Right Choice

Investing takes time, so for one last time look over your new project as a whole. Now you've got all the pieces to see if this investment is really worth your while. And it's ok if it isn't: you'll be better off starting from scratch than losing on a big gamble.

9. Go for the Gold

In choosing to pursue an investment, go after it. Give it everything you've got and you'll come up a winner. Clich�, I know, but even if worse comes to worst you won't be that big of a loser either. Wholeheartedly following through on your game plan will give you the best returns in the long run.

10 Debrief

In the end look back over your plan. If somehow you bombed and lost a lot of money, try to figure out what went wrong. You want to ensure that you don't make the same mistakes next time. Constantly tweak your approaches until you find that perfect strategy. Once you've done that you'll eliminate all that stress that comes with the job.


Manage Your Time, Don�t Let Time Manage You

by :Adam Terebeckij

As small business owners, most people who own or operate home businesses will find that they face many challenges along the road to home business success. One of the biggest challenges we face is the need to manage our time in the most efficient manner possible. While we work at home with no boss checking the clock and making sure of our productivity it can be quite easy to get distracted by other things and not keeping to the task at hand. In fact, there are many things that come along to steal our time as the days go by.

Recognizing those time stealers is the first step in understanding what needs to be done in order to overcome them. Each person will have different distractions that prevent him or her from keeping on target for the workday. While you may find that Solitaire provides the most distraction possible, someone else might find being at home (which has its own laundry list of things that need to be doneincluding the laundry) will provide distraction enough to keep him or her from focusing every effort into his or her business.


You must remember that you are now the boss. You are the only one that determines if you work and how much you work. The downside of that is you only have yourself to blame when those low paychecks dont quite meet your expectations. Here are a few things you can do in order to help you manage your office hours more effectively.

���1) Set

office hours. Make a big sign and show it to your family, tell your friends what your office hours are and be in your office during those hours. Wear your business hat from the time those hours begin until quitting time.

���2) Make a list each day of what must be done. While you want to offer yourself a challenge and keep your day busy, you also want to be realistic in your expectations. Don'

t put too much on your list that you will feel no sense of accomplishment at the end of the day.

���3) Mark the things off your list that have been completed. This helps you celebrate the completion of one task before moving onto the next.

���4) Don'

t procrastinate. We all have certain tasks that we enjoy less than others, dont talk yourself in a game of solitaire in order to avoid doing those very tasks. If you are in a position to do so, consider outsourcing some of the tasks that you hate the most. When you think about it in the terms of time is money this is one case where spending the money for someone else to perform the task would be well worth the time it saves you in the form of lost work on other projects while you were procrastinating.

���5) Remove all temptations and distractions. I know some of you have small children and you can'

t lock yourselves away from them for hours at a time, nor can you really remove them as distractions, but you can take the solitaire game off your computer. You can make sure you arent in the same room as the television or at least arrange the room so that you cant see the television.

���6) Don'

t take personal calls during business hours. Family and friends often have a hard time understanding that you are working from home. It's still a foreign concept to many. They will call in the middle of your workday just to chat. Don't allow them to do that. This will rob you of precious time that could be devoted to finishing a task or worse, have you talked into watching someone elses children all afternoon instead of working. If you don't take the calls during your office hours then you wont find yourself in a position where you must choose between your business and your family or friends.

Once you learn to rule your time rather than allowing yourself to be ruled by time, you will find your workdays are much more productive. Having a productive workday means you dont have to work well into the night, you actually get to achieve your goal of having more time to spend with your family, and you have a strong sense of accomplishment over what youve achieved for the day. Not to mention, your income will grow as your productivity increases. Start practicing the positive things you can do in order to manage your time most effectively and soon they will become good business habits.


Monday 20 August 2007

Is Small Business Ownership Right For You?

Many people are very attracted by the prospect of starting a small business that will help them have a better life. Unfortunately, not all of them have the skills and the mind-set needed to achieve their goals. There are some important things to carefully consider before you embark on starting your own business.

First of all, what will be the goal of your business? A standard definition would say that a company is an organization made up by one or more persons which strives to obtain profit by economic means in general. A business can be considered a small business if it meets certain requirements which refer to: hired personnel, the income, and how certain aspects of the business are represented.

The role played by small businesses world wide is enormous. Generally, the smaller a business is, the smaller its' potential market is. Still, small businesses form the great majority of all businesses, being the "locomotive of competition."


Usually, the competition between small businesses has at its center the services or products they deliver to their customers and the quality of those products and services. Prices are only third in placement on a hierarchy of the importance of the competition factors.

There are also some hurdles that small businesses have to overcome on their way to becoming an economic success. The most important one seems to be the lack of a well-trained, skilled work force. Secondly, accessing the funds necessary to start up and operate a small business can be difficult. Third, many small businesses operate on a poor if not substandard infrastructure.

One of the most important categories for small business development and growth in the past few years has been the high tech industry. These companies usually create and implement technical innovations and contribute to raising the life standard. They also have great potential in creating work places and raising the incomes of from several to many employees.

Also, with the internet revolution, the number of small businesses accessing the World Wide Web has grown very fast over the last decade. Other means of communications are: cell phones, e-mails, computer networks, etc. All have had an impact on the develoment of small businesses.

The internet provides small businesses with an easy way to communicate. This is a mandatory action for a small business nowadays, and various ways of reaching both clients and employees can be used, such as w-mail and FTP.

Just a cursory consideration of these aspects of starting and operating a small business reveal how complex a process it truly is. It takes more than a dream, it takes action, commitment, determination and creativity to make the dream come true. If you are not a person who enjoys tackling challenges, then starting your own company is simply not for you.

But if you possess these characteristics and feel driven to succeed, you can learn how to run a company even with no formal management training. All you need is dedication, determination and research. You need to design a good business and marketing plan and put your ideas into action. Then you will begin building the foundation of your successful small business.

Articles Source - Free Articles


10 Reasons To Start an Online Business

By Kevin Cooper
1: Anyone Can Do It.

It’s true; it has never been so easy to start a business. Think about it, in the past you were confined mostly to brick and mortar businesses. You would need retail premises or warehousing. Now you don’t need any of these. You don’t need experience. Everything you need to know is out there on the World Wide Web. Get yourself a notepad, put the coffee pot on and hit the search engines. Be methodical, visit message boards, user groups and article directories. Subscribe to ezines. (Online magazines). Ask lots of Questions.

2: Low cost.

This has to be one of the cheapest ways to start your own business. You’ve got a PC and an Internet connection, what more do you need? Web hosting? You can even get this for free! You may need to upgrade at a later stage, which will cost you money, but even then it won’t be really expensive. A web site? Maybe, it depends what type of business you start. But again you can do it yourself with Microsoft Frontpage, or similar software. Even free web hosting may come with a Wizard to help you build a site. Content for your Web page? Again it depends what sort of business you want but this could even be found for free. As above, hit the search engines!

3: Work from home.

Didn’t you always dream of working from home? No more daily commute, sitting in traffic wondering where you’re life is going. More time for yourself and your family. You can wear what you like, work when you like. If you want to get up at 5 am, and work while it’s quiet, go ahead. A word of caution! You must be disciplined when working from home. If you got a space to call an office, then use it. Tell you family and friends not to disturb you except in emergencies. (Running out of ice cream is not an emergency).

