News reports are that Dell is engineering an Apple iPod Rival, which will do pretty much everything that iPod does, but at a fraction of the price. Wall Street Journal has got hints that price may be in the range of just $100 USD, which surely looks very interesting. Guess they will launch it just before Thanksgiving Holidays :-)
This video has updates:
So those of us who want functionality, can use the Dell option (even LG/Samsung may come up with something soon). And those who want to use Apple (and feel stylish about it), can of course stay on with the iPod – surely there will be innovations in it. Steve Jobs is never satisfied with status quo- which is good.
Category Archives: Sales & Marketing
Motivation for Starting Your Home Based Business
Did you know that increasing number of professionals working from home — even if they are employed with large companies? The advances in Internet and communications have made this possible.
And with such experience (or taste), some people are finally able to make a decision to start working on their own from their home office.
Most home based businesses can outsource 100% of non-key business functions. It’s a definite trend if you see the increase in project volume of sites like Elance.
We are seeing every possible work – from easy digital products to high-end investment banking work — being done from a home based business. Starting your home business is easier today than ever before, but most people don’t realize it, or don’t want to act on it!
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Here’s a thoughtful article written by Lazz Laszlo.
Has the idea of starting a home based business of your own been rolling around in your head for days, weeks, months, or sadly… even years?
You almost started a couple of times, but for some reason something came up that resulted in you deciding to delay the very first step.
The first step is truly the hardest, but there’s no denying that the first step is STARTING.
A man by the name of James Cash Penney who died at the age of 96 in the year of 1971 said something that perhaps will help you to understand that you are not the only one to have been timid about beginning a new business, in particular, your new home based business.
James Cash Penney said, “It is always the start that requires the greatest effort.”
He knew, and I’m sure you know, he’s the man behind the retailer J.C. Penney. You have to just love his middle name as it relates to his last name and capsulizes his life so to speak. He’s got a great story to tell if you take the time to find it and read it. Just to imagine that he lived through two world wars is amazing in itself.
There are lots of excuses used by people as to why they haven’t started their new home based business. Some of them include, but not limited to; just don’t have the time; just not ready yet; not sure which type of home based business to start; no money; looking for a partner; haven’t found the right product; or have to learn more.
If you’re in this zone of not being able to start, investigating the lives of others may just be the catalyst to kick you in the behind, knock you off the fence, and get you started. Benjamin Franklin said, “An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.”
The money you spend on a new pair of shoes is gone forever once it is spent and after weeks, months, and even perhaps years, those shoes will be discarded. The knowledge you gain from the article you read, the book you buy, the course you take, or the mentor you befriend will be with you for a lifetime.
You are not the first to have the desire to start a business. You certainly won’t be the last, but if you don’t start, you’ll be among the thousands who wished they had. It’s your choice to either get started or just forget it.
Some of my favorite people to read about have been, but certainly not limited to just these people;
Jeno Paulucci, the creator of Chung King Foods brought Chinese food to the kitchen tables of America. One of my favorite parts of his story was when he made a split-second decision and ate a grasshopper rather than… well, you’ll have to read his story.
Walt Disney began his dream, essentially in a garage. There are a lot of companies that begin in a garage, apparently because the kitchen table wasn’t available. Bill Hewlett and David Packard began the company that bares their name in a garage and as a footnote, they wound up burning down the garage. Oops! Apple Computer is another garage beginning business.
William Wrigley Jr., essentially stumbled on his fortune with chewing gum when this item he used as an incentive became more popular than the item he was selling.
Reading one or two of what I like to call, “How’d they do it” stories can shed a lot of light on what it really takes to get a business off the ground. It would be smart to make this an ongoing practice of reading about how others built their businesses, but don’t use the excuse of having to read just one more, and another, and another, and another… delaying your own start indefinitely.
The message here is that you have to focus and disregard what the naysayers think and say, this includes that little naysayer voice in your own head. Do you really want to do what other people want you to do, or do you want to put your efforts, energy, and brain power into doing what you really would like to do?
If you’re embarrassed as to what people will think of you while you are climbing and stumbling on the ladder of success, you might as well quit now. Success is a bumpy road with lots of hazards and stress, which is another couple of reasons why people seek the safety of a job rather than beginning a home based business in their off hours.
Dean Martin, the entertainer said, “Successful people make mistakes.” Some people make more mistakes than others, but I have never met anyone who has only made one mistake in their life. I was taught that there is a lesson in every mistake, but more to the point, you can learn from the mistakes made by others. Read a biography or two of people behind some of the greatest achievements in history and you’ll see that it wasn’t always smooth sailing.
If you are not just a little bit daring and willing to spit in the face of pessimism, than you’re not living.
