25 tips for hard times

In the world of economics there are few proverbial jokes that offer less insight into the current state of the economy than this: “A recession is when your neighbor loses his job. A depression is when you lose your job.”

The U.S. slipped into recession in December 2007. Canada is thought to have followed suit in December 2008, but we won’t actually know for sure until May when official numbers are expected to indicate the economy to have gone through two quarters of negative growth, thus having the variables needed to declare it an official recession.

Proverbs aside, a prolonged recession where real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) falls by more than 10 per cent, is called a depression, a term introduced during the presidency of Herbert Hoover (1929-33) as a euphemism for “panic.” During that depression Canada’s economy shrank for four consecutive years starting in 1929 while the American economy cratered by 33 per cent.

Unemployment in the U.S. peaked at about 25 per cent, and in the early years after 1929, about 8,000 U.S. banks collapsed. By comparison, most current forecasts have U.S. unemployment rising to as much as 11 per cent this year, up from 6.9 per cent last fall. GDP contraction in the U.S. — which is expected to be worse than in Canada — should be in the range of no more than 2 per cent to 3 per cent in 2009-10.

Still, with even the most optimistic forecasts not predicting a return to growth until late this year early next, we have compiled 25 tips for the average reader to survive a recession (assuming we’re in one) that might help you come out in 2010 with more than just your shirt on your back.

1. Switch to a credit card with a lower interest rate. There’s no sense collecting air miles or other such points if you can’t even pay off your monthly bills. Equally, there’s not much point in paying 20 per cent interest when you don’t have to. You might try shopping around then ask your credit card provider to lower your rate, especially if you’ve received a better offer from a different provider.

2. Go retro and clip coupons. A 50 per cent coupon for a sandwich at your local McDonald’s is the next best thing to a food stamp.

3. Be sure to pick up the sales flyer at your local grocer whenever you shop. You never know what savings you might find tucked in the corner of the meats or frozen foods sections. On that note, you might want to reacquaint yourself with the age-old tradition of marinating stewing beef and turning it into filet mignon. A $3 cut of veal shoulder, if marinated for 12 hours can taste hauntingly similar to a $15 sirloin steak but at a fraction the cost.

4. Do your food shopping at discount stores. No Frills and Food Basics might be more crowded and offer less selection than your local Loblaws or Metro and you’ll have to pay a quarter for the cart and bag your own groceries, but you’ll see a payoff at the cash register. If you’re shopping for a larger family try buying in bulk from stores like Costco.

5. Give the office cafeteria a wide berth and get into the habit of packing your own lunch. You’ll save money and calories, even if you are just eating peanut butter sandwiches.

6. Throw away your bank card and leave your credit card at home. ATM charges can add up and it’s hard to live on a budget if you keep paying for things on credit. Or, try only using your bank card once between pay cheques. That will help you budget your money accordingly.

7. Join your local Free Lance network, where people pass on baby gear, furniture, electronics, clothing and craft supplies, among other stuff, for free.

8. Cancel your gym membership. Go for a walk or run around your neighbourhood instead. If it’s muscle you’re trying to amass then start doing push ups in your bedroom, invest in a chin-up bar and start walking up and down multiple flights of stairs. You don’t need to spend $50-$150 a month to stay active.

9. Having a baby? Ask around for hand-me-downs. Most parents are eager to get rid of the mounds of kids’ gear cluttering up their basements.

10. Got kids? Forget shopping at Baby Gap. Buy children’s clothes at discount retailers or department stores. Your two-year-old won’t know the difference, and if they do they won’t remember it for too long anyway as their brains are still evolving. Better yet, phone up everyone you know with young kids, bring them all together and swap anything from shoes to strollers to clothes and toys.

11. Find free or low-cost activities for your kids. Ontario Early Years Centres, school board parenting centres and city recreation programs are good places to start.

12. If you’re getting $100 a month from the government for child care, try your best to keep banking it in a high interest savings account for your child’s future. Saving can be hard, especially in these times, but a few dollars a month can go a long way over the course of 20 years..