4: No Staff.

Can you imagine running a store without staff? Or a repair shop, or almost any ordinary business. In most cases it can’t be done. If you need three staff, ones on vacation and another calls in sick, you’ve got a real headache. But working from home you shouldn’t have these problems. If you need help with some tasks, like copy writing, or web page design, You can hire people’s services online at sites like elance.com
5: Part Time.

Not only can you work from home but you can work part time. It is possible to run a very successful online business in just a few hours a week. Maybe in the early stages of creating your business, you’ll burn the midnight oil. But with so many repetitive tasks being done by software packages, e.g.; autoresponders, once you’re set up you may need to do little more than regular maintenance. Or create new products.

6: A portable business.

One of the great things about your online business is that being run from a computer means it can be run from a computer anywhere. If you’ve got a laptop, you can work in the garden, or from bed. As long as you can get an Internet connection, you can go on vacation and still do some work.

7: No stock or Shipping.

If you choose a business selling information products; such as ebooks. They can be downloaded by your customer, which means you don’t have to carry stock, or deal with packing and shipping. If you want to sell a physical product, search the internet for drop shippers. These are companies who carry the stock and do the shipping for you. There are drop shippers carrying an amazing variety of goods.

8: 24/7 Income.

This has to be one of the best things about your online business. You don’t have to pull down the shutters at 6.00pm or any time at all for that matter. If you’ve set things up with lots of automation built in your web site can be pulling visitors night and day. And from around the world. You can earn money while you’re sleeping.

9: More fun than work.

It’s a good idea to base your business around an interest or hobby, something you’re intimately involved with and knowledgeable about. Whether it is Koi carp, computer games or wedding planning, if you are passionate about it, you won’t feel like you’re working. You will want to get up in the morning, and get on with it. No more Monday morning blues.

10: Control your own destiny.

There is nothing quite like taking charge of your own life. You may only start part time, but when you’re successful in your business, that extra income can be a real boost, and not just in spending power but in your self esteem. Maybe you like your job, but a little extra money every month will give you freedom from worrying about bills and the pleasure of spending more on your family. A few treats now and again can work wonders for your morale. If you hate your job, then looking forward to getting home to work on your own business, sure helps you get through the day. And looking forward to the day you quit, spurs you on to be successful.


I hope I’ve given you something positive to think about. If you’re inspired to start an online business, but still worried about the nuts and bolts of it, remember, the World Wide Web, is full of free advice. There are thousands of ebooks available, thousands of articles, thousands of products to help you, much of it low cost or free.


Monday 13 August 2007

How to Find the Billion-dollar Opportunities

Author: Holly Beitel
How many times have you kicked yourself because you had the chance to get involved with a new business opportunity, and you passed it up because you just didn't want to take a chance? Well, you don't have to leave your success to chance.

There are clues that the next billion-dollar companies give you. There are some very specific indicators that a company is destined for greatness. The purpose of this article is to help take a little of the guesswork out of determining the potential of an investment opportunity in the network marketing industry, or any industry for that matter. Your time and your hard earned money are precious commodities. However, life is too short to pass up on the real opportunities that, on the average, come around about once every ten years. These indicators apply to any company in any industry, but are especially true when evaluating a network marketing company.


Be first to market with a new product, new market, or an innovation to an existing product or market.

The luggage industry is the perfect example. Everyone has luggage. It was a large, but stagnate, market for many years. Then, someone put wheels on those heavy suitcases. Do you ever see anyone carrying a suitcase now? An existing market redefined by innovation!

How about redefining a market? Music has always been around. However, every time an innovation is made, fortunes are made. Vinyl records begat eight-track tapes which begat cassette tapes. Then came CD's and now iPods. Get the idea? The drivers of those innovations enjoy huge financial success.

History shows that the company that is first to market with such innovations always maintains the lion's share of the business. Can copycat companies be successful? Absolutely. Look at all of the "me too" juice companies out there. However, if you are looking for the billion-dollar opportunity, go with the first to market!

The company must be in a high-growth market.

If the market a company is in doesn't exceed a billion dollars, it is going to be impossible for one company in that market to do a billion dollars by itself. Look for industries that are being driven by the baby boomers. They are by far the largest consumer group, and they are spending money! They are going to define much about our economy for the next twenty years.

In network marketing, consumption is key.

For a network marketing company to survive the long haul, marketing consumable products is a must. Network marketing is driven by volume, and volume only increases through new customers and/or increased consumption. Eventually new customers become hard to get. However, repeat consumption can drive a business for a long, long time.

If a company wants to expand they have two options. The first is increasing the number of customers. The second is increasing the amount of volume being sold. Therefore, a company that only has one product to offer handicaps themselves because they are primarily relying on increasing their number of customers month after month year after year. This becomes very difficult in a relatively short period of time. It is not a good choice for the person looking for long time residual income.

A company that has developed a loyal consumer base can increase volume by introducing new products to existing satisfied customers. Do not underestimate the importance of this difference.

Cash flow is king no matter what the business or industry.

Many great ideas die a painful death at the hands of debt and depleted capital. Look for companies that are profitable quickly. Financing its own growth gives a company huge advantages over their competitors and allows it to survive the "bumps in the road" without so much as a hiccup.

The experience and expertise of key management is a real clue to long-term viability.

A company can have all the right ingredients, but if the management team doesn't have the correct recipe for success it is all for naught. Look for years of experience in the industry. Look for management personnel with experience in taking other companies to the billion-dollar mark, international expansion experience and large operations and customer service experience are a few important areas.

Finally, take a hard look at field leadership.

Who is out in the trenches training the troops? Have they had success in the past? Do they have a good reputation within the network marketing industry? This is where the rubber meets the road. The foundation of network marketing is "word of mouth advertising." The distributors ultimately determine the success of the company. So, how well they are developed and trained is paramount. Look at this aspect of a company very carefully.

In summary, can you make money with companies that don't meet all of these criteria? Sure you can. However, if you are looking for an opportunity that is going to give you the best shot at achieving long-term residual income and financial freedom, I would locate a company with these characteristics, secure a place in their organization as quickly as possible and be one of the reasons for their success!


Best Home Business - Array the Perfect Home Business for All

Author: Monica Hendrix
This business can be done by anyone in under an hour a day, does not require above average intelligence, needs a small amount of money, gives you free money to use to buy stock and never has a recession. What is it lets find out.

The business is becoming a forex trader from home – STOP! I can’t possibly do that well consider this story first and you will be intrigued.

Richard Dennis a legendary trader in the eighties, selected a group of people with no trading experience and from a variety of backgrounds and taught them to trade a simple method in just 14 days.

The result?


They made him $100 million dollars!

Now could you make money at forex trading?

Well the answer is everything about trading can be learned you just have to have the right mindset to succeed – consider this as well.

- Leverage

Deposit $1,000 to a forex broker and they will grant you the ability to trade $100,000 so you gains are magnified there are no credit checks – you are granted this when you open your account.

Forex trading is not just for the rich and you can open accounts with a few hundred dollars and before you trade you can trade a live demo account to PROVE The potential for yourself before you risk real money.

- Consider these advantages to!