Malcolm Forbes said, “Venture nothing, and life is less than it should be.”
It’s time to start your journey into business. You don’t have to go at break-neck speed, but you do have to begin. It’s been said that the best part of the trip is not the destination, but the journey itself. Begin your journey today.
Yes, it sometimes hurts to be entrepreneurial and a visionary. It is full of embarrassment and behind-your-back ridicule, neither of which is lethal. Try something and if it doesn’t work, try something else. The adversities in your life will fertilize the genius within you. I’ll leave you with this Welsh proverb; adversity and loss make a man wise.
About the Author: Lazz Laszlo is a former Investment Executive and Radio & Television Financial Reporter with many entrepreneurial endeavors to his credit. He spends his time as an emcee, public speaker, enjoying life and writing about business, travel, retirement, strategy, and pleasure. To learn more, please visit Lazz’s website; http://www.925-wage-slave-alternatives.com
Will Information Technology Really Turn Organizations Upside Down This Time?
The battle tank example used by Professor Heskett is a high risk, high gain scenario for an information technology (IT) application. The latest advances in IT have the highest marginal utility for a tank commander because it is a question of life and death. However, the majority of us prefer to deploy IT applications for medium risk, medium gain scenarios like credit card processing, market forecasting etc., and prefer the manual route where it really matters.
The battle tank example presents two distinct scenarios. On one hand, a badly implemented IT application could lead a tank commander to make a wrong decision. On the other hand, a well implemented and intuitive IT application could actually lead the same tank commander to save his life and that of his comrades. He could fight more and increase his country’s chances of winning the battle.
In business terminology, the latter scenario is equivalent to large gains in employee productivity and increased employee contribution towards winning market share. All CEOs want this to happen, but only a few succeed. Why?
It is because organizations differ in their risk-taking profiles. We can divide organizations in two broad categories. On one end, we have organizations like the pension funds that are risk-averse because their investors want it that way. Their employees tend to have the same philosophy. And because they are giant investors themselves, they pass their risk-averse sentiment along with their investments. The quarterly reporting on Wall Street represents this sentiment. Strategic investments like high-end IT applications tend to get flagged as low priority in the annual budgeting exercise, even though some of them could turn out to be market winning applications.
On the other end, we have organizations that want to experiment, and their investors want them to do exactly that. Failure is usually a part of the annual expenses. The firms in biotech and wireless are examples of this category. They are smaller in size than the typical Fortune 500 and the employees know their regular customers. They tend to know how an event could affect their revenues and profits. These firms not only sell their experimentation, but also pass their innovative methods on to their customers.
Most of today’s Fortune 500 organizations lie in between these two ends. And therefore, they vary in their zeal to try out an innovative approach, which could be an IT application.
It is true that exposing decision making information to frontline employees is a business risk. But a well-implemented IT application can mitigate that risk and still bring the benefits of speed into business. For example, it could help a customer service rep to identify potential sales, and pitch right away from a pool of ready-made product demos while the competition is still planning an internal meeting. It is the same as the ability of a Japanese autoworker to stop the billion dollar production line and correct a defect right away, and avoid expensive and embarrassing recalls later.
So, will information technology really turn organizations upside down this time? Yes it will, but only for a few organizations. These would be organizations willing to experiment with the capabilities of their frontline employees using innovative approaches. These would be organizations willing to place the knowledge acquired by the seniors in front of the juniors. And possibly, these would be organizations poised to become the new market leaders.
Shankar AVSB
Associate
Infosys Technologies Limited
01 October 2021
MyOrbit Lab Report: Increase Website Traffic with Web Traffic Machines
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More Test Results: These tools are working. On our test site, we have got 30% increase in real visitor traffic in 2 days – that’s a significant increase worth reporting. But we spent a whole day in learning the system. So it is important to follow the tutorials to the exact word.
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Our Original Post from March 2nd:
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Now, which online business does not want to increase their online traffic? We can’t think of any! Whether you are selling insurance, or real estate, or credit cards, or printer-ink, or any other service, you want “interested” people to come to your site. We call that targeted website traffic.
A couple of days back, a new product suite has been launched by Bishop Anders from Texas, which looks like the most comprehensive website traffic generation system there is. In addition to 26 simple and complex tools, the package includes informative videos and guides to help you understand the full framework.
The tools are showing promising results in our experiments (remember we have lab to test these new products), and hence we will recommend this product. If you have an online business that needs more visitors, then should be good for you.
It operates on a monthly subscription fee $97 (easily worth the amount) for the value, and one can also try it out for 10 days with just $37. Learn more at their website: Web Traffic Machines
It is very important to understand that not all the tools in the package will be useful/relevant for each website/online business, and that you will need to see these as long-term helpers, rather than short-term tactics which could get your website under scrutiny, which is not good.