13. Switch to Skype for long-distance calls. After the initial hardware investment, it’s free or practically free to call friends around the world.

14. Itemize your monthly expenses and allocate money for each by placing it in marked envelopes. If you only want to spend $50 this month on entertainment, then put $50 in an envelope marked “Entertainment” and use it to entertain yourself. Once the money’s spent, that’s it. No more fun. It’s shrewd and effective.

15. Don’t ignore inflation. Many economists predict that, with so much money being pumped into the global financial system in bailouts and stimulus packages, inflation is destined to rise. So make sure the interest on your savings keeps up with the level of inflation from here on in. If, for example, inflation hits 5% and you’re still only getting 3% in your savings account you’re going to come out the loser.

16. Instead of an expensive vacation to the Bahamas this year, why not try a “staycation” — a trip to the CN tower, the theatre or a local maple sugar bush is infinitely less expensive than a sunburn and you’ll be infinitely less depressed when you return to work the next day.

17. Make an appointment with your financial adviser to review your portfolio. It’s too late to protect yourself from recent carnage in the markets, but you can at least position yourself for the recovery – if and when it comes.

18. If you and your friends have young kids, consider setting up a babysitting co-operative with another family. You look after their kids for an evening in exchange for a night out at a later date.

19. Bring a coffee maker or kettle to work. With coffee ranging anywhere from $1 to $5 a cup (depending on size of cup, exoticness of brew and franchise from which it is purchased) some people are dropping anywhere from $20 to $200 a month just to stay caffeinated. Don’t believe it? Try this: bring your own coffee to work, make it yourself and put the money you would have spent in a jar on your desk. At the end of the month, empty the jar and see how much you saved.

20. Fast food restaurants have long been regarded as recession-proof – the benefactors to the demise of high cost dining in times of economic turmoil. It’s one thing to take the family to McDonald’s instead of Red Lobster just to save a few pennies, but there are some of us out there who should really cut the fast food bit out altogether. The constant inhalation of cheeseburgers, pizza and Chinese food isn’t just ripping through your lower intestine. It’s blowing a hole through your wallet as well.

21. Review your monthly plans for phone, wireless, Internet and television services. Often households are paying significant sums for features that aren’t even being used. That includes everything from digital TV channel packages to wireless voice and data plans. Paying $30 a month for 6 gigabytes of data for your iPhone might seem like a good deal, but not if you’re only using 50 megabytes to check your email and surf the Web occasionally. Also, don’t be afraid to ask for a better deal from your current provider if they want to keep you as a customer – particularly if you subscribe to multiple services and have done some comparison shopping. If long distance phone calls are costing you a fortune, you might want to think about signing up for one of those $5 a month zero-cent per minute long distance plans, especially if you’re currently paying 25 cents a minute on your cell phone.

22. When purchasing household items that are only used occasionally – gardening equipment, ladders, snowblowers, for example – consider sharing with a neighbour. Store the stuff in a mutually accessible shed or garage, and split the cost.

23. Start an entertainment-sharing club with like-minded friends. Meet monthly to pass around books, magazines, movies and music.

24. Try your best to keep yourself employed. Though it goes without saying, it’s the best advice anyone can give you. But with layoffs adding up and unemployment on the rise, there’s no way for everyone to come out of this with their careers still intact. Career counsellors advise that the best way to keep from getting a pink slip in times of economic turmoil is to make yourself indispensable at work. Take on extra projects, preferably high-profile ones your boss cares deeply about.

25. The same career counsellors however advise you to keep up your networks, just in case you do join the growing ranks of the unemployed.

Obama challenges lobbyists to legislative duel

WASHINGTON–President Barack Obama challenged the country’s vested interests to a legislative duel Saturday, saying he will fight to change health care, energy and education in dramatic ways that will upset the status quo.

“The system we have now might work for the powerful and well-connected interests that have run Washington for far too long,” Obama said in his weekly radio and video address. “But I don’t. I work for the American people.”

He said the ambitious budget plan he presented Thursday will help millions of people, but only if Congress overcomes resistance from deep-pocket lobbies.