Also consider these advantages:

Forex trading takes about an hour a day, can be done from home with just an internet connection and a computer, you don’t need any stock and there is NEVER a recession – as one currency rises another must fall and vice versa, meaning you can trade at anytime for big profits.

Is it really that easy?

The answer is yes and no.

It is for some and not for others but is really down to each individual trader – You need to have the mindset to succeed a burning desire and discipline to run profits and cut losses – but these are LEARNED skills.

Anyone can become a successful trader but it is up to you – the challenge is there and its one you can win - but like anything in life it’s not just a walk in the park you have to accept responsibility for your destiny.

If making money was easy everyone would be rich and their not.

If you want to be rich you will find a way and a method and this is the perfect method for those people who want and desire to be wealthy.

If you are prepared to put in the effort this business will give you the opportunity to make money quicker than almost any other you may not become as rich as the turtles but their the perfect example of the potential

Now a Final Question

The potential is there and it’s up to you what you make of it – Are you ready for a challenge that could make you a lot of money?

Then consider becoming a forex trader from home and you maybe glad you did.


Monday 30 July 2007

The Secret to Becoming Rich

by: Elise Fisher

Napoleon Hill, the author of Think and Grow Rich, believes that a person does not have to be a genius to become rich. Any person can become wealthy if he thinks positively and has a deep desire to achieve his goal.

Positive Thinking: You must see your financial dreams and know that you will be able to attain them. You must already own them.

If you begin making up every rationalization under the sun why you can't succeed, pinch yourself. You have to discipline your body and mind to think positive thoughts. Teach yourself that those kind of thought patterns are unacceptable. You can obtain greatness, even if you are not the smartest, most talented, or best looking person in the world. Success is your if you'll just allow it to come into your life. Don't underestimate the power of your thoughts.


Burning Desire: Hill tells a true tale of a man named Edwin Barnes who desired to become Thomas Edison's partner. Most of us would have scoffed at him had we lived back then. Edwin Barnes was a nobody. Nevertheless, he had a deep desire, a life dream, and he was determined. He went to Thomas Edison and convinced him to hire him. He did not instantly achieve his dream, but he worked hard and ultimately became Thomas Edison's partner. This was a feat everyone thought was impossible.

Edwin Barnes followed these 7 steps to gain this great success:

1. Choose a definite dream.

2. Put all your energy into that dream.

3. Be willing to do menial work at first.

4. Visualize your dream.

5. Form a strategy.

6. Endure through the hard times.

7. Eliminate any way to retreat.

As you focus on obtaining your goals, answer these questions: What is the exact amount of money I want? What am I willing to sacrifice for it? What exact date do I want this money by? What is my strategy?

Don't forget, to successful people, there is no such thing as "defeat." What looks like defeat is no more than a great opportunity. Start creating opportunities out of failures and being successful today!


The First 30 Minutes of the Day

The first 30 minutes of the workday will set the tone for the entire day. For most people, the first half hour of the day consists of settling into the office routine by grabbing a cup of coffee, checking the internet, and, of course, chatting with others. Now, I will never be one to say we have to avoid coffee and/or socializing, but I will be the first to say it is advantageous to put these activities aside until later.

One of the ways that top-performing salespeople separate themselves from others is by effectively using the first 30 minutes of the day. It is highly beneficial to your productivity to know exactly what you are going to accomplish during this period. Therefore, you must determine the day before what you intend to do when you first arrive in the morning. For anyone in sales, this means one thing: start the day by making a minimum of three sales calls before you do anything else.


To begin using this strategy, your objective today (and everyday in the future) should be to identify three people you want to call first thing tomorrow morning. There is no better way to start the day than by calling customers. If you are the type of person who arrives in the office early, your phone calls will wind up going straight to voicemail. Great! In fact, using voicemail is an effective way to demonstrate to others that you are a hard working individual and you take your relationships seriously. For those of you who have a large number of clients, this is also a perfect way to personally reach out to them, while not having to wind up in a long, drawn-out telephone conversation.

In addition to beginning the workday more productively, you will also find yourself warmed up to make additional phone calls throughout the day. This will help you overcome a very common problem among anyone in sales: the initial reluctance to make the first call of the day. Many studies have shown that people waste on average 15 minutes each day just getting ready to make that first call. It is ironic to think that you will have made three phone calls in the time it takes the average salesperson to even start making theirs.

An additional benefit of this plan will come when you begin applying this same principle to the first 15 minutes after returning from lunch. Use that time to make three prospecting calls. Again, you will find yourself becoming productive faster and you will be less likely to find yourself at the end of the day looking back to realize that you did not make the phone calls you needed to.

By establishing these habits, you will increase the number of phone calls you make every day from utilizing time that, in the past, was unproductive. Make it part of your routine at the end of each day to identify both the three people you intend to contact the next morning and the three you�ll contact after lunch. Do not fall into the trap of thinking you�ll come up with the names the next day because the chances of you actually contacting those people will fall dramatically.


Thursday 26 July 2007

The 7 Secrets of Home Business Success

If you look at the word "success" you will notice that it has 7 letters. Well, there are also 7 secrets to home business success and each one can go along with the letters of the word "success." Hopefully, sharing this with you will give you the knowledge and motivation you need to achieve the success you want.

Ok let's take each letter of the word "success" one at a time to give you 7 secrets of home business success:

"S" stands for Solo focus. This means that whatever you want to do with your life, your home business or anything else, you MUST have a solo, or one focus. You can't allow yourself to be distracted. You must identify your goal and go for it and not allow outside influences distract you. If you can't get past this first thing it is going to be very hard to get anything to work efficiently for you.

"U" stands for Undying belief, leadership and imagination. You must, at all costs, have total belief for what you are doing in your home business. You must believe that what you want to do is not only possible but critical. You must develop imagination when dealing with home business problems because some things are not going to have straightforward answers. You must learn to think outside the box to keep your business moving ahead. Again, you must do this totally and completely.

"C" stands for Crystal Clear path. You must visualize the path in front of you. You must know exactly where you are headed with your home business. You will run into obstacles along the way but you cannot, under any circumstances, allow anything to throw you off your path.

"C" stands for Connection to the heart. This is something nobody can teach you. What this means is this... You must LOVE what you are doing. It must be something that if you don't do it you will not be fulfilled. This must be one of the most important things in your life and home business. Use your brain to think. But use your heart to drive you.

"E" stands for Extraordinary Energy. This doesn't mean that you have to be able to run a marathon. But you have to be enthused to run your home business. You have to want to wake up in the morning and get to work. You can't lie around watching the TV. You can't make excuses that you're too tired. Your energy level MUST be high because building a successful home business is very hard work. Without the proper energy, you don't stand much of a chance to go the distance.

"S" stands for Skill Set. I'm not saying you have to know how program a computer, be a web design expert, a guru marketer, or anything else like that. I'm talking about your people skills, your communication skills. You must be able to communicate with people. You must be able to get people to have confidence in your ability to help make them successful especially if you're promoting a home business opportunity. You must be able to communicate your sincerity and belief in the business.

