Monday, 4 May 2009

The Recession Is All In Your Mind (By Brian Wong / Source: The Science of Getting Rich)


Is the recession all in the mind?
Brian Wong, prodigy of Bob Proctor, thinks so. Brian and Bob teach that media sensationalism contributes to the cycle of doom the world is manifesting as the recession.

They also reveal how you can break free from this cycle of doom with lessons we need to learn from people like Sir John Templeton, Sam Walton and Benjamin Graham who, despite the odds, prospered during the Great Depression.
You see, when faced with the Great Depression of the 1930’s, these people knew one thing.
They knew that the mindset they had over the next few years would determine the rest of their financial lives.

It was make or break.

And guess what? Right now, in today’s economy, you’re facing the same situation. Right now, the mindset you have over the next 2 years is going to make or break your financial future.
Find out the crucial mindset and 2 specific steps that you need to learn from people like Sir John Templeton to prosper during any economic situation.

Recession-Proof Your Mindset - Key Insights From Those Who Always Prosper During Times Of Crisis

Friday, 10 April 2009

A Little Something A Day



Hiya, Happy Easter! I hope you are enjoying every bit of the time. I am doing my best to enjoy and make the most of the long break here in the UK. Recently I have met a number of people who complain of being non achievers or having too many things to do and not having time.

This happens, when we crowd ourselves with too much and don't get task out of the way as they come. Study yourself, learn and master how best you work. Everyone has a systematic of how best to complete task. Work to improve your system, the most important thing is do something every day towards your goal and dream.

Brian Tracy is the goal expert and his video gives us a quick tip on how to get things done, one day at a time. You can also find more tips in his book Eat That Frog


Enjoy your holiday !

Placida











Tuesday, 24 March 2009

Tips On Finding Quality Clients - The Key To Business Success


The biggest concern for e-businesses today is finding quality clients for their products and services. What or who are these "quality" clients? How do you go about finding them? Why are they important to your e-enterprise? How do you attract them to your products or services? These are some of the questions that pop up in your mind, right? Well, let us find the answers to these questions and understand this novel concept.

Every business needs to multiply its customers and broaden its market coverage then gradually narrows down the niche to get the real “niche”. The brand building can be a slow and painful process, which requires not only your 100 percent attention and effort, but also creativity and time. Quality is usually a term associated with excellence, high value, superiority above similar products, and the like. When this term is applied to clients, it means loyalty, dependability and recurring business.

Loyalty – a quality client would stay put and remain loyal to your brand, even when the market oscillates or introduces other competitive products. They do not navigate away from you because they are satisfied and want more.

Dependability – a quality client would promote by word of mouth your product as one of the best. You can depend upon them to create a huge 'personal circle' marketing which would boost your sales through ripple effect and this is what you want. To get this you need to put a process on the ground to finding these quality clients.

Recurring business – these clients are high end users of your products. They keep coming back again and again and again; they also rope in family, friends, colleagues and whoever they can into the same enthusiastic circle.

You are probably wondering where you could find these types of clients. You need to do a few things and like I mentioned earlier it’s on a continuous basis, it then becomes a way of life.

You need to go out and find them! How? Where? You may ask – They are out there.


a. Plan – we all know if we don’t plan we have already planned to fail.
b. Network – get yourself known, become comfortable in self advertisement and if not hire someone to announce you.
c. Get client’s testimonial- this assures potential clients.
d. Promotions – offer free stuff, give them more than they expect.
e. Advertise – In Strategic places
f. Do researches - Find out what others are doing and follow carefully? Learn from others.
g. Find a mentor – An expert in your field that you can build rapport with and comfortable to speak to about your huddles.

They will also find you ,provided you are able to advertise yourself as an expert in ONE particular field and maintain an unchallenged leadership in that particular field.


A few things you need to know :


The more you follow your strategized plan, people begin to know your name and what your business is all about.
Remember your plan is a continuous process until it becomes a part of you. In today’s world there is a lot of competition you will find loads of people who know more than you do (in your field) and that might make you feel: you are in a cage. I am right?


My regular phrase is- Take one step at a time and like a baby you will find your bones get stronger.
Get a business buddy to boost your confidence and kick you in the back when you are giving up – not your mentor a colleague.


Think about this for a moment – “If you don’t try you die” before you even start out. I don’t think that’s what you want.

Finding quality clients as you can see is possible with the steps above and is the key to your success without them you cannot capture and rule the market in your particular niche; with them you your business excel.

The ABC of Business Financing


Any business needs three basic things to get it off the ground: finance, ambition and a good plan of action. Ambition is what keeps you at it when you encounter obstacles, and a good plan would help you apply for financial aid. Business financing is critical to the success of a fledgling business, yet most people pay only superficial attention to it.

Three Things You Should Keep In Mind About Finance

How much? When you are launching your business, the projected amount usually includes the initial operational costs until the break-even time. What most people tend to neglect is that until that time, you need to support yourself as well. The gap unless carefully addressed, would eat into your capital (meant for your business) and you end up with shortage of funds. This is further aggravated by the fact that your business has not yet reached its break-even point, which would further condemn it to failure. This is why when you calculate the projected amount you need to add to it your sustenance costs well past the breakeven point. You should not depend upon the earnings from your business until it provides a reasonable profit.

How? The first thing that comes to your mind when you think of ways to raise finance is banks. However, that should be your last resort. Many business fail because the profits are buried in the repayments of loans availed for capital funds. Try to launch your business in baby steps, using whatever money you have saved as the initial investment. Expand gradually with the profits gained. In this way, you learn strict financial discipline and avoid the pressure of loans at the same time.