“I know these steps won’t sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business, and I know they’re gearing up for a fight,” Obama said, using tough-guy language reminiscent of his predecessor, George W. Bush. “My message to them is this: So am I.”

The bring-it-on tone underscored Obama’s combative side as he prepares for a drawn-out battle over his tax and spending proposals. Sometimes he uses more conciliatory language and stresses the need for bipartisanship. Often he favours lofty, inspirational phrases.

On Saturday, he was a full-throated populist, casting himself as the people’s champion confronting special interest groups that care more about themselves and the wealthy than about the average American.

Some analysts say Obama’s proposals are almost radical. But he said all of them were included in his campaign promises. “It is the change the American people voted for in November,” he said.

Nonetheless, he said, well-financed interest groups will fight back furiously.

Insurance companies will dislike having “to bid competitively to continue offering Medicare coverage, but that’s how we’ll help preserve and protect Medicare and lower health care costs,” the president said. “I know that banks and big student lenders won’t like the idea that we’re ending their huge taxpayer subsidies, but that’s how we’ll save taxpayers nearly $50 billion (U.S.) and make college more affordable. I know that oil and gas companies won’t like us ending nearly $30 billion in tax breaks, but that’s how we’ll help fund a renewable energy economy.”

Passing the budget, even with a Democratic-controlled Congress, “won’t be easy,” Obama said. “Because it represents real and dramatic change, it also represents a threat to the status quo in Washington.”

Obama also promoted his economic proposals in a video message to a group meeting in Los Angeles on “the state of the black union.”

“We have done more in these past 30 days to bring about progressive change than we have in the past many years,” said the president in remarks the White House released in advance. “We are closing the gap between the nation we are and the nation we can be by implementing policies that will speed our recovery and build a foundation for lasting prosperity and opportunity.”

Congressional Republicans continued to bash Obama’s spending proposals and his projection of a $1.75 trillion deficit this year.

Almost every day brings another “multibillion-dollar government spending plan being proposed or even worse, passed,” said Sen. Richard Burr, who gave the Republican party’s weekly address.

He said Obama is pushing “the single largest increase in federal spending in the history of the United States, while driving the deficit to levels that were once thought impossible.”

Charge More For Your Consulting Services

There is one very simple, straightforward and easy way to make more money from consulting. You only need to raise your rates.

Some find the idea horrific. “Won’t I scare my client away if I ask them for more money?” is the most common concern. It’s this mental block that holds back most individual from increasing their consulting fees. And yet it shouldn’t.

You may lose a few clients by charging more. But you’ll make so much more with your other clients and the new ones you take on that in the end you’re bank account will sit fatter.

If you take it one step further you can find creative ways to keep your clients from jumping ship when you raise your fees.

If your client can’t afford your new rate you can offer to spend an hour or two less a week (for example) at your new fee. That way they still get to keep you and you keep them. It’s a compromise that often works.

When increasing your fees the key is to be prepared. You don’t just want to show up and say “Just so you know, next week my hourly rate is $150 an hour and not the old $95 an hour.” Be sure to explain why you are raising your fees.

Consultants usually use one of the following reasons:

* You’ve completed a new certification
* You know more than you did last year
* You’ve added an employee
* Fees you are charged have increased
* Demand for your services has gone through the roof.

Personally, I feel the last one blows the rest out of the water. Whatever you’re saying, it all really comes down to increasing your skills and knowledge and by de facto you’re services are more attractive to more people. And in order to keep working with your client and grow your business you have had to raise fees for all clients.

You should be raising your fees every year or two at the minimum. If this idea is hard for you to swallow, take some time to think it through. After all, you have to be comfortable initiating it. But as any successful consultant about raising fees and you’ll hear from everyone one of them that it’s a must.

Entrepreneurs – Statistics for Next Generation Leaders

Entrepreneurs who all have something in common.

They believe that their lifestyle is as important as financial results. They stay motivated and focused in their business because they truly love what they are doing. They keep the balance in life and work and reap the rewards by helping others. They are becoming the next generation of leaders in a world with a growing numbers of entrepreneurs.