"S" stands for Stop at nothing. The main point of this is not to allow negativity of others get to you or let failures bring you down. There will always be people who are going to try to convince you that you're wasting your time doing what you're doing. You must be absolutely determined that you will succeed in your home business, and nothing that anybody says should be able to convince you otherwise. Failures are certain but you cannot let them stop you. The moment you quit is the moment you guarantee your home business will never succeed.

There you go. Those are the 7 secrets of home business success. Notice I didn't say anything about needing to be super smart, a great ad writer, an amazing marketer, a good copywriter, or any of the other things you were probably thinking of. Everything in this list is ALL about your attitude and mindset. If you have a totally positive attitude you'll succeed in your home business and anything else you do in life. If you don't, you won't. Don't let anything get in your way. It's that simple!


7 Ways To Earn More Income Online With Forex Trading

by Steve Gwillim

Did you know that... hundreds and thousands or forex traders trade in the forex market online every day... and make an absolute killing at it. How do they do it?

Well I am going to give you 7 easy tips that will help you make more money with forex trading.

Tip #1 Knowledge is Power.

When starting out trading forex on the net, it is an absolute must that you understand and become good at the basics first. Once you have a good concept on the basics then you can move forward.

For example, one of the major forex influencer's are global news events. An ECB statement is released on Euro interest rates and this will cause a flurry of activity. Most newcomers will get scared and wait until everything calms down. If you hesitate you are likely to miss out on some great trades. You must act when the market is in volatility not when it is in a stand still.

Tip #2 Independence

When you are new to Forex you will be trading yourself or have someone else do it for you.

Obviously you will make more trading yourself, but you must know these things.

If you have someone else doing it, don't interfere what he is doing... he has a strategy that may take some time, let it ride.

And if you are doing it yourself... don't get too much information... if you try and get too must information from too many sources this will result in only multiple losses.

Take a position, ride with it and then look back and analyze what has happened. Be independent and stand strong.

#3 Don't Get Over-Confident

Take tiny margins. It is one of the biggest advantages in trading forex. It allows you to trade amounts far larger than the total of what you have deposited.

But don't get over confident with this... some rookies get greedy and this destroys many traders. Only increase depending on your experience and success.

Tip #4 Trade When It's News Time

Most really big trade occur around news time. Trading volume is high and the moves are noteworthy.

This means there is no better time to trade than when the news is released. This is when the big guns adjust their positions and prices change resulting in a serious currency flow.

Tip #5 Exiting Trades

If you place a trade and it's not working out for you, get the hell out of there. Don't multiply your mistake by staying in for hopes sake for a reversal. That is very unlikely to happen. And on the other side if you are winning a trade, don't pull back because of the stress levels. You must learn to tolerate the stress, it is natural to trading, and you must get used to it.

Tip #6 Don't be smart

The most successful traders keep their trading basic. They don't analyze all day or research historical trends and track web logs and their results are excellent. They spend their time in the stress zone not in the library.

Tip #7 Build Your Confidence With Experience

If you lose money early in your trading career it's very difficult to regain it; the trick is not to go off half-loaded; learn the business before you trade.

Knowledge is power when coming to trading.

------------------------------------------------------------

Forex is a game of knowledge... you must know about the business. That is why I recommend you check out the soon to be released groundbreaking forex trading system at ForexAim.com and you will flourish in forex trading.

How are you going to gain unless you put this information to action... you will simply not. Its that simple.


Tuesday 24 July 2007

The Magic Move to Being in Business

by: Heather Dominick

Lots of entrepreneurs that I speak to spend a lot of time "being busy." They're attending meetings, answering emails and a ton of activity that fills up their schedule. They have great ideas in the middle of it all, but are so overwhelmed they fall into "productivity paralysis" and are just plain perplexed about how to really get to that next level. There's a magic move to being productive and profitable in business that no one is talking about.

Before we get to the "Magic Move," we have to first acknowledge that as an Entrepreneur you should always be striving to work on your business rather than just in your business. You open up the energy around this by setting up systems. This approach allows you to be set up for growth and actually implement all those fabulous ideas you have. For example, if you're an acupuncturist instead of only treating patients all day you can explore ways to treat and reach more people at once-leveraging your time and your income. Strong systems in your business operations will create that space. I have entrepreneurs I coach who either set up or strengthen their systems as a must. For the sake of this article, we accept that as a given. Now, step into the magic move-the one that has you in joy with everything you're doing, rather than just trying to catch your breath and stay one step ahead (or filing you your time with "stuff" because you secretly feel lost about what to do next).


Often, I've found that even when you have the tightest of systems, you can find yourself feeling like something is missing. Your energy is a bit blah and you don't feel jazzed to create. Even though the systems are crankin', you feel stuck. Just about every time I hear this from an entrepreneur, I know the magic move is missing; there isn't anywhere in the systems that allows for time to just be. Incorporating this move makes all the difference in the world and it's the one that is most resisted (including myself at times). Interesting, right?

Let's get clear about exactly what I mean by "time to just be." I'm not talking about time to watch TV or be with family and friends-although this is important and should be part of your systems, too. I'm talking about time to really connect to that part of yourself which is a direct connection to divine, inspired action. These are the ideas, solutions, and "how tos" that cannot be conceived of, created, or tapped into when you are busy "doing" and "going 24-7." And it's the powerful, magic move that no one in business is talking about. Frankly, I believe it's because they're scared to.

Traditional business doesn't operate from a place of stillness. The battle cry is, "if you're not in motion, you're losing money!" Meanwhile, money is being left on the table everywhere because folks are rushing by and too busy to see it. Even all the latest buzz about the Law of Attraction is filled with insistence to, "use this tool, this exercise, this strategy." Be sure to understand, these are very helpful, but the point of them is often lost; to bring us to that deep place of knowing that comes from being able to be.

Every time I've coached a client around this magic move more money has appeared. I have one client who just created $4,500 in a half day. The inspiration to pursue this means would never have appeared had she just still been going, going, going. It works.

Call To Action:

Start by scheduling some "be" time. Just take it and see what happens.

Write down anything that comes to you.

Let it go and then return to it a week later. Mark what that experience is like (you might be surprised what happened in the week between!).


Your Greatest Asset

by: Joe Heller

Your greatest asset is your own customer list. These people have already purchased something from you in the past. If you've delivered as satisfactory product, they are very likely to buy from you again.

The easiest sale you'll ever make is to an already established customer of yours. They already trust you. They feel comfortable in dealing with you. You've delivered what you said you would so a certain degree of trust has already been established. Your customers are probably quite confident that you wouldn't sell them something that wasn't in their best interest.


The high road to increased profits always takes the route of established customers. There's always an expense associated with finding a new customer. Regardless of the marketing method used there's always an investment required in establishing a customer whether in terms of real dollars or human capital. Once you have a customer, any subsequent sale is made without the cost of locating that customer. The cost or finding a new customer is proportionally much higher than the cost of retaining an existing customer.

Keys To Success

The secret of capitalizing on your customer base is to continually feed them with new products and services you know they'll want. This is no time to diversify into completely new areas. Everything that you make available to your customer list must be compatible with what made those people customers to begin with.

Whatever subsequent products and services you offer must be related in some way. Think of your customers as belonging to a specific group. They're gardeners or small business owners or health enthusiasts. Whatever you offer must fit that product niche.