The membership slots are limited, so if you like it, join risk-free using the trial offer rather than losing the slot.
Expert Advice on How to Convert Leads into Customers
So you’ve got hundreds or thousands of people looking at what you have to offer. What now? While generating sales leads is definitely the first step, the leads you get are worthless until you learn to convert them to customers. It’s time to complete the cycle with five proven methods to increase the number of leads that turn into paying customers.
1. Build Personal Relationships
In today’s fast paced, high tech world, it’s easy to think that sales and marketing have changed from being people to becoming big faceless corporations. Well the simple fact is that people still buy from people.
Think about it. Have you ever walked out of a store because the sales staff was obviously more interested in chatting with their friends then seeing what they could do to help? Have you ever dealt with a rude customer service representative who told you that everything was your fault and they couldn’t do anything about it? Have you ever decided not to deal with a company because the people are not very nice? We all do it.
Companies have come up with all kinds of ways to get people to check out their product or service, but if the people you meet when you walk in are unfriendly or unhelpful the sale never gets made. The people who deal directly with customers need to be friendly, helpful, and take an interest in the real lives of every potential customer who comes in. Work on making the interaction between sales people and new customers personal and friendly. More than anything else, people buy from people they like.
2. Better Company Image
Never underestimate the power of a trusted brand. When all else fails we tend to go with the names we know and trust. If your company has a trusted image, then the products or services you offer inherit that same trust. Have you ever shied away from what looked like a good deal because it was coming from a company you’d never heard of? I know I have.
So how do you build a better company image? Well there’s a lot to it, but one of the basic elements is familiarity. Familiarity breeds trust. People are naturally wary of things they don’t recognize. So get your name out there, sponsor community events and keep doing it.
Building a strong company image takes time so don’t expect this to happen overnight, but there’s a reason big companies do it. Then next time you watch a commercial for a big company watch for the product promotion. Many times you won’t see it at all; all you’ll get is a feel good message about the company. There’s a good reason they do that.
3. Better Products & Services
Improving your product or service to help the people you are trying to help can increase your sales conversion dramatically. Most big companies spend about 10% of their revenue on introducing new and improved products.
In many of today’s fast paced markets constant improvement is a must. The secret is to pick a specific target market niche, and focus your improvements on that market. If you try to satisfy everyone with your next big improvement you will end up satisfying no one.
4. Targeted Communication of the Value
The more focused a company is on its target customer the more likely they are to succeed. Instead of trying to satisfy everyone, choose a specific market and focus on it; even if your product or service is also a great fit for other markets.
In the early sixties Coca-Cola was outselling Pepsi-Cola by approximately 5 to 1. That was until Pepsi decided to stop trying to sell Pepsi to everyone and decided to focus all of its marketing efforts on the teenage market. They launched the choice of a new generation and hired teen icons like Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. The result was that in one generation Pepsi went from being outsold 5 to 1, to being only 10% behind Coca-Cola in sales.
More companies have failed by trying to reach too broad of a market than have failed trying to reach too narrow a market. A good measure of whether your chosen niche is too large is to consider whether it is reasonable to expect that 80% of the people in your niche will have heard of you in the next 12 months. If that’s not achievable then you should consider narrowing your niche. Chose you niche and focus on it.
5. Better Follow Up
Most people don’t buy anything as a result of the first contact. It takes time to build the value of a new thing up in our minds to the point that we are willing to open up our wallets. On average you have to contact a person between 3 and 7 times to get a sale, even if you are selling something that person is looking for.
When you follow up, don’t push for a sale. Just ask if they got the initial information, and ask if they have any questions you could help them with. If the offer is something the person would consider, then they appreciate the help in a friendly relaxed way. If it’s not something they are looking for right now, it’s a long shot that you are going to convince them they need it. Your objective is to follow up enough that people who are looking for the kind of help you have to offer will think of you first when they decide to buy. People who don’t need what you have won’t buy; don’t waste your efforts there. Keep your offer on their mind for a while, and the people who need it will respond.
Summary
There is definitely a lot to say about converting leads into customers, but these five tips should get you thinking along the right lines. Build your personal relationships. Build a trusted and familiar company image. Continually invest in improving your products and services. Target your advertising to a specific group of people. Follow up to keep your offer in the minds of the people who can benefit from what you have to offer.
| About the Author: Daryl Cowie has shared management tips with 1000s of people in over 30 countries around the world. His mission is to help you and your company turn business opportunities into business realities. You can sign up for his free business management home study course at http://FreeManagementTips.com . For more management tips on how to grow and manage your business, check out the practical resources at sites like http://BoundlessThinking.com and http://FreeManagementTips.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Daryl_Cowie |