Fast Growing Trends in Entrepreneurship
According to a recent article by P. Hise (Fortune, 2007) the U.S Small Business Administration, SBA, had found that nearly 675,000 new companies were formed in 2005. At the same time, the Bureau of Labor Statistics concluded that the first half of 2006 saw more businesses being created than the first half of 2005.

Talking about a fast growing trend…

Yahoo Media Relations last year released a study in which it was found that 75% of the people interviewed wanted to start a company someday. About 50% wants to do so in the next five years. “The survey results suggest that entrepreneurial aspirations are rooted among the vast majority of the American public.” according to the report.

Small enterprises generate a staggering 60 – 80% of new jobs… This is according to data from the U.S. Census published by SBA. The Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership has published that in 2005, about 460,000 people created small business every single month. It was also found that more than one third of highest tax paying individuals are business owners including owners of big private corporations.

To summarize: there were more businesses created than children were born per month in the year 2005 (CIA World Factbook).

Small entrepreneurs pay over 50% of the total of income taxes. This result was found by the not for profit Tax Foundation and recently quoted in an article by P. Hise (Fortune, 2007).

Why Are People Starting Their Own Business
“Control of Destiny” – The level of security in a startup business is not so much lower than it is in the traditional world. Challenger Gray & Christmas has found in a recent review that convential perks and job security offered by traditional corporations are gone. It’s a sad fact that over 70,000 people are being laid off every single month which is a huge increase from the 30,000 just a couple of years ago. Even top executive positions reserved for people who have been working extremely hard to finally get there are no longer secure. Even a multi million-dollar parachute cannot replace the damage the long years of living an imbalanced lifestyle did to their health and relationships.

Capital – A second factor has to do with the way small businesses are easy to capitalize. Money is readily available. This view is supported by a leading Venture Capitalist, National Venture Capital Association, who estimated that initial funding for new ventures nearly doubled in 2005, expectations are that will increase with another 100% again over 2006.

Small business really is Big Business nowadays!

Who is Entrepreneuring?
Unexpectedly, based upon research concluded by Robert W. Fairlie from the University of California who studied data from the U.S. Census and related sources, the largest share of new business starters is represented by people over 45 years old: about 65%. Entrepreneneurs in age group 20-34, however, are catching up fast since 4 years. Further investigation of date provided in the same report reveals that 30% of entrepreneurs are actually people without education levels any higher than high school (2005).

It is a sad fact that about 33% of all companies fails within 2 years. This is a percentage that has been used in the investment community as a rule to work with. On the top of the list of problems: misaligned leadership and market focus.

Entrepreneurial Leadership becoming a Key Factor
1- We can see that a lot of people who are starting as an entrepreneur have plenty of working experience and seem to fall in the age category of the Babyboomers.
Just imagine all these people coming out of a job situation nowadays. If that is all they have been doning their entire life, they need help. Not only with the setup but mostly with their mindset and attitude to personal responsibility. Here is the opportunity for the leaders in this field: provide the experience and information to make them successful as well. To move from an ‘entitlement mentality’ to becoming self-reliant is the topic of a best-seller by Trump and Kiyosaki: Why we want you to be rich.

2- Secondly, many people seem to be starting a business without education. Same thing. They most likely can benefit from simple, proven, easy to learn methods to get their business up and running.

Just imagine, if you establish yourself as a leader in this field you will be able to contribute meaningfully to many people’s life as long as you live! How great is this, how rewarding, and how different from slaving away in an office cubicle until you reach your future retirement age of 70… If you believe with me that there is something greater than cash, I am convinced that this is what gets me motivated.

How Business Burns
I decided to use the following analogy when training new entrepreneurs to get started:

View your businesses like small fire producing the heat to drive an engine generating revenue for you from output. A system working according to fixed rules.

There are 2 variations:
Either you provide the engine (your new business idea supported by a business plan) or you use a readily set up engine that has been proven to work for your purpose (revenue generation). In the latter case, all you do is set it up, start the fire and keep it going.