Always be on the lookout for new things you think your customers would gladly pay for. And give customers first crack at any of these new products and services. If you can offer a discount, that's even better. By letting them in on new products and services, you're giving them priority customer status, an added value of doing business with your firm.

Be careful not to overdo it. You don't want to annoy anyone, least of all your customers. Allow enough time and space between customer contacts. How much time you allow between mailings or calls depends on the nature of your business.

Examples

When a clothing store receives a shipment of new designs, they should first notify all previous customers who've purchased in the same price range. All the store has to do is contact these customers by phone or by mailing invitations to a special event where this new line is unveiled. Suggest to customers how additional new outfits can be created by mixing and matching and you've provided an extra service that will help retain customers.

This approach would seem natural for a wholesaler who relies on distributors or retailers to act as re-sellers. By showing your new merchandise and suggesting ways to move more of it, you're providing a valuable service while keeping in touch with your customers.

A self-published author of book on camping tips, should come up with natural additions to his product line to sell to buyers of his book. Things like maps of parks, local facilities, lists of "must-see sites" or specialty camping equipment, could all be add-ons made available to the author's buyers.

One final note; in order to start making more sales and build your business empire – you must become an avid student of lead generation and marketing strategy – the high-payoff items necessary for you to magnetically attact new clients to skyrocket your profits.


The Secret to Becoming Rich

by: Elise Fisher

Napoleon Hill, the author of Think and Grow Rich, believes that a person does not have to be a genius to become rich. Any person can become wealthy if he thinks positively and has a deep desire to achieve his goal.

Positive Thinking: You must see your financial dreams and know that you will be able to attain them. You must already own them.

If you begin making up every rationalization under the sun why you can't succeed, pinch yourself. You have to discipline your body and mind to think positive thoughts. Teach yourself that those kind of thought patterns are unacceptable. You can obtain greatness, even if you are not the smartest, most talented, or best looking person in the world. Success is your if you'll just allow it to come into your life. Don't underestimate the power of your thoughts.


Burning Desire: Hill tells a true tale of a man named Edwin Barnes who desired to become Thomas Edison's partner. Most of us would have scoffed at him had we lived back then. Edwin Barnes was a nobody. Nevertheless, he had a deep desire, a life dream, and he was determined. He went to Thomas Edison and convinced him to hire him. He did not instantly achieve his dream, but he worked hard and ultimately became Thomas Edison's partner. This was a feat everyone thought was impossible.

Edwin Barnes followed these 7 steps to gain this great success:

1. Choose a definite dream.

2. Put all your energy into that dream.

3. Be willing to do menial work at first.

4. Visualize your dream.

5. Form a strategy.

6. Endure through the hard times.

7. Eliminate any way to retreat.

As you focus on obtaining your goals, answer these questions: What is the exact amount of money I want? What am I willing to sacrifice for it? What exact date do I want this money by? What is my strategy?

Don't forget, to successful people, there is no such thing as "defeat." What looks like defeat is no more than a great opportunity. Start creating opportunities out of failures and being successful today!


Freelancing as A Career Option

by: Lewis Low

Home bound workers can either consider telecommuting or freelancing. While telecommuting may keep you out of your home for some hours a week, online freelancing is a good way to make money if you are forced to stay at home. For example, homemakers, part-time students, retired folk, or others who wish to supplement their income from jobs or businesses can all consider freelancing.

Freelance Skill Sets

You can start earning as a freelancer as long as you have skills that someone is willing to pay for. For example, writers, web designers, photographers, and programmers can earn a substantial income by creating articles, websites, portfolios and software from home. The Internet is a hot and viable source of income for freelancers from around the world. Your target customers can be webmasters, online business owners, blog owners etc. For example, blogs and wikis are hot sources of income for freelance writers nowadays, and there's no reason why you can't tap into this market if you possess good writing skills.

Freelance Income

On the flip, your income may fluctuate from one month to another. As with all businesses, freelancing does not guarantee a stable paycheck at the end of the month. So keep a small kitty reserve for dry days or have another source of income for which you can work part-time. Be prepared to accept boring, low-level work initially just to keep the cash flow strong. Once you get a good reputation for providing original, high-quality work at reasonable price, then clients will flock to you.

Freelance Advantages

Probably the best thing about freelancing is that you get to work at your pace, in your own hours, from home, and be your own boss. That means, your shop is open 24x7. And as long as you provide good quality work and meet deadlines, your clients will remain happy with you.

In order to be visible, you also need to be seen and heard in the right places, like forums, blogs, online groups, etc. Spend time everyday to visit such sites because they are invaluable repository of freelance gigs and email addresses of prospects. Alternatively you can sign up with freelance sites like Elance.com, GetAFreelancer.com and Scriptlance.com where you can start bidding on projects and snag a few as early as today!


To conclude, a freelance business is one of the best ways to earn money from home and to work for your own self. If you've got a fair amount of time on your hands, maybe you too should consider freelancing as your full-time career alternative or supplementary income source.

(Hint: While you can find plenty of lucrative freelance assignments on Elance, the other sites mentioned above generally tend to feature lesser-paid projects. However, if you're just starting out as a freelancer, the competition on Elance can prove to be really tough. So you might want to first try GAF and Scriptlance to build up your portfolio, and then go for Elance.)


Tuesday 10 July 2007

Criteria For A Good Home Business Product

by: Wonder Nyatanga
Choosing a product to sell in your home business is one of the first steps in starting a home business. You have to choose the right product because it is going to have a large impact on your businesses success.

Finding the right product is going to require a lot of work. You will want a product that meets some certain criteria.

The first criteria is a product that you can be passionate about. It is very important that you feel like this product is worth your time. You have to feel it is a good product that people will want to buy.

The second criteria is that it is something that people need or want. A product is only good if people are going to buy it. Choosing a product that has a good demand is important.

Choosing a product to sell in your home business is one of the first steps in starting a home business. You have to choose the right product because it is going to have a large impact on your businesses success.

Finding the right product is going to require a lot of work. You will want a product that meets some certain criteria.

The first criteria is a product that you can be passionate about. It is very important that you feel like this product is worth your time. You have to feel it is a good product that people will want to buy.

The second criteria is that it is something that people need or want. A product is only good if people are going to buy it. Choosing a product that has a good demand is important.

The third criteria is that it needs to be something that is a good value. People want to get their money's worth. If you think you can not sell the product for a reasonable price and still make a good profit then you should avoid it.

The fourth criteria is that you want to choose something that does not have a lot of competition. You are not likely to find a product with no competition, but you should choose a product that has limited competition or that you can easily find a way to make seem better then the competition.

Lastly, the product should be something that you can easily market and ship. You do not want to choose a product that will be hard to market because then you will only make your work much harder. Additionally, you want something that is easy to ship because that is also something you will have to worry about and that could create a lot of work for you.

If you choose your home business products carefully then you should be able to get your business started quite easily. You will have already set the stage for making the business start up process simplified.


Best Forex Trading Education

by: Ricky Lim
There are many forex trading courses and educational material that a person can find online. However how does someone go about finding the best Forex trading education information? Certainly there are huge amounts of information that will educate you about Forex trading, but not all of it will help you to achieve your goals of making a profit rather than losing.