When? "This is easy", you would say. "Of course, in the planning stage". You will be surprised to learn that this is one of the most popular myths today. You should try your best to launch your business based on your own funds. Apply for loans only after you are satisfied that the business is on track and gives you reasonable returns. In this way, you would need less effort to sell yourself to your bankers, and have better chances of steering your business towards success.

Business financing is all about these three factors. You pay attention to these, and everything else will fall into place.

Thursday, 5 March 2009

Mergers & Acquisitions in the turmoil: trends and perspectives through these days of crisis


How Do mergers and acquisitions work today?

To answer to this question first it is important to understand what they exactly are and what their goal is.

Mergers and acquisitions have in general the objective of maximizing the wealth of the shareholders: it means that an acquisition should create an added value that exceeds the
cost of acquisition.

So what possiblilities can you create with M & A?

Synergies for example that increase the competitiveness far beyond what the two companies are expected to accomplish independently with the value of new company created exceeding the sum of the two previous companies.
It could mean operating and financial economies; and also less or not tax (if for instance the company acquired has accumulated losses).

And looking at the terminology we can identify as Corporate restructuring, all activities involving expansion or contraction of a firm’s operations or changes in its asset or financial structure;
and a Merger as a transaction in which at least one firm ceases to exist and the assets of that firm are transferred to a surviving firm so that only one separate legal entity remains; an Acquisition is a transaction in which both firms in a transaction survive but the acquirer increases its percentage ownership in the target; for Consolidation we mean the combination of two or more firms to form a completely new corporation; and last but not least we have the Merger of equals.

We can distinguish also between a Strategic merger that is a transaction undertaken to achieve economies of scale and a financial merger that has the goal of restructuring the acquired company to improve its cash flow and disclose its hidden value.

A hostile merger is a merger not supported by the acquired (we can call also it target company) firm’s management, forcing the acquiring company to gain control of the firm by buying shares in the marketplace.

But does it exist a secret for successful mergers, mergers that create value?
From the observation experts say that often companies that acquire with frequency and make it a major core competency tend to do well and perform better than their peers, but this is not a rule. We can add that buying without studying the possible creation of value and the future performances can lead to mergers and acquisitions that are destroying value.

We can conclude that we are facing a challenging and complex issue. Judging if an M&A will be successful or not is very difficult and needs a serious and wide analysis.

Today it is probably not the time for big mergers and it is instead probably the time for mid corporate mergers; sometimes the economic crisis can create new opportunities.
Author¬ Andrea Campione

Friday, 20 February 2009

Small Business Advertising – Optimizing ROI


When you say 'small business advertising', all you hear is 'small'. In your mind, a picture is inadvertently created: low finances, low profits, and low business levels. It need not be this way, however. Agreed that when you speak about small business, the budget for advertising would be minimal, but that does not mean in any way that the profits too would be small.

Quality Vs Quantity Always Counts

When you have a small budget you are often tempted (and advised) to use free advertising boards, forums and other low or no cost methods. My advice here is that you avoid these methods like the plague. Rather, use this money to hire someone to write a few dynamite articles about your business. The articles should be no less than 300 words and no longer than 500. They should be written in a friendly, yet expert tone geared to hold the reader's attention from beginning to the end.

Now, take these articles and submit them on various ezines and free article directories with a three-four line resource box where you give reference to your business. This is an inexpensive method, which could explode the traffic to your business almost overnight.

Viral marketing is another exceptional method of marketing, which costs virtually next-to-nothing. Here all you have to do is create an email, e-book, or something similar, which is qualitative, and of interest to the market segment your business targets. Now send this material to your existing email list and watch your business grow exponentially. What happens is that when a person receives your email and finds it good and useful he or she would like to send it to their friends, relatives, and colleagues so they could also benefit from it. As the email is passed on, the message about your business also goes along. The result would be a boom in business.

As you can see, small business advertising can be done well even on low budgets. So, never ever settle for any less.

Sunday, 8 February 2009

Coaching For Small Business – Getting More From Your Life

Coaching for small business is relatively new concept. This is a service born out of a need for a periodic review without any strings or pressure for immediate action. This exercise works like radar – it tells you where you are at present and what your projected trajectory is while helping you introspect whether or not this was what you wanted.

The Tools For Success

Know, this type of coaching would not give you tools for success. It would rather help you find them, build them, identify them. In other words, the simplest way to explain it is ,think of it like sessions with a counselor who is goal driven. On the surface, your counselor seems to simply sit there and listen to your wandering thoughts; while in realty he or she is helping clearing the cobwebs from your mind and heart to enable you to get more out of your life.

Small business coaching is very similar. This is an exercise that helps you redefine your business and professional goals. What you want to achieve? How you want to achieve it ? When you want to achieve? Are you on the right path? Is your vision an achievable goal? These are the questions, which you would be able to answer with the help of coaching. It is obvious that when you would do so, you would have a high level of clarity about your business purpose and the method to achieve it.

Once you experience the benefits of this service, you would be amazed how people have managed until today without it. This is as amazing input which impacts your stress levels, success in business and relationship with inside and outside your business. It creates a new you, a more focused you, a more effective you, a self-sufficient and self-confident you.

Enough of describing: Coaching for small business. The best way to understand what it can do for you is by subscribing to at least one short course or seminar. Find out first hand whether it deserves the reputation it enjoys today. Is it really so good?

Placida
Personal/business coach