A business needs 3 primary ingredients in balance to produce revenue:
1. Cashflow (the fuel) – have enough available to keep your business going without having to scale it down too much risking the engine to stop.
2. A steady flow of fresh leads (the oxygen). Keep finding people who will benefit from the output of your business. Like oxygen, customers are everywhere.
3. The passion (the heat) – Do something that is meaningful to you and to others and be passionate. Network with like-minded people to share ideas and thoughts. Join a business forum and get plugged into training programs.

Successfull lifestyle entrepreneurs maintain a balanced focus. They pay attention to the right combinations in business and in life. They keep the fire burning naturally and enjoy the rewards, the lifestyle and the joy.

Online Business Start-Up Ideas

There are so many reasons why having your own domain name will make the world of difference for your online home business success, so let’s have a look at some of them now.

By having your own domain name means you have total freedom as well as complete control over your online home business. Nobody can dictate to you what you can put on your site and you do not have to answer to anybody.

Your chance of success online is increased one hundred fold because with your own domain name and website you are not restricted at all. Affiliate links are restricted in many areas on the internet.

Learning html and optimizing your website for the search engines is one of the most important things you need to learn how to do if you want to appear on the first page of Google. By having your own domain name and website you have full access to your own source code and so you can select your keywords and optimize your website.

Another huge advantage is that when you choose your actual domain name you can incorporate your main keyword into the domain name which will give you an edge over your competition in the search engine rankings.

You will be able to add fresh content to your website e.g. you own articles, which again will put you in favour of Google and the other search engines.

You will be able to pick and choose what products or affiliate programs you wish to promote, nobody can dictate to you what programs you have to join.

Adding a free newsletter to your website which your visitors can subscribe to is a great way to build your list and you can install an auto-responder to take care of the follow-ups.

By installing a stat counter on your website that records inter alia the number of unique visitors, where they came from, what keywords they used, what page they entered your site on and left will give you invaluable information.

Using the Google tools such as Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools provides very valuable information and you will be able to install the Google code on your website to take advantage of them.

You can project your own personality into your website with design, colour, wording, graphics etc. The list is endless.

Exchanging links with other websites is now possible with your own domain. You could exchange links manually or install link exchange software. You will be able to host you own images instead of linking to a banner on an affiliate site. This not only ensures that your images always open on your website but will decrease the load time of your web page.

You will be free to add slide in adverts or pop ups to your website. You can add new pages to your website as and when you want as well as easily cloak your affiliate links and create sub domains. Monetizing your website with the use of Adsense or other forms of advertising will also be possible.

For special occasions throughout the year, e.g. Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, Mother’s Day, you will be able to decorate your site for the occasion and offer specials.

As you can see from the above the advantages of having your own domain name and website are numerous and endless and yet so vital to your success online.

How to get referrals in the sales process

First, getting referrals is as easy or as difficult as you make it. The main reason most sales people are not good at getting referrals is simply because they do not ask or do not ask with conviction. Asking a prospective customer or a customer for the names and contact information for a few of their friends or associates is really not a big issue. Think of it this way:

If you were sitting at the dining room table with Mr. and Mrs. Prospect and their next-door neighbor walked in the home, do you think Mr. and Mrs. Prospect would introduce you to the neighbor and tell the neighbor what you do for a living? Of course, they would. Well asking for referrals is nothing more than this. It is nothing more than asking for an introduction. That’s all: just a simple introduction.

Second, for some reason most sales people believe there is only one appropriate time to ask for referrals. Most feel that the only time to ask for referrals is after the close of a successful sale in where the prospect bought the product. Other more astute sales people will also ask for referrals after the close from a no-sale visit, but still this is not enough. There are plenty of other opportunities to ask for referrals. First let’s look at a few referrals tips and then examine all of the additional opportunities to get referrals.

Think!

1. Help people give you referrals: Often people have a hard time coming up with names of people they believe are appropriate to introduce you to. You need to HELP them. Make suggestions on where they can find names: their cell phone, telephone book, appointment book, church members, club members, association members, bowling team, sports and recreation partners, dentist, doctor, school personnel, etc. You should have a ready list to supply people to help them think of referrals for you.