Below are some guidelines which should help you to find the best forex trading education course

Point 1 - Avoid Day Trading Systems

Many people when starting out in Forex trading will be enticed into thinking that the best way of making money is through day trading. Certainly if you were to ask a person who is selling a Forex trading course for details relating to their real time track record with regard to profits relating to day trading they will not be able to provide one to you.

There are many forex trading courses and educational material that a person can find online. However how does someone go about finding the best Forex trading education information? Certainly there are huge amounts of information that will educate you about Forex trading, but not all of it will help you to achieve your goals of making a profit rather than losing.

Below are some guidelines which should help you to find the best forex trading education course

Point 1 - Avoid Day Trading Systems

Many people when starting out in Forex trading will be enticed into thinking that the best way of making money is through day trading. Certainly if you were to ask a person who is selling a Forex trading course for details relating to their real time track record with regard to profits relating to day trading they will not be able to provide one to you.

So if you are looking to produce an income from your trading then do not waste your time on day trading.

Point 2 - Real Time Profit Records

When buying any sort of forex education course, you need to be provided with these records. If a person selling their system does not have confidence in the abilities of their system and are not investing their own monies then why should you. Unfortunately some of these courses being offered online today are from people who have either never traded in their lives or have failed when they have used the system themselves.

Point 3 - Understand It

Once you find a forex trading system which either has a track record or is willing to show their real profits then there are some other things which you will need to take into consideration.

It is important that you learn everything you can about the system in question so that you understand it completely. Unfortunately if you have no understanding of how the system works then you will not have the confidence to trust in it and follow the system through to a likely conclusion if you start to suffer losses.

By keeping these points in mind, you will find the best Forex trading education that is suited to your kind of personality. There are literally hundreds of places on the web that can offer you an education as well as free advice on Forex trading so do some investigating and you will soon find one that is ideal for you.


Tuesday 3 July 2007

Business Process Outsourcing: The Perfect Solution for Your Business

The business process involves a lot of things. It will involve every aspect of your company in order to let your company operate smoothly and efficiently. It will involve business tasks, such as marketing, payrolls, help desks, management, human resources and more.

In the past, handling all these can be easy. But because of the growing demands in businesses today, you have to consider that it will be difficult for your company to cope up with today’s competitiveness in the business world. Your company should maximize its resources in order to remain competitive with other companies.

The business process involves a lot of things. It will involve every aspect of your company in order to let your company operate smoothly and efficiently. It will involve business tasks, such as marketing, payrolls, help desks, management, human resources and more.

In the past, handling all these can be easy. But because of the growing demands in businesses today, you have to consider that it will be difficult for your company to cope up with today’s competitiveness in the business world. Your company should maximize its resources in order to remain competitive with other companies.

This would be impossible or very expensive if you handle every business process involved. This is why many companies are now considering outsourcing their business process.

Business process outsourcing is one of the most popular and the most cost-efficient business solution that you can ever make. By contracting other companies to do a specific business task, you will be taking off extra work involved in your company and focus more on important aspects in running your business.

For example, making payrolls can be time consuming. It will involve computation of salaries of every employees and it will also involve taxes. You can hire your own employees to do the payroll for you. But, this will only add to the expenses that your company is making. Your target would be to decrease overall expense in your company. So, in order to save money, you have to outsource this particular business process to companies that accepts outsourcing.

Another example would be the help desk. Every company that manufactures products needs one. This particular business process is a way to communicate with your clients and know about their feedback in your products and it is also a way to assist your clients in case they encounter difficulty with your product. Creating a help desk department may prove to be too costly. It will involve everything from hiring additional employees and purchasing all the necessary tools you need to create an efficient and working help desk.

Today, there are available call center companies that will be able to provide a help desk for you. They will be the one who will answer your calls and generate reports regarding each caller and providing the reports for your company.

Companies regularly outsource their business process offshore, particularly to developing countries filled with qualified and talented individuals, such as China, Philippines, Mexico and India. These countries offer good quality services for your business process and they charge a very cheap rate for these services.

By outsourcing your company’s business process or some of your company’s business process, your company will be able to utilize its facilities to its maximum potential.

Through business process outsourcing you will be able to cut some operational costs and at the same time, let your company focus more on important factors in running your own business.

These are the reasons why you should consider outsourcing your business process to offshore companies.

Always keep in mind that you should first check the quality of an offshore outsourcing company first before you sign the contract in order to be sure that you will be getting your money’s worth. Remember this and it will pave the way to make your company the best in the industry.


Market Neutral Strategy: Staking The Odds in Your Favor

Is there a trend in stock and option trading?

Let's start of by defining a trend. A trend is simply the general direction of the market. The market can only move in 3 directions – up, down or sideways. It is as simple as that.

For directional traders, knowing the trend is important because that is how money is made. If there is no trend, then how would the buyer of the uptrend profit when the market moves sideways. They need to buy low and sell high. Likewise, short sellers can only benefit when they sell high and buy back lower. Trend followers will always wait for the market to shift or turn before jumping in. Directional trading, like any trading strategy, requires discipline and patience. Directional traders can only benefit when the market moves in their direction – up or down.

Is there a trend in stock and option trading?

Let's start of by defining a trend. A trend is simply the general direction of the market. The market can only move in 3 directions – up, down or sideways. It is as simple as that.

For directional traders, knowing the trend is important because that is how money is made. If there is no trend, then how would the buyer of the uptrend profit when the market moves sideways. They need to buy low and sell high. Likewise, short sellers can only benefit when they sell high and buy back lower. Trend followers will always wait for the market to shift or turn before jumping in. Directional trading, like any trading strategy, requires discipline and patience. Directional traders can only benefit when the market moves in their direction – up or down.

Directional trading demands strong self-discipline to follow precise entry and exit rules. Successful traders utilize strong risk management systems that use current market price, portfolio allocation system in an account and takes advantage of market volatility. Directional traders use an initial risk strategy that determines their capital exposure at the time of entry. This means that they must know how much to buy or sell based on their account size. On the other hand, adverse price movements may lead to an early exit for their entire trade for a small loss. To be a successful directional trader, the risk reward ratio should be 1:3 for any trade to be worthwhile. That is because despite the technical tools available, directional traders are wrong most of the time. If they are profitable 4 of 10 trades, then they can be considered as excellent traders. Directional traders have the market odds staked against them every time that they enter into a trade. So when they are right, they have to let their profit run, and when they are wrong, they must quickly cut their losses fast.

Before entering into any trade, any trader must already consider the below.

Price: One of the first rules of directional trading is that price is the main concern. If a market is at 50 and goes to 47, 49, and 46 - the market is in a down trend. Sometimes technical indicators can show otherwise. There are many different indicators that can supposedly show where the market should move. While that is always a nice tool, successful traders should only be concerned with what the market is doing, not what the market might do. The price tells you what the market is doing – not the indicators!

Money Management: The most critical factor of any trading system. Successful traders will already have a money management system is place. Money management ensures that the traders will always be in business despite a bad spell. Good traders will lose money. Bad traders lose more often. Whatever you trading level, a good money management system will prevent a wipeout of your portfolio.

Risk Control: How much can you afford to lose in a trade if it goes wrong? That must be determined before any position is opened. Setting your rules upfront will curb emotional and irrational decision making. For most traders, emotional decisions can almost certainly be the worst decision that they make. Knowing what to do before trouble come knocking will help keep you on your toes.