2. People NOT Prospects: Often people will begin to try to think of referrals of those who may be buyers or at least good prospects for you. You must stress that this is not the idea. One way to explain it is that referrals are a method to advertise and with advertising you do not think about who will buy or who will not. You job is just to get the message to many people. Let the customer know that it is never a waste of your time to talk about your product. You just need people.

3. Controls Costs: Let the customer know that this form of advertising helps your company and others keep costs low. Let them know that word-of-mouth is an integral part of how you work. It is how your company operates.

Many Opportunities

There are many opportunities to ask for referrals. Choose just three and use them consistently and you will have more referrals than you can handle!

Prospecting – When making cold or warm calls to set appointments what do you do when a prospect refuses an appointment? These are people to ask for referrals. Just because the person does not wish to accept an appointment, does not mean he or she will not direct you to others who will. If you are professional on the telephone, ask people whom you do not set appointments with for referrals of who you may call.

Setting the appointment – After you set an appointment, depending on what you sell, could be a good time to ask for a referral: especially if you are going to travel to an area that is out of the way. Ask the person if they know of someone else you might be able to visit while you are in the area.

The Warm-Up – Before you begin your sales presentation and you are warming up and getting to know the prospect, is a perfect time to ask for referrals. If you are smart, you can build this into your warm up talk. As you ask about friends, relatives and associates, you can easily led to asking to meet those people.

During the Presentation – Depending on your product, you will have several opportunities during your presentation to make a connection to associates of the customer. Short periods of dead air are good times. For instance, when you have to calculate something or construct an offer. During that dead time, ask the product to fill out a referral form.

Closing – Closing the sale presents an excellent opportunity to ask for referrals, even before you get the answer. Also, you can use referrals as a great incentive to offer the customer extra benefits or a lower price. If your selling process includes a price drop, use the discount to buy the referrals.

After the Sale or No Sale – If the prospect bought—it is a good time to ask for referrals. However, if they did not buy, this is also a good time.

Product Delivery – Right after you deliver your new product or set up the new program or install the new software is a perfect time to ask for referrals. Your customer is happy and excited. Take advantage of this timing.

Customer Service Calls – Your customer had a problem that your company solved exactly in the manner that you said you would; you provided excellent customer service—this has to be one of the best times to get referrals.

Continuing Relationship – You can always call customers and ask for a referral. There really are no rules.

Sales Consulting – key areas where sales consulting can improve performance

For companies seeking to improve top-line revenue performance, a sales consulting company can provide a fresh perspective on the issues at hand.

Whilst it may be easy to “blame the sales team”, sales consulting companies will tell you that it is seldom so simple. Sales performance can suffer because of many reasons, both external and internal to a company. However, there are usually three key areas that a sales consulting firm will focus on:

1. sales processes
2. resource optimisation
3. management tools

Sales processes
Whether you’re a corporate with clearly defined sales processes or a small business with a laissez-faire approach to your sales team, the reality is that your people are following a process. A sales consulting company will help its clients first define the existing sales process, working with your sales team, management, and customers to understand what’s actually happening.

Often, from initial sales consulting sessions, it becomes clear that not every sales person is following the same process. One of the huge benefits of sales consulting is that it provides a fresh perspective, unencumbered by “baked in” assumptions and internal culture.

Once the sales process has been defined and mapped, a sales consulting firm will work with its client to refine and optimise it to improve top-line performance.

Resource optimisation
One of the clear things that can be uncovered through a sales consulting project and a sales process mapping exercise is “waste”. In other fields, such as manufacturing, waste is highly visible. In sales, waste is almost accepted as part of “the numbers game”.

Sales consulting companies will work with their clients to identify areas of waste. This will include unnecessary time spent by the sales force without adding value to customers. It will also include time wasted on prospects that do not convert.

In addition to waste, a sales consulting company will seek to understand what’s working well. Modelling your star performances and identifying how they differ from your lower performing sales people is an essential part of the sales consulting process.

Understanding your sales processes through a sales consulting project will enable you to clearly see what needs to be changed to optimise your existing resources. Sales consulting can bring immediate value and results without further investment in people or technology; often the simplest change from a sales consulting recommendation will have a major impact on top-line results.

Management tools
Of course, identifying what to change is only part of the sales consulting puzzle. The next part is to implement the recommendations of your sales consulting partner and make sure they stick.

Management tools do not necessarily mean expensive software. Often, a sales consulting company will develop management models using simple everyday tools such as Microsoft Excel. These can be set up to provide vital management information and “dashboards” that pool individual sales reports and forecasts in a central set of key performance indicators.

In additional to hard tools, sales consulting firms will support their clients with soft tools such as coaching models. Coaching can be an effective way to support change resulting from any sales consulting project.

With the right tools, sales consulting companies can transfer capabilities to the management team to ensure that performance improvements are embedded within the organisation.

The sales consulting process really is very simple:

1. Map the current sales processes and understand what’s actually happening.
2. Identify where the current process is not working; where resources are being wasted. Also, focus on where they are working; look at your star performers.
3. Finally, your sales consulting partner will provide you with the management tools you need to make the necessary changes and embed them within your company.

For any size of organisation, working with a sales consulting company to identify areas for improvement and then implement necessary change will provide measurable improvement in top-line performance.

Recession Hits the Website Hosting Market

As businesses reduce spending in light of the current recession, one of the key areas targeted for cuts are IT budgets. By reducing infrastructure maintenance costs and streamlining IT (Information Technology) resources, the hosting industry anticipates a trend towards the adoption of hosted services. However, tight customer budgets mean that new customers are currently reduced.

At the end of 2008, the reduced number of new customers led to increased competition between hosting companies. This has led to website hosting plans being lowered, in addition to free upgrades and monthly pay plans being introduced. What’s more, non-traditional players such as telecommunication companies and search engines have entered the hosting industry.

This increased competition is compounding the problems caused by the recent economic recession. Some smaller web hosting providers are struggling to continue operations in what can only be described as an increasingly difficult and competitive market.

It is also a tough time to be an IT executive – costs must be cut to allow businesses to weather the recession, while the traditional IT demands placed on businesses must continue to be met. In addition, IT departments are tightening budgets and searching for technologies that can help reduce costs in order to deliver the requisite service delivery levels, resilient scalable server capacity and equipment requirements.

Businesses are aware of the benefits of managed hosting solutions which can ensure system performance, scalability, backup and redundancy without the expense of upfront investment and maintenance costs in infrastructure. However, the wide variety of hosting providers and solutions available can mean that it’s difficult to choose the best quality service for the business.

The services typically bought from managed hosting providers include: hosted email, enterprise application management, network security, disaster recovery, storage, IT outsourcing and help desk services. As IT executives search for the technologies to help reduce costs, hosting companies are making the most of new technologies to replace servers and provide cost effective hosting solutions to businesses.

What’s more, solutions such as cloud computing, cloud hosting and visualization have increased in popularity, as more businesses discover their capabilities. With both cloud computing services and the virtual server environment, you only pay for the resources you are using at any given time according to demand, which is why many businesses are keen to adopt cloud computing technology.

Despite the necessity of cutting costs, businesses will continue to require increased productivity; and what this means for hosting providers in 2009 is perhaps more interest surrounding cloud and utility computing. And of course, an increase with the interest in hosting solutions for small businesses should also be expected.

5 Tips to Market Your Business in Recession With No Money

Everyone is talking about recession, gas prices and rising energy costs. Top 500 companies are cutting back on their marketing budget and laying off workers.

How can your business survive tough times? How can your business grow while making sure it’s not losing money with bad advertising?

Most business owners still think that marketing is all about spending money to attract visitors. When I talk to small business owners about marketing they think I want their money. However, advertising is just a small part of marketing. Marketing is far beyond the advertising world.

The most effective form of marketing is optimizing your business, website and ads to instantly achieve higher profits. Optimization has been overlooked more than any other thing by most small businesses.