Any trader should already know the below questions before entering into a trade.

How and when to enter the market?

How many contracts or shares to trade at any time?

How much money to risk on each trade?

How to exit the trade if it becomes unprofitable?

How to exit the trade if it becomes profitable?

While trading trends can be extremely profitable, the odds are unfortunately staked unfavorably against the directional traders, even more so for directional option traders due to time decay. A relatively unknown but superior trading strategy does not forecast nor predict market movements exist – a Market Neutral Trading Strategy. Prediction is impossible in the stock market. The Market Neutral Strategy is certainly not a holy grail. It is not some passing fad or hyped-up secret trading strategy. It is the strategy that takes full advantage of the depreciation of options premium as it approaches expiration. Markets may move up, down, or even sideways for this strategy to be profitable. If you must trade everyday, the market neutral trading strategy will not work for you. A sound trading strategy should only limit you to 3 to 6 trades per month which should provide decent returns of up to 10% per month. With all the discipline and rules of a directional trading strategy applied, the market neutral strategy can be used to devastating effect.

What do you need to get started?

An active mind, willingness to learn, strong discipline and passion to succeed.

No knowledge of what is happening in Shanghai or the ability to read financial statements is required. The key is the price on the chart.

Discipline and common sense to do the right thing.

About ten minutes a day to check on all open positions.

A reliable PC/Notebook and internet connection.

Trading is a zero-sum game. For every winner, there is a loser. If you are tired of losing in the market, then it is time to arm yourself with Market Neutral Trading Knowledge.


Saturday 30 June 2007

Some Helpful Tips For Remortgaging Your Home Loan

Preparing to remortgage your home loan

Nearly half of all mortgage applications are for remortgages. If you are considering remortgaging your home loan, here are some things you can do to get ready:

1. Check the current interest rates.

Traditional wisdom says you should remortgage your home if the interest rate drops at least two percentage points lower than your current interest rate.

Preparing to remortgage your home loan

Nearly half of all mortgage applications are for remortgages. If you are considering remortgaging your home loan, here are some things you can do to get ready:

1. Check the current interest rates.

Traditional wisdom says you should remortgage your home if the interest rate drops at least two percentage points lower than your current interest rate.

However, if the current interest rate is only 1% or 1.5% less than your current interest rate, you can still save money over the term of your mortgage. You want your interest rate to go down by at least 5/8%, or you won't save enough money to be worth the cost of remortgaging.

2. Consider how long you plan to stay in your home.

The interest rate is not the only factor you should consider when deciding whether go for a remortgage.

Keep in mind how long you plan to stay in your home. You need to stay put long enough to recover the costs of remortgaging.

If your new interest rate is 1.5% less than your current interest rate, you generally need to stay in your home more than three years to make the remortgage worth the fees.

3. Check your credit rating.

Check your credit rating before you filling out any remortgage applications. If there are any problems with your credit, you can take a little time to fix them before proceeding. This is especially true if there are out-of-date or incorrect entries on your credit report.

It's a bit of a chore to send off the letters and keep up the correspondence, but if someone were to say they'd give you a grand to do it (i.e. the amount you might save with a better deal), you'd do it!

4. Check the value of your home.

You will need to have your home appraised. But for now, just check the selling price of similar homes in your area. Has the value of your home gone up or down since you bought it?

5. Decide if you want to use the equity in your home to get cash out.

If the value of your home has gone up, you can remortgage for a higher amount than what you owe, and get cash out for school, vacation, home improvements, or to start a new business.

For myself, I'd only use such money to set up something that would make money, or to fund a child's education; it's much better for your peace of mind to have low monthly outgoings than a fancy holiday or car.

6. Make sure you have cash to cover the refinancing costs.

You will have the same fees and expenses you did when you first purchased your home, including a home appraisal, closing costs, and other fees and points. Further, while you may be able to remortgage with no points or closing costs, your interest rate could be higher. And there is no reason to remortgage if you are going to end up with a higher interest rate!

7. Talk to lenders.

You should talk to several lenders to see what the current interest rates are and how much money you will need. Then figure out what your new payment would be if you remortgaged and how long it would take to recover the costs.

8. Adjust your mortgage term.

When you remortgage, you can take the opportunity to change your mortgage term. Maybe you originally took out a 15-year mortgage, but want to remortgage to a longer loan term so you can have more cash each month. Or (much better) maybe you want to reduce your mortgage term from 30 years to 15 or even 10, and get your mortgage paid off more quickly. Wouldn't that be nice?


Wednesday 27 June 2007

How To Follow Your Creative Flow And Keep Your Business Profitable

Creativity and inspiration are essential to any business venture. Without these, your business will become stale and may even begin to lose profitability. Owning a business means that you will constantly be in a state of change and improvement, and so it is crucial to stay connected with your own creative flow.

Working from home offers the incredible freedom of being able to create your own schedule. The blessing of this freedom is that it can enhance your creativity and ability to follow inspiration. On the other end of things, this freedom can tempt you into time wasting activities, or cause you to flow too much and forget about productivity and the “bottom line”.

Creativity and inspiration are essential to any business venture. Without these, your business will become stale and may even begin to lose profitability. Owning a business means that you will constantly be in a state of change and improvement, and so it is crucial to stay connected with your own creative flow.

Working from home offers the incredible freedom of being able to create your own schedule. The blessing of this freedom is that it can enhance your creativity and ability to follow inspiration. On the other end of things, this freedom can tempt you into time wasting activities, or cause you to flow too much and forget about productivity and the “bottom line”.

These four tips will help you to maximize your creative and intuitive flow, without sacrificing the productivity of your business.

1. Create a plan for the income producing activities that you will do each day, or each week for your business. Once you know that you need to accomplish X, Y and Z in a day, you can set this as a priority and then “flow” around these activities.

2. If possible, accomplish your income producing activities first, then reward yourself with something fun to do. You’ll be surprised at how many women get fantastic business ideas while gardening, playing with the kids or lying in the bath!

3. Schedule some ‘down time” each day for business reading and education. The constant influx of new ideas will foster your own creativity.

4. Create balance in your life by scheduling time daily to care for your body, get outside in the fresh air, and do fun, non-business activities. This balance is essential to avoiding burnout and keeping your creativity flowing.

With some fun, balance, and just the right amount of structure in your business day, you can navigate your business through today’s ever changing business climate, and continue to grow both professionally and personally in the process!


Double your Income in 2 years

If you are a business owner or sales person, this article will appeal to you. You both earn your income from selling, so I guess you want to earn a few bucks more! What is it that sees two equally qualified people going into similar sales calls, with one of them consistently outselling the other?

I did this when I was in sales, but at the time, I did not know what precisely I was doing right. This sent me on a search of a system; so that I could help other people model this success. What you will read here is a summary of a fool proof system, created from the very best life coaches, sales trainers and business gurus on this planet, both dead and alive!

If you are a business owner or sales person, this article will appeal to you. You both earn your income from selling, so I guess you want to earn a few bucks more! What is it that sees two equally qualified people going into similar sales calls, with one of them consistently outselling the other?