In this article I would like to share with you five solid website optimization techniques to grow your business without spending more on advertising.

1. Analytics – One of the first step to improve website conversion is to install analytics software on your website. Analytics software can provide you all the important information you need to understand your target customers including page view, buying habits, needs,wants, requirements and competition.

There are number of free analytics software available on internet with easy installation guide. You can integrate your website with analytics software in one hour or less for a 5-10 page website.

2. Guarantee – If you are not offering any guarantee or risk reversal on your website then you are loosing tons of customers. When you are selling face to face then its easier to put your clients at ease by verbal communication but its extremely difficult to do that on a website.

You must offer some kind of guarantee on your homepage. Guarantee is not limited to money back, you can offer price guarantee, fast shipping, fast service, best quality (verified by third party) and lot more.

3. Incentives – The easiest way to make your customers buy from you and not from your competition is to offer incentives. Incentives can be anything from free shipping to free trial, discounts, coupons, free gift, buy one get one, free product, free second time service.

4. Customer support or contact information – It is estimated that an average user spends not more than 8 seconds on a website. If your website cannot provide a visitor contact information in less than eight seconds then you can loose them forever. Add your telephone number and email on the top left corner of your web page to dramatically improve conversion.

5. Capture information – Setup a small email capture box on your web page. Offer incentive to encourage customers to leave their name and email. Once you have the customer information you can follow up with them easily.

Product Creation Type of Information Product Business

The niche you have chosen should allow creation of more than one product or service. With the technological advancements in the hosting industry, from automated control panels and scripts that simplify creation of accounts, to complete turnkey solutions; there is no need to worry about spending time on the real products sold to the customer. The main ones are keyword selection, sales copy principles, graphics, affiliate programs, product creation, online payment processing, auto responders and search engine optimization.

Once you’ve earned money from this type of information product business, you can invest in the creation of your own products if you want, or start offering more informational products that allow you to sell your knowledge. But the creation and production costs of a similar big ticket in sequence product, although higher, are still pretty low. A key by-product of this process will be the creation of 3-D, Computer Assisted Design art.

The Association for Financial Professionals permits the following activities for repatriating funds: Research and Development activities, advertising and marketing programs, hiring and training new recruits, acquiring patent and other rights to intangible property, improving transportation, funding capital investments with the purpose of job creation and job retention & funding product responsibility or environmental claims. It prohibits certain activities like:

Tax payments, Payment of executive recompense. Payment of dividends. Redemption of stocks, Debt investments and Portfolio investments, Therefore, before repatriating the money, you must consider whether it is worth or not. Checklist on what artist and product development necessitate includes:

Exceptional vocals, musicianship and/or songwriting skills, Continued education and enhancement of musical skills, Quality equipment, Performance ability, Image creation and maintenance, Plan of action, goal setting, excellent promotion materials including photographs, press releases and artwork, Business management skills, Marketing, Publicity and Promotion knowledge, Online and Offline Professional management, Basic knowledge of recording, producing, engineering, and mastering, Basic knowledge of manufacturing, distribution, and sales online, brick and mortar and air-play, Good choices in members, staff and advisors, Physical and mental preparedness, Basic knowledge of finances, accounting Law and legal issues etc. The goals for doing so are for the product owner to:

Communicate the whole, Determine and communicate when releases are needed, Determine what functionality is sufficient for each release & focus on business value derived from the releases. The delivery team on the other hand will see the whole, learn about the steps to realize the vision, learn the business priorities, provide technical input to the roadmap and provide estimates for the projected features.

The salesperson must lead the prospect through the various decision criteria needed in order to secure a sale. Whether your idea is the development of a product, launch of a service business, or even the creation of an event or program for a non-profit, creativity is the root of all entrepreneurial efforts starting with the vision itself.

People quickly learn to spend their time on marketing and product creation, rather than repetitive tasks. Apart from empowering companies and individuals, there should be a particular focus on identifying labor intensive businesses that have the potential to make a significant and positive impact on employment creation as well as those businesses that have a product or service offering for export markets with the final objective of booming

Next Page »