I did this when I was in sales, but at the time, I did not know what precisely I was doing right. This sent me on a search of a system; so that I could help other people model this success. What you will read here is a summary of a fool proof system, created from the very best life coaches, sales trainers and business gurus on this planet, both dead and alive!

The Power of Certainty

"You become what you think about", Buddha, circa 500 BC. In fact all the great Gurus, from Buddha, who had it right all those years ago, to the inventors and practitioners of NLP (Neural Linguistic Programming) all share the same toolbox.

Modern Life and Business coaching has moved from the "positive thinking" era, to one of "positive doing". What this means is that you set your goal, visualise it, and take powerful action, towards obtaining it.

As you move along your course of pre-determined action, you must constantly take note of the events around you, and adjust your approach accordingly, with your goal still in sight.

So how does one visualise what a P60, double its current net amount would look like. OK, so you guessed it, it's twice as big a number. No, that's not what I mean, what will that get you, is the real question.

OK, take a moment and write down, what you could do, own or give with that extra money. Now close your eyes and really visualise what that would look like. What can you hear, smell. What does it feel like to be living that life? What is your breathing like, do you feel excited, happy, proud or grateful that you have that extra money.

But can you do it? If you can answer yes, with absolute certainty, then it will happen.

Approaching a sales call with certainty

Once you understand that you can achieve the very best outcome from a sales call how do you go about structuring it?

First you must understand how you will cope with not getting your desired outcome. If for example, you wanted to get the go ahead for a proof of concept trial. You must understand what NOT getting the proof of concept trial will mean to you. You will get a red light for one of the following 3 reasons.

1. The prospect does not want to proceed.

2. The prospect wants the products, but has a legitimate reason for postponing the purchase.

3. You really messed up the call!

Whichever of these 3 rationales you get for not achieving your desired outcome, you must understand exactly what they would mean to you, and how you can take advantage of the situation.

Once you know how to handle NOT achieving your goal, you will no longer have a fear of failure. This almost certainly will remove the 3rd situation, due to your confidence, and make the first 2 outcomes easy to deal with.

What are the 3 stages of a successful sales call?

With a desire to succeed, a certainty of success, and no fear of failure, once you have the simple tools for making all your customer calls first rate, your earnings will start to skyrocket.

The 3 parts of the ultimate sales call are as follows;

1. Thank your prospect for their time, and really mean it with a genuine smile on your face. Next ask them precisely what THEIR desired outcome from this meeting is. And then listen intently to their answer.

2. Find out exactly how long they would really like the meeting to run for, and spend the remaining time, minus 15 minutes, asking questions about their business, needs and desires. Make a note of how these may or may not be relevant to what your offering is.

3. With 15 minutes to go, suggest to your prospect that you summarise the meeting, as you see it, and ask them to correct or clarify any points you may make. You will then finish with an action plan that INVOLVES both you and the prospect. You will then confirm this action plan within a day in written form.

Now how many of you, go into a sales call, and when the prospect asks you why YOU wanted to see them you go into sales mode.

Well from now on, help your prospect go into BUYING mode, and close more sales, raise more finance and double your income in two years.


How to use power questions that create an irresistible urge to buy with your prospects

Did you ever end up buying something that you did not know you wanted, and yet it felt the most natural thing in the world? Can you remember what the sales person said to you? Did it feel like they really understood you? Would you like to be able to get that same reaction from your customers? Read this article to learn how to woo your future customers the same way.

My regular readers, by now will have realised that the art of all successful selling, is to ask the questions. All good sales questions have the following characteristics

Did you ever end up buying something that you did not know you wanted, and yet it felt the most natural thing in the world? Can you remember what the sales person said to you? Did it feel like they really understood you? Would you like to be able to get that same reaction from your customers? Read this article to learn how to woo your future customers the same way.

My regular readers, by now will have realised that the art of all successful selling, is to ask the questions. All good sales questions have the following characteristics;

Ask;

The Right Person

AT the Right Time

The Right Questions

Listen, then have;

The Right Answers

IN the Right Way

With The Right Evidence

At all times have a great Attitude

Whether you like it or not, you are always selling, selling benefits for someone, including yourself. When you go to the bank for a loan, you are selling yourself and your business idea. When you ask someone on a date, you are selling them on spending time with you. When you play a sport with someone, you are selling them on the fact you are an enjoyable person to spend time with.

I am however going to assume for this article that you have an offering that you wish people to buy, and I will cover 4 times that you have an opportunity to sell your concept, by asking the right questions.

Questions to ask at a seminar or networking event

The one-many networking concept, means that you get a chance to speak, while many people listen to you. You are speaking to many people, while they get an understanding of what you can do for them. Everyone always wants to know what you can do for them.

You stand up and before you deliver your irresistible sales presentation, that will have buyers flocking to your door, you must start off by asking them a few questions.

I am going to use as an example, one of my clients, who help their customers dramatically decrease their expenses, by having the experts analyse their spend patterns, and negotiate fantastic deals on their behalf.

In order to maximise your audience's understanding of your proposition, you must involve them in the learning process. The questions they would ask at an event may be as follows;

Would everybody please stand up for a moment?

Would everybody, who is 100% certain that they are fully in control of their costs and expenses, and are not paying a cent over the odds, please sit down.

OK, would everyone, who is happy to continue paying over the odds, please sit down.

OK, you can all sit down again, but I would really like to know why you have not done something about this before. In fact why don't I see which of the three most common reasons, for not doing this, matches your circumstances.

You never thought about it before

You don't have the time to do it, because you are swamped

You need to bring in someone who knows what they are doing and has done it before.

Now can you imagine, in a room of 20 Financial Directors, how many of them, would not want to know more about these guys, and if they could get substantial savings, as a result of their services.

Questions to ask on the phone

Most people on the phone get hung up on their result. In fact some gurus even teach you how to feel good when you get rejected. The main reason that you get rejected, is not because the customer does not want what you have, it is because they don't want to be sold to yet again!

So have a conversation with them. Your end goal should be to find out if there is a match between you and the stranger on the other end of the phone, and to find out what they want to do about it. To get to this ask the following types of questions;

Are you able to speak for a minute?

Would you please be able to help me out with something?

I was trying to understand if you were 100% certain that you were getting the very best value for money from all your suppliers.

Would be interested in knowing how much we saved for XYZ Company?

Now I am not sure if we could do the same for you unless we took some time to explore this together, how would you suggest we proceed from here?

Questions to ask in a prospect meeting

Very similar to those above, your questions should be aimed at getting the prospect to tell you in their words, what their problems are, and how they believe you can help them, with your offering.

At minimum, you should ask the following questions;

Thanks for taking the time to see me, how long do we have?

Great, now that I am here, what precisely was it that made you want to see me?

Could explain to me in detail; how that is impacting what you do in your business?

If that were solved, what would you be able to do then?

How would you put a value on getting that?

When would you like to start getting this value?

What has stopped you up to now, from getting this value?

Conclusion

Just try these questions out, modified of course to your own business. They may seem a little strange at first, but then again, so did walking when you were 12 months old! Take a note of the results, I would love to know how much more business you win.

If you need any help in crafting these questions for your business, why not avail of our free sales and marketing assessment. This way we will know together, whether or not I can help your business reach the levels that you really